Seen this request in the Summer edition newsletter from the Monte Cassino Society by Joe (Giuseppe) Grossi. You chaps are quite good at finding map references and information so I thought I would post it here Joe Grossi has asked if anyone can help in his research. He is writing the autobiography of his father, Silvio Grossi, now aged 82 who was an eleven year old boy in Italy 1944. "The family lived at Via Capo D'Acqua 41, a three storey farmhouse just uphill from the Bailey Bridge, which is very near the Fountain (la Fontana). The main question I have is about the military name or code/map reference for the house where Giuseppi Grossi, his wife Mary and his brother Giovanni lived with their families. The house was partly requisioned by the Germans, then the British and the Polish during late 1943 until May 1944. As you all know, the soldiers came over the mountains, past Capo D'Acqua to get to Cassino. My father Silvio has told me many events that he and his family witnessed. The many nationalities passed by their house and some of them stayed there on the Grossi family land. My questions are about these soldiers. In around November 1943 Germans arrived in vehicles and set up a radio station on the family farm. They took one of the rooms in the house. They were very polite and were not soldiers. I presume that this radio station has a military name? These German engineers then moved down to Cassino. The next soldiers to arrive were German Infantry followed later by soldiers of different nationalities. Because the main route (the Via Casilina) was flooded and impassible, all the soldiers-from the Germans to the Moroccans-all came down the mountain road from Cervaro, through Capo D'Acqua where the Grossi family were living. Was this Route 6? Did it have a military name? When the fourth battle of Monte Cassino took place, the Polish soldiers had huge guns pointed at Monte Cassino. One of them, a tailor back home, cut down a Polish uniform for my dad to wear. My father would go to them every day as there was no school. During the bombardment he helped to throw water and wet towels into the big gun as it glowed from being fired so often. I would be grateful for any information-where I might find photographs of the area etc. If you have any information or help in any way please get in touch-in English, Italian or Polish." londonjoegrossi (at) gmail.com Mille grazie, Many thanks Joe (Giuseppe) Grossi
Just to get the ball rolling Via Capo D’Acqua seems to be just south of Castrocielo, unfortunately the road name is not shown on Google maps but it does appear on others of the same area. Lat/long - 41.525882,13.700611 - will find it. The area is full of modern houses, if you roll back the Google street view to 2008 you can see that they were built around then. There is a house entrance with an ‘old’ number 47 on the gate post and it looks as if the street may have been renumbered. Scrolling along the road there are, what appear to be some older houses in the background.
OK, may need a rethink, just found another Via Capo D'Acqua !! 41.514444,13.869722. The one I suggested earlier is near Casilina, this one is near Cervaro - both locations are mentioned in the original post - back to the drawing board.
I doubt that Polish guns would have been so far forward if they were deployed around Portella. They were too exposed to German observation from Monte Cifalco and would not have survived long against German counter battery fire. My vote is for Castrocielo because that is the area of responsibility allocated to II (PO) Corps after the fall of Cassino and Piedmonte San Germano. it would logical to site their guns in Castrocielo as the advance towards Rome started to gain momentum after 25 May 44. Regards FdeP
I'd go for the location near Portello. Before the Poles arrived there were NZ field regts in there including the bowl at Portello, and the yanks before them. Not really "huge" guns, but big enough for the uninitiated. There is a WW2 SS Bailey still in use in that area as well, though not necessarily the same one mentioned. Capo d'Aqua ('head of the water') is a very common name unfortunately, but most of the clues in the original post point to this location. You will also see Strada Fontana Penta runs off Via CApo d'Aqua, so perhaps another confirmation.
Thanks to everyone who has contributed to this thread. I have alerted Joe to the forum and I hope he sees the replies. Lesley
Thanks for the comments so far. Southwest of Portella, following the road to Cassino, is the Via Capodaqcua that my father's family lived in from 1880 until the 1950s. I am appealing to members of thei forum because my father, now 82, gives me general remarks about distances and relative positions. What I can assure yo all is that he is telling the truth about soldiers using the family land and also about the guns. I am providing more detail below Here: https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@41.515708,13.870566,3a,75y,90t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1shegWn3jOWak5N-wN_OX__g!2e0!7i13312!8i6656!6m1!1e1 The Grossi family (new house under construction) is clearly visible Via Capo D'Acqua 40 This new build is on the site of the old house. (How can I put a photo of the old house here?) This land & house was owned by Giuseppe Grossi (lower half of the house) and his mother, Angela Top floor owned and occupied by Michele Grossi, brother of Giuseppe. He emigrated to Canada in the 1950s. House on the right of the new house under construction is on the site of a house owned by another brother, Giovanni Grossi. It was on his land, further to the right, that the French had 200mm guns, firing on the mountain area, Monte Cassino. German engineers used it as a base while they laid mines, etc. and set up a radio base. Other soldiers came down the hill (from the Portella direction) and also used it as a base. There must have been military names/ codes for these communication centres? I would love to find maps of the area. Always the possibility that some photos were taken at the time ? To the left i.e. behind the house, their land runs downhill to a brook. Cross that brook and go uphill to Via Tora, crossing west to Filieri. https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@41.5049029,13.848572,15.25z It on land here in Filieri (owned by my father's family) that my dad spend days with the Polish gunners. They were firing a 4" gun from March/ May 1943. During short periods of constant bombardment, the gun glowed red and my father (aged 11) was helping them to put wet cloths and water to cool it down. Driving downhill towards Cassino, your pass the Bailey Bridge: a little overgrown, but it is still there in daily use https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@41.514645,13.869936,3a,75y,180h,54.75t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sSRpXBCquHqkfXMTSpIxTEw!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 riving further down the hill towards Cassino to https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@41.513258,13.868263,3a,75y,50.44h,81.07t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s-0qk0sc8Zp3QGSw7ZLdBQw!2e0!7i13312!8i6656!6m1!1e1 Via Capo D'Acqua 39 behind the iron gates the local "fountain", la fontana, on the right. I refer to this as it would have been important knowledge to all WW2 soldiers in the area, who all used it for water. Nowadays everyone has water pipes. Until the 1950s, people brought their water home in pots and did their washing in the river.
Let's see if this works. There is a Capo d'Acqua locality near San Michelle that I think would be a likely contender. https://goo.gl/photos/KqFJd8AEHZk42skg7
Hello Everybody and thank you for your interest. Ropey, that is the correct place. South of Portella, the place name Capo D'Acqua. Go west along the road marked 172 This road bends south to the point 119. This is a river crossing: the Bailey Bridge is, I think, here Just north of the 119 and blue line of the river crossing, are brown contour lines with ridges. This is the Grossi land; the house in just north of here, on the western side of the road. Via Capo D'Acqua 40 (Dad says 40 not 41: a subtle difference !) So, if I could get hold of military maps - German or Allied, I could find this point, get the Military/ coded name for the radio / communication post. Then I could start searching for any documents, photographs, etc taken in that area. It is like treasure hunt for me: hard to imagine anybody else being bothered. As visual illustrations of my father's family window on the war, however, it would make it more interesting.
Joe Among the 56th Recce war diaries (published elsewhere on this site) are various operational documents of the 78th Infantry Division, of whom they were part. You may know that this Division fought in the Cassino battles. The '78th Division Operational Order 19' may be of interest:- View attachment Operational Order 19.pdf Paragraph 11( c ) and 11( d ) on page 2 of this document provides details of some of the Polish artillery regiments in the San Michele and Cervaro areas in the latter part of April 1944. I believe these abbreviations are the 1st and 2nd Field Artillery Regiments of the 3rd Carpathian Division Also '78th Division Operational Order 21' View attachment Operational Order 21.pdf Again, provides details of troops in the area and, in particular, mentions, on page 2 paragraph 6( e ) and ( f ) that the 5 Kresowa Division where at Inferno and the 3rd Carpathian Division at Michele. The map below shows the Vne dell’Inferno and I have indicated the position of the road junction rG892243, these features are only a few hundred metres from your family home. Incidentally the map reference, as used by British forces, for your family home would be rG892237. The 56 Recce diaries for April ’44 can be seen here, acknowledgments to Recce Mitch:- http://ww2talk.com/forums/gallery/album/189-56th-recce-war-diary-april-1944/ It seems that these documents provide information on some of the Polish artillery units that were in the area. Obviously I am not saying that these were the troops occupying your family home but it may well be a starting point for further investigation. I also came across this article detailing the Polish involvement at Cassino:- “Our own artillery positions had to be established sufficiently far forward to enable support being given during the attack. Unfortunately this necessitated the siting of guns in the flat Rapido valley under enemy observation from Monte Cifalco, Monte Caira and from Monastery Hill and under enemy artillery fire directed from the area Belmonte - Atina (North of Monte Cifalco). Our artillery, therefore, had to be extremely well camouflaged and had to remain silent until the actual attack started; from zero hour, the gun positions were continuously screened by smoke for the whole period of the attack. These measures were successful and right up to the capture of Monastery Hill, enemy counter-battery fire did not seriously hamper the activity of our own artillery. The smoke screen covered a belt of ground 7 kilometres wide. 18,000 Smoke Generators were used, a total weight of about 400 tons.” You may like to read the article: http://felsztyn.tripod.com/id14.html I have plotted the features mentioned on this map:- There is a great Polish map on this site:- http://www.warrelics.eu/forum/polish-armed-forces-west-polskie-si-y-zbrojne-na-zachodzie-1939-1947/monte-cassino-maps-439072/ It clearly shows the area you are interested in with details of the units, 3 DSK = 3 Dywizja Strezelcow Karpackick (3rd Carpathian Division) 5 KDP = 5 Kresowej Dywizji Piechoty (5th Kresowa Division) I think!! Hope that these details may provide some useful information for your research – happy hunting.
Joe Found this site, which has copies of Polish war diaries, if you can read Polish then this may well help you. It seems to have documents of both the 3 Carpathian and 5 Kresowa Divisions and some artillery regiments. Some of the files are pretty large. http://www.pism.co.uk/page3_documents.htm
Working on other parts of the book, plus the distractions of ordinary life, meant that only now have I returned to this site. I am amazed at your effort and knowledge: thank you. Am absorbing some of this to cross-examine my Dad o get a bit more detail. It amazes me that he cannot remember a sinle name of the guys he spent about three weeks with, every day. Hopefully I can read him some of the Polish christian names and make a break through. The gun they used was not a huge gun; I will ask him about the smoke. The map which shows the bed of the Inferno is where the :Polish guns were positioned. I will ask Dad if he was aware of the one-way messages on the phone and the hand signals to confirm. More from me on this soon. Once again, apologies for disappearing for so long. The book spans 1866 until 1974 though the battle of Montescassino is an important chapter. Thank you once again. Joe Grossi
