( Log Out /  They haven’t got the light of battle in their eyes.”, Montgomery was perhaps most controversial among his own countrymen. During the fighting at the Mareth Line Messe commanded a mix of Italian and German troops. “If he admitted to an error, it was always minor, and served, like a touch of black in a color scheme, to throw up his general infallibility,” the historian Correlli Barnett would write after the war. Montgomery's Plan The New Zealanders followed up, mopping up any defenders who had been left behind. Rommel had lost at least 30,000 men, most of his tanks and almost all of his 88mm guns at El Alamein. Contrary to the Desert Victory mythology, pursuit after Alamein was hardly “relentless.” Rommel had escaped with the core of his army despite a fifteenfold British advantage in tanks, an artillery superiority of twelve to one, and an intimate knowledge of Axis weakness thanks to Ultra and other intelligence. Removing the muzzle cover of the gun, showing the flash elimination on the end of the barrel. The preliminaries for the attack began on 11 March when the New Zealand corps left the Medenine area heading south towards their crossing point over the hills. The tanks would drive down into the wadi, drop fascines into the water, and cross to the far side. In the 1930s the Matmata Hills had been seen as largely impassible to military transport and tanks, but by 1943 that was no longer the case. The Axis forces were being pinned into an increasingly small bridgehead, and the campaign in North Africa was clearly coming to an end. Immediately before the defensive position was the Wadi Zigzaoug joined by an anti tank ditch. The Allies took 7,000 prisoners by the end of 28 March, and for once the larger number of prisoners were German. By the end of the day they were close to the Tebaga Gap. The Battle of the Mareth Line or the Battle of Mareth was an attack in the Second World War by the British Eighth Army (General Bernard Montgomery) in Tunisia, against the Mareth Line held by the Italo-German 1st Army (General Giovanni Messe). 153 Brigade was one of three probing attacks on the night of the 16/17th March. He deemed Anderson “quite unfit to command an army.” First Army as a whole was worthless. It was a fun game hard work for both the Indian Infantry from British Infantry Division list in Battlegroup Torch and the 164th Leichte Divion on the defensive (using … He asked General Leese, his corps commander, for permission to withdraw. Editorial Reviews. Assaulting the Mareth Line. The centre of the line, across the main road to Gabes, was held by the German 90th Light Afrika Division. The 151st Brigade was slowly forced out of its lodgements, and back towards the edge of the Wadi. Churchill tartly noted: “Indomitable in retreat, invincible in advance, insufferable in victory.” Yet the army lumbered like “a dray horse on a polo field,” in Correlli Barnett’s phrase, despite an enthusiasm for the amphetamine benzedrine, which was issued in tens of thousands of tablets “to all Eighth Army personnel” on Montgomery’s order. Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in: You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Twenty-five decrepit French blockhouses marked the line, some with concrete walls ten feet thick. Built by the French in the 1930s to thwart Italian aggression from the east, the Mareth Line by an odd turn was now garrisoned by twenty-two Italian battalions backed and flanked—“corseted”—by ten German infantry battalions and the 15th Panzer Division with thirty-two functioning tanks. The line ran along the north side of Wadi Zigzaou for about 50 km (31 mi) south-westwards from the Gulf of Gabès to Cheguimi and the Djebel (mountain) Matmata on the Dahar plateau between the Grand Erg Oriental (Great Eastern Sand Sea) and the Matmata hills. It was also joined by two new Italian divisions, the La Spezia infantry division and the Pistoiamotorised division. Rommel's battered Panzerarmee Afrika began a difficult retreat back across the Libyan desert, just ahead of the victorious British Eighth Army led by General Bernard Montgomery. The battle of El Alamein saw the shattering of Germany's hopes for victory in North Africa and from this point on the end was inevitable. The idea was that artillery in the hills north of Wadi Zigzaou could cover these positions. THE 8TH ARMY DO IT AGAIN ENTIRE MARETH DEFENCES TAKEN FIRST PICTURESThe 8th Army has done it again. He also began work on a new route across the Matmata Hills, passing just to the south of the Axis front line. After being detected they had been ordered to advance as quickly as possible, and had moved throughout the day on 20 March. “Kill Germans, even padres—one per week and two on Sundays,” he told his soldiers. The first of these was at El Agheila, the same place where Rommel's First Offensive had begun early in 1941, and his Second Offensive had begun in 1942. Battle of the Mareth Line-Wikipedia On 24 January 1943, while Rommel was still retreating from Tripoli, von Arnim was ordered to protect the key area around Gabes and Mareth, to stop the Americans from reaching the coast between the two Axis armies. Eighth Army had hugged the ancient Pirate Coast across Libya much closer than it hugged the retreating Axis. This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. On the same day Messe ordered the German 164th Light Africa Division to move to Tebaga to reinforce the defences, having only now realised that an entire division and an armoured brigade was heading for the gap. The Mareth Line was a fairly strong position. What if Eisenhower Had Driven On to Berlin? The main position was protected by the Wadi Zigzaou, a steep sided valley, with sides up to 20 meters tall and water flowing along its base. XXX Corps (7th Armoured, 50th and 51st Infantry Divisions) were ordered to attack in the centre of the Mareth Line, to keep the German reserved pinned down in that area. At the start of his retreat after the second battle of El Alamein Rommel may have been considering attempting to defend a position in Libya, but after the Allies landed in French North Africa (Operation Torch), he realised that the only way to save his army was to retreat into Tunisia, to join up with the new army being built up around Tunis and Bizerte, and ideally use the bridgehead to evacuate the army from North Africa. The 50th Division (Operation Pugalist) attack began at 2145 hours on 20 March with an artillery bombardment. Even so 15 Panzer, 21 Panzer, 165 Light Division and three Italian divisions had been so badly mauled that they were no longer effective combat units. The break-in attack. All surviving tanks and infantry pulled back across to the British side of the Wadi Zigzaou. Rommel was then given command of both forces for the final part of the offensive, an attack north through the Kasserine Pass (19-22 February 1943), but after some initial successes this attack ran out of steam, and on 22 February Rommel cancelled the offensive. Barbarossa to ‘Berlog’ – Soviet Air Force, Rome Military mid-fourth century to the mid-third century BC, Rommel Recaptures Cyrenaica, January 1942, Russian Weapons, that are currently in service…, A Lesson of History: The Luftwaffe and Barbarossa. Preliminary Moves This failed attack cost Rommel 52 tanks, and also played a part in ending his time in North Africa. The battle also showed that Montgomery could be a flexible commander - after his initial plan for a breakthrough on the coastal front failed, he turned his attention to a wide outflanking movement that forced the Axis troops to retreat. XXX Corps (Leese) contained the rest of the infantry, and was made up of the 50th (Northumbrian) Division, 51st (Highland) Division, 4th Indian Division and 201st Guards Motor Brigade. Martin Baltimore Mark IIIAs of No. This would be followed by an hour long bombardment, before at 1600 the New Zealanders and 1 Armoured Division would attack out of the setting sun. They were supported by the 88mm and 20mm anti-aircraft guns of the Luftwaffe 19. The Mareth Line was a system of fortifications built by the French between the towns of Medenine and Gabès in southern Tunisia. The latter included remnants of the Afrika Korps among its 50,000 Germans and 35,000 Italians, and was commanded by General Giovanni Messe, who for the past two years had led the Italian expeditionary corps in Russia. The new Pheasant Mark II 17 pounder anti-tank gun in action at Médenine, Tunisia. Wadis were scarped into antitank ditches—more than a hundred feet wide and twenty feet deep in places. LATE in February, 1943, Field Marshal Erwin Rommel’s position in southern Tunisia was daily growing more desperate. The main attack was now to happen in the Tebaga Gap (Operation Supercharge II). These preliminary operations took place at the same time as the start of Operation Wop, Patton's limited offensive south of Kasserine. The Axis flank to the west beyond the hills was protected by chotts—desert salt lakes—and was marked on French maps as terrain chaotique. On the right the 5th East Yorkshires were expelled from the Ksiba East strongpoint. The figure of 3ipints per patient !appears to be high and may be attributed to the followirig causes ,:-, (a) The c.C.S. On march 20, Montgomery attacked the line with 30th Corps while making a flanking attack to the south, around the German right flank, with New Zealand and Free French troops. Montgomery had lost some of his units after the battle of El Alamein, in particular the Australian 9th Division, which had returned home to defend against a possible Japanese invasion, and the South African 1st Division, which had returned to South Africa to be converted into an armoured division. It was to be preceded by an aerial bombardment that would start late on 25 March and continue to 1500 hours on 26 March. THE WAR OF THE SPANISH SUCCESSION – FRANCE, Prokhorovka – the unknown clash of the Great Patriotic War. On 9 March he flew out of Tunisia to visit Hitler, with the aim of explaining the real situation in North Africa. was but two and a half hours' ambulance car journey distant and only the very severe and … Learn how your comment data is processed. That British attack on October 23, with more than a thousand tanks, cracked the much weaker Axis defenders across a forty-mile front. General Liebestein, the German commander at Tebaga, ordered his left flank to retreat just in time, and also used 15 Panzer Divisoon to attack the right flank of the advancing column. “Kill Germans, even … A line from the Book of Job was among Bernard Law Montgomery favorites: “Yet man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward.” He was a master of organization and training, of the set battle, of the theatrics of command. On 19 March 1943 XXX Corps of the British Eighth Army under General Bernard Montgomery assaulted the Mareth Line under the code name Pugilist. The Guards took their objectives, but heavy enemy fire meant that they couldn't be reinforced during 17 March,and on the night of 17-18 March they withdrew to their starting points. The Mareth line was equipped with obsolescent 75 mm and 47 mm naval guns for anti-tank defence and a few new 25 mm anti-tank guns and infantry small arms. Attempts to cut them off failed, because of a mix of dust storms, mines and the usual booby traps, combined with a disagreement between Freyberg and Horrocks on which route to take from El Hamma. The Mareth Line 44. Change ). Montgomery decided to carry out a two-pronged assault on the Mareth Line. The attack on the Buerat line began on 15 January, and the Eighth Army entered Tripoli, their target since the end of 1940, on 23 January. Finally came the unmounted infantry. This time Montgomery was prepared for this, and had ordered his troops not to stop until they had taken Tripoli. A few miles further south was a smaller valley, the Wadi Zeuss. As a redeeming virtue, that too was something. The area beween the two valleys was filled with minefields and wire, as well as anti-tank guns and other defensive positions. As his troops began to enter their new position, Rommel suggested that he could combine with von Arnim's 5th Panzer Army, then being built up in northern Tunisia, for an attack on the right flank of the Allied armies advancing into Tunisia from Algeria in the aftermath of Operation Torch. Post was not sent - check your email addresses! Tunisia. The Free French moved into the hills to screen this advance. ( Log Out /  The fighting resumed after the moon came up, and by first light on 27 March 1st Armoured Division had reached El Hamma (to the north-east of the Tebaga gap, and at the south-western corner of the Gabes Gap), where they were held up by anti-tank guns. The purpose of the battle for the Allies was to break through the Axis defences at the Mareth Line so they could continue their push on through Tunisia in order to secure North Africa. On the left flank the 6th Durham Light Infantry crossed the Wadi and captured The Zarat Sudest and the Ouerzi Ouest strongpoints, to the west and north of the Ouerzi strongpoint. The Mareth Line consisted of casemates surrounded by barbed wire and built for all-round defence in the main and reserve lines, the obstacles being doubled on the fronts and sides. Eight artillery casemates, forty infantry casemates or blockhouses and fifteen command posts were built. Fan letters arrived at Montgomery’s bivouac by the thousands, including some marriage proposals, and soldiers rushed to glimpse his passing car as if he were a film star, which now he was. The purpose of the battle for Axis forces was to stall the Allied forces’ advance and prevent them from moving any further into Tunisia past the Mareth Line. On the night of 22-23 March the British position in the lodgement became increasingly vulnerable, and General Nichols, commander of the 50th Division, realised that the position was about to be overrun. The Mareth Line was a system of fortifications built by France in southern Tunisia in the late 1930s. Following decisive defeats in the North African campaign at the second battle of El Alamein, and more recently, minor defeats during the Tunisia campaign, German and Italian forces retreated back to the Mareth line to prepare against an incoming Allied assault. After the French Armistice of 22 June 1940, the Mareth Line was demilitarised under the supervision of an Italo-German commission. However he wasn't terribly impressed with the Mareth Line after inspecting it in more detail, and by early February was seriously considering a further retreat to the Wadi Akarit position, north of Gabes, where there was another narrow gap, this time protected on the inland side by the Chott el Fedjadj, a series of salt marshes. Allied Forces In the six months that passed before the final surrender there was much hard fighting, as the defeated German and Italian armies sought to hold off the encroaching Eighth Army. He was puerile, petty, and egocentric, bereft of irony, humility, and a sense of proportion. Main article: Battle of the Mareth Line On 19 March 1943, the Eighth Army frontally assaulted the line in Operation Pugilist. Swaggering into Tunisia, Montgomery and his army were also thoroughly overconfident. The Eighth Army had 743 operational tanks and 692 guns at the start of the battle. The retreating Axis forces stopped again in the Gabes Gap, the last remaining natural obstacle before the Tunis plains. The 50th (Northumbrian) Infantry Division, with difficulty, penetrated the Italian held line near Zarat. 21 March also saw the New Zealand Corps conduct its first attack on the Tebaga Gap, but without success. “The sheer weight of British resources made up for all blunders,” one account noted. The German anti-tank screen stopped the direct attack on El Hamma, while 15 Panzer and 21 Panzer combined to attack the right flank of the advance once again. That lollygagging had allowed Rommel time to drub the Americans at Kasserine, return to Médenine for a drubbing of his own, then slip away again. The strongpoints in the main line included flanking machine-gun casemates and anti-tank gun positions; in the reserve line artillery emplacements provided covering fire in the gaps between the strongpoints in the main line. The battle of Medenine. The line was intended to protect Tunisia against an Italian invasion from its colony in Libya. The rest of 50th RTR's tanks also made it across. Tanks, lorries and quantities of other war material have been taken. He disdained the French—“quite useless except to guard aerodromes”—and especially the Americans, to whom he would be miserably yoked for the duration of the war. The idea was for sappers to blow a gap in the near side of the wadi. The going was more difficult than had been expected, and they weren’t able to attack on the night of 20-21 March as expected. Rommel's defences on the Mareth line are broken and the Afrika Korps is retreating on the Gabes Gap - with the R.A.F. The Mareth Line had originally been built by the French to guard against an attack from the Italians in Libya. The original plan was for them to wait there all day and then continue their advance on the night of 20/21 March, but they were detected early on 20 March and ordered to continue their movement during the day. Index 95. The 25th and 26th New Zealand Battalions attacked towards an old Roman wall that had been turned into a powerful defensive position. Background The battle of the Mareth Line (20-26 March 1943) was the Eighth Army's last major setpiece battle in North Africa, and saw Montgomery force the Germans and Italians to retreat from their last significant defensive position in southern Tunisia. “We all trust him to win,” one brigadier said. The Destruction of Army Group Center, 1944. Full description. This had two purposes – the first was to speed up the movement of troops between his main position and the isolated position in front of the Tebaga Gap. The Axis left was secured on the sea. Instead they made contact with the defenders of the gap on the afternoon of 21 March, but the Saharan Group had a strong defensive position and was able to hold its ground. The attack was carried out in an unusual formation. The line was intended to protect Tunisia against an Italian invasion from its colony in Libya. The Battle of the Mareth Line or the Battle of Mareth was an attack in the Second World War by the British Eighth Army (General Bernard Montgomery) in Tunisia, against the Mareth Line held by the Italo-German 1st Army (General Giovanni Messe). X Corps (Horrocks) contained the armour, and was made up of the 1st Armoured Division and 7th Armoured Division. Battle of Mareth Line, Tunisia, March 19th 1943. Sparks flew up around Montgomery. The advance stalled somewhat on 27 March. The British defenders managed to hold on throughout the day, and after dark the 5th East Yorkshire Regiment, 69th Brigade, crossed into the lodgement, and attacked to the right, taking the Ksiba Est strongpoint next to the coast. Further Reading and Bibliography 94. Their right wasn't so strong – the line crossed the northern tip of the Matmata Hills then turned north-west to cross another area of flatter ground (the Tebaga Gap) before reaching more high ground at the Djabel Tebaga. The attempt was abandoned at first light and the rest of the regiment retreated to its starting point. On the right the 9th Durham Light Infantry, 151st Brigade, captured the Ksiba Ouest strongpoint. "The Mareth Line 1943" picks up World War Two's North African campaign at the conclusion of the Second Battle of El Alamain. An infantry position was dug into the Matmata hills at Ksar-el-Hallouf and in the Dahar beyond, a strongpoint at Bir Soltane had two 75 mm turrets, removed from Char 2C tanks built in 1918. The detection of their move allowed Messe to move the Saharan Group into the Tebaga Gap. The battle of Medenine (6 March 1943) was Rommel's last offensive in Africa, and was an unsuccessful attempt to disrupt the Eighth Army's preparations for their upcoming attack on the Mareth Line, the main Axis defensive position in southern Tunisia. Help - F.A.Q. The night of 21-22 March also saw the first large scale attack on the Tebaga line. Anglo-American intelligence possessed not only the Mareth blueprints but also the former French commander, who, Beetle Smith reported, was indulged in Algiers with six aides—“one for himself and five for his wife. Operation PUGILIST. - Contact Us - Search - Recent - About Us -  Subscribe in a reader - Join our Google Group "The Mareth Line 1943" picks up World War Two's North African campaign at the conclusion of the Second Battle of El Alamain. The Mareth line was a defensive position set up initially by the French prior the World War Two. Flak-Division. Rommel wasn't allowed to return to North Africa, and was told to take sick leave. Under orders issued by Comando Supremo on March 17, Mareth was “to be defended to the last.” With Rommel gone to Europe, Arnim would command the Axis army group that comprised his own Fifth Panzer Army in the north and Panzer Army Africa, renamed First Italian Army, in the south. Abstract. Not a man among the 200,000 in Eighth Army doubted that he was their leader, or that he would be stingy in spending their lives. 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