Ortona by Mark Zuehlke Page A

resources. The four companies would move as an isolated island through enemy territory. If successful, the regiment would regain contact with other Canadian forces upon its occupation of San Leonardo. If the attack failed, the RCR would have to fight its way back to the Hasty P’s or die trying.
    The Panzer Grenadiers were not surprised by the RCR attack. Liddell’s company advanced no more than fifty yards into the orchard before being caught in the open by a deadly accurate shower of mortar bombs. Every man in one platoon section led by Corporal L.F. Meister was killed. Casualties in all the other platoons were heavy. 26 ‘A’ Company pushed on despite its losses, moving forward in line at a steady pace. Waiting his turn to advance, Galloway saw Sam Liddell with his company HQ “striding through the smoke and dust as if he was going for a stroll. His coolness was most admirable, as was that of his whole company.” 27
    Mortaring of the orchard continued unabated, so Galloway decided to lead his company over to the right where an open culvert offered some protection. The deviation worked — the company suffered no initial casualties. Galloway led his men out of the culvert into a vineyard. Darkness was lowering onto the battlefield with its usual December haste just as a German machine gun opened up on their right. Three men fell wounded before the enemy gun was knocked out.
    In the darkness and tangled terrain, Galloway became confused. He led ‘B’ Company off into the thick of the German lines, eventually stumbling into a bridge on the coast highway to the north of San Donato. 28 Risking a furtive look at his map by flashlight, Galloway realized his position. He would have to stop the advance, turn around, and try sneaking back to the ridgeline road. All around them, ‘B’ Company heard Germans shouting and moving back and forth. Veering away from the concentrations of noise and sometimes slipping between groups yelling across to each other, Galloway’s men returned to the road without incident.
    By this time, the mortar barrage had lifted and an unearthly silence had settled upon the eerie landscape of twisted trees and torn vineyards through which the soldiers passed. But the silence was shattered when Galloway entered a farmyard and a dog began to bay. The major was so unnerved he yanked his pistol out and shot the animal. One of the men behind him riddled the dog with a Thompson submachine gun. Quiet returned. 29
    Minutes later Galloway reached his objective overlooking a bend in the road, and sent a runner to ‘A’ Company’s position beside another bend slightly ahead of his own. Both positions were situated on a low hill. The runner returned with news that Liddell had reported being on his objective, code-named Halifax, some time earlier. Although ‘B’ Company was still engaged in its walkabout, RCR commander Lieutenant Colonel Daniel Charles Spry had decided to send Captain Lavoie’s ‘C’ Company up to Halifax and accompany it with his forward battalion HQ. Galloway radioed back that he now occupied his objective, code-named Toronto. ‘D’ Company, commanded by Captain C.H. “Chuck” Lithgow, departed the Hastings and Prince Edward position and moved toward Toronto. 30
    When ‘C’ Company finished groping its way slowly through thedarkness to Halifax, it immediately headed off for the next objective. Spry remained at Halifax, setting up a battalion HQ in a mud-floored ramshackle farmhouse. Lavoie’s company advanced only a couple of hundred yards before Lieutenant Dave Bindman’s platoon stumbled on eight German infantrymen hunkered down in a ditch beside the road. Bindman, experiencing his first day in combat, rushed forward waving his Tommy gun and the enemy soldiers surrendered without a shot being fired by either side. This promising start ended, however, when 500 yards out, ‘C’ Company