1944 May 28: Welcome to Italy
The Combat Team debarked and found a ruined city. The panorama of the Bay of Naples was still breath-taking, but the port itself was a shell. Demolished buildings and gutted interiors were all that was left of the waterfront. Yet for all this, Naples was busy. Hundreds of GI trucks of all sizes, shapes, and descriptions raced to and from the port. It was worth a man’s life to cross a street intersection within a half a mile of the waterfront. Some units marched to the railroad station, loaded aboard little inner-urban trains, and rattled and rocked the ten miles or so to Staging Area #4 at Bagnoli. Others moved out in trucks. Immediately everyone went to work uncrating all the equipment that had been...
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