The fall of Modica and the end of the 206th Coastal Division

Italian POWs from the 206th Coastal Division, July 1943.

By the evening of July 10, the 206th Coastal Division found itself in dire straits. General Achille D’Havet was unable to restore contact with the command of the XVI Corps; he had no news from the left sector (where the 146th Coastal Regiment, after suffering heavy casualties in Avola and Noto, was retreating towards Palazzolo); in the central sector, the front had fallen back to the Bonivini-Ispica line; in the coastal positions, the only remaining units were the 375th Battalion in Pozzallo and the 381st Battalion in Cava d’Aliga, both of them already engaged and outflanked by the Allies. The only working phone line was the one with the command of the 123rd Coastal Infantry Regiment, in Scicli; Santa Croce Camerina had been captured by the Americans, and incorrect news had spread about Ragusa, Giarratana and Monterosso having also been taken by the enemy (they hadn’t, although they would also fall soon), which would mean that enemy troops were already behind the command of the 206th Coastal Division. Major Liberti, having returned from the Corps command in Piazza Armerina, brought the bad news that there were no reinforcements available and that the 206th had to fend for itself.

Meanwhile, the battered remnants of the 146th Coastal Regiment, about 600 men led by Colonel Felice Bartimmo Cancellara, were retreating towards Vizzini, plagued by repeated Allied air strikes.

In the central sector, Mobile Group "F" under Major Argenziano, greatly weakened by the losses it had suffered, was still resisting in the Bonivini-Modica stronghold, a little to the south-east of Rosolini. This position was attacked by two companies of the 5th Battalion, Cameron Highlanders (152nd Infantry Brigade), supported by a machine gun company and by some Sherman tanks. An initial attack by tanks, that started at 1:30 on 11 July, was halted by an Italian 100/22 mm battery. At dawn the British attack resumed, until 5:50, with tanks now covered by smokescreens. Major Argenziano ordered all his gun to open fire and, simultaneously, sent a motorcyclist to Modica with a report. He never heard from him again, nor was he able to learn whether the report had reached its destination or not. The Italian artillery continued its fire until 10:00, when the British tanks ("C" Squadron, 50th Royal Tank Regiment) began an outflanking manoeuvre on the left, came very close and attempted to cut the road to Rosolini. Many Italian guns were hit and disabled by tank fire. At that point Argenziano, in order to avoid having his escape route cut off, ordered to disabile the surviving guns, then had his men board the trucks and retreated to Rosolini. But this town was also going to fall to the British very soon, as Console (Blackshirt rank equivalent to Colonel) Busalacchi’s Tactical Group "Sud" (South), under heavy pressure from Canadian troops, had retreated to Ispica, and was marching along the road to Frigintini with the intent of bringing his unit to Giarratana. Before the Canadian armoured vanguards could surround Rosolini, Major Argenziano took an internal road towards Modica, where he placed his group at General D’Havet’s disposal. D’Havet ordered Argenziano to deploy his men in the area of the Modica-La Sorda crossroads.

Late in the morning on July 11, Console Busalacchi also presented himself to D’Havet, who ordered him to go back with his group – seven 100 mm guns and 1,200 men – and to garrison the line that connected Roadblock 454, La Sorda (a district of Modica) and Villa Caterina (already garrisoned by three companies from the Engineers, the artillery and the headquarters). Busalacchi and his men went back but ran into a British column coming from the Rosolini-Frigintini road, that was repelled by fire from the seven guns. Then, while on the road, they were bombed and strafed by Allied aircraft. Finally, between 21:00 and 24:00 Busalacchi’s troops, exhausted from the long march and the fights they had sustained along the path, reached Modica.

Ragusa had been occupied by the 157th American Regiment in the early hours of July 12; Canadian armored columns were roaming along the roads north of Modica, towards Giarratana and Frigintini; to the east, Rosolini had been occupied and the command of the 122nd Coastal Regiment had been captured; to the south-east, Pozzallo had fallen.

Along the coast, the only territory that remained in Italian control was Scicli, where the command of the 123rd Coastal Regiment had its headquarters, with some units from the 381st Coastal Battalion, whereas two companies from the 542nd Bersaglieri Battalion were holding the line on the Irminio river. Modica was encircled, the end for the 206th Coastal Division was just a matter of time.

The Canadian assault on Modica began at dawn on July 12. The "Loyal Edmonton" Infantry Regiment, supported by a tank unit from the 12th "The Three Rivers" Armoured Regiment, concentrated its attack on La Sorda, where it was met with resolute opposition from Captain Casertano’s 3rd Sapper Company, Captain Amato’s mortar company and by the guns of the 1st Battalion, 54th 100/17 mm Artillery Group under Lieutenant Colonel Polcari. The leading tank and several jeeps were destroyed or disabled, and the tank officer who led the Canadian vanguard was killed.

General Achille D'Havet, commander of the 206th Coastal Division (from www.generals.dk)

At 6:00 Console Busalacchi reached General D’Havet and reported that his line was very weak, as little more than 500 men – 218 Blackshirts and about 300 between mortar-men and artillerymen – were left from the initial 1,200 that he had brought to Modica. D’Havet ordered him to resist on the spot.

At 7:30 a Carabiniere arrived from Ragusa, riding a donkey and disguised as a peasant, bringing a message from prefect Moroni, who asked to free Ragusa of the American tank troops that had remained there as a garrison, as most of the Allied forces had carried on towards Giarratana and Vizzini. The prefect did not understand, evidently, how desperate was by now the situation of the 206th Coastal Division.

At 8:30 D’Havet went to the town center, where he ordered the removal of the white sheets that had already been hung from the balconies by the civilians, and he went to speak with the local authorities. Finally, he decided to go to La Sorda to personally ascertain the situation, but Allied tanks coming from Ispica were already in the outskirts of Modica, so he decided to go back to his headquarters, where he found out that the phone lines were no longer working.

At about 10:00 Allied artillery started to shell La Sorda in order to overcome the resistance by its defenders, while Canadian infantry started to enter the town. A Canadian negotiator went to meet D’Havet and relayed to him that the Canadian divisional commander, General Guy Simonds, demanded that he ordered the end of the resistance in La Sorda, otherwise naval artillery would destroy Modica. Moreover, Simonds waited D’Havet so that the surrender of his troops could be arranged. D’Havet did not go personally, but sent instead his chief of staff, Lieutenant Colonel Lombardi, who while on his way to the Canadian headquarters informed the commanders of the units who were still resisting that it was all over.

Console Busalacchi ordered his men to destroy their weapons, then went to D’Havet, asking him the authorization to go into hiding and escape capture. D’Havet authorized him, and Busalacchi left Modica on a motorcycle, taking the road to Scicli, with the aim of reaching the Irminio front and from there the command of the 54th Infantry Division "Napoli", that was still resisting. Along the way, however, he was stopped and captured by an American patrol: Scicli had fallen as well.

Colonel Giuseppe Primaverile standing among the men of the 123rd Coastal Infantry Regiment (Giuseppe Primaverile Collection - from "La battaglia degli Iblei", Domenico Anfora)

Scicli had been garrisoned by the 123rd Coastal Infantry Regiment (also part of the 206th Coastal Division), under the command of Colonel Giuseppe Primaverile. During the night before the landings, the 123rd had been involved in a lot of sparse fighting against American paratroopers that had mistakenly landed in his sector, a hundred of whom had been captured; the coastal batteries manned by the 123rd Regiment had opposed the landing in Scoglitti, and its infantry units had clashed with the advancing Americans in Santa Croce Camerina and elsewhere, but had been defeated. By the morning of July 12, the 123rd was surrounded: to its left, the 381st Coastal Battalion had retreated from the beaches of Cava d’Aliga to the stronghold located at kilometre 8 of the Pozzallo-Sampieri road, defending the eastern flank of the regiment; to its right, on the Irminio river, the two Bersaglieri companies were under attack by American troops; to the north, Modica had been captured by the Canadians. Units of the Edmonton Regiment (2nd Canadian Infantry Brigade), supported by a troop of Sherman tanks and by American paratroopers, had marched towards Scicli, and at 11:00 in the morning of July 12 an American negotiator had presented himself to Colonel Primaverile, demanding his surrender. Primaverile had capitulated.

In La Sorda, Major Argenziano, when a private told him that the divisional chief of staff had ordered to surrender, and having ascertained that every road was blocked by the Canadian troops, at 11:30 retreated towards the town center, but was captured by a tank unit shortly afterwards. Along with the mayor, Emanuele Giardina, and with General D’Havet, Argenziano was taken to the headquarters of the 1st Canadian Division, where General Simonds was waiting for them. Achille D’Havet was the first Axis general to be captured in Sicily; General Oliver Leese, the commander of the British XXX Corps, wanted to celebrate this first and had him as a dinner guest. On the following day, D’Havet was embarked on a ship bound for Algeria, where he was interned in a POW Camp; he would be repatriated in December 1944, during Italy’s co-belligerence with the Allies.

General D'Havet, right, leaves after his surrender ceremony (Canadian Army Newsreel)

Overall, 1,100 Italian troops were taken prisoner in Modica. The 206th Coastal Division had effectively ceased to exist, with the exception of Colonel Cancellara’s 146th Coastal Infantry Regiment, whose battered remnants, after fighting in Avola and Noto, withdrew to Vizzini and fought on, during the following days, alongside the Germans.

The extent of the casualties suffered by the 206th Coastal Division is not precisely known; in the report he wrote after his release, General D’Havet estimated that between 35 and 40 officers and between 500 and 700 non-commissioned officers and soldiers had been killed, from a force of some 8,500 men. No information about the number of the wounded and prisoners; the former was probably quite high, if one considers that the 146th Coastal Regiment alone suffered some 400 wounded (plus about a hundred killed) in the first two days of fighting. The latter likely numbered in the thousands, comprising the vast majority of the men in the 206th Coastal Division.

The Canadian official history, sistematically dismissive of any Italian resistance, described the capture of Modica and the surrender of the 206th Coastal Division in the following terms: “Unlike the hill town Ispica, Modica lies in a deep gully, and from their position of vantage on the surrounding heights it appeared unlikely to the Patricias that the reduction of the place would present much difficulty. Late on the 11th the naval F.O.O., Captain Mitchell, after his exploit with the road-block had reached the outskirts of the town to find it occupied by Italians only. His report that there were no Germans in the Modica area was relayed by the 2nd Brigade to Divisional Headquarters shortly after midnight, and was followed by another message that. Modica was seeking to surrender. An immediate reply, dispatched at 1:25 a.m., ordered the Patricias to accept the town's submission. Accordingly, on the morning of the 12th, after a 15-minute bombardment by the 142nd Field Regiment, a fighting patrol from the battalion went down into the town and took a considerable number of prisoners. Reports appearing in the official war diaries and accounts given later by participants are at some variance as to what followed. It appears that Modica was left without any occupying forces, and that some enemy elements who showed more spirit than usual had either re-entered the town or ,emerged from the cellars to which the artillery bombardment had driven them. About mid-morning two small detachments, one consisting of two Seaforth lorries, bringing forward rations and ammunition, and one from the R.C.R.'s anti-tank platoon, both seeking their respective units, entered Modica under the impression that it was safely in Canadian hands. As the former approached the central square, however, it was ambushed; it suffered some casualties and lost one of its vehicles. The R.C.R. and Seaforth parties, joining forces, advanced under cover of fire from a mortar whose crew had become attached to the anti-tank group. Not until further artillery fire had been called down from the Royal Devon Yeomanry did resistance cease and the little band of fifteen reach the main piazza. There they captured seven field and five medium guns and one anti-tank gun, which were sited to cover all converging roads. From all parts of the town several hundred Italian soldiers now came flocking to surrender. They were turned over to The Edmonton Regiment-the fourth infantry battalion to claim a share in the occupation of Modica. A possible reason for the brief flare-up of resistance was the presence in Modica of the headquarters of the 206th Italian Coastal Division, the formation, it will be recalled, responsible for the defence of the coastline between Licata and Augusta. The Commander, Major-General Achille d'Havet, who had been decorated by the Duke of Connaught with the Military Cross in the First World War, was concerned that his capitulation should be made to an officer of appropriate rank--a sensitiveness which caused the General rather a frustrating morning, and produced a number of separate claims for credit for his initial capture. From the mass of conflicting evidence it would appear that the first Canadian to make contact with the Italian commander was a sergeant of the P.P.C.L.I. fighting patrol, who discovered d'Havet in a building in Modica. The General's request for a captor of more exalted rank was referred to the 2nd Brigade Headquarters-apparently on more than one occasion and by more than one agency. Eventually he formally placed himself in the hands of the Brigade Major, Major R.S. Malone, who conducted him to General Simonds' Headquarters. Here the G.O.C. had the pleasure of accepting the submission of the first general officer to be captured by Canadian troops in the Second World War”.

Some personal accounts are even more scathing, as individual Canadian soldiers who entered Modica in the confusion that followed the surrender agreement between D’Havet and Simonds, appear to have taken the situation as if the hundreds of Italian soldiers garrisoning the town (whom had already been ordered to lay down their arms) were rushing to spontaneously surrender to them. Mark Zuehlke, in his book “Through Blood and Sweat: A Remembrance Trek Across Sicily's World War II Battlegrounds”, is one such example, as he describes how a Canadian Lieutenant “was responsible for taking virtually an entire division [the 206th] bloodlessly out of the war”, while in reality hundreds of soldiers from the 206th Coastal Division lay dead between Avola, Noto, Modica, Cassibile, Casanuova, the surroundings of Augusta and elsewhere in the Sicilian countryside, killed in a hopeless struggle against far more numerous and well-armed enemies. Zuehlke even twists the knife by adding, “I point out that it is a very good thing that the Italians had scant interest in fighting. All these stone walls could have been transformed into fortified bastions of resistance. A single machine gun firing through a loophole in one wall could have held up a battalion for hours, and killed a lot of soldiers”. Apparently, tanks, artillery and aircraft, which the Canadians had in abudance and the Italians were nearly deprived of, do not factor in these considerations. Any resistance from “those stone walls”, a resistance that actually took place in several instances, was easily blasted into oblivion by the superior Allied weaponry.

Zuehlke also repeats the never-ending refrain, started by Allied propaganda and kept on after the war by the Anglo-Saxon’s innate sense of superiority towards Italians, of the Italian – more precisely, in this case, Sicilian – soldiers who had decided, to a man, that they would not “die for Rome” or “for Mussolini” (“for Italy” is a notion that seems not to exist): after all, as everybody knows in the lands where English is spoken, loyalty to the country and sense of duty – misplaced or not – only exist among the Germans and Anglo-Saxons, whereas Latins and especially Italians can only be interested in going home to drink wine, eat spaghetti and be with their mothers. Don’t they?

In reality, whereas a substantial part of the ill-armed, disillusioned Sicilian soldiers did give up rather quickly as soon as they realized the hopelessness of their situation, many others stayed and fought back, and lost their lives, including more than some of the haggard territorials of the miserabile 206th Coastal Division. Historian Enrico Cernuschi has noted how the registers of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission list 489 British and Canadian soldiers as killed in action between 10 and 12 July 1943 in the sector held by the 206th Coastal Division, and buried in the Agira and Syracuse war cemeteries – a number that does not include the Allied airborne troops that fell into the sea with their gliders in the partially botched Operation Ladbroke, as their bodies were, for the most part, never found and they are thus considered as missing in action. Furthermore, the Royal Navy lost twelve landing craft off that part of the Sicilian coast. Not a single German soldier appeared in this area during those two days.

But the Canadian propaganda newsreels in the first days of the invasion were anxious to let the public know that “Italian prisoners were coming back in the hundreds, anxious to get out of the war as quickly as possible”…

The end - Italian prisoners are marched through Syracuse in July 1943. Some happy, some sullen...