- Paperback: 608 pages
- Publisher: Aurum Press Ltd; New edition edition (24 April 2003)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1854109162
- ISBN-13: 978-1854109163
- Product Dimensions: 20 x 13.1 x 3.7 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 201,890 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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"John Ellis has worked hard to extract from war diaries, personal testimony, and war correspondents' stories a vivid and often moving account of what the battles were like for the troops taking part in them.
Product Description
The struggle to capture Monte Cassino, the impregnable heights barring the Allied advance on Rome in 1944, was the longest land battle fought in Western Europe in World War II and among the most costly; in four separate assaults over the course of the grim six-month epic over 105,000 men from the Allied armies and at least 80,000 Germans became casualties and, between the attacks, the armies of both sides endured conditions of appalling privation. To fight at Monte Cassino was to participate in a grim epic that can be compared only to such modern Armageddons as Verdun, Passchendaele, Iwo Jima and Stalingrad. Cassino was the most important battle of the Italian campaign and the culmination of the long struggle between Churchill and Roosevelt as to whether the assault on Europe should be launched through Italy or France. The fact that the Germans were able to hold the Allied armies south of Rome for those vital six months ensured that the Italian campaign would never be decisive. The course of the battle, on the Allied side, was all too often dictated by disagreements and misunderstandings between the commanders of the various national contingents - uniquely, the Allied forces at Cassino included divisions from seven countries: America, Britain, Canada, France, India, Poland and New Zealand - and in John Ellis' classic account of the battle few of the Allied commanders (except for the Free French General Juin) emerge with credit. But the author has nothing but admiration and compassion for the courage and endurance of the common soldiers whose experiences he vividly recreates in the pages of this narrative.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
The battles for Monte Cassino were so dreadful, the conditions so awful, that some German soldiers wrote that they would rather be sent back to Stalingrad than continue to fight in Italy. British historian John Ellis, using primary first-person accounts, really draws out the horror and indeed the tedium of this terrible World War II campaign.
Ellis quite rightly uses as many first-hand accounts as possible, which really bring to life what these battles might have been like for the soldiers who actually had to endure them. The mountains, the freezing sleet and snow, the precipitous drops, constant artillery barrages, the pervasive threat of snipers, the lack of food, water and dry clothing and in many instances, the sheer bloody pointlessness of it all.
Layering on top of this, Ellis presents us with the general's perspective - the planned movements of men and machines, the sweep of the various strategies. These are all supported with maps showing troop movements, targets, German and Allied positions. Many of the men from high command come off as arrogant bunglers, unable to see past their own last mistake, at a cost of thousands of lives. The French command are the few who have reputations left intact from Ellis's penetrating criticism.
In many other ways, too, this book is excellently encompassing: Ellis explains the multinational aspect of this war and the part played by African and Eastern European fighters - and in many cases, the shameful post-combat treatment they received. This book also furthers the case so convincingly made by Nigel Knight in his praise-worthy piece of revisionism, Churchill: The Greatest Briton Unmasked, that the Italian campaign was an unnecessary diversion from the primary war against German fascism and achieved nothing of strategic importance. The "soft underbelly" of Europe was proven to be no such thing.
Where this otherwise commendable book slips is that there is perhaps just too much "Battalion X attacked Point 357 while Y Division attacked Point 445." Conceivably this is of interest to the armchair general but unfortunately, these numbers became meaningless through heavy repetition. The book comes alive with the names of men and rivers, the accounts of street-to-street (and sometimes, room-to-room) fighting, the evocations of the landscape, the rats bloated on the abundance of human flesh; the level of tactical detail, whilst important for the academic historian, is possibly including a superfluous level of specificity for the general reader.
In all, though, I would find it churlish to not recommend John Ellis's Cassino, The Hollow Victory: The Battle for Rome, January - June 1944. Ellis gives us the big picture and serial incompetence of Allied generalship, the atrocious conditions the Poor Bloody Infantry had to suffer and also credits German command and infantry where respect is due.
Ellis quite rightly uses as many first-hand accounts as possible, which really bring to life what these battles might have been like for the soldiers who actually had to endure them. The mountains, the freezing sleet and snow, the precipitous drops, constant artillery barrages, the pervasive threat of snipers, the lack of food, water and dry clothing and in many instances, the sheer bloody pointlessness of it all.
Layering on top of this, Ellis presents us with the general's perspective - the planned movements of men and machines, the sweep of the various strategies. These are all supported with maps showing troop movements, targets, German and Allied positions. Many of the men from high command come off as arrogant bunglers, unable to see past their own last mistake, at a cost of thousands of lives. The French command are the few who have reputations left intact from Ellis's penetrating criticism.
In many other ways, too, this book is excellently encompassing: Ellis explains the multinational aspect of this war and the part played by African and Eastern European fighters - and in many cases, the shameful post-combat treatment they received. This book also furthers the case so convincingly made by Nigel Knight in his praise-worthy piece of revisionism, Churchill: The Greatest Briton Unmasked, that the Italian campaign was an unnecessary diversion from the primary war against German fascism and achieved nothing of strategic importance. The "soft underbelly" of Europe was proven to be no such thing.
Where this otherwise commendable book slips is that there is perhaps just too much "Battalion X attacked Point 357 while Y Division attacked Point 445." Conceivably this is of interest to the armchair general but unfortunately, these numbers became meaningless through heavy repetition. The book comes alive with the names of men and rivers, the accounts of street-to-street (and sometimes, room-to-room) fighting, the evocations of the landscape, the rats bloated on the abundance of human flesh; the level of tactical detail, whilst important for the academic historian, is possibly including a superfluous level of specificity for the general reader.
In all, though, I would find it churlish to not recommend John Ellis's Cassino, The Hollow Victory: The Battle for Rome, January - June 1944. Ellis gives us the big picture and serial incompetence of Allied generalship, the atrocious conditions the Poor Bloody Infantry had to suffer and also credits German command and infantry where respect is due.
12 of 15 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This book can be considered one the greats, next to the sharp end and The Battle Of Hurtgen Forest. It shows grand strategy at its worst, the greatness of the Poor Bloodly Infantry and how they went through hell, to conquer a monastery and a capital that gained nothing. If you are interested in understanding war this is one the greats to read.
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I have very recently and belatedly developed an interest in the history of the battle of Monte Cassino. My father spent a number of weeks in the bombed out ruins of the town when with "S" company Scots Guards (attached to 2nd Coldstream Guards) in April/May 1944,before being badly wounded in the battle of Monte Piccolo on 27th/28th May. He scarcely mentioned it, and, as I grew up, it was all too long ago for me to be all that interested.
Reading "Cassino:the hollow victory..." was an eye-opener for a non-specialist.It gives a very clear, adequately detailed account of why the four separate battles were fought, the discord between allied commanders, the overall confusion as to the whole point and purpose of allied strategy in Italy. The maps and diagrams are brilliantly conceived and executed,and the photographs chosen are very apposite. In spite of being thoroughly scholarly, the whole book reads almost like a novel.This is the way military history should be written-balanced, factual and fair but nevertheless drawing conclusions and to some extent apportioning personal blame on some of the allied generals and politicians.
Needless to say, however, although the essential facts have not changed, more recent researches have added extra glosses to certain episodes, for example, the atrocious and uncontrolled behaviour of the French Moroccans who raped,pillaged and murdered their way through scores of Italian villages on a grand scale.
Reading "Cassino:the hollow victory..." was an eye-opener for a non-specialist.It gives a very clear, adequately detailed account of why the four separate battles were fought, the discord between allied commanders, the overall confusion as to the whole point and purpose of allied strategy in Italy. The maps and diagrams are brilliantly conceived and executed,and the photographs chosen are very apposite. In spite of being thoroughly scholarly, the whole book reads almost like a novel.This is the way military history should be written-balanced, factual and fair but nevertheless drawing conclusions and to some extent apportioning personal blame on some of the allied generals and politicians.
Needless to say, however, although the essential facts have not changed, more recent researches have added extra glosses to certain episodes, for example, the atrocious and uncontrolled behaviour of the French Moroccans who raped,pillaged and murdered their way through scores of Italian villages on a grand scale.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
very happy
I would like to thank Mr J. Frost, there was a slight delay in the post, but a hand written letter from J frost explained why, apart from that the book was very clean, and as near... Read more
Published 10 months ago by very happy
The definative work on the Cassino battles!
This is the finest book I have ever read about the dreadful battles that took place in and around Cassino. Read more
Published 15 months ago by Mark Time
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