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Updated
20 April 2010
Last few
signed copies of the Pen & Sword Battleground Europe Guide
Touring the Italian Front
are
available on Amazon.UK; look for seller troopertwo
Books
A trickle of books about this campaign have appeared
in the last few years, including
In 2001 Isonzo. John R Schindler
In 2008 In The White War; Mark Thomson
Also in 2008 Battles in The Alps;
G Irving Root
And, some years back now (1998) Pen & Sword
published The British Army in Italy,
1917-1918, by John and Eileen Wilks, and published by Pen & Sword
Military Books Ltd. It is now out of print, and P&S are unlikely to re-print
it, even in soft-back. (Copies can usually be found on Amazon, the
used ones at reasonable prices
And also in 1998 The Forgotten Front: British Campaign in Italy,
1917-1918, by
George Cassar.
Both books are well written, and describe different
aspects of the British involvement along the Piave. (Neither covers the
British part in the Allied naval and air operations in the lower Adriatic,
and do not even mention the Italian campaign in Albania,
which featured some RAF missions .)
In
the later half of 2007 Naval & Military Press Ltd, released their
re-print** of The
Defeat of Austria as Seen by the Seventh Division, thanks to kind
permission of the Central Library of the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst.
This fine little book was written Major the Reverend E C Crosse, DSO MC, Army
Chaplain’s Department**, who
was Senior Chaplain (Church of England) in the Division during its service in
Italy during the Great War. The book was first published in 1919, by Deane
& Son, London,
and never reprinted.
The
book describes events leading up to the night assault river crossing of the
river Piave during the last week of October 1917. In that long-forgotten feat
of arms four Italian Armies, one led by a British General (Cavan), another by
the French General Graziani, bridged that turbulent stream and forced the
defending Austro-Hungarian Armies to withdraw, then, after a generally
well-conducted withdrawal in contact with the enemy, that most difficult to
capitulate when
Major
Crosse saw service as the Church of England chaplain to the 8th and 9th Battalions
Devonshire Regiment, 20th Brigade, 7th Division, before and then
throughout the Battle of the Somme (30 June - 5 September 1916). He wrote the
above book shortly after Armistice in Italy
(4 November 1918) completing the work in early 1919. He then wrote a long
essay (75 pages), analysing the work and assessing the achievements of Church
of England chaplains with the infantry during the Great War. The essay
stressed the obstacles which the chaplains had to surmount and the fact that,
for some time after the outbreak of war, their duties were largely restricted
to conducting compulsory Church parades, taking Communion, caring
(spiritually) for the sick and wounded and conducting burial services. This
essay was to be published under the title of The God of Battles; not
sure what happened, but not record has so far been found of its existence.
3.
Naval &Military also stock British
Military Operations – Italy
1915-1919, one of the Official History series.
4.
Pen & Sword still have copies of their two Battleground Europe Guides (see
below) to aspects of the Italian campaign. A third may be in the
offing, covering various crossings of the Piave in 1917 and 1918, including
that by Leutnant Erwin
Johannes Eugen Rommel of the Wurtemburg Mountain Battalion in November 1917,
and ending with the British crossing at the Grave di Papadopoli, spearheaded
by the 2/1st Battalion, Honourable Artillery Company, the oldest Regiment in the British
Army.
Asiago;
15/16 June 1918; The Battle
in the Woods and Clouds
Touring
the Italian Front: American, British, French, German & Italian Forces in Italy
1917-1919.
Titles in bold are currently available.
Other titles can usually be borrowed by UK residents only, through the
Inter-Library Loan Service.
The item * can only be read in a library as it is very rare, and fragile.
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This scrupulously-researched and well written book is
now (Autumn 2006) out-of -print and can only be found in very small numbers
on Amazon, and, occasionally, on the shelves (actual or virtual) of
specialist booksellers.
John and Eileen Wilks describe the reasons for the move of the British
Expeditionary Force (Italy)
from Western Front to the Veneto,
and its subsequent operations in support of Italian and French forces. The
book covers the moves of the various divisions into the rear areas around Vicenza and Padua,
and their advance to the front line on the Montello, along the Piave Front.
Also covered are subsequent move to, and operations, on the Asiago plateau,
a wide shelf at the top of a small section of the 4,000 ft escarpment
backing the Venetian Plain roughly from the Adige valley north of Verona to
Trieste. The book concludes with an account of the final phase of fighting
in the mountains north of the plateau, and the huge, multi-army night
assault crossing of the Piave in late October, spearheaded in the centre by
the 10th Army, commanded by a British general (Lord Cavan) and comprising
British and Italian divisions and, at one, point, the US 332nd Infantry
Regiment.
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Bibliography
Atkinson, CT The Seventh Division in the Great War; London 1927 (Reprint by
Naval & Military Press.)
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Aston, J, Duggan, L The 12th
(Bermondsey) Bn East Surrey Regt in the Great War London 1921
Reprinted by Naval and Military Press
Ltd 2005.
This is one of the best accounts of the life
and times of Service Battalion, probably because it was written
by 'Hostilities-only' personnel, not Regular Army officers!
The battalion was in the 41st Division, fought on the Western Front
from May 1916 to November 1917 then went to Italy. Returned to France in
March 1918 where it served for the rest of the war.Roll of Honour, nominal
roll of all who served, honours and awards.
The 12th East Surreys were raised on 14th May 1915 by the Mayor and
Borough of Bermondsey, and in October the battalion joined 122nd Brigade,
41st Division, the last of the Kitchener
divisions. It remained in the same brigade throughout the war. A year
later, May 1916, the division arrived in France
where the battalion served until November 1917, when they were sent to Italy. In
March 1918 they returned to France
where the battalion remained for the rest of the war.
The authors have made every effort to be accurate in their account, but the
main aim has been to provide a narrative, not so much for the general
reader as for the members of the Battalion Association and their friends.
In pursuit of this aim they have included plenty of ‘yarns’
using the actual words of the individual narrator which, they believe, will
prove the best part of the volume. In fact this is the most
‘anecdotal’ unit history I have yet come across. Reading it
today, some ninety years later, it is clear that these personal
contributions add a great deal to the story, bringing a feeling of reality
to the scenes being described. There are plenty of references to
individuals, references which are always welcome in what amounts to a family
history, telling the day-to-day story of a close knit battalion. There is
no doubt it will have brought to mind those who died and will have helped
to recall incidents, localities, friendships and dangers shared. The
division was one selected for the Army of Occupation in Germany and the battalion ended its war
service on garrison duty in the Rhine
bridgehead. 217 officers and 4,487 other ranks served with the battalion
during the war, and total casualties amounted to 128 officers and 2,675
other ranks of whom 38 and 683 respectively died.The appendices contain a
wealth of information, of great help to the researcher. There is the
nominal roll of officers and men who served with the battalion; there is a
list of cemeteries in which the dead are buried, each is numbered and keyed
to the Roll of Honour so the place of burial can be checked; and there is
the list of honours and awards. This is a very comprehensive history.
2005 N&M Pres reprint (original pub1936). SB. x + 331pp with maps
and illustrations
ISBN 1845742753
£ 18.00
www.naval-military-press.com
order.dept@naval-military-press.com
Naval & Military Press
Unit 10, Ridgewood Industrial Park
Uckfield
East Sussex
TN22 5QE
United Kingdom
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Banks, A Military Atlas of the First World War; Barnsley
1975 (Very good; great tool for any WWI
resarcher)
Barnett, GH With the 48th Division in Italy Edinburgh 1923
Carrington, CF The War Record of the 1/5 R. Warwickshire Regt
Birmingham 1923
Caddick-Adams, P By God they can fight!: History of 143 Brigade
Shrewsbury, 1997
Cassar, George H The Forgotten Front, the British Army in Italy
1917-1918; London, 1998
Corbett, Edward 1/8 Worcestershire Private. Worcester 1920s
Crosse, EC The Defeat of Austria as seen by the Seventh Division
London 1919 (Reprinted in 2007; see above)
Crutwell, C The War Service of the 1/4 Royal Berkshire Regt (TF)
Oxford 1922
Dalton, H With British Guns in Italy London 1919 (2005 Reprint
by Naval & Military Press)
Dopson, FW The 48th Division Signals in the Great War Bristol
(private) 1938
Edmonds, JE Official History of the War Military Operations Italy
1915-1919 London (Reprint 1986)
Eberle, VF My Sapper Venture London 1973
Gladden, Norman Across the Piave IWM London 1959
Glover, M That Astonishing Infantry: The History of the Royal Welch
Fusiliers, 1689-1989 London 1989
* Goldsmid, CJH Diary of a Liaison Officer in Italy1918 London 1920*
Halpern, PG The Naval War in the Mediterranean 1914 -1918 London,
1987
Herwig, HH The First World War, Germany and Austria-Hungary
1914-1918 London 1997
Hody, EH, With the ‘Mad 17th’ to Italy London 1920
Hussey, AH The Fifth Division in the Great War London, 1921
James, L The History of King Edwards Horse London 1923
Lambert, A Over the Top London 1922 7 (Reprint by Naval &
Military Press 2002)
Lettau, JL In Italy with the 332nd Infantry Youngstown, Ohio 1921
(This is very rare indeed; try e-bay for a copy, but $$$$!)
Mackay, F Asiago, 15/16 June 1918 The Battle in the Woods and
Clouds Barnsley, 2001
Mackay, F Touring the Italian Front; British, US, French &
German Forces in Northern Italy, 1917-1918. (P&S)
Mockler-Ferryman, AF The Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire LI
Chronicle1917-18 Oxford
1923
Morselli, M Caporetto 1917: Victory or Defeat? London 2001
Pearse, HW, Sloman, H.S. History of the East
Surrey Regiment. Vol. 2-3,1914-1919. London 1933.
Pickford, P War Record of the 1/4 Oxf & Bucks LI Banbury 1919
Sandilands, H R The 23rd Division 1914-1918 Edinburgh 1925
(2003 Reprint by Naval & Military Press)
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Extract from Naval & Military Press website
THE TWENTY-THIRD DIVISION 1914-1919
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The division arrived in France
at the end of August 1915 and fought on the Western Front till October
1917, when it was transferred to Italy where it remained for
the rest of the war.
The author, Lieutenant Colonel HR Sandilands, served as the
division’s GSO1 from March 1918 to its demise in March 1919. In his
preface he states his aim to include as many names as possible, and in
doing so he has added human interest to a graphic, detailed account of
the part played by one of Kitchener’s
divisions on the Western Front and in Italy. The appendices are
particularly useful, including the divisional order of battle, with any
changes; successive reorganisations of the divisional artillery;
succession of commanders and staff with dates of appointment; summary of
honours and awards, British and Foreign (over3,200 including nine VCs);
extracts from the Battles Nomenclature Committee Report identifying those
battles in which the division took part. There is a comprehensive index
and to conclude this admirable History there is a chronological record of
the division’s activities with dates and reference to the pages of
the History where they are mentioned.
The 23rd Division, one of Kitchener’s
Third New Army divisions, began forming in the middle of September 1914
in the Aldershot area. The divisional
sign is a red cross patte on a white disc, all encircled by a red ring;
the significance and origin is not known. The division landed in France in August 1915 and for the next two
years it fought on the Western Front - in the Armentieres
and Carency sectors, on the Somme where it captured Contalmaison, Munster
Alley and Le Sars. It took part in the June 1917 Messines offensive and
in Third Ypres, after which it moved to Italy in November 1917. In
June 1918 it fought in the Battle
of the Piave, sustaining losses of 556 and gaining two VCs. It took part
in the final offensive, the Battle of
Vittorio Veneto,
ending its part in the war about ten miles east of that place after an
advance of some thirty miles. This good division was unique in that it
was the only one to retain the same GOC throughout the entire war, apart
from the last three weeks. Total casualties amounted to 23,574, about
ninety percent of them on the Western front.
Author : Lt Col H.R Sandiland
2003 N&M Press reprint (original pub 1925). SB. x + 389pp with 24 b/w
illus and ten maps
ISBN 1843426412
£ 22.00
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Schindler,JR Isonzo, The Forgotten Sacrifice of the Great War
Westport 2001
Seth, R Caporetto, The Scapegoat Battle; London 1965
Speakman H From A Soldier’s Heart Abingdon Press USA 1919
Stacke, HFM The Worcestershire Regiment in the Great War
Kidderminster 1929 Reprint Naval & Military Press)
Walker, G Goold, The HAC in the Great War 1914-1919 London
1930,(Reprint 1986)
Ward, S Faithful: The Story of the Durham Light Infantry London 1962
Wilks, J & Wilks, E The British Army in Italy 1917-1919
Barnsley 1998
Wilks, J & Wilks, E Rommel and Caporetto October, 1917
Barnsley 2001
Wyrall, R E The Gloucestershire Regiment in the War 1914-18
London 1931
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Four
novels which describe some very unusual aspects of the Great War Italian
front, from the Austro-Hungarian point of view. Very well researched, interesting,
and amusing. Good for long flights, or sitting around airports… Look up
John Biggins on Amazon.