In The Last Battle (Da Capo, 173 pages),
author Stephen Harding tells the fascinating, little-known story of the firefight
for an Austrian mountain-top castle called Schloss Itter in northern Austria in
the closing days of WWII in Europe – May 4th and 5th, almost a week after Hitler had
committed suicide. American units were
advancing into northern Austria, confronting roving and scattered bands of German
troops, many of which were eager to surrender but some of which were fighting
on, the latter mostly fanatical SS units that even terrorized and killed German
soldiers and civilians trying to surrender.
The castle housed a German army prisoner of war facility whose
inmates included 10 or so high ranking French VIPs, including two former
premiers (Daladier and Reynaud) and two former top generals (Gamelin and
Weygand). The small regular German army prison
garrison, interested in staying alive until they could surrender, came to learn
that fanatical Waffen SS troops in the area were preparing an attack in order
to kill the French VIPs. In order to
improve their post-war position with the near-by advancing Americans, the
Germans in charge allowed two prisoners to leave to try to reach the advancing
Americans for help in defending the castle.
The two went in different directions, and each was successful in
reaching American lines. Not wanting to
fall into a trap, each American unit sent only a small detachment on a rescue
mission.
The small force destined to reach the castle in time fought
off minor German army resistance on the way, reluctantly left most men and
equipment behind when a bridge threatened collapse, linked up with a friendly
group of German soldiers wanting to join in the rescue, and left some men and a
tank to guard an avenue of retreat. The tank and crew left to guard the escape
bridge hid between buildings in a small town, joined by 10 or so Austrian
partisans, and stayed silent as many still-fighting German troops moved through
the town during the night. Finally
arriving at the castle were 7 Americans with just one tank, all from the
spearhead of the advancing 12th Armored Division and led by a burly tank
commander named Captain Jack Lee, along with about 10 German army soldiers (some
of them conscripted Poles). The
Americans’ radio was broke and so they had no communication with their
lines. The assaulting Germans had a
small cannon, a lethal 88mm gun, and between 100-150 men. A battle ensued.
In light of the pre-war and early-war utter incompetence and
malfeasance of the imprisoned senior French officials that directly led to the
overrun of their country by the Germans, whether any American lives should have
been risked rescuing and defending them is an intriguing and unaddressed
question. The book is an easy read,
though perhaps too detailed early on in providing background on some German jailers
who weren’t even around by the time of the assault. Overall it’s an engrossing story of heroism
and tactics under fire, and great movie material.
R. Balsamo
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