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(Sunday, June 4, 1944, approximately 8:00 a.m. Central European Summer Time; during the Battle of Anzio, part of the Winter Line and the battle for Rome of the Italian Campaign of World War II) — The U.S. Fifth Army entered Rome from the south in several jeeps this morning, one day after the Germans declared it an open city, bringing liberation for the first time to a Nazi-enslaved European capital.
The first units to reach the outskirts of the city were elements of the 88th Infantry Division, the 3d Infantry Division, the 85th Infantry Division, and the 1st Special Service Force.
They encountered only scattered German resistance.
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Allied landings on the Italian mainland began in September of 1943, and after slow gains against German resistance, the progress was stopped in December of 1943 at the German defensive Gustav Line, south of Rome.
The initial landing at Anzio achieved complete surprise with no opposition and a jeep patrol even made it as far as the outskirts of Rome.
However, Major General John P. Lucas, of the U.S. Army, commanding U.S. VI Corps, who had little confidence in the operation as planned, failed to capitalize on the element of surprise and delayed his advance until he judged his position was sufficiently consolidated and he had sufficient strength.
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The Battle of Anzio was costly, with 24,000 U.S. and 10,000 British casualties.
While Lucas consolidated, Field Marshal Albert Kesselring, the German commander in the Italian theatre, moved every unit he could spare into a defensive ring around the beachhead.
For weeks a rain of shells fell on the beach, the marsh, the harbor, and on anything else observable from the hills, with little distinction between forward and rear positions.
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After a month of heavy but inconclusive fighting, Lucas was relieved and sent home. His replacement was Major General Lucian Truscott, who had previously commanded the U.S. 3rd Infantry Division.
The Allies broke out in May. But, instead of striking inland to cut lines of communication of the German Tenth Army’s units fighting at Monte Cassino, Truscott, on Clark’s orders, reluctantly turned his forces north-west towards Rome, which was captured today.
As a result, the forces of the German Tenth Army fighting at Cassino were able to withdraw and rejoin the rest of Kesselring’s forces north of Rome, regroup, and make a fighting withdrawal to his next major prepared defensive position on the Gothic Line.
