The headlines that an Italian Soldier received an Army medal, while rare may not seem to striking at first glance, but the story behind how Lt. Col. Kevin Bigelman, US Army Garrison Livorno commander, presented Lt. Col. Vittorio Biondi, Italian “Folgore” Brigade, the Army Commendation Medal on April 3, 2012 is one that goes back to World War II.
On Dec. 26, 1944 in the small hilltop village of Sommocolonia, Buffalo Solider’s with the 92nd Infantry Division were fightinga battle against the Germans. Lt. John Fox remained in his forward observer position as his unit made its way back to the town of Barga. With German Soldiers advancing on Fox’s tower, he called artillery on his position in order to take out as many of the enemy troops as possible. That village was home to Biondi’s family.
Biondi, an avid military historian, was fascinated by the battle of Sommocolonia (article here) and wrote a book about it. Fate eventually paired Biondi up with the Camp Darby Public Affairs Office in 2010 during their search for a historian guide to talk about the battle site with service members for African American heritage month. Over the next few years, Biondi would speak to Camp Darby service members and their families during the many trips to battle sites, museums and memory rooms along the Gothic Line.
However, that is not how Biondi’s name ended up being submitted for the Army Commendation Medal. Rather three American civilian from academia played a role: Dr. James Pratt from Cornel University, (article here) who is working on a book that will include the names, gravestone photos, and personal photos (as available) of 366th infantry soldiers who died in Italy and whose remains were repatriated to the U.S., Anne Saunders, a Research Associate at College of Charleston, who translated Biondi’s La Battaglia di Sommocolonia into English (article here) and published an English-language book titled “A Travel Guide to World War II Sites in Italy: Museums, Monuments and Battleground” and Solace Sheets, an American writer who bought a home in Sommocolonia in the 70’s, learned about the story of the battle from local villagers and spent many years searching for survivors of the battle.
Pratt, whose father’s battalion fought in the Sommocolonia battle, met with Wales, Saunders and Biondi in 2010 in Sommocolonia. These three civilians were so touched by Biondi’s efforts to preserve the connection of the village to the U.S. Army and relatives of the American veterans that fought in the area, that they researched how to submit someone for a military award and sent the Department of Army form 638(Recommendation for Award) to the commander of the Army Reserve Personnel Center in St. Lousi, Missouri.
When the award recommendation was returned denied, they didn’t stop. They followed the trail of the stories of the U.S. troop’s visiting Sommocolonia and the Gothic Line until they reached U.S. Army Garrison Livorno Commander, Lt. Col. Kevin Bigelman. Much paperwork later with help from the U.S. Embassy in Rome, the award was approved and a small contingency from Camp Darby went to Biondi’s duty station at the Italian Folgore Parachutist school in Pisa, Italy to present the award to Biondi in front of his Unit.
“Biondi has worked tirelessly to preserve the memory of the sacrifices made by the Buffalo Soldiers of the 92nd Division during World War II,” said Bigelman. “Biondi’s efforts have contributed significantly to the preservation of the memory of the U.S. Army’s accomplishments in Italy during World War II and to a sense of shared history between the U. S. Army and citizens of Italy.”
“It was a big honour for me to receive this award and I am happy to be able to keep the memory of this battle and division alive,” said Biondi.
By Joyce Costello USAG Livorno Public Affairs
The events of December 26th 1944
On December 26, 1944, John Fox was awakened at four a.m. by the sound of mortar fire and rushed to his position on the Sommocolonia hilltop, where he served as an artillery spotter. As dawn broke over the mountains, the 29-year-old lieutenant saw that the streets below him were swarming with troops.
They were Austrian infantrymen from the elite Fourth Mountain Battalion, the forward edge of a blitzkreig offensive that was to throw elements of six Axis divisions at U.S. Army detachments in the Serchio Valley. The poorly equipped and thinly supported 92nd was expected to pose no obstacle to the offensive. With luck, the Wehrmacht hoped to retake the strategic port of Livorno, 40 miles miles south of Sommocolonia. If successful, they would have choked off supplies to the Allied invasion force.
It didn’t happen that way.
By nine a.m., Sommocolonia was the scene of bloody, hand-to-hand fighting. The black G.I.s and 25 Italian Partisans who joined them knew they could not turn back the offensive. But they could slow it down. An order came to retreat at noon. “Get the hell out of there,” a U.S. Army captain in the nearby city of Barga radioed Lieutenant Graham Jenkins, Fox’s fellow officer in Sommocolonia.
“Just get me some ammunition,” Jenkins radioed back.
The men in Sommocolonia fought on until more than two-thirds of them were dead or wounded. The Austrians began torching houses where wounded G.I.s lay, shooting them as they tried to escape from the windows.
Jenkins radioed his final message. “They’re coming after us,” he said to the captain in Barga. “Please, when you get back to the States, tell my wife and my kid and my mother that I love them…”
As the Austrians closed in to kill Jenkins, who had no ammunition left, a survivor reported, he was trying to comfort a badly wounded G.I..
“That was how it was with ‘the master race’ of Nazism,” said villager Bonafede Moscardini, who was thirteen when he watched the battle explode around him. “They weren’t about to show mercy to these black soldiers.”
From his observation post, which was now surrounded by enemy troops, Fox telephoned in artillery coordinates that moved closer and closer to his own position. No one has survived who saw what happened at the end, but several men at 92nd headquarters overheard Fox’s last call.
He asked for a smoke screen to cover a withdrawal by the handful of G.I.s. and Partisans who could still walk. Then he ordered a heavy concentration of mortar and 105mm shells on the surrounded observation post.
“Fox, that will be right on you. I can’t do that,” the artillery officer at headquarters yelled into the phone.
“Fire it!” Fox yelled back.”
Late that night, the Austrians rounded up villagers who had hidden in cellars during the battle, and forced them to leave Sommocolonia. The village priest recalled seeing the body of Fox next to his observation post, with the corpses of more than 100 Austrians around him.
Of the 95 American and Italian Partisan defenders of Sommocolonia, 18 made it alive to U.S. Fifth Army lines.
Three days later, the German offensive sputtered to a halt, and by January 1, Sommocolonia was firmly back in Allied hands — read the full article about John Fox and 26th December 1944 by Frank Viviano here