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When complete histories are written of Allied operations in the Mediterranean Theater, the story of the progress of our forces from the coast of North Africa up the long Italian peninsula will be in many ways that of the 34th Division. No outfit has fought harder and longer, and the slow, steady, costly advance of the “Red Bull” Division from November 1942 to May 1945 is a typical example of grim infantry warfare over terrain so rugged that the foot soldier was the only consistently usable means of waging war.
Although its first members in this war were National Guardsmen from Iowa, Minnesota, and the Dakotas, the 34th has a shoulder patch—the background is an olla, a Mexican water bottle—inspired by the desert country of the Southwest, where it trained during World War I. It was the first Division to be shipped overseas after Pearl Harbor, its first elements embarking in January 1942, and sailing to Northern Ireland where the 34th trained for the invasion of North Africa. After landing at Algiers, it trained some more for the campaign in Tunisia. Parts of it were badly hit at Faïd Pass, and it had another rough time at Fondouk, but in the famous Battle of Hill 609, the 34th more than repaid the enemy for its previous setbacks and paved the way for the advance on Mateur and Bizerte.
The 34th rested during the Sicilian campaign, and then sailed for Salerno as a reserve division. Only one 34th unit, the 151st Field Artillery Battalion, got ashore at the start of the invasion, and during eight stormy days it fired more rounds than it had during the whole of Tunisia. One battery of the 151st, its guns overrun by German tanks, withdrew, and then, armed only with rifles, fought back and recaptured its guns.
During the 20 months of fighting in Italy that followed, the 34th’s artillery ran its wartime total of shells expended to 1,125,639—the record for any divisional artillery in this war. The 34th, after the whole Division had assembled at Salerno, moved up to the German defense line at the Volturno, and three times bridged that formidable river under fire. Once the assault battalions, after a crossing, had to pick their way single file through a fire-swept enemy minefield. For 76 straight days, the 34th maintained contact with the enemy, finally pushing into the outskirts of Cassino, under withering fire directed by German observers in the Benedictine Abbey at Monte Cassino. On the day the 34th was withdrawn from the city, the Abbey was finally bombed, after ground forces had long been forbidden to assault it. Then five Divisions hammered their way into Cassino, completing the job the 34th had started.
The Red Bull men moved on to the Anzio beachhead, broke out of there on May 25, 1944, marched through Rome, and then took Castellina, Pastina, Fauglia, Leghorn, and other cities, finally bumping into the Gothic Line in October. For four months the Division stayed there, dug in, probing the heavy enemy defenses, constantly patrolling and waiting for an opening. Finally, in February 1945, the Fifth Army launched a heavy attack, and the tired 34th reached Bologna and moved out through the Po Valley as all enemy resistance began to crumble. On May 3, when the German LXXV Corps surrendered in Milan to Major General Charles L. Boité, commander of the 34th, the Division’s long job was done. Fifteen thousand Purple Hearts had gone to wearers of the Red Bull, and more than 3,000 decorations for bravery. The 34th had learned so well the cost of living up to its own motto—“Attack, Attack, Attack!”
From Fighting Divisions, Kahn & McLemore, Infantry Journal Press, 1945-1946.
