Allied HQ, North Africa (July 14, 1943)
Communiqué:
The Navy’s main task of supporting the Army as commanding the sea and disembarking troops and their supplies continues.
Throughout the operations, U.S. warships have rendered valuable support to the troops on shore by engaging surrounding formations of tank columns behind Gela and, among other targets, the airfield at Ponte Olivo and enemy divisions at Porto Empedocle.
A British and a Greek destroyer entered the port of Augusta at 1600 (4 p.m.) July 12. These ships, with the cruisers and monitors outside, assisted materially in the capture. The naval bombardment was described by the Army as both accurate and timely.
Catania Airfield was bombarded from the sea in the early hours of July 13.
It was reported that the swell on some of the beaches has subsided. There were some bombing attacks on certain of the beaches and the vessels lying offshore, which did not interrupt the work in progress. Disembarkations proceeded smoothly.
There were signs of increased U-boat activity throughout the area, but countermeasures have been highly successful and disheartening to the enemy. Activity on the part of minesweepers and light coastal forces continues and efforts of all have been crowned with success.
On the night of July 12-13, one of our flotillas of motor torpedo boats operating is the Strait of Messina engaged two E-boats, which were set ablaze and driven ashore. A third E-boat was damaged during a later engagement, but managed to escape.
During the operations yesterday, contact was made between U.S. and Canadian forces.
A further general advance was made in all sectors, including the capture of Augusta early this morning with its port facilities undamaged, and the capture of important towns, including Ragusa and Naro. Some thousands of prisoners have now been taken.
Gen. D’Havet, commanding the 206th Division, has been captured with his entire headquarters, and this division has now been almost entirely eliminated.
The work of administrative units is of particular importance in operations of this nature, as a ceaseless flow of vehicles, ammunition and stores is being maintained through the ports and over beaches.
Air Communiqué:
From dawn to dusk, our fighters carried out sweeps and patrols over the invasion area, the beaches and the shipping, successfully intercepting enemy aircraft attempting to interfere with our operations.
Fighter-bombers, in another day of intensive activity, carried out many attacks on enemy communications and troop columns throughout Sicily, destroying many enemy vehicles.
The airfield at Milo and Catania were attacked by heavy bombers, while medium bombers attacked Enna, a communication center. Night bombers attacked enemy airfields and communications.
During the night of July 12-13, our Intruders operated against enemy communications in Sicily and southern Italy. Two enemy merchant vessels were sunk and two destroyers were damaged in attacks by our torpedo aircraft north of Sicily.
During the course of those operations, 42 aircraft were destroyed, 11 of which were shot down by our night bombers. Seven of our aircraft are missing.