82nd Airborne WWII Map of Mediterranean-European Theater of Operations - Berlin Edition

Map Inset:

The 82nd “All American” Airborne Division first touched foreign soil on May 10, 1943, at Casablanca. This is the story of the two years of combat since that time. After intensive training in North Africa, the “All Americans” made the first large-scale Airborne invasion in U.S. military history. It was July 9, 1943, and the occasion was the allied airborne landing on Sicily, the initial invasion of Hitler’s “Festung Europa.” The bloody Sicilian campaign ironed out the kinks in the new Airborne game, and Italy followed with the jump at Salerno and subsequent action through Altivilla, the Volturno, Naples, and the Anzio beachhead. This completed division action in the Mediterranean. While the 504 combat team slugged it out at Anzio, the rest of the 82nd worked out in Ireland and England making ready for the great D-Day jump into Normandy. On June 6, 1944, hours before the beach forces had landed, 82nd troopers jumped and seized the first town of the western front (Ste. Mere Eglise). The fighting in Normandy was long and furious, but the perfect airborne mission for the 82nd was yet to come. On September 17th, the division left England again for airborne combat. This time it was Holland, the Nijmegen bridge, and two more months of fierce fighting. Airborne missions had grown in size and number since the 82nd had lone-wolfed it in Sicily and Italy. The perfect drop in Holland and the division’s subsequent gallantry and initiative led British second army’s Lt. General Miles Dempsey to call the 82nd “The finest division in the world today.” Holland was the last 82nd airborne assault. Her four skyborne invasions stand as a total which is twice that of any other airborne division in U.S. Army history. Combat days and bloody “foot soldier” campaigns continued to mount. No trooper will ever forget the emergency call which brought the 82nd overnight from training in France to the fiercest winter combat in the Ardennes. There the “All Americans” stopped Von Rundstedt cold on the northern side of the Bulge in the U.S. Army’s darkest hours since Corregidor. Soon it was attack again, crashing through the Siegfried Line, the Rhineland, and the final battles east of the Elbe. Three hundred and seventy-one combat days, seven campaigns, 200,000 German prisoners, four airborne invasions, and seven major river crossings, are but a partial reckoning of the exploits of the troopers, who the Germans respectfully referred to as the “the Devils with the Baggy Pants.” Behind lays an unprecedented record of victory and achievement in war. Ahead lies the important job of occupying and policing Berlin; the tradition and heritage of the 82nd “All American” Airborne Division trooper, first in war, and first in peace.