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Published Saturday, September 27, 2008 in Local
Craven served in north Africa, Italy POW camps
By Alex McRae
The Times-Herald
Walter Craven survived the war in north Africa, but wasn't sure he'd make it ashore in Naples, Italy. And not because of enemy action.
When the huge American convoy arrived, the harbor was choked with sunken enemy vessels, preventing the American ships from docking in the harbor. Since troops couldn't unload directly at the docks, another solution was found.
Temporary walkways were strung between the ships anchored outside the harbor. Troops crossed the walkways from one ship to the next until they made it to shore.
That is, if nothing went wrong. When Craven started his long trek between ships, he was carrying his regular gear plus a Thompson submachine gun and 200 extra rounds of ammo. The extra load made the crossing that much more treacherous.
A word of encouragement would have been nice. All Craven got was a warning.
"A sergeant told me not to fall off, because with all that stuff I was carrying, I'd sink right to the bottom of the ocean," Craven says. "I took it real easy."
Craven was born in Heard County in 1921. His folks had a farm, and Craven grew up milking cows, slopping hogs and tending the crops. In 1936 the family moved to Coweta County, and in 1938 settled in Sharpsburg, where Craven attended Starr High School. When he was a teenager Craven picked peaches for 55 cents a day and says he was glad to get it.
"Times were tough back then," he says. "It was hard work. But it helped out, and that's what counted."
Craven left school in 1939 for permanent work. He did carpentry and roofing and eventually started working at a service station on Greenville Street in Newnan.
Craven was drafted in November 1942 and inducted at Fort McPherson in Atlanta. He was sent to Camp Lee, Va., for basic and advanced infantry training, then headed to Hampton Roads, Va., to catch a troop ship headed east.
Craven had seen the Gulf of Mexico while looking for work in Florida. But he had never seen a ship as big as the one preparing to carry more than 16,000 troops to north Africa.
Soldiers were stacked five high in bunks with barely enough room between them to turn over. Craven's sleeping area was close to the main deck, making it easier to step outside for a breath of fresh air. But he and the others were relieved when the ship finally docked in Casablanca, Morocco, in July 1943.
While Craven waited for new orders in Casablanca, he had time to see -- and smell -- the local sights.
"Some of Casablanca was really nice," he says. "But you didn't want to go in the slum areas. There were animals all over the place and people everywhere. The toilets were out on the street and covered up to about 18 inches high, but the people were right out in the open. And the smell was really bad. We didn't go there much."
After a few weeks in Casablanca, Craven was sent to Oran, Algeria, to await further orders. While in Oran, Craven's group spent hours each day hiking and drilling to get physically ready for whatever battles lay ahead. The invasion of Sicily was already under way when Craven reported to the dock in Oran to board a landing ship headed for the combat zone.
"We didn't know exactly where we were going," he says. "But it didn't much matter."
But just before he boarded the ship, Craven was pulled out of formation and told he had been reassigned. Instead of going to Sicily, he joined the 2660 POW Company and went to a prisoner of war camp 60 miles out in the desert.
The camp was filled with Italian prisoners captured in north Africa and Sicily. Craven did a little bit of everything, including clerical work, administrative duties and even some carpentry.
Projects included building a new mess hall for American troops. The new facility even included an orchestra pit where a band made up of Italian prisoners played American hits by such musical favorites as Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller and Artie Shaw.
There was just one problem. The POW camp was at the base of a mountain range and engineers knew the site would flood during the rainy season.
Bulldozers and other pieces of heavy equipment weren't available, so Craven supervised Italian prisoners as they attempted to dig a huge trench around the camp by hand. It didn't take long for everyone to realize the task couldn't be done with picks and shovels.
"It was pretty obvious you couldn't dig a ditch big enough to handle the floods without bulldozers," Craven says.
When the rainy season finally arrived, Craven moved to a POW camp near an area the GIs called Little Mountain.
This time, large ditches weren't required. So Craven and his fellow soldiers spent their time guarding prisoners, maintaining the camp and performing administrative duties. Craven also drove an ambulance that shuttled prisoners to and from large American military hospitals.
Craven says most of the prisoners were not hostile to their American captors. Several were made trustees and given jobs outside the stockade. The Italians also helped with the cooking, and Craven says when food was in good supply, everyone ate well.
Just weeks after the June 6, 1944, Normandy Invasion, Craven's unit sailed to join Allied troops fighting for control of Italy. After walking the plank from ship to ship to get ashore, Craven's unit went to a prison camp outside Naples.
By this time, the Italian Army had surrendered and Italians were no longer kept as POWs. But Italy was still crawling with Germans, and captured German soldiers started to fill the camp.
In addition to keeping the prisoners in line, Craven accompanied German POWs to U.S. ships that sent them to America to be held for the duration of the war. After several months in Naples, Craven's outfit moved north to another POW camp outside Florence.
Florence was much closer to the fighting in northern Italy, and it was not uncommon for American and German artillery shells to whistle over the POW camp heading in different directions.
Craven says the soldier who manned the camp's 40 mm cannon was amused when the German guns started firing.
"He'd say 'Big Bertha's really raising hell tonight,'" Craven says. "We weren't really in danger, but it was a good reminder there was a war going on."
In Florence, Craven picked up a new job that made him a troop favorite. Several times each week he drove to Pisa, Italy, to pick up and deliver the mail.
"Mail call was always a big highlight," he says. "They were always asking me when the mail was coming, and they were sure glad to see it."
Craven says the German prisoners did their own cooking, laundry and cleaning and were responsible for maintaining the camp.
Certain German prisoners also cooked for the Americans. Craven says the German interpretation of classic American dishes was interesting and good.
"They were real good cooks," Craven says. "We all ate the same food and they cooked it like they wanted in their camp, but did it more American-style for us. They added some German touches, though, and it turned out real good."
Not all the Germans were model prisoners, however. Craven says members of the elite German SS Corps made it clear they were not happy to be prisoners and didn't care who knew it.
"They'd spit in your face or do anything else to give you a bad time," Craven says. "At least they did at first. We had to give some of them a little attitude adjustment, and after that they were all right. They weren't bad people as much as they were the enemy, and it was our job to keep them locked up so they couldn't hurt anybody. I never saw a prisoner get beaten. We treated them like human beings."
During his stay at Florence, Craven's unit took custody of a German general reputed to be the head of the German Luftwaffe, or Air Force. The general's wife and daughter were also held. Craven was in the group that delivered the general and his family to British troops in Naples.
Near the end of the war, thousands of prisoners started pouring into Florence. One group included 3,800 women who were captured with soldiers in the field.
"We took them all in," Craven says. "The women got their own camp and it was fine."
There were some light moments, too. On occasion, the Americans attached signs advertising a dance on Army trucks and drove the trucks through town. Local women hopped aboard and went to the dance. They socialized, danced, enjoyed some good food and drink and were returned safely to town.
"We were glad to have them and they were always treated real well," Craven says. "It was a good time for everybody."
Craven's most tense moment came when he and another soldier were sent to the outskirts of Florence to hunt for the rumored burial place of a high-ranking German officer.
They reached an American checkpoint and were stopped by MPs. Craven and his buddy didn't know the password but convinced the MPs they were legitimate and needed to continue their search.
The MPs said they could pass, but then passed along a warning.
"They told us if we kept going, that as soon as we rounded the next bend in the road, we'd be under attack from a German machine gun," Craven says. "That was all we needed to hear. We didn't do a whole lot more searching that day."
Craven was still in Italy when Germany surrendered. The troops decided to throw a party and collected $1,800 for the occasion. Craven took the money to nearby vineyards and stocked up on local wine.
"We had a big time," he says. "That was the best celebration anybody had had in quite a while."
Craven returned home in mid-December 1945, and went back to work at the service station on Greenville Street. A few years later he took up carpentry and roofing work and sold cars at Goza Motor Co. in Newnan.
In 1956, Craven went to work for Liberty Mutual Life Insurance Co. and stayed with the company until he retired in 1981.
Craven was married in 1950 and started a family that included one child and two grandchildren. His first wife passed away in 1998. Craven remarried in 2001 and his second wife passed away in early 2008.
"I learned a lot in the Army, and got to see some very interesting things," Craven says. "As much as anything I learned to get along with people. And I know I wouldn't have been so lucky if the good Lord hadn't been watching over me."