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The record · Kasserine Pass, 1943
Centauro and the 5th Bersaglieri
The 131st Armored Division “Centauro” was a Royal Italian Army armored division with outclassed tanks. Its tank battalion and its 5th Bersaglieri Battalion fought in the Kasserine Pass on 19–20 February 1943 beside the Afrika Korps assault group, and Italian soldiers made up most of the prisoners the Allies took in the battle.
Illustration A neutral marker made for this site, not a unit emblem.
An Italian armored division
The Centauro, “Centaur,” was formed from an armored brigade at Siena on 20 April 1939. It served in Albania and fought in the war against Greece, where it was badly mauled, and in the invasion of Yugoslavia in 1941. It was sent to North Africa in the autumn of 1942 and joined the long retreat from Libya into Tunisia after El Alamein. Its infantry was the 5th Bersaglieri Regiment, from the Italian army’s traditional light infantry, and its tanks were M14/41 mediums of the 31st Tank Regiment, outclassed by the armor both sides fielded in 1943. Its commander from March 1942 was Generale di Divisione Giorgio Calvi di Bergolo (Wikipedia, citing the Italian army historical office; Chapter 5).
For Rommel’s February offensive the division put a large share of its strength into the Afrika Korps assault group, Kampfgruppe DAK: two infantry battalions, two artillery battalions, a motorized Bersaglieri battalion, a tank battalion with 23 tanks and a battery of assault guns. Of the roughly 49 tanks in the group, nearly half were Italian (Howe, ch. XXII, n. 6; Chapter 4). The group entered an empty Gafsa on 15 February and took Fériana and the Thelepte airfields on the 17th. An Italian official photograph dated 16 February shows self-propelled guns moving through the dust, possibly of the Centauro, though the unit and place are not recorded.
In the pass, 19–20 February
During the night of 19–20 February a Centauro tank battalion and the 5th Bersaglieri Battalion came up from the Fériana–Thelepte area to reinforce Kampfgruppe DAK at the Kasserine Pass (Howe). In the morning attack of 20 February the Bersaglieri went in on the left, on the Djebel Chambi side, against the American 19th Engineers. The broken ground west of Hill 712 and accurate American artillery and mortar fire slowed them and the German grenadiers beside them. Italian and some English-language accounts describe the Bersaglieri as fighting hard and losing heavily that morning (Howe; Chapter 5).
Two further claims appear in the English-language Wikipedia article on the battle without a source: that the Bersaglieri regimental commander was lost in the attack, and that Bülowius credited the Bersaglieri with the decisive part in the victory. Neither is in Howe or in the British official history, and this collection treats both as unconfirmed.
The American line on the Tébessa side broke around noon. Late in the afternoon the coordinated Axis attack opened the Tébessa road first, and the Centauro tank battalion went down it in a pursuit of about five miles; by Howe’s account it “could find no Allied troops” and halted for the night short of the Djebel el Hamra passes. At 2 a.m. on 21 February the German 33d Reconnaissance Battalion, reinforced by Italian tanks, light howitzers and engineers, set out northwest from the pass and ran into the reconnaissance company of the U.S. 13th Armored Regiment (Howe; Chapter 5; Chapter 6).
Djebel el Hamra and the prisoners
On 21 February Rommel held his main forces back through the morning, expecting an Allied counterattack. Only at 2 p.m. did Kampfgruppe DAK, now made up of Panzer Grenadier Regiment Afrika, the 1st Battalion, 8th Panzer Regiment, and Italian troops and assault guns of the Centauro, leave Kasserine for Djebel el Hamra. In the late afternoon it met the dug-in tanks of Lt. Col. Henry E. Gardiner’s battalion and the tank destroyers and artillery of Combat Command B; after about an hour of long-range fire it broke off, still about four miles short of the passes (Howe, ch. XXIV; Phifer).
On 22 February the Italian assault guns went in again. Between 10:30 a.m. and noon, with the 1st Battalion, 8th Panzer Regiment, they attacked the American line at Djebel el Hamra and were stopped by antitank fire and artillery. Late that day, after the Americans retook Hill 812, Brig. Gen. Paul Robinett’s tanks caught the 5th Bersaglieri Battalion near Hill 732 as it tried to get away and captured many of its vehicles and supplies intact (Howe, ch. XXIV; Chapter 6).
The prisoner figures show who paid for the retreat. By Blumenson’s count the Allies took 73 German and 535 Italian prisoners in the whole offensive, most of them on 22 and 23 February, when the Axis broke off the attack and the Italian rear guards were caught in and around the pass. Italian losses in the battle were never fully recorded in the sources available in English (Blumenson, 1986; Chapter 9). After the withdrawal Kampfgruppe DAK went south to relieve the Centauro at Fériana and Thelepte.
El Guettar and the end
In March the Italian positions east of Gafsa took the first blows of Patton’s offensive. On the night of 20–21 March the 1st Ranger Battalion led the 26th Infantry over the hills behind the Italian positions at Djebel el Ank, and by nightfall on the 21st the 1st Infantry Division had taken more than 1,100 Italian prisoners. Italian infantry also supported the 10th Panzer Division’s failed attack at El Guettar on 23 March (Howe; Darby; Chapter 8). The Centauro was badly hurt in the March fighting and was declared lost on 18 April 1943; its remaining men were transferred to the Pistoia Division (Wikipedia; Chapter 5).
The record of the division in Tunisia is of soldiers sent into battle in tanks outclassed by their enemy’s, who were left as rear guards in the last days of the offensive and taken prisoner in large numbers. The chapters of this collection record no war crimes against the division in these battles.
Timeline
- The division is formed at Siena from an armored brigade.
- It fights in Greece, where it is badly mauled, and in the invasion of Yugoslavia.
- It is sent to North Africa and joins the retreat into Tunisia.
- With Kampfgruppe DAK it enters Gafsa, Fériana and Thelepte.
- A tank battalion and the 5th Bersaglieri Battalion reinforce the attack on the pass.
- The Bersaglieri attack the engineers’ side; the tank battalion leads a five-mile pursuit down the Tébessa road.
- Assault guns are stopped at Djebel el Hamra; the 5th Bersaglieri Battalion is caught near Hill 732.
- Most of the 535 Italian prisoners of the offensive are taken.
- Italian positions east of Gafsa fall; Italian infantry supports the attack at El Guettar.
- The division is declared lost.
Read the full story
- Chapter 5: The Pass: The 19th Engineers and Stark Force, 19–20 February
- Chapter 4: Sbeitla, Gafsa, Fériana and Thelepte: The Long Retreat
- Chapter 6: Thala and Djebel el Hamra: Where Rommel Was Stopped
- Chapter 8: Patton, El Guettar and Victory in Tunisia: The Army Learns
- The Kasserine Pass collection and atlas
By the numbers
Centauro and the 5th Bersaglieri by the numbers
Kampfgruppe DAK’s tanks, February 1943
Approximate; Howe gives about 49 tanks in the group, 23 of them in the Centauro battalion
Source: George F. Howe, Northwest Africa (CMH, 1957), ch. XXII, n. 6.
Who paid for the retreat: prisoners
Axis soldiers taken prisoner by the Allies; Italian losses in killed and wounded were never fully recorded in English-language sources
Source: Martin Blumenson, “Kasserine Pass,” in America’s First Battles (1986), p. 260; George F. Howe, Northwest Africa (CMH, 1957), ch. XXVIII.
In pictures
More photographs
In the art of World War II
Insignia, posters and art
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Sources
- George F. Howe, Northwest Africa: Seizing the Initiative in the West, United States Army in World War II (Washington: Office of the Chief of Military History, 1957), chapters XXII–XXIV and XXVIII, including chapter XXII, note 6.
- Martin Blumenson, “Kasserine Pass, 30 January–22 February 1943,” in Charles E. Heller and William A. Stofft, eds., America’s First Battles, 1776–1965 (University Press of Kansas, 1986), p. 260.
- Wikipedia, article on the 131st Armored Division Centauro, citing the Italian army historical office; Ian Walker, Iron Hulls, Iron Hearts (2006), as cited in Wikipedia.
- I. S. O. Playfair et al., The Mediterranean and Middle East, vol. IV, The Destruction of the Axis Forces in Africa (HMSO, 1966), as cited in Wikipedia.
- William O. Darby and William H. Baumer, Darby’s Rangers; Mike Phifer, “Panzer Strike at Kasserine Pass,” Warfare History Network.