First Special Service Force

Mt. Meras March 13/14 2010

R.N. 1314032010

Date March 13-14, 2010

Written by Marco G. Staff Sgt. F.S.S.F.

Team: Marco, Mancio, Luigi and the Forty Four Memories guys.

Here is our usual detailed report on the event with our friends from F.F.M., the Mt. Meras reenactment march in honor of the First Special Service Force.

A meritorious mention to Luigi and Mancio who, at the end of their working week, met at the Milan airport Friday night at 10:00 pm. – Luigi just debarked on his way back from a work trip abroad – and left for Sanremo where they arrived just before midnight.

March, 13

We meet our French friends at the L'Escarène station at 08.00 a.m. A few minutes to remember our recent experience together in the Ardennes, then we depart, destination unknown. Unpaved roads bring us to a parking lot where we leave our cars and start arranging our equipment, paying particular attention not to leave behind what we will need during our next two days. Our basic gear included shelter half with pegs and pole, poncho, sleeping bag, blanket, food and water, ropes, M1943 jacket or parkas, pack, webbing gear and individual weapons.

Little B and Nicolas (the organizers) brief our group cautioning us about a few dangerous spots along the route, where we must be particularly careful. After the briefing, we begin our march, keeping 5-meter intervals between men.

After a few miles along a gravel road we take a trail, which runs along the mountainside reaching a fresh stream where we replenish canteens and take a short rest. Our path now becomes tougher, as we have to climb up to reach the main road. There is no trail leading there, and we march in the woods trying to keep our azimuth to get to our destination. It’s rough going, with our heavy packs and our weapons, which have a tendency to slip from our shoulders. Branches constantly slash our faces, the ground is slippery. At about 1:00 p.m. we reach a clearing, and decide to stop for lunch. I take the opportunity to mend my sleeping bag, which has been torn by a branch during our climb.

After about an hour we start again our climb towards the seemingly disappeared road. Forty minutes later, here she is, plain and easy! We are late on schedule, and must get to our destination for the night before it gets dark. We have to cross the Northern side of the mountain, where snow has not yet melted, reminding us Spring is coming late this year, and the night will be cold. We reach our chosen destination in time – a ruined house besides a meadow; we light the campfire and start pitching our tents.

Together with Mancio, we scrounge some hay, which we stuff under our bags in the tents, while Luigi decides to sleep in the ruined house, near the fire. A few French friends reach us with some meat to roast. No canned rations for dinner!

It’s night already. The starlit sky is beautiful to look at, but it also means the night will be very cold. We don’t mind, though, as long as we can sip the home-made grappa distilled by Little B’s father and David’s 15-yrs-old Whisky.  Bedtime comes early. We have marched 14 kilometers, tomorrow we will march just about the same distance.

March, 14

Reveille is at 07:00 a.m. To be true, a great part of the night has been occupied to try to keep the ice cold out of our sleeping bags, but we fell rested just the same. I get out of the tent finding the landscape frosted. It’s freezing cold, luckily someone has already lighted up the fire and we prepare for breakfast. I am in for a surprise, though: the water has turned to ice in my canteen.

We get down our tents, and snap a few photos with a local who has driven his GMC truck to our place for picture taking.

At 9:00 we start to our destination – the wartime positions of the FSSF. The path soon gets into a steep climb. We feel yesterday’s fatigue in our legs, but nobody quits. The military soles of our Corcoran or Combat boots is no use when we must cross several snow patches along the way, and often we step up only to slip back to our starting point, so that our climb finally becomes much longer than its actual distance. When we reach the FSSF positions, we rest on the ground slipping our sore shoulders out of our pack straps. Most of us take a break, but Nicolas, Mancio, three French guys and I decide to climb up and visit the place. The view is magnificent. Far away on one side is Nice with its airport. On a hill close to us we can see some more FSSF dugouts. The strategic setting is obvious from up there. A couple of cal. .30 MG’s is all it would take to deny the enemy the use of any road for a large area around our positions.

We run back to the group and we depart to the place we will have lunch, about one hour of road march down and away from the FFSF positions. After lunch, we start the last leg of our trip towards L'Escarène, along a steep trail cutting a long diagonal line along the mountainside. The going down sometimes is more difficult and tiring than all of our climbs, since the ground is uneven, full of jumps and at spots covered with gravel. Finally we reach an unpaved road and, after one more hour of marching, we are back where we parked our cars the day before. Sadly, because reaching there means we are on our way back after this weekend.

Summing it up: this was a fantastic experience, strengthening our friendship with our French comrades and giving us the inner satisfaction of having endured the mental and physical hardship of the long and difficult march, without giving in to mental or physical fatigue.

Marco G. Staff. Sgt. Gruppo Clemente

Normandy2004@normandy.it

We thank Mancio for his videos and photos. Photo and video elaboration by Marco Sgt.

Thanks to Corso for the translation.

For the photos and the videos klick here