The 517th Parachute Regimental Combat Team (517th PRCT) was an airborne, specifically a parachute infantry, regiment of the United States Army that was formed in March 1943 during World War II, training at Camp Toccoa in the mountains of Northeast Georgia.
Although it began as the 517th Parachute Infantry Regiment (517th PIR), an element of the 17th Airborne Division, the 517th PRCT was formed when the 517th Parachute Infantry Regiment was combined with the 460th Parachute Field Artillery Battalion (460th PFAB) and the 596th Parachute Combat Engineer Company. The 517th saw most of its combat (in Italy, Southern France, and the Battle of the Bulge) as an independent unit. At the end of the war, the unit was eventually incorporated into the 13th Airborne Division.
Before its dissolution after only thirty-three months, the outfit of 2,500 men endured heavy fighting from Italy through the invasion of Southern France (Operation Dragoon), then the bitter winter in the Ardennes (in the Battle of the Bulge) and the final thrust into Germany.
During the unit's relatively brief lifetime, members of the 517th Regimental Parachute Combat Team received one Medal of Honor, six Distinguished Service Crosses, five Legions of Merit, 131 Silver Stars, 631 Bronze Stars, two Air Medals, four Soldiers Medals, 17 French Croix De Guerre, and 1,576 Purple Hearts—at the cost of 252 officers and men killed in action.
The 517th Parachute Regimental Combat Team was formally deactivated in 1946. Seven members of the 517th went on to attain the rank of general in the U.S. Army, and one became the Sergeant Major of the Army.
History
Activation and training The 517th Parachute Regimental Combat Team was formed from units of the 17th Airborne Division, which was activated on 15 March 1943. The division's parachute units were the 517th Parachute Infantry Regiment, the 460th Parachute Field Artillery Battalion and Company C, 139th Airborne Engineer Battalion. The 517th was at Camp Toccoa, Georgia; the 460th and C/139 were at Camp Mackall, North Carolina.
Paratrooper units were formed from volunteers, who were screened and trained at Camp Toccoa. The 517th was charged with screening the volunteers and assigning those qualified to either infantry, artillery or engineers. Officers of the 460th and C/139 were placed on temporary duty at Toccoa to help with the screening, and men assigned to those units were sent to Mackall.
On activation, the regiment had a total strength of nine officers, headed by newly appointed, 32-year-old, commanding officer Lt. Col. Louis A. Walsh Jr. Walsh had been with the Airborne since its earliest days and had spent three months as an observer with U.S. forces in the Southwest Pacific. Colonel Walsh was known for setting extremely high standards, including physical conditioning. In addition, each trooper was required to qualify as "expert" with his individual weapon, "sharpshooter" with another and "marksman" with all crew-served weapons in his platoon.
As units filled up, they were to be given basic training at their home stations and then sent for parachute qualification to Fort Benning, Georgia. After jump training, all units, including the 517th would join the 17th Airborne Division at Camp Mackall.
The battalions were filled in numerical sequence. The 1st Battalion, under Major William J. Boyle, was filled in April 1943, and the 2nd Battalion, under Major Richard J. Seitz, was nearly filled in May. By late June or early July, while Major Melvin Zais' 3rd Battalion was still waiting for its first recruit, with the flow of volunteers to Toccoa was suddenly turned off. The 3rd Battalion would be completed with Parachute School graduates who had already completed basic training.
The regiment was moved to Fort Benning for parachute training. The 517th completed jump school with no washouts, setting a record that has endured to this day. The 517th troopers were the first paratroopers to wear the steel helmet in jump training; until then a modified football helmet had been used. On completion of jump training the 1st and 2nd battalions moved on to Mackall while the 3rd remained at Benning to complete fill-up.
In February 1944, the regiment moved to Tennessee to take part in maneuvers being conducted by Headquarters U.S. Second Army. In March, it was announced that the parachute elements of the 17th Airborne Division—the 517th Parachute Infantry Regiment, the 460th Parachute Field Artillery Battalion, and Company C of the 139th Airborne Engineer Battalion, which was redesignated the 596th Airborne (Parachute) Engineer Company—were being pulled out for overseas shipment as the 517th Regimental Combat Team. The 517th RCT was expected to operate as a small division.
On return to Camp Mackall, while preparing for overseas movement, Colonel Walsh was replaced as commanding officer by Lt. Col. Rupert D. Graves, United States Military Academy '24, who came from command of the 551st Parachute Infantry Battalion.
In early May, the RCT components staged through Camp Patrick Henry near Newport News, Virginia. On 17 May, the 517th boarded the former Grace liner Santa Rosa, while the 460th and 596th loaded onto the Panama Canal ship Cristobal.
Italy The RCT docked at Naples on 31 May 1944, the troopers filed down gangplanks into waiting railroad cars and were carried to a staging area in the Neapolitan suburb of Bagnoli. En route, Colonel Graves was handed an order directing the RCT to take part in the attack from Valmontone to Rome the next day. The 517th was ready to go, but since crew-served weapons, artillery and vehicles had been loaded separately it would have to be with only rifles. After this was pointed out, the order was cancelled and the RCT moved on to set up camp in "The Crater", the bed of a long-extinct volcano.
Gradually weapons and vehicles arrived. On 14 June the outfit struck tents, stowed away extra gear and moved to a beach to wait for LSTs to carry it to Anzio. The following day the convoy stopped off the coast of Anzio and the regimental and battalion commanders and staff went ashore where they were briefed on the enemy situation and informed that the destination was Civitavecchia. The convoy resumed sailing and the following morning the RCT disembarked over the beach unopposed. The RCT was then attached to Major General Fred L. Walker's 36th Infantry Division, which, under Major General Willis D. Crittenberger's IV Corps, was operating on the left of U.S. Fifth Army, under Lieutenant General Mark Clark. A long truck ride and a short foot march on 17 June brought the units south of Grosseto. Colonel Graves was handed an overlay marked with zones, objectives and phase lines. The regiment was to join the division's advance north from Grosseto the next day.
On 18 June 1944, in its first day of combat, the regiment suffered 40 to 50 casualties but inflicted several times that number upon the enemy. The next seven days were spent in almost continuous movement. The Germans tried to make an orderly withdrawal while the Americans pressed them hard. For the 460th the period was a continuous, 24-hour-a-day operation. Gun batteries continually leap-frogged each other; usually two batteries were in position while the other two were moving forward. The principle chore of the 596th Engineers was road reconnaissance and mine-sweeping.
On 19 June the 2nd Battalion captured the hilltop village of Montesario. On the left the 3rd Battalion moved through Montepescali against light resistance, going on to take Sticciano with 14 prisoners. Meanwhile, the 1st Battalion had been taking Monte Peloso. The RCT bivouacked overnight 22–23 June on a ridgeline south of Gavorrano. Next morning the RCT moved across the Piombino Valley and closed into all assembly area behind the 142nd Infantry Regiment. On 24 June the 2nd Battalion entered the eastern outskirts of Follonica under heavy artillery and Nebelwerfer fire.
During late June, the 517th went into IV Corps reserve and remained in that status until early July.
Operation Dragoon The 517th had been sent to Italy in response to a Seventh Army request for airborne troops for Operation Anvil, the invasion of Southern France. Troops had been withdrawn from the line (including the 517th's) and air and naval forces were assembling.
On 2 July the Combined Chiefs of Staff issued a directive to the Commander-in-chief Mediterranean to go ahead with Anvil (renamed Dragoon) on 15 August. As a by-product of this directive the 517th RCT was released from IV Corps and moved to join the 1st Airborne Task Force in the Rome area.
The German Nineteenth Army was stationed along the Mediterranean coast. Four divisions and a corps headquarters were west of the Rhône. East of the Rhône the LXII Corps at Draguignan had a division each at Marseille and Toulon and one south-west of Cannes. There were an estimated 30,000 enemy troops in the assault area and another 200,000 within a few days march.
The planners decided early that an airborne force of division size would be needed. Since there was none in the Mediterranean, a force of comparable size would have to be improvised. In response, the 517th RCT, 509th and 551st Parachute Infantry Battalions and the 550th Airborne Infantry Battalion were provided. Other units in Italy were designated "gliderborne" to be trained by the 550th and the Airborne Training Center. By early July the concentration of airborne forces in the Rome area was almost complete. Two additional troop carrier wings totaling 413 aircraft were en route from England.
H-Hour and D-Day were tentatively set for 0800, 15 August 1944. The 517th RCT had been allocated 180 C-47 aircraft in four serials. The combat team was sealed off on 10 August. Maps, "escape kits" and invasion scripts were issued. Radio beacons would guide the serials from Elba to the northern tip of Corsica. From there, radar and Navy beacon ships would lead them to Agay, where each serial should descend to , slow to 125 miles per hour, and home-in on its drop zone by beacons and lights to be put out by pathfinder teams. Each plane carried six equipment bundles in pararacks beneath its belly.
Most of the pathfinders missed their drop zones. The 517th team dropped early at 0328. North of La Ciotat the aircrews dropped 300 parachute dummies and a large quantity of "rifle simulators" which went off in firecracker-like explosions as they hit the ground.
The four serials bearing the 517th RCT began drops at 0430. First to arrive was Lt. Col. Dick Seitz' 2nd Battalion in Serial 6 flown by the 440th Group from Ombrone. Lt. Col. Mel Zais' 3rd Battalion was due next in the 439th Group's Serial 7 from Orbetello. The 460th Field Artillery (less Battery C) in Serial 8 with the 437th Group from Montalto fared better than the 3rd Battalion but not as well as the 2nd.
Twenty plane loads jumped early and were spread from Fréjus to the west. Last in was Serial 9 at 0453, flown by the 435th Group from Canino with Major Boyle's 1st Battalion and Battery C of the 460th. One platoon of the 596th had dropped with the 509th. One platoon had dropped with the 2nd Battalion and one with the 3rd Battalion. All told, only about 20 percent of the 517th RCT landed within of the DZ.
Actions throughout the next three days threw the Germans into a state of chaos. Enemy convoys were attacked, communication lines severed and German reinforcements were denied access to the beach landing areas. Towns and villages were occupied as troopers fought toward their objectives, capturing Le Muy, Les Arcs, La Motte and Draguignan.