North Africa Part 1

Click on image to enlarge This map of Northern Algeria shows Oran where we docked after a 14 day troop trip out of New York harbour . We camped at Ain-El-Turck for two weeks before we traveled 110 miles by truck over mountainous roads to Tlemcem where we opened a hospital for combat troops fighting under General Patton in the Tunisian campaign.  We were part of " Operation Torch", the Allied invasion of North Africa. During June and July 1943. Some of our members were given R&R at the sea shore at a place called Beni Saf.

On February 28,  the United States Army established a hospital at Tlemcen, Algeria to care for the combat troops engaged in the Tunisian campaign, the Sicilian Campaign and the invasion of Italy.  The hospital unit was originally organized in Camp Rucker, Alabama, August 13, 1942. It was then transferred to Fort Benning, Georgia on October 26, 1942.  The unit left Fort Benning on December 28, 1942 and arrived at Camp Kilmer, NJ on December 29, 1942, leaving with a convoy from the port of New York, January 14, 1943. On January 26, 1943, the unit arrived in Oran, Algeria.  The unit moved to Tlemcin on February 18, 1943 and the first admissions were two soldiers dead on arrival as a result of a jeep accident on February 28, 1943.  In May, the bed status was increased to 750.

The Invasion Involved Americans landing at Casablanca and Oran. The British 1st army, together with American troops, attacked Algiers. Fighting for Oran was severe. At Algiers there was a little resistance from the French forces under the control of the Vichy government. After two days, Admiral Darlan ordered his troops to surrender. This was after the British victory at El Alamein.

On November the 12th 1943, British Airborne forces captured Bone on the Algerian coast close the Tunisian border. By the following Spring, the German  & Italian Forces commanded by Field Marshall Rommel, had been driven from North Africa by Britain's Montgomery commanding the 8th army, which pressed westward from libya, meeting eventually the with the 2nd US Corps, the french 19th and the 1st British army fighting eastward from Algeria. The causalities suffered by the enemy numbered more than 50,000 dead and wounded. Prisoners numbered 250,000.

Late in May, Winston Churchill and general Dwight Eisenhower met in Casablanca to plan the next step in the war against the Axis powers. The landing in Sicily and the Battle for Italy.

This next segment is to introduce you to the city of Tlemcen, Algeria. which is located about 100 miles southwest of Oran in the Atlas mountains.  This town was made up with about half of the inhabitants French and the other were Arabs.  Tlemcen was somewhat of summer retreat for the well to do French and when Germany invaded France many of those people fled their home land and settled in Tlemcen. Our hospital unit arrived as the first and  only American troops in the area.  Some of the local residents were friendly, but many looked upon us as intruders,  for which one could not blame them.  Before we left this town, 5 of our people married French girls, among them  was , I believe, Major Isadore Wessel our X-ray specialist.

Under the direction of the Surgeon, Mediterranean Base Section in Oran this hospital was set up in two school buildings. Headquarters, Administrative Offices, and the, and admission and Disposition Office and Dispensary, the Operation Rooms, X-ray Department Orthopedic Clinic, Pharmacy, and Physio-therapy were set up in L'Ecole des Filles Indigenes (Building "A"). This building accommodated approximately 200 patients.  The second building, L'Ecole des Dilles, housed the laboratory, E.E.N.T. clinic, Dental Clinic, Prophylactic station and G.U.Department, and 200 patients, (building "C").  The engineers constructed Niessen Huts (building "B") adjacent to L'Ecolel  adjacent to L'Ecolel des Filles Indigenes, to house more patients and medical supply.  When in June the bed capacity was further increased to 1,000 the roofs of Building "A" and building "D" were put under canvas and screenings; later wood and tar paper roofs with enclosed sides and plastiglass windows were set up.

It should be stated here that the two school buildings were separated by a ten minute walk.  The detachment was within a three minute's walk from hospital "C" and seven minute's walk from hospital "C".  The Officers, Nurses, Dietitian, P.T. S.O and Red Cross workers lived just around the corner from the main hospital.

Because of the scattered layout of the various hospital units it was necessary to have four messes - at the main hospital, at Hospital "C", at the detachment, and at the hotel for the Officers and Nurses. This worked a hardship on both mess personnel and equipment. There was a great problem with security;  we had to post guards at all installations which took a lot of man power we could not spare.  Also, we were trained as non-combatants with no arms so all we had to confront any intruders was a club;  I pulled this guard duty a number of times. Getting equipment and supplies from one place to another presented many problems because we had a limited number of vehicles.  We needed one or two vehicles every day to make the 90 mile trip to the docks on Oran for our supplies.  Our table of allowances and equipment was set up for a unit to handle 500 patients when we eventually were treating over 1500 patients.  On 8 September 1943, Italy capitulated so some of the Italian prisoners we had as patients were hired for the menial jobs which relieved some of our own men.  We did get some "filler" personnel from a replacement depot, but they never arrived on time when we needed them; many were poorly trained for hospital duties. Some of our equipment arrived at the dock in broken crates with damaged goods. In my opinion, our higher headquarters, the Surgeon General of Mediterranean Base Section did a very poor job of locating us in the above set-up.  Also, they were not prepared for us upon our arrival in Oran; it took over a month for us to become operational.