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d o g f a c e  s o l d i e r   V I P s

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surf section : Jacob Devers || Alexander Patch
Mark W. Clark || LUCIAN K. TRUSCOTT JR.
Edward H. Brooks || John W. O'Daniel
John E. Dahlquist || William W. Eagles
Jean de Lattre || Sir Harold Alexander
George C. Marshall || Audie L. Murphy
Keith L. Ware || Lucian Adams
Russell E. Dunham || Wilburn K. Ross
John J. Tominac || James P. Connor
David C. Waybur || Otto Skorzeny
Hiroshi Oshima
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3rd Division Patch      « «   RETREAT  |||  ADVANCE   » »

Lucian K. Truscott - 3rd Infantry Division - VI Corps - Fifth Army WWII
 
 

3rd Division  6 Corps  5th Army



Lucian K. Truscott

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LUCIAN KING TRUSCOTT JR. (1895-1965)
enlisted in the U.S. Army prior to WWI. He was selected for officer training and was commissioned in the cavalry in 1917.

Early in WWII he joined Admiral Louis Mountbatten's Combined Operations Headquarters where he aided arrangements for the transfer of the American command to England. While at this post, Truscott studied and observed the training of Allied commando units later deployed at Dieppe and North Africa. Truscott had personal witness to the Dieppe Raid from one of its command ships.

In October 1942, Truscott trained troops in amphibious assault in Chesapeake Bay in preparation of Operation Torch. Under General Patton's Westen Task Force Truscott commanded the 60th Infantry Division assault on Port Lyautey in November 1942. He next served under General Eisenhower establishing a forward-leaning Allied command post in Constantine, Tunisia. General Truscott witnessed and reported the action surrounding the Battle for Kasserine Pass from forward command posts.

He took charge of the 3rd Division in March 1943 and began a rigorous training regimin to see if the ordinary infantry soldier could perform to the standard of the rangers and commandos he observed in England. During this successful training, Truscott pushed soldiers to a five-mile-an-hour pace beyond the three-hour pace in the manual. The march became known as the Truscott Trot. The challenge and success of turning the 3rd Division soldier into a better soldier set a basis for success and elan that is still part of the 3rd Division today while distinguishing the division as one of the most aggressive and successful infantry ground forces in the Mediterranean and European theaters during WWII.

Truscott was ordered to take the 3rd Division to the front to assist the final blow in Tunisia in May 1943. After a successful division move into II Corps command and a quick relief of First Infantry Division troops the battle for Tunisia ended.

Following even more training near Bizerte, Truscott led the division's assault into Sicily in July 1943 with daring accomplishments pressed by Seventh Army Commander George Patton. After the taking of Salerno and Naples Truscott led the division into the Italian mountains to join the fight against the Gustav Line. Withdrawn in November 1943, Truscott's division landed at Anzio on January 22, 1944 where he assumed command of VI Corps from General John Lucas in February.

Under Truscott's VI Corps command, the 3rd Division and the First Armored Division led the charge out of the Anzio Beachhead in May 1944. VI Corps troops led the Fifth Army into Rome on June 4, 1944.

Considered expert on amphibious warfare, Truscott help direct planning and training for the invasion of France by the Seventh Army and led VI Corps up the Rhone River Valley and through the Vosges Mountains. In October 1944 he was assigned to the 15th Army.

Truscott replaced General Mark Clark as commander of the Fifth Army in December 1944. He succeeded George Patton as 3rd Army commander and military governor of Bavaria in September 1945 after Patton's removal from the post.

After retiring from the Army, Truscott wrote his memoir, Command Missions in 1954. Truscott died on September 12, 1965, in Alexandria, Virginia.

3rd Division Patch      « «   RETREAT  |||  ADVANCE   » »


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