Colone Jim Gavin - 505th PIR - 82nd Airborne Division

Jim Gavin: The General Who Jumped First
July 11, 1943, was one of the most unforgettable days of Jim Gavin’s life. It was on this, the second day of the Sicily Campaign, that he demonstrated the courage and leadership skills that would soon propel him to become, at age 37, the U.S. Army’s youngest major general and division commander of World War II. The airborne operation that preceded the invasion of Sicily had taken place the night of July 9 –10, 1943, with Colonel Gavin’s 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 82nd Airborne Division as the spearhead unit. Their mission was to seize key sectors of the invasion front to prevent the Germans and Italians from launching counterattacks against Lieutenant General George S. Patton’s Seventh Army before it could secure a foothold along Sicily’s southern coast. The drop, however, was a complete fiasco due to high winds, poor navigation by inexperienced pilots, and badly designed aerial routes. Of the 3,400 paratroopers of the 505th who left Tunisia that July evening, scarcely 100 were dropped near their intended landing zones. Most of the regiment was scattered over 1,000 square miles of southern Sicily.
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