The capture of Riva Ridge and Mount Belvedere is a two-stage mountain operation in Ben Givens’s wartime recollections: Riva Ridge falls first, then the 85th takes Mount Belvedere as Ben’s company prepares to advance. The sequence emphasizes the waiting, bombardment, and movement through the lines as much as the announcements of victory, and distinguishes the units that secured the heights from Ben’s own assignment to the next objective.

Approach and Position

On a frigid, fog-bound night, Ben’s company left Vidiciatico in refitted quartermaster trucks and hiked from the foot of Mount Belvedere to its line of departure. The men dug slit trenches in rocky ground beneath steep faces dusted with fresh snow. Before the assault, Ben and Bill Stackhouse had studied an infantry map and learned the names of the surrounding promontories, while German positions remained entrenched along the ridge. The company’s approach was therefore a passage into a prepared front, not an isolated advance across open country.

The Long Wait Under Fire

After one o’clock, distant gunfire and mortar detonations reached the trenches. At first light, word came down the line that Riva Ridge had been taken, but Ben’s company remained in place through the day as German counter-barrages and artillery continued. The men waited in the February cold; Ben cleaned his BAR and ate from his pack while the firing to the north eventually quieted at dusk.

The bombardment intensified again after dark. Stackhouse used his watch to time rockets fired from Belvedere and identified the heavier rounds as 88s. Ben and the others stayed in their trenches as artillery passed overhead and explosions struck the slopes. The scene’s central rhythm is one of endurance and constrained action: information arrives in brief reports, while the men’s immediate task is to hold their position and wait for orders.

Mount Belvedere and the Next Objective

At dawn, P-47s bombed the summit of Belvedere. Ben’s company then moved up the slope and took cover behind chestnut trees. At 0700, the company commander reported that the 85th had captured Mount Belvedere and Gorgolesco. General Hays ordered the Third and First Battalions of the 85th to defend those gains against counterattacks. Ben’s own unit, the Third of the 86th, was instead directed through the front lines to take Monte Della Torraccia. The distinction matters: the capture of Belvedere is reported as an achievement of the 85th, while the 86th’s role in this sequence is to continue the advance.

Cost and Narrative Significance

As the infantry moved toward Mazzancana, the men encountered parties carrying dead soldiers away from the front and wounded men waiting for evacuation. These glimpses place the announcements of captured heights beside the human cost of the operation without making victory seem immediate or uncomplicated. The episode moves from a nighttime departure, through prolonged exposure to fire, to a tactical gain and a fresh order forward. Its ending is not a pause for celebration: Belvedere has been taken, but Ben’s company is already being sent toward another mountain objective.