The enemy gave them the name “The Devil’s Brigade.” They were an elite commando force launched with 1,800 volunteers who took on the most dangerous suicide missions in World War II. In their 251 days of combat they suffered 2,314 casualties while capturing more than 30,000 prisoners. They never failed a mission.
And on Tuesday, Feb 3, more than 70 years after their last battle, the 42 surviving members were honored when the force received the Congressional Gold Medal in Washington, D.C.
North Bergen resident Paul Novembre was among the men who traveled to the nation’s capital to receive a tribute as a member of this influential force, the model for future units including the Green Berets, Navy SEALS, and Delta Force.
Now 90 years old, Novembre served with the unit, officially known as the First Special Service Force, in Italy and France, moving in advance of regular troops and penetrating behind enemy lines in dangerous tactical operations.
Anyone who owns a copy of the Ken Burns World War II video documentary “The War” has seen Paul Novembre. That’s his picture on the inside cover, burying a dead German soldier with the help of his friend, Baptista Piccolomini.
Joining the Devil’s Brigade
“I was 18 in September of ’42,” said Novembre. Volunteering for service at his earliest opportunity, he was in active duty by March of 1943, serving in the Signal Corps in North Africa.
“I never saw any action in Signal Corps,” he said. “They don’t fight. They lay wire, connect phones, and they keep operations open as best they can. That’s what I was doing.”
Novembre was in Casablanca on layover when he saw a demonstration that changed his life. “I was awaiting assignment and these men came down, the force and the rangers, looking for volunteers. They showed all the equipment that you would get and I had nothing like that. I had blankets, and I don’t care how many blankets you use, you could never get warm. I saw that sleeping bag, I raised my hand, and I volunteered. I said, ‘That’s for me.’”
Printed on the cards were the unit’s red arrowhead insignia and the words “The worst is yet to come,” in German.
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Still a teenager, Novembre was considerably younger than most of the men in the force, whose average age was 26. He knew upfront that the assignment was dangerous. “They told them, ‘In this outfit we don’t know if you’re coming back,’ ” recalled his wife, Arlene.
“As a replacement we went to three weeks of training,” said Novembre. “It was hell. Basic training was nothing compared to those three weeks. Rapeling, climbing. And believe you me, it paid off.”
By February of 1944, Novembre was at the Anzio beachhead south of Rome. “I was on Anzio a long time,” he said. “They never pushed us off. The Germans thought we had a division. If they knew we were only 1,800 men they could have pushed us right back into the border.”
“One time we went through five miles of water to get behind them,” said Novembre. “Walking through ice water. We got them. They were surprised.”
The force fought for a grueling 99 days straight on Anzio, with Novembre suffering shrapnel wounds and receiving a Purple Heart and Bronze Star. “We had a motto: never leave anybody back,” he said. “If they got shot, carry them with us. Never leave anybody behind.”
Among his fellow soldiers was a man named Baptista Piccolomini, known as Piccolo, who would remain a lifelong friend. “Piccolo was a nut job, he wasn’t afraid of nothing,” remembered Novembre. “Him and another guy, they held off a counterattack alone, on Anzio, just the two of them, and they stopped [the Germans] one night. There was never a better soldier.”
It was on Anzio that the force acquired their nickname “The Devil’s Brigade.” Legend has it that that a German officer’s journal found by the allies contained an entry reading, “The Black Devils are all around us every time we come into the line, and we never hear them come.” The entry was a reference to the Allied soldiers smearing their faces with black boot polish to carry out covert operations in the dead of night.
Also while on Anzio the force began their tradition of leaving calling cards on dead German soldiers as psychological warfare. Printed on the cards were the unit’s red arrowhead insignia and the words “The worst is yet to come,” in German.
Sweeping through Europe
Following the devastating battles on Anzio, the force moved north to liberate Rome on June 4, 1944. “We lost a lot of men,” said Novembre. “I remember when we got up to Rome, 400 of us were left.”
From there the force was shipped to the coast of France in advance of other Allied troops to begin a new campaign of attacking and terrorizing the enemy. “We landed in Southern France and swept out everything to the Italian border,” he said. “Once we reached the Italian border we stopped and cleaned it all out, got the Germans out, and we were there for a while.”
“Frederick, the officer in charge, he was something else again,” recalled Novembre of Lt. Col. Robert T. Frederick, the recipient of eight purple hearts. “That was a man that believed that officers and noncommissioned officers lead, you don’t stay behind and let them go. You couldn’t ask for a better leader. He was great. We loved him.”
Novembre himself went to become a master sergeant. “I had a squad of 11, 12 under me.” he said. “All Irish. All of them from ninth avenue [in New York]. All Westies. They were something.”
He deserved to be buried’
“One day I buried one of them,” recalled Novembre of the incident depicted in the famous photograph of him and Piccolo used in the Ken Burns documentary and displayed on the wall of the Ottowa War Museum. Novembre was a private at the time, entrenched with the force alongside the Mussolini Canal in Anzio. The German soldier was one of the enemy troops killed in an assault attempt on the force.
“We were in that position and he was laying maybe six feet from me,” said Novembre. “And every day I’d look at him and look at him. He was the only guy that made it up to our position. The rest of them fell back, shot and everything. But he was the only one that managed to get up there. I said this isn’t right. That guy was good. He was fighting for his country. He didn’t deserve to be out there like that. He deserved to be buried.”
So Private Novembre measured the body and found a spot to dig a grave. “I laid him in there, covered his face with a handkerchief, threw all the dirt on him,” he said. “His rifle I put at his head, his dog tags on the carry strap, and his helmet on top of the rifle, so when grave registration came around they’d know who was in that hole. They’d know it was a German.”
A career soldier
The First Special Service Force was disbanded in December of 1944. “By that time the war was pushing on and they didn’t need us to go in advance anymore,” said Novembre. “The Canadians went back to the English army and we established the 474th Infantry regiment.”
Novembre went on to participate in the invasion of Norway before his service ended. “I was discharged after it was all over,” he recalled, but “after two weeks I said I can’t stand this and I volunteered to go back. I went down to the recruiter. Europe was all over but the other war was just starting.”
Sent to the Pacific theater this time and stationed in Okinawa, Novembre continued a distinguished career in the U.S. military. In the 1950s he served in Korea, where he received the Purple Heart after being shot by a sniper.
“Every time a military action would come up they would call him,” remembered his daughter, Paulette. “Like when the Berlin Wall was going up, they moved my father immediately to the wall, because of his background.” When the Cuban Missile Crisis occurred he was called upon once again and stationed in the area.
In 1965, Paul Novembre retired from the military. He has been married for 63 years to Arlene, a girl he met at a dance in Hoboken. And now, seven decades after serving in the elite and influential First Special Service Force, he has achieved national recognition for his important and perilous service to his country.
“Brave men like Mr. Novembre built our country into what it is today,” said North Bergen Mayor Nicholas Sacco. “Without the incredible heroism he and so many other members of his generation showed we might not have the free and open society we enjoy today. I commend Mr. Novembre on receiving this wonderful recognition and on behalf of the Township of North Bergen want to thank him for his service.”
Paul Novembre will receive a proclamation from the mayor and town commissioners at the next commissioners meeting on Wednesday, Feb. 25.
Art Schwartz may be reached at arts@hudsonreporter.com.