page_title: 8th Infantry Division (India)
section_title: Cassino
hierarchical_section_title: 8th Infantry Division (India) / History / Italy / Cassino
caption_attribution_description: English: The British Army in Italy 1944 Men of 'A' Company of the 5th Royal West Kents advance along a road past an abandoned German 75mm anti-tank gun in the Rapido bridgehead, 16 May 1944.
context_page_description: The 8th Mountain Division was raised as the 8th Indian Infantry division of the British Indian Army. It is now part of the Indian Army and specialises in mountain warfare.
  The 8th was formed as an infantry division in Meerut on 25 October 1940 under Major-General Charles Harvey, a British Indian Army officer, as part of the Indian Army during World War II. It served in the Middle East in the garrisoning of Iraq and then the invasion of Persia to secure the oil fields of the area for the Allies. A brigade was detached to the Western Desert to reinforce the British Eighth Army as it withdrew before the Axis forces. Following training in the Near East, the division entered the Italian Campaign landing at Taranto on mainland Italy.
  The division was disbanded at the end of World War II but re-formed again in 1962 as a specialist mountain division of the Indian Army.
context_section_description: When the spring came the 8th Indian Division was switched in great secrecy (along with the bulk of the British Eighth Army, now commanded by Lieutenant-General Sir Oliver Leese) 60 miles west across the Apennine Mountains to concentrate as part of Lieutenant-General Sidney C. Kirkmans British XIII Corps, serving alongside the British 4th and 78th Infantry Division, 6th Armoured Divisions, as well as the 1st Canadian Armoured Brigade, along the River Garigliano at a part of the river better known as the Gari. Their heavily opposed night crossing of the Gari in May 1944, supported by Canadian tanks (1st Canadian Armoured Brigade) with which the division had formed a particularly close fighting relationship over the previous six months, was critical to the Allies' success in this, the fourth and final Battle of Monte Cassino. Following this, the division advanced some 240 miles in June across mountainous country, fighting many actions against rearguards and defended strongpoints. In late June they had reached Assisi and the division was rested. It was during the fighting on the Gari that Kamal Ram of the 3rd Battalion, 8th Punjab Regiment was awarded his Victoria Cross. At 19 years of age, he was one of the youngest recipients of the VC during the Second World War.
caption: Men of 'A' Company of the 5th Battalion, Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment advance along a road past an abandoned German 75mm anti-tank gun in the Rapido bridgehead, Italy, 16 May 1944.
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