Sam Agliano died peacefully on January 21, 2022 at the age of almost 98. He was born January 29, 1924 in West Tampa and remained in Tampa his entire life. Sam is survived by his children Frank Agliano (Amy), Sarah Rivas (Rene), and David Agliano, his brother Sebastian “Buster” Agliano, grandchildren, and great grandchildren.
He was preceded in death by his wife of 69 years, Josephine Beiro Agliano and granddaughter Rosalynn Rivas, his parents Francesco and Giuseppina Agliano.
Sam graduated from H.B. Plant H.S. and the University of Florida with an accounting degree. After high school, he enlisted in the Army instead of waiting to be drafted. He served in WWII as a sergeant with the 103rd Infantry (Cactus) Division. After college graduation he worked as an accountant and then went on to create a successful, nationwide garment manufacturing company, Gator of Florida, Inc. In 1979, he bought the ownership of the Valencia Garden Restaurant from his in-laws to keep it in the family until its closure in 2009.
Sam enjoyed golf throughout the years playing at Carrollwood and Avila until his late eighties. Later, he played a weekly card game, Tonk, with some of his “younger” golf friends.
The family would like to thank his caregivers and constant companions, Odelia, Teresa, and Dania, for their excellent care, contributing to his longevity and wellbeing. Thanks to Melech Hospice House nurses and staff for a peaceful passing.
The family is holding a private graveside service. In lieu of flowers, please send donations to St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital in Sam’s memory.
World War II
Written by Sam Agliano, in 2001
Prior to Pearl Harbor, the life of a teenager of Italian descent in a neighborhood of Spaniards and Cubans seemed quite natural. Everyone spoke Spanish and as a result, I became fluent. At home, we spoke Italian. Many of my relatives never learned English, because there was not a need. Spanish was spoken in the schoolyard, but we spoke only English in the classroom. Speaking Spanish in front of a teacher at school undoubtedly resulted in a punishment.
Race relations in our neighborhood of West Tampa was never a problem. Some of the Blacks living among us were from mixed Cuban marriages, and as kids, we all played together. We developed close friendships and only truly became aware of our differences when our friends were enrolled in Black segregated schools.
One day at home as I was listening to a professional football game, the program was interrupted. Pearl Harbor had been bombed. No one at home knew where Pearl Harbor was, so we didn’t suspect that it would affect us. How wrong we were.
Soon after Pearl Harbor, the Home Guard was organized. One person on each block was designated as Captain for his block. His duties included going around and making sure no lights shone from any of the houses. The upper half of car headlights were painted black, so the light would not reflect upward. Complete darkness was the order of the day.
The armed forces became top priority. Everything was rationed, and therefore, shortages developed into a fact of life. Then they started air raid drills; small single-winged planes flew overhead and dropped bags of sand to simulate bombs, so we could feel prepared in case of an actual attack.
Joining the Army
Many volunteered for the service of our country, while some tried their best to beat being drafted. If you had job at the shipyard, you were sure to be exempt, especially if you were a welder.
I was 18 when I enlisted in the Army. When I got home and told my father, he was very upset. Upset that I couldn’t wait to be drafted and that I didn’t join the Navy. “The Navy eats good and lives clean,” he said. He had been in the Calvary in World War I. He knew Army life and combat. He didn’t want that for me. However, I wanted to do whatever I could in order to serve my country.
During my Army career, I would have three opportunities to avoid combat. When I first enlisted, I was at Camp Blanding near Jacksonville, FL, awaiting assignment. I was placed in the processing office to care for draftees coming into camp. I did such a great job on the paperwork that the captain wanted me to stay on the job. “Not me. I didn’t join the Army to be in an office. I want to go to combat.”
The second chance came when I’d already experienced combat for 6 months. By this time, I knew about war; I knew about death; I knew about combat. Yet when the opportunity to transfer to Division Headquarters presented itself, I couldn’t leave my friends. I was their Sergeant. I wouldn’t be able to look at myself if I left them now.
The third opportunity was a few weeks after the war. Our division was coming home for furlough and then they were to be transferred to the Pacific to fight Japan. The Colonel in charge of setting up the Post Exchanges in Europe saw on my resume that I had bookkeeping experience. “We’re going to live like kings. We’ll have the best of everything.” But, again, I didn’t want to leave. I replied, “My outfit is going to Japan. I’m going with them.” Fortunately, the war in the Pacific ended while I was on furlough at home.
Between arriving at Camp Blanding and being committed to combat, there were other stops along the way.
The Army was always testing to find the personnel they needed. After basic training, during which I took several tests, I was sent to Arkansas State College in Jonesboro for G2 training. G2 is the intelligence branch of the Army. My Spanish and Italian fluency would come in handy. This was in 1943 and just a few months later, the training was terminated before completion.
I was reassigned to Oklahoma A&M (Oklahoma State today) to become an engineer within two years on an accelerated educational course. After 9 months, in the spring of 1944, this program was terminated too. The Army needed infantry. D-day was just around the corner.
Combat
We entered Europe through Marseilles in what was designated as H-day, September 15, 1944. We were H-day plus twenty, and we were in reserve following the other divisions leading the fighting. Finally, we were close to combat. We couldn’t hear the shooting in the daytime, but at night you could hear. You could see the sky lighting up and hear what sounded like thunder. It was as if you were watching a storm from a distance.
The division kept moving in, ever closer, and now we started seeing the wounded being evacuated. As we marched even closer to combat, we saw the dead ones in sleeping bags landed up on the side of the road.
Finally, the day came. We were to replace the 45th at night. They were in a forest dug in, overlooking a valley of farmland. We were to replace them in their foxholes and gun positions.
It was very dark. We stumbled in the dark; we ran into trees, fell, got up, and couldn’t find where we were supposed to be. The one thing you don’t do in combat is turn on a light. When someone turned on his flashlight, in no time, the Germans started hitting us with artillery. The 45th didn’t wait to be replaced. They took off for the rear. Most of us never found the positions we were meant to take over and just lay down and tried to get some sleep. Fortunately, the Germans didn’t have the right range, and all the shells were hitting behind us. We had no casualties.
In the morning as the sun rose, we looked down in the valley, and it was beautiful. The green crop that grew in the field, a small white farmhouse with an orange tiled roof. All looked so peaceful. This would become an aid station for the wounded. Our objective was to cross the valley, traverse a narrow river, and go up the other side of the valley.
I was a machine gunner. We set up the weapon on the edge of the retaining wall holding the rocks from sliding down the road below. The jump from the edge of the wall to the road below was about 10-12 feet. As the riflemen jumped, they were being picked off. All hell broke loose. We fired to give them cover across the valley from where the shooting was coming by razing the area.
As our company ran across the valley, the machine gun section got ready to jump down. We hadn’t been able to see directly below us, and as I jumped, I realized that many never made it across the road. Dead lay with the wounded who were calling for help.
My assistant gunner dropped the 48-pound machine gun, and I caught it and disappeared into the green crop growing in the field. I’ve got the gun cradled in my arms. My assistant has the tripod, and my ammo bearer has the ammunition. The gun is useless. I get up, run, and disappear. I keep repeating running and diving into the crop. I’m lying there exhausted and trying to catch my breath.
Suddenly, less than 10 yards away, a German in a camouflage jacket jumps up in front of me. He has his arms over his head. He wants to surrender. It is a good thing. The only weapon I have is a 45 Colt in my holster, and I can’t use it because I’m cradling a machine gun with no ammo in my arms. I motion him to move to my rear. He goes a few yards, and he is cut down.
We finally get to the edge of the river. The Germans are razing up and down. The only way to get across is by timing the German machine gun shooting. I figure I have too much to carry. I take off my field pack, abandoning my blanket, rations, and my toiletries.
Once we cross the river, we set up the machine gun. Everything and everyone are wet. I start to fire into the undergrowth of the forest. Three Germans jump up and surrender.
We find a German foxhole and set up our gun. The Germans are retreating, and it has gotten dark. My assistant gunner and I wrap ourselves in his blanket and eat his rations with some bread the Germans had left.
As everything got quiet, names can be heard softly being whispered: “Reynolds, DeGarmo, Sack.” These are some of the 54 that were either wounded, killed, or broke down crying like babies and had to be evacuated. Some stuttered and some became speechless. The first day of combat is over. I am never to be a boy again; I now know what dying is all about.
Being in the combat infantry is not all about fighting and shooting. Infantry is about being cold, wet, and hungry. It’s about not having any toothbrush from October through January (when I finally got my replacement) or not taking a bath from October to December 23rd. In fact, I didn’t take my clothes off during that period at all. However, I did take my shoes off nightly and changed socks of which I had two pairs. One I wore while I kept the other next to my body to dry them. It was important to massage your feet and change socks, or you could get trench feet. If you got trench feet, they would have to cut your toes off. We never knew anybody who lost his toes, but we didn’t take our chances.
Combat is an everyday thing. Day in and day out, we were part of small skirmishes. Some days, no one gets killed. Other days, a handful. When the enemy is retreating, you keep advancing, not giving them any rest for an opportunity to regroup. The details of all those days and skirmishes have become muddled. I can see them clearly in my mind, but I can’t remember the name of the place where some of them occurred.
The big battles, you remember. Like when my company and I were the first to penetrate Germany on the Seventh Army front, breaking through the Siegfried Line at Bobenthal, and ran the Germans out so fast they left warm Army food on the stove. We knew they would counter-attack. We were now in Germany. We dug in. We were ready in the forest outside of Bobenthal, but they didn’t hit us with infantry. They laid a barrage of incendiary artillery shells and set the whole forest on fire. Now I know how a rabbit feels in a forest fire. We were ordered to retreat, but we could not find our way out. Every direction you ran, it seemed you ran into a wall of fire.
Once we got out, we were given a few days away from combat. General McAulife--famous for saying “Nuts!” to the Germans-- was our Division Commander. He came over to tell us how proud he was of our company, and when we got ready to go back to Germany, he was going to let us be first again. Almost in unison, we all yelled, “Hell, no! Let someone else be first!”
Battle of the Bulge
During the Battle of the Bulge, our unit was in the Alsace Lorraine area. We were pulled out and transferred to Forbach to contain the German breakthrough. We were on the flank of the German penetration. We stayed there until January 17, 1945 when we were rushed back to the area abound Strasbourg where the Germans had broken through the area that we had left only four weeks before.
We were to take Sessenheim. That morning, starting at about 5 a.m., our artillery pounded the city for about an hour before our riflemen with four tanks started across some open farmland. As a Sergeant, I was told not to cross over or use the road that ran parallel to our area of attack. The road was supposedly mined.
That morning our company strength was 132 men. As we advanced in the dark, we could see the silhouettes of German soldiers against the flames in the background. The Germans were waiting for us. They opened up with everything they had. Their 88’s flying over our heads aimed at ground-level sounded like jets racing above us.
In no time, our first four tanks were hit. Bodies are flying through the air. Our second four tanks following us open fire with their cannons and machine guns. Now we are caught in crossfire, and there is no place to hide. The road is elevated above ground level. I take my squad across the road about which I’d been warned. Thankfully, there were no mines. We use the road as protection and set our gun about 75 yards from the edge of town. The Germans load and fire their 88’s. We hit some as they load, but they keep firing. Shells are flying. Seven of our tanks have been hit, and the eighth heads retreating toward our gun position. Jerry and GIs are calling for their mothers, and medics are everywhere. Some of our lead troops are cut off from us. By 10 a.m., Captain Hemic crawls behind my gun position and orders me to go back to the forest where we started. His order was “There is no one left. Get back.” Soon after, I helped to evacuate Hemic, Session, and Bremmer. '
We started with 132 men at 6 a.m., and by 10 a.m., we had only 22. The Germans left Sessenheim that night. I spent the rest of the day and all the night by myself under an Army truck with my machine gun. Fortunately, there wasn’t a counterattack. We didn’t know that they too had suffered heavy losses. Through May 1945, we had many more battles, but none like this.
World War II Victory
In July, I was on my way home with plans to later go to the Pacific. By August 14, 1945, I was home in Tampa, and we celebrated V-J Day (Victory over Japan). I was driving my young cousins, and our picture appears on the front page of The Tampa Daily Times.
Downtown Tampa was a mass of humanity. Celebration was unbelievable with horns blowing and flags waving.
It was a happy time for some, but, for us, we had hard memories. The war certainly had changed my life completely. Before the war, I was a youngster who had never eaten in a restaurant or been further than 30 miles from home. I was in awe the first days of Army life. I thought the people were bigger than God because they were Majors, Colonels, Generals. That was, until I had to do latrine duty and found they sat on the john just like we all do and put on their pants one leg at a time.
I learned to judge people not by their appearance, but by their substance. Some who looked like the perfect hero in a movie turned out to be a cream puff, and some that you would normally overlook were the ones you want when times get tough.
In the nine months of combat, I had six company commanders and some real heroes that today number among my friends fifty-six years later. We have mutual respect for each other. We know where we have been, we know how we did it, and we know who we are. Even though less than 10 of us remain, we still meet annually.
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