1945 Bartolomeo 289th Engineer Combat Battalion WWII Pictorial Route Map of Western Europe

This is a 1945 John Louis Bartolomeo World War II pictorial route map of the 289th Combat Engineer Battalion in Western Europe. Pictorial vignettes highlight battles, the defeat of Germany, occupation duty, encounters with women, and parties.

A Closer Look

The map follows the 289th from Southampton, England, through France to V-E Day in Germany and occupation duty in Kaubeuren after the war. Calendar pages provide dates and cities where the headquarters and supply company set up command posts from October 22, 1944, in New York through France and Germany, ending in May 1945. Vignettes highlight a stop in Paris where the artist had his 'first French lesson' from a beautiful French woman. Campaign stars mark the Rhineland and Central Europe campaigns. The Battle of the Saar acts as one of the primary focal points and is illustrated by the battalion crossing the Saar River with German fortifications on the other side. A gigantic broken swastika and an even bigger fire await them behind the fortifications. From the Saar, the battalion moves farther into Germany, and 'Bed Check Charlie' makes his appearance. 'Deutschland alles kaput!' appears in the upper right quadrant, and V-E Day is celebrated in Göppingen. A soldier and an armored vehicle appear in Kaufbergen, where the word 'Polizei' references the battalion's role as military police. Kilroy from 'Kilroy Was Here' a classic World War II meme that generally appeared as graffiti, peeks over the border in the bottom right.

The 289th Combat Engineer Battalion in Europe

The 289th left New York on October 22, 1944, and arrived in Bristol on November 1. The battalion remained in England until December 28, when it embarked for France and arrived in Le Havre on December 31. The battalion then traveled by 40 and 8s (illustrated here) to Fort de la Mouche. The 289th first saw combat during Operation Nordwind, which helped clear the Colmar Pocket. The battalion's first major offensive was as part of Operation Undertone, the invasion of the Saarland. The 289th helped ferry infantry across the Saar River from March 17-20 and then helped with the Rhine and Necker river crossings later in the month. The battalion continued fighting in Germany until V-E Day when the Headquarters and Supply Company was stationed in Göppingen, but the forward elements of the battalion were as far away as Austria and northern Italy. The battalion was rushed to secure Kaufbeuren Air Base in southern Bavaria because U.S. intelligence believed that it was the final location of the Nazi Party's top-secret FA signals intelligence and cryptanalytic unit. The battalion remained on occupation duty until August 1945, when it was transferred to Antwerp to redeploy to the Pacific for the presumed invasion of Japan. The battalion was aboard a troopship next to the White Cliffs of Dover on August 15, 1945, when the Japanese surrender was broadcast. They were rerouted to Boston and arrived on August 28.

World War II Route Maps

Maps tracing unit movements during World War II were created by both American and British forces during and after the war. As a genre, these maps represent a broad range of aesthetics, from the purely functional that labels places and provides dates to the artistic, even comic. Many combine the three and provide a visually striking but historically informative summary of the unit's peregrinations.

Publication History and Census

This map was drawn by Technician Five John Louis Bartolomeo and published in 1945. This is the only known cataloged example. A digitized example appears in Wikipedia, but its source isn't given.