WORLD WAR II Prisoners Americans at the battle of Cassino. In January 1944 the Allied advance along the Italian peninsula was blocked by German troops declared on powerful Gustav Line. For more than four months Cassino and Montecassino Abbey found themselves at the center of fierce clashes and continuous attacks and counterattacks made by the opposing sides for the possession of a hill; the banks of a river or of a group of houses. To overcome reach Rome and Cassino the Allies lost about 105;000 men in killed; wounded and missing; about 80;000 Germans. Numerous victims among the civilian population. Italy; 1944