MEMORIES OF SERVICE
IN THE SECOND PLATOON,
COMPANY K, 407TH INFANTRY
March 1944 –
September 1945
MEMORIES OF SERVICE
IN THE SECOND PLATOON,
COMPANY K, 407TH INFANTRY
March 1944 – September 1945
Edited by
Paul N. Haubenreich
and William L. Schaible
Printed September
1995
CONTENTS
OFFICERS AND MEN OF THE SECOND
PLATOON
SECOND PLATOON CHRONOLOGY
PREFACE
FOREWORD
1. PREPARING
FOR OVERSEAS
1.1.
Camp Swift
1.2.
Troop Train
1.3.
Fort Dix
1.4.
Camp Kilmer
2. CROSSING
THE ATLANTIC
2.1.
Embarkation
2.2.
Life on a Troopship
3. MOVING
TO THE FRONT
3.1.
Normandy
3.2.
A Different Troop Train
3.3.
Across the Border
4. FIRST
SHOTS
4.1.
Into the Front line
4.2.
First Day at the Front
4.3.
Events in the Nights
4.4.
Making Ourselves at Home
4.5.
The Island 4.6 Random Shots
4.6.
In Division Reserve
5. EDEREN
5.1 First Views
5.1.
Artillery
5.2.
Buried Alive
5.3.
A Combat Patrol
6. WELZ
6.1.
Riflemen's Views of the Battle
6.2.
After the Assault
6.3.
A Glimpse Through an Enemy's Eyes
6.4.
Civilians under Fire at Welz
7. HOLDING
THE LINE
7.1.
Recuperation
7.2.
Laying Wire and Digging Holes
7.2.1. Christmas,
1944
7.2.2. An
Unforgettable New Year's Day
7.3.
On the Front Line at Lindern and Linnich
7.3.1. Friendly
(?) Fire on a Snowy Night
7.3.2. Trading
Hand Grenades
7.3.3. Frigid
Outpost in the "Roer Pocket"
7.3.4. A
Flood in the Night
8. ATTACKING
ACROSS THE ROER TO THE RHINE
8.1.
Preparations for Roer Crossing
8.1.1. A
"Dry Run"
8.1.2. A
Night of Confusion
8.1.3. A
Night on the Dike
8.2.
D-Day Crossing
8.2.1. Barrage
8.2.2. The
Crossing
8.2.3. On
the Far Side
8.3.
Movement and Battles
8.4.
At the Rhine
9. SWEEPING
FROM THE RHINE TO THE ELBE
9.1.
Mopping Up Bypassed Forces
9.2.
The Watch at the Elbe
10. AWAITING TRANSPORT
TO JAPAN
10.1. Gross
Garz
10.2. Nauendorf,
Thuringia
10.3. Iggensbach,
Lower Bavaria
10.4. The
End
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
|
1 July 1944
|
Arrive at Fort Dix, New Jersey on troop train from Camp
Swift, Texas.
|
|
4 Sep
|
Move to Camp Kilmer (staging area for New York Port of Embarkation).
|
|
12 Sep
|
Depart Staten Island, NY aboard S.S. Santa Paula.
|
|
23 Sep
|
Cross English Channel from Weymouth, anchor in Cherbourg
harbor.
|
|
23 Sep
|
Go ashore, move to Area M, near St. Pierre Eglise. Go into
bivouac.
|
|
23 0ct
|
Hike 14 miles to Valognes, depart in 40-&-8 car in
troop train.
|
|
27 0ct
|
Arrive Hasselt, Belgium, ride trucks to Brunssum,
Netherlands, hike into Germany, bivouac between Brunssum and Teveren.
|
|
29 0ct
|
Hike into Teveren, take over defenses from 29th Division
troops. Guard "Island," patrol, forage. Saunders killed by
artillery shell.
|
|
12 Nov
|
Relieved by British 43rd Division, move to rear.
|
|
24 Nov
|
Bivouac in forest by British artillery near Dutch-German
border.
|
|
25 Nov
|
Ride trucks, then hike to Puffendorf. Wait until midnight.
|
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28 Nov
|
Hike on to Ederen, relieve 406th Infantry troops.
|
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30 Nov
|
Combat patrol hits corner ofWelz, Mansour shot.
|
|
1 Dec
|
Attack; take Welz from 10th SS Panzers. Radice, Hurley
killed, many wounded
|
|
1 Dec
|
Get replacements: Love and Hansen.
|
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2 Dec
|
Actions under fire in and around Welz. Amore, Love killed,
more wounded.
|
|
5 Dec
|
Move toward Rurdorf. Return to reserve in Welz.
|
|
8 Dec
|
Replacements: Reist, Voccio, Milgate, Pokorski, Phillips,
Schmidt, Summers Ride trucks to Eigelshoven, Holland for
"rehabilitation." "Battle of the Bulge" starts. Pull out
of Eigelshoven.
|
|
16 Dec
|
Arrive back at Welz.
|
|
17 Dec
|
Move into foxholes near Gereonsweiler. Start laying wire
and digging holes.
|
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19 Dec
|
Move into house at edge of Gereonsweiler. Continue work on
defenses.
|
|
24 Dec
|
Christmas Day. Leaflets, dinner and religious services.
Then back to work.
|
|
25 Dec 1944
|
Somers arrives, is killed. Baron, DelaO, Francolini,
Lahti, Phillips wounded.
|
|
1 Jan 1945
|
Lt. Welti sick; goes to rear, never to return to Second
Platoon.
|
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15 Jan
|
Lt. John Wilson arrives, takes over as Platoon Leader.
|
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18 Jan
|
Move up to Linnich (Smith's birthday).
|
|
20 Jan
|
Spearhead across Roer aborted by flood.
|
|
9 Feb
|
Cross the Roer on footbridge, under artillery fire.
Schaible wounded.
|
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23 Feb
|
Fight at Erkeleaz. Phillips killed, others wounded.
|
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26 Feb
|
Advance past Wickrath to Rheydt
|
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28 Feb
|
Begin rest and rehabilitation near Krefeld
|
|
4 Mar
|
Take up position on Rhine
|
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11 Mar
|
Cross the Rhine at Wesel, in trucks with lights on.
|
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4 Apr
|
Hit by Panzers near Fallersleben. Wheat, Eller wounded.
Three captured.
|
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21 Apr
|
Move up to Elbe at Heinrichsburg.
|
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27 Apr
|
Victory in Europe Day
|
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7 May
|
Move to Gross Garz
|
|
? May
|
Move to Nauendorf
|
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2 June
|
Move to lggensbach
|
|
3-6 July
|
Hear the news: Japan has surrendered! We won't have to
invade!
|
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15 Aug
|
Move to Lichtenfels for occupation duty.
|
|
5 Sep 1945
|
Ozark Division returns to U.S.A.
|
PREFACE
Someone, talking about memories, aptly said, "When an
old person dies, it is like a library burning down." What you have in hand
is a slim volume that was put together from fragments in several
"libraries" that were about to "burn down." It is a
collection of memories, most of which were put on paper between 45 and 50 years
after the events, by some of the men who were involved.
These memoirs will not interest everyone. We would
not feel hurt if we knew that you were asking yourself: "Why should I take
the time to read this stuff?" That is a question that each person should
answer for himself after learning just what the writers tried to do.
If you are related to one of the men of the Second
Platoon, we hope you will read what we have written because you are likely to
learn something that is personally significant. If, on the other hand, you are
unrelated to any of us, you could be thinking something like this: "Scores
of books have been written about World War Two; so why has anyone bothered to
write yet another account of events that happened almost half a century
earlier? What is in it that is unlike what I have already read?" For you
we offer the following remarks.
This is an authentic, personal account by the
surviving members of the Second Platoon; the word "we" appears in
almost every paragraph. We have tried in some places, along with the factual
account, to describe what the experience was like for us, how it felt to be in
that foxhole or cellar or wherever we were. Few books try to do this; even
fewer succeed.
The critical reader who wasn't there may be
distracted by the obvious deficiencies in our writing. You must realize that
most of us are not especially articulate and all of us are inexperienced in
writing history. We hope you are not turned off, but make no apology. We are
writing mostly for ourselves, for whom these defects are unimportant, and for
our posterity, who we hope can overlook them. Unlike the general reader, we
need only a reminder of some episode to bring the scene to our minds' eyes.
Thus we neglect to paint a complete word picture of the surroundings. The years
1944-45 was a period in our young lives that left indelible impressions and
memories. Thus, the mere mention of a familiar event triggers a flood of
memories; some bad, some humorous.
We believe that the facts are reasonably accurate.
We realize, however, that even eyewitness accounts are imperfect; what a
witness sees is colored by his viewpoint and his emotions at the time.
Especially with regard to our stories about combat, we witnesses freely admit
that at the time we were under great emotional stress and our attention was
usually focused on something immediately ahead of us rather than on trying to
comprehend everything going on in the panorama around us. As for the effects of
time on memories, we can only note that after 45 years the agreement among us
as to what happened was better than one might expect. We were at an impressionable
age and the nature of some of the events was such that the memories won't fade,
even if we want them to.
The question of what we have written is easier to
answer than why we have written it.
All of us hope that our families will want to know more
about us. We imagine some young person reading with interest what happened to
Granddaddy. We have tried to give this person a fuller and clearer picture than
he could possibly get from family traditions passed down by word of mouth or
from any history book about the war, written from a more distant perspective.
But that doesn't answer the question of why we think
our experience is worth recording for posterity. Our feelings have something to
do with the nature and historical importance of World War Two and more to do
with our attitudes toward military service and combat in that most
earth-shaking of all conflicts. In war we were brought face to face with some
realities about life and death that transcend the concerns that later came to
preoccupy our minds: jobs, automobiles, entertainment and the like.
We feel a need to tell someone that for us it was
not like the picture of war in some movies. As critic Richard Bernstein wrote
in the New York Times, "For several years now, as the movies have focused
on the Vietnam War, combat has come to be portrayed as destructive not only of
life and limb (which obviously it always is) but also of personal values,
morals and the very spirit of comradeship. The battlefield is pictured as a
place where conflicts among soldiers on the same side go from bad to worse and
the spirit of brotherhood dissolves in the general horror." We want to say
that it was not like that for us in 1944. In training together and later on the
battlefield, we developed extraordinary loyalties and "a spirit of
brotherhood" that for at least some of us has survived for decades.
Perhaps you will get a message from what we have
remembered and written. Perhaps not; if you discover nothing profound,
attribute it to our inability to put our feelings into words that convey what
we want you to understand. We went through some things that affected us for the
rest of our lives, but are hard to pass on to those who were fortunate enough
to miss the kind of experiences we had.
FOREWORD
In one of Bill Mauldin's cartoons, Willy and Joe are in a
foxhole in Italy, reading in Stars and Stripes about the invasion of France.
One says to the other: "The hell this ain't the most important foxhole in
the world — I'm in it!" Mauldin had something there. Those who were
in the Second Platoon, Company K, 407th Infantry feel sort of like that about
our Platoon. When we try to be objective, however, we admit that among infantry
platoons in Europe in World War Two, our platoon was more typical than
outstanding.
Our Division, the 102d, was called the "Ozark
Division" but thanks to the draft, we in the Second Platoon came from all
parts of the U.S.A., from various ethnic backgrounds. The great majority of us
were between 18 and 21 years of age when we went into combat. Only some of the
sergeants were older, with more experiences in civilian life. Most of us
learned a lot about death before we had a chance to learn much about life.
The Second Platoon was also probably somewhere near
the middle of any scale that might be used to measure the experience of a rifle
platoon in combat. In that regard, we tend to think of the extent and quality
of suffering rather than the number of battle stars on the theater ribbon or
the number of citations or medals that got handed out, or even the number of
days on line. The casualty list is a more relevant indicator. A glance at the
list for the Second Platoon will show that "battle-scarred" is not an
empty phrase when applied to this unit. Less than one-third of the 39 enlisted
men who went overseas in the Second Platoon remained with the platoon
continuously until the end of the fighting. During six months of combat, four
of the 39 were killed, 19 were wounded and four others were transferred out
because they were physically or emotionally disabled.
The nominal strength of a rifle Platoon was 40 men
and one officer. The attrition due to deaths, wounds or other incapacitation
was such that a total of more than twice that many served for a time in the
Platoon. Some served only briefly; two replacements were killed during their
first day with the Platoon. The chart at the beginning of these memoirs lists
the names of the two officers and 88 enlisted men who served in the Second
Platoon between the time we arrived in Europe in September 1944 and the end of
fighting there in May 1945. The symbols beside the names in the chart tell
something about our experiences. A heart means a wound for which the Order of
the Purple Heart was bestowed. 'In many cases, the wound was so severe that the
man never returned to combat. In other cases, the man came back to the Second
Platoon after hospital treatment and recuperation. A cross means the man was
killed. We did not have any missing. We did, however, have three men who were
captured near the end of the war by a die-hard German force trying to link up
with others for a last stand. All three escaped after a couple of days and
wound up back "home" in the Platoon.
The titles in the table of contents give some feel
for the Platoon's history. The table entitled "Second Platoon
Chronology" lists some of the important events in that history.
After V-E Day the Platoon began training in
preparation for taking part in the invasion of the Japanese homeland. While
awaiting shipping space, we pulled occupation duty. The surrender of Japan,
following the use of the atomic bombs, spared us from further bloodshed. Not
long afterwards, transfers involved in the demobilization process began to
scatter the veterans of the Platoon and in March 1946, when we returned to the
States, the dispersal was completed.
Over the years we went in all kinds of directions,
both geographically as well as with regard to careers. Most of us remained in
touch with only one or two or three buddies. Decades after the 102d Infantry
Division Association began to have annual reunions, during the time that our
Jim Harris was Association President, eleven members of the Platoon got
together, most of us for the first time since the war. Out of that came the
idea of a separate Platoon Reunion, where we could have more time in the
company of just the men with whom we had been closest during the War.
Jim Harris had the idea and was a prime mover in an
effort in 1984-85 to get in touch with as many survivors of the Platoon as
possible. The result was a reunion in September 1985 in a mountainside lodge
above Gatlinburg, Tennessee, at which 14 of the veterans were present. Most of
us came with some apprehension about how well we would hit it off with people
we had known for only a few months and had not seen for 40 years afterwards. We
need not have worried. There seemed to be few, if any, hard feelings left over
from the old days. Instead everyone enjoyed reminiscing. We seemed to
selectively remember with wry amusement some of the circumstances and events.
Along with the laughter, however, there was a recognition of the extraordinary
bond of comradeship that had been forged in combat.
At the 1985 Gatlinburg reunion there was general
enthusiasm for pulling together a written history of the Platoon, from Camp
Swift, Texas, in the spring of 1944 through the return from Europe, in March
1946. How something got done is described in the Acknowledgement at the end of
the report.
What you have in hand might be regarded as a draft,
in that the editors (Schaible and Haubenreich) still welcome additions or
corrections from other members of the Platoon. On the other hand, there is no
assurance that it will ever be more than what you see. What Hitler's forces
didn't do, time soon will; the surviving witnesses' leases on life are fast
running o
