Combat
Pfc. Roy Van Arsdall 15306087
Hq. Co., 3 Bn., 411th Inf.
c/o Postmaster, N.Y., N.Y., APO 470
September 1944 - February 1945


Shipped Out!!
September 29, 1944
Dear Mother,
Looks like from now it’ll be, “Dear -----, Feeling fine. Love, ---”.
I haven’t the slightest idea what to say without making a scrapbook of this letter.
We had a good trip, Pullman and troop sleeper, 3 meals a day, and not very crowded. Stopped the train twice for 30 minutes and took calisthenics (Bull! Can’t even say that!!) I rubbed it out. Just had to tear up a whole sheet. Darn!! We can’t write anything!! Not even a phone call without an emergency.
Didn’t come close to home at all. Didn’t come through St. Louis, but saw a lot of Lake Erie. That’s very close to Margie. (Send her pictures now). All I can tell you is that I’m on the Eastern coast.
Camp is pretty, food better than before, weather pouring rain, dark, foggy--just regular messy fall weather. When we left the Colonel said, “This is it, men. This is what we’ve waited for for two long years. We’re on our way!” (I wouldn’t say this is what I’ve waited for.)
Your mail will not be censored so write what you wish.
You can’t imagine the ‘don’ts’ that are in this censoring. It really took an effort to think of even this much.
When we get home, which will be a h--- of a time away, I’m afraid, then I can tell you the works. But when I do get back I’m gonna forget the word “army”, but quick.
Candy is 3 cents and cigarettes 10 cents. Soon cigarettes will be only 5 cents a pack.
Haven’t the slightest idea when or where I’ll go.
I give up! There just aint nuthin’ I can say!
Love,
Roy
P.S. - Write letters. Forget about Christmas. I don’t know what you can send. Save the money. I’ll ask for anything I need.
October 3, 1944
Dear Mother,
Just had a pass to NYC. Didn’t do much because we didn’t know just which things we wanted to see and which not.
We barreled around on the subways a lot. That’s some system of transportation, but not the least interesting. Spent most of our time in and around Times Square. Some of the things we saw were Radio City, Rockefeller Center, famous Latin Quarters, ice skating at Madison Square Garden, Grand Central Station, Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty, and a lot of buildings.
The Empire State and all the very tall buildings are in Manhattan. When you cross the Hudson they stick out from the other buildings like trees out of grass. They look kinda ghost or fairy like off in the distance through the mist.
About all we did was go and look at the places we’ve heard about most. ‘Course lotta drunks. Did my watch arrive OK?
Love,
Roy

Roy N. Van Arsdall (Burgin, KY), Carl W. Gertsen (Des Moines, IA),
James R. Green (Columbus Jct., IA), Walter L. Bartelt (Mora, MN)*
* New York City! A passing WAC took this photo of our group. She sent copies to us while we were in France. Names are left to right.
October 23, 1944
Dear Mother,
Provided I get this written and mailed and back across the ocean, you’ll know I’ve landed safely somewhere.
This trip has both good and bad points, but most of them are bad. It’s a lot worse than the worst train movement we ever had, but we’re still much better off than lots of guys who’ve come before us.
The weather has been clear and calm except for one foggy day. Today we are getting pitched around worse than before. I notice some guys are getting sick. It hasn’t bothered me as yet.
I’m on the bottom deck and that’s pretty far down. We’re below water. My head will almost touch the ceiling. The bunks are a curved pipe with canvas laced in them. Look like shelves and are four deep. There’s just about 18 inches from the bottom of my bunk to the bottom of the one above. All our equipment goes into bed with us because there’s just no floor to lay it on. All the guys couldn’t even stand up at once.
Time means nothing because day is as night. For awhile it was terrible, but it is better now. Every one naked (pants), sweaty and greasy--not even room to sit down. I’d try to read and couldn’t get my eyes into focus for the life of me.
The thing we look forward to most is our four hours out of 24 on deck. The only exercise we get is walk to chow and the deck. Both places you stand. We’re fed twice a day. Of course the officers live upstairs and eat three times a day.
We don’t know where we are or where we’re going. Just somewhere out in the water and guess direction by the sun.
It’s nice to get on deck even though we’re crowded. The water is deep blue, not green like the lake. The spray sometimes makes it pale green. Seems queer to watch a big ship go almost out of the water and then fall back. (Whew! This one is really bucking!)
I’m up on deck now and it’s about to pitch me off. The waves are 15 ft., maybe more. I can’t judge them. I know the ship across from us puts her nose under and then the propeller comes clear out.
One minute I could get a drink, and the next it’s like standing on Lane’s cliff.
Only fish I’ve seen are flying fish. They resemble a corncob with dragon fly wings. And they go 100 yards or so.
There’s a lot I’d like to tell about this and that I can’t. All I can tell about is the ocean which any author can portray better than I.
You can send that picture of Ida if you wish, then dwindle off in the writing. I may write now and then, but I certainly don’t want her under foot. I’m pretty certain that one day it will be either Margie or Betty. Time will tell. Of course I’ve a little job of coming back first.
Don’t wonder too much where the cigarettes are going. Thousands of packs have been given out on this boat alone since we left and for nothing.
Now we begin to see the value of Red Cross. When we hadn’t eaten for a long time, along comes the Red Cross with coffee, doughnuts and candy. Then we were all given a little draw-string bag with lots of things we’d really need.
Have lots of chaplains on board and they hold little 15 minutes services all round. Just sing, read a few verses, and a prayer. As one chaplain said, “Long ago I learned that GI’s wanted you to ‘get up, speak up, shut up, and sit down.’”
We also see the almost worthlessness of money. I have $30.00 on me and I couldn’t get a cold glass of milk or a couple of apples for all of it.
Your letters with Mrs. T’s letters, Ida’s and Marge’s pictures were given to me after we were well out to sea. Certainly glad to get mail at that time.
I got to New York twice. It was a disappointment to most everyone. I guess it just had too much of a buildup in our minds. But I saw most of the places we’ve heard about. (Hard writing here. Bad pitching of the boat, spray and a broken pencil).
Every month you will get a $50 and a $10 bond. They are all made co-owner to you. At any time if something should come up where you’d need money and couldn’t get it elsewhere, don’t hesitate to use it.
We used to talk a lot about if something should happen to Dad and Rog and me, and you’d be left in the cold. My bonds and $11,500 insurance will fix that.
I can never tell you any news of what’s happening to me, but I guess you’ll just have to read between the lines and imagine. You know what army I was attached to. Maybe some time the news papers will tell you more than I.
You can get 2 or 3 little tubes of yellow Vaseline to send over when you mail something. I use tiny bits of it for my scalp. Before I ask for anything I’ll have to realize what I need first. Of course I’ll always be able to eat. I could eat some of the stuff we used to throw away right now. Especially the milk. You can realize how fresh water is here. I have a beard that I can almost stroke.
Is Goodlett still doing the same work? It’ll be a great help.
Don’t bother about the gripes that I write. Here your buddy has the same ones and you can’t tell it to the officers so home it goes.
This is three or four--don’t know which--days later. We had a storm for two days. Water was coming over the decks so we had to stay in this hole. (Honestly, our back porch would roomily hold 32 men). Men stood in line to get sick, used cans, buckets, and the floor. I was lucky (I guess) enough to hold what I had, but I felt kinda rough.
The ship wasn’t satisfied with going up and down, it had to roll to the sides, too. Couldn’t lay still in your bunk, couldn’t walk across the deck, in fact, you just couldn’t.
But today is clear again. We got on deck for four hours and the sea wasn’t very rough.
Don’t know how much longer we have, but as far as I could write, it’d be the same so......
Love,
Roy

Free Postage from Overseas
October 24, 1944
Dear Mother,
We’re still on the boat and it’s practically impossible to write. Had to tear up one and now I’m squeezed down between the bunks being kicked and mauled. (Bunks are four deep and have only a foot or so between).
There have been a couple interesting things such as the large ship and the ocean (only because of first time). It all gets very tiresome after awhile. You can’t imagine the crowded conditions, heat, etc. in the bottom of this tub. I don’t think we could all stand up at once. Deck for four hours a day and two meals per.
Won’t be on here very much longer. Saw land yesterday for the first time in ages (seemingly). I’m just writing this to let you know I’ve arrived safely (when I do). Letter follows.
Love,
Roy
Note: This was first V-mail.
October 27, 1944
Dear Mother,
Well, the sun is only about 30 minutes high, it’s pretty cold, and Mac is boiling some coffee over a little fire. All we’ve had for several days is K rations.
We’re in southern France now. A pretty good distance behind the front, but the adjoining unit had a bit of trouble with a plane a couple nights ago.
We’re on a kind of mountainside. The big craggy hills tower over us on two sides. All homes are of stone and very quaint in appearance. I notice one hilltop in the distance seems to be covered with a sort of castle like building. Most everything is in a deplorable condition.
I saw Gibraltar and Oran, where the British sunk the French navy, and then we came up to France.
I worked night and day for two days. And it was work getting that equipment on the beach. We came out here (can’t tell) and clawed through the mud and rocks for quite awhile digging in. It was quite miserable for the time being just starting from scratch making a home out of the raw earth. And as usual it poured.
Our home is a pup tent and a hole in the ground. I’ll be glad when we get some chow. I’m already tired of looking at three little packs labeled breakfast, dinner and supper. Pretty good when we heat it up in our cups, though.
An old Frenchman gives us helmets full of grapes for a pack of cigarettes. They are sweet white grapes. Cigarettes (American) are priceless to the French. Cost us a nickel. A steak in town costs $60.00.
I have four blankets and a wool sweater. One thing you can send is a nice warm scarf, couple pair warm socks.
First mail we got I had two from Wilma and one each from Betty and Margie. Write airmail and they’ll come much faster.
We talked to a couple our guys today who were just back from the front. We’ll get on OK, never fear. Be going up before long.
My hunting knife is about the most valuable article I have.
Most of the boat ride was just being crammed in the hold, but I’ll tell you lots about everything when I come back. French hills, homes, and towns are much different from ours. Everything is much more backward. We came through a very large city.
(Next morning)
The three of us just ate hot lunch, hot chocolate, hot coffee and hot lemonade. I’m full of smoke. Pretty cool, but nice and warm now. Sun was coming over the mountains.
Love,
Roy
October 29, 1944
Dear Mother,
This will be dirty because I just built a fire. I’m parked on a rock beside it. After supper.
It rained all except part of one afternoon since we came. We’ve kept our tent dry as possible. Has 2 ends. Not like the old one with one end open. I made a rock floor in the front triangle of it and on out front.
We covered the floor with grass, then our rain coat, then we each have four blankets and a big overcoat, and lots of other clothes to pile around. Keep pretty warm long as our feet stay warm.
We wear rubber bottom leather top lace boots. They are big enough for 3 feet. We have 4 pair very heavy wool socks. Heavier than my hunting socks.
For all night work I wear boots and 2 pair socks, long underwear, wool pants and fatigue pants, two wool under shirts, wool turtle neck sweater, fatigue jacket, combat jacket, overcoat, gloves, helmet with wool night cap and Turkish towel scarf. Only when we have to stand around is it cold that way.
Now if I have to ask for stuff before you can send it, here it is. Chow is OK, but there’s a limited amount. And there’s gonna be many times when rations just don’t get there. It’s already happened here in camp.
Any kind of bar candy or just any candy at all, cookies--you know--just anything I could eat. Try to get it in intervals of a week or so and in not very large amounts. I know it will cost to get candy and things so take my money because I’d sure spend it if I had it and the chance to buy. I think they’ll get cigarettes to us. Haven’t anything yet. I’m going on my stomach wants and what the boys at the front say. (C-47’s haul them back all day. Come back on just slight wound). See if you can find some cocoa that you just put in water and heat. It comes in C rations like that. Be good if you could find some. Buy 6-cent airmail stamps cause that’s all we need. I got 3 as my allotment for no telling how long. Reason for our trouble is that headquarters for a lot of this stuff is in Paris.
Did my watch ever come?!!
Mail call is in the vicinity of once a week now. Don’t know how letters go out. This is my third home. Haven’t heard from you yet.
McArthur’s doing OK, isn’t he? Maybe we could kick the Germans out of these mountains before long. We’re with this southern army now. Uncle Ed can probably tell you about French winter and rain. All I can think of now. Hope you all have a nice Christmas. Maybe I’ll be there next one. Hope so.
Love,
Roy
October 31, 1944
Dear Mother,
May not get a chance for another letter before our first scrap so I’m taking time off now. And yet may write 2 or 3 more.
Still raining out. Had one day of hard cold wind and most of the rest has been rain.
Got into town once. Pretty big--maybe a million. You can see bombed out buildings, bullet scared walls, and old German positions. They’re still finding mines which German prisoners remove. Most of the streets are narrow except in down town section. We got a shower for 12F and a shave for 7F. Men and women go to the same bathhouse (Douche). Customs are very different. Always tip and if you don’t they’ll ask for it. All we can buy is beer and wine. Old guys tell us to buy no trinkets or perfumes because they are US ten cent store stuff. I thought maybe I could find something, but just isn’t.
We went to several places and a couple dances. Band played American songs. Plenty of girls. FFI doesn’t appreciate Yanks getting all their girls. Been several “incidents” which I’d better not talk of now. We don‘t go in alone or unarmed.
The new bill is invasion money and the other French. French bills are all different sizes. Some as big as this envelope. Ours from 50F up are the size of a US dollar. These are worth ten cents each. Send some larger when I can spare it. We were only paid $5.00. We aren’t even allowed to have US money. All must be F. The bills run down to 1F and on up. Also get 1F coins as change.
Maybe you saw ‘Seventh Cross’, and remember the stone fence in it. They have lots here. A stone fence about 8’ high and 18” wide. The whole top is concrete and thickly embedded with all kinds of broken glass. Bottles and just anything. Very wicked looking.
Yesterday was the first mail from you in over a month and then a post card. Something wrong somewhere. I’ve six letters from Betty, 3 Wilma and 3 Margie, and been getting them for several days.
I think I’ll manage with the airmail stamps, but I still want something to eat, wool scarf, maybe a real warm pair fur lined gloves, a pair or so heavy socks. Probably take forever to get here as some of my mail took 20 to 28 days. I would like for you to send a small package of something to eat every ten days. Not much at a time ‘cause I might not be able to carry it. What a guy has to eat here he usually eats it all himself. No telling when stuff will reach us when we move up. There’s almost nothing about this that you folks at home can realize. I know guys who’ll spend the winter with 2 blankets and 1 pair of shoes. Can’t get it. We’re lucky compared to most here. Bye for now.
Tell Mr. G. that those two years (French) help a lot. I’m catching quite a bit more, too.
Love,
Roy
November 5, 1944
Election Day
Dear Mother,
Parked in my tent with a lamp made out of kerosene and a wine bottle. Works very good. Has been a rare day, too. Warm and sunny. Got our stuff dried out a bit. Had a regular cloud burst a couple days ago. We were on a 10-mile hike and it ran about a foot deep. Went over the tops of low placed tents. Sleet and rain mixed, but we only got the edges of our blankets wet.
There’s one high peak off in the distance. The sun hits it first of a morn. Makes red streaks on the sides like lava and the mist looks like red smoke coming out of the top. Beautiful.
This country has some very beautiful places along with the bad. I stood on a ridge and looked on top of a very quaint little stone village, red tile roofs and red, yellow and blue walls. It was at the bottom and on the side of the ridge. I could see for miles back to the mountains one place, then out over a large valley, and then out over the Mediterranean Sea. One very striking feature--a cliff rose about 400 feet, its sides perpendicular and about an acre in size. A beautiful old monastery with a cemetery sat on top. Few pines mixed in and a winding stone stair way leading from the village straight up. Words just can’t show it.
Something of Marseilles. About one million people and one of France’s largest. Harbor is full of wrecked ships and the docks are messed up. Lot of the town is bombed out. You see a 7-story apartment building cut to the ground. A kitchen stove, sink, dresser, etc. will be hanging on part of the walls that are left. Many of the walls are bullet scared, too.
There’s all nationalities here, too. We easily get $2.00 per pack for cigarettes. Candy and gum is the same. You can buy any kind of drink, but no food. We got some kind of an ice and a baked pear in one place. They aren’t short on cash. The department stores are 6 or 7 story affairs. Nice lace in one. Anything you’d like me to try to find some time?
The majority of the women are bad--most even look bad. You can’t imagine. But conditions caused most of it.
Took the first mail a month to catch up, but I just got a letter from Margie dated the 27th and only a 3 cents. Only a couple from home so far. I still want all the grub you can possibly get through the post office or offices. Figure your own angles on getting it out-- aunts, uncles, maybe mail it for you?
May have to lay in a fox hole all winter, but we’ll whip them. We’ve got the equipment, men and guts, God on our side, and the will to win just to come home. Be a while before the next edition.
Tell Goodlett am having a great time with the language.
Love,
Roy
November 12, 1944
Dear Mother,
I doubt if anything you send gets here before the end of winter, but no harm done. Remember I can carry nothing I can’t wear all the time.
Hope you got my last letters telling about different things I’d seen. I can’t tell anything any more, but after the war there’ll be some things I’ll want to tell and some I wont.
Yesterday wasn’t much like Armistice Day, at least for us. The French rang a few bells, but don’t know why.
Eddie hasn’t a thing on me. I understand a lot of things now.
There is just one thing I’d like very much--just for a number of the people back home that think things are tough to spend one night with an infantry outfit, or just a couple of hours of it. They wouldn’t believe it--I didn’t comprehend till I tried it out.
I got a letter from Dad with the one in which you said read the passage in the Bible--you had it marked special. That Bible is one thing I have left and intend to keep. We’re rough and tough--wouldn’t be here if we weren’t, but it’ll take luck, guts, the help of God, and a lot of other things to get through. I think we’ve got ‘em all. Anyhow, you can trust this kid to do the best he can to do a good job and take care of himself at the same time.
Mother, I know it’s useless to say “don’t worry”, but don’t get ideas when mail doesn’t come because I know there’s many stretches of at least a month. Packages may get through, don’t know, but I still need a scarf and grub. *
Lots of love,
Roy
* Packages sent to us could not exceed eight ounces; home folks were limited as to the number they could send to one person.
Next day
Dear Mother,
Another chance and only one envelope. Tell you a mite more now. The little stationery I had was ruined and none has been brought to us. Very little among us.
I have only had a couple glimpses of the sun since I came to France. In S. France it rained continually. I’m in N. France now. Has been no sun. Snowed since we got here and that’s too long ago. I’ll probably change clothes next summer. I have what I wear, 2 blankets, a shelter half, and a couple pair socks I stuck in my pocket and that’s it. You see why I didn’t want anything to carry from home. When we dive into a puddle of which there are plenty, we just are wet till we dry by natural causes. But we’re still the best equipped here. Our rubber bottom, leather topped boots are worth a million dollars. Money is just firewood here.
We’re doing OK, though. Happy as possible and always grumbling. Get hot chow when possible and rest is rations. Hold 3 meals in one hand. But sometimes we miss out entirely. I did on Armistice Day. That’s why I want little bits from home whenever you can send them. I can carry some in my pocket. Candy of any sort bought or homemade, cookies, little tins of anything, etc. Forget all garments except gloves (warm) and scarf.
And don’t worry about me. I could get along very well on what we get, but the things you might add will help a lot.
I got 19 letters today. About 10 from you. Some 40 days old. An airmail is best. Forget about Ida. She’s getting to be a pain and I told her plainly what was what. Circumstances make writing pretty hard, but when and if we get a break I’ll try to catch up with the folks.
Boy, my very best dream is a warm dry place to sleep. I’ll never climb out of my bed at home for at least a month. At home I’d have said it impossible to take one suit (wear it) and two blankets and move out for the winter, but it’s not. And we’re not doing too badly as yet. Lots of snow for this early and such country. Boy!
Well, be good, send me a bite of something (have plenty of cigarettes) and remember there are thousands with me. I’m not alone. And the Germans are human, too.
Might as well wish everyone a nice Thanksgiving, too. And don’t cheat Rog on Christmas just because I might be having it a bit rough. He deserves as much or more than I got at his age.
Your latest letter was dated October 30. Got them from 5th to 30th.
Lots of love,
Roy
November 17, 1944
Dear Mother,
I hope you can make this out. I found a bit of paper and some muddy envelopes in a hole and dried them out. Pretty messy, but I’m pretty lucky to catch this chance to write.
We saw the sun for the first time today, but for only a few hours. Snow every day. I never saw the equal. It’s just warm enough to keep everything wet. It might as well rain because the trees keep up a rainstorm.
All we carry now is one blanket. Started with four, but it was too much for us to carry. Shelter halves gone, too. So now all we have to carry is a rifle and one blanket.
Been eating C and K rations now for quite a while. Sometimes get a warm meal. Eat two meals a day, but we get used to each thing as it comes. I think a few packages have come in, but they haven’t brought them to the boys yet. Most have even thrown away their towels. I have one I use for a scarf. And don’t think I’m not dirty. I don’t think I ever was so dirty. Same clothes I left southern France with on.
Don’t worry about me, though, because right now I’m not hungry, not too wet (am getting dried), got a cup of water on to shave, not sick at all, and not hurt. Only scratch is a little cut on my forefinger I made with my own trench knife.
Still everyone’s greatest ambition is to get into that bed back home, to wash up (in something besides a cup of melted snow), and eat some of the things we used to. You’d probably laugh to have seen us this morning. One of the guys got a half loaf of bread. He cut that in about 20 pieces so we could all get a bite. At home I wouldn’t have even eaten dry bread, but it was like a piece of pie or something. Did you ever see K rations? I think you have a C ration there.
Well, don’t know when this will get out, but maybe sometime. Have plenty of cigarettes, so all I want is something to eat and not too much at once because I’ll either have to give it all away or throw it away. Hmmmm---am I ever asking for stuff!
Got two V-mail and one airmail of 4th. Here’s the request--I want a box of grub.
Love,
Roy
November 20, 1944
Dear Mother,
I’ll just add another sheet to this letter. Been carrying this one around in my pocket and still don’t know when I’ll get to mail it.
I got a letter from Rog and one from you the other day. You still haven’t heard from me, but Margie has. She enclosed a little scrap of her new formal in her last letter. She always does something like that. (I’m writing this on the back of my bible).
The snow went off yesterday. It’s not very cold now and we have a dry place to sleep. We were praying for clear skies for more reasons than one and it was sure good to see them come.
With the rations we’re given and what we find that have been lost we get all we can eat. One day is like another. We don’t even know when Sunday comes and goes. Even if I could tell you all I know, you’d still know a lot more by reading the paper. But I’m still not hurt or sick. Don’t even have much of a cold.
I hope you didn’t send anything but food because I’m still wearing the same clothes I left southern France in. I carry one blanket and my raincoat. Our only worry is food and ammo. We either lost, turned in, or threw away the rest. We have high hopes of ending this war soon, so be seeing you.
Love,
Roy
December (no date), 1944
Dear Mother,
Cloudy and a cold half rain today, but we’re resting a bit, and did the guys ever need a rest.
Got the 2 V-mail letters and an airmail from you today. Every time I ask for a package you don’t have to send it, but I’m taking no chances. I guess we’ll eat C and K rations till the war is over. I’ve done fairly well, but I know some that have eaten only 3 times in four days. Our regular is two a day. Anything you send to eat is OK. Heck with the selection. And bull to the Red Cross and PX. They must work only in the states. A piece of bread is like cake. So--send food. Anything more than gloves I’d have to throw away. Still same clothes, but got a pretty nice little sleeping bag. Been pretty bad sleeping in a muddy hole, but doing OK. Trade with the French??? They barely have their lives!
Love,
Roy
December (no date), 1944
Dear Rog,
I got a couple letters from you lately. Something must be wrong with you--that’s more energy than you ever got up before. No kidding, though, I was glad to get them.
You’d like to roam around in this place in the summer. It would be fine then, but now when you have to dig holes in the rain and mud and snow and live in them it’s not much of a go. The nights are the worst--long, cold, wet, and full of everything. I spend my time digging holes. In the States I spent my time practicing digging holes.
I’ve seen lots of things over here. Tell you some of them when I get back. An old old French woman hung a cross around my neck the other day for helping her a little. And did she ever need it.
You keep right on going in all the things at home. You keep your guns going on the rabbits and you can bet mine will stay hot. When I get home we’ll get us some nice shotguns. I should have a little money. All I’m drawing is $5.00 a month and there isn’t a place where we can spend even a penny. It’s against the law to even have American money. Use this request when you need it, but here--send me a package of something to eat in cans--Nescafe, cocoa that needs only water--anything.
Love,
Roy
December 2, 1944
Dear Mother,
By now I reckon you’ve guessed we’ve been fighting. We came north and hit just a few days after we got to France. We’ve been pushing ever since. No break. It’s just attack, attack, attack.
The first was the worst of course. We didn’t know what to expect or how we’d take it. We started far back in the mountains. We had to dig the Germans out of those places. It was dirty stuff. Weather was our greatest enemy. We dug holes and put logs over the tops. Had to dig a new hole at least every day. What sleeping we did was in those holes. It was wet, cold, and nasty, and plenty of scared boys, but we made it.
General Mud was bad. We had to chop roads out and winch vehicles over the mountains, tree to tree. Mud got clear over the wheels. One stretch I only slept about four hours in four days. The woods were full of snipers. One morning we found we’d worked in just a hundred or so feet of some German machine guns. I guess they were just afraid to open up. The old stuff of a German shooting till all his ammo is gone and then surrendering is out. We kill them. But we do have a h... of a lot of prisoners.
We spent the day after Thanksgiving in a little town. We got more turkey than we could possibly eat--peas, potatoes, raisin pudding, coffee, bread, butter, and lots of hard candy. It was the first hot meal we’d had since we’d been fighting. And that night was the first time we’d slept inside.
The last few days we’ve been moving from town to town and just taking over whatever we want. I’m writing in some one’s kitchen by the stove now.
We’re scared to death of 88’s. We catch it every day. One morning at dawn we were moving down the street in a little town. They just walked those shells right down the middle. I was just plain lucky. They lifted me up and threw rocks on me twice. Three of our boys got it. Not too bad, though. None in our platoon dead yet.
We’ve knocked snipers and radios out of church steeples with our big gun twice. They certainly leave every little town full of snipers. One clear day P-47’s sure saved the boys from 88’s. They love ‘em. Just let a tire scream and we all hit the ditch. Oh, but they have a murderous scream! But we have everything on them a million times over.
Our battalion has done the rough stuff. Been behind the lines over half the time.
No packages arrived yet. Send one. Coffee, cocoa and something to eat. Got clean clothes yesterday. People nice (most) here. Get loads of cigarettes now. Send some air mail stationary. Been getting letters OK.
Bye.
Love,
Roy
December 3, 1944
Dear Mother,
My yesterday’s letter was misdated. We moved up another town yesterday. We do practically every day. We pulled into the town around noon. The Germans must have had beautiful observation. They caught us right in the middle of the street in our trucks. Those 88’s again and they have uncanny accuracy. Boys tore down doors, dived in holes not big enough for a rat and three even tried to crawl through the tracks of a half track. They shook the whole town till dark. We were lucky again. Rocks and all, but not a scratch in the platoon. Always a nice cellar, candles, squad stoves, and food.
The people here have temporarily moved out or to basements. We move in to any house we like. This family is completely German. So’s this paper, ink, and money. They have everything. They have six hundred-gallon barrels of wine in the cellar, loads of butter, sugar, lard, etc., canned meat like at home, salt pork, cellar full of stuff, six cows, hogs, chickens, everything and plenty of it. Last night we cooked canned pork, potatoes, hot bread, butter, cherries, gravy, etc. The front lines were 500 yards down the street. This morning I milked about three gallons. We had eggs, fried potatoes, bread, butter, peach preserves, milk, coffee, and just most anything. Slept in beds, too. It’s around noon now and four of us are in the living room with a nice fire, some are sleeping, and some cooking. (Don’t worry, we always have our security out). Right now the 47’s are giving ‘em a going over. The guy’s horse has a big shrapnel wound. Read the 7th Army news and send me a box of food, little airmail stationery, Gillette blades. We’re doing pretty good now, so........
Love,
Roy
December 5, 1944
Dear Mother,
This is the Christmas greetings we get to send to the folks back home. We’re allowed one per man. *
I got the first packages today. One from you dated the 16th and one from Aunt Emma. I thought the can had baking powder in it for a second. We’d been needing it for pancakes when we raid some house’s pantry. You needn’t send any because by the time it got here we hope to be elsewhere. We’ve cooked some pretty good meals in some of these houses.
I have plenty of cigarettes, usually more than I can use. I broke my pipe so you might put a cheap pipe in a package. Not an expensive one because I’m very apt to break or lose it. We do get a little pipe tobacco.
So Dad did or perhaps will get that year round job. Wouldn’t it be nice if he could have his job and I could work the farm. I just wonder what I will do. At times I think it would be nice to fix Ma’s house, but then there’s no living for me around. I wanted to finish college, but I just keep staying in here longer and longer. Be two years tomorrow that I enlisted. Wish that farm were mine ‘cause I hate to leave. But things will work out when I’m out of here.
We had our first Protestant services here in the village chapel yesterday afternoon. It was a small and very old church. Had a squawky old hand pump organ, but it was nice. Had communion for the first time. (The chaplain is a great comfort because he’s right in the front lines with the men.) You should have seen the men. Some dirty, long-haired, unshaven--all carrying weapons, but it made us feel a lot better.
We have put on our shoulder patches and regimental crests again. Took them off when we left Howze.
This is the first place where we’ve bought anything--beer, wine, milk, bread. Everywhere else we just took it or what people were left gave to us.
You asked for it so you’ll get a request in every letter. We certainly do want the stuff, though. Send me a box of cookies, candy, etc. Don’t send anything I can’t eat unless I ask for it.
Love,
Roy
* Each of us was given a single sheet of paper on which a Christmas wreath had been imprinted via mimeograph machine. This was our ‘Christmas Greetings’ home and on which we wrote a letter.
December 8, 1944
Dear Mother,
This picture of mud is the same stuff we went through, only our part had snow mixed in and usually sat at a 45-degree angle. These are tank men that came by after the place was ‘civilized’. We never saw a mess kit like they are carrying. But you can see how nice it was. *
You see our letter writing conditions. We lost nearly everything back in the mountains. That’s why some of my letters looked so dirty.
The first package got here in perfect order. You can send cookies or anything and they’ll arrive OK. Send me a box of something to eat.
Those 12 marks I sent home happened to be worth around $5.00. The spots are from candle wax.
Love,
Roy
* I was commenting on news pictures Mother had sent to me.
December 10, 1944
Dear Rog,
The hunting season ought to be in full swing right now. Can you get shells? Shells here are thicker than dirt, and just any caliber you want. Some of them you don’t want, though.
You know we’re not nearly so scared of bullets with addresses on them as we are those addressed to “Whom it may concern”. Those are bad. I nearly got one of those a couple of times.
Keep writing airmail. Some get here in seven or eight days, some a month. V-mail may be a bit faster in case needed, but I’d as soon get a greeting card.
What would you like to have from here? I can mail anything but ordinance equipment. Can bring some stuff when I come. Send a box of grub and few airmails.
Love,
Roy
December 10, 1944*
Dear Mother,
Well, I write letters under all kinds of situations. This one isn’t new. We’re reserve battalion (for once). The artillery is making the candle wobble. The first time I wrote after I came north the guns were shaking the tent, too.
It’s around 7 AM now and the barrage has slackened a bit. You know, D-Day and H-Hour means a lot more than it used to. At home there was only one, the big one. Here we have one nearly every day. There may be only a small river and a few Germans, but to us it’s pretty darned important. This morning the artillery let loose just before dawn. It was the most earth shaking barrage I ever heard. Boy, have we ever got the artillery. Certainly makes you feel good (when they don’t land short.)
Yesterday we had a few awards in the company. Five men got the bronze star for keeping wire laid under heavy enemy artillery fire. Our boys (anti-tank) carried litters under that same barrage. Several of the men in our company have purple hearts. None have been killed in Hq., but none of the wounded are still with us.
Since Thanksgiving we’ve spent practically every night inside, either in haylofts or in houses. Before we spent a couple of miserable weeks in the snow and mud. Put a bedroll in the hay and you can really stay warm.
We’re in Alsace and have been for quite a bit. You can look on the map and catch the situation. Nearly all the people speak German and lots have sons in the Kraut army. Just after we take a town the FFI takes charge. They tickle me. They do help on the snipers, but each time they run down and jerk out the Nazi mayor and shoot him.
I’m heeled with a rifle and a 45, a couple knives, and a pocket full of ammo. I want to get myself a Luger and a P-38 (automatic). The Krauts have a machine pistol we call a “burp” gun. Fires faster than any other weapon made. They also have a big mortar we call ‘screaming meemie’. I just noticed Mary Helen’s picture. She’s a pretty girl. Send a box of food and six of my old handkies.
Love,
Roy
* Mother noted that she received this letter January 23, 1945. The Burgin post office had postmarked it February 17, 1945. Odd that they postmarked incoming letters.
December 16, 1944
Dear Mother,
Well, we’re doing pretty good as far as we can. Been cooking some pretty good meals, me being cook. Night before last I found a ham. Never eat rations any more unless we have to. We had fried ham, potatoes, fried apples, jelly, bread, onions and coffee. Last night we had a big batch of pancakes, sugar syrup, jelly, and canned pork (like you can). About 8 PM I started a little midnight snack. Four chickens (boiled), gravy, potatoes, peas, baked apples, jelly and wine (always plenty of that). Ate that about 1:30. Only 8 in our squad and they eat the whole works every time. Squad leader and I haven’t made ‘em sick yet. This morning we had a cereal that’s like oatmeal only better, bread, jelly, peanut butter (from states), coffee, and cherries. It’s noon now and I have potatoes, applesauce, meat, bread, and coffee. Only thing I have a hard time finding is lard. We find these huge loaves of bread ready-made. They really hide the stuff, too.
It’s funny to see our squad move into a house. Two go up stairs, two to the cellar, and the others through out the house. And brother they don’t miss a thing. Most all the time we’re in a house and we have a new one nearly every day. I found a beautiful flag the other day which I’ll send home with some other things soon.
Some of the people I feel sorry for and some I don’t. These Krauts are getting repaid. There’s a Negro outfit along and they eat every chicken in sight. A few days ago we moved into a home that was really bad off. There was one old man about 70 and a girl. One of our big shells had left only one room of his house that didn’t leak (too bad). Got his barn, too. He had two sons on the Russian front and both were dead. One was the girl’s husband. The same shell had killed the girl’s daughter (about 4) and the old man’s wife. They were both lying in one of the ‘worser’ rooms. He stayed in the room that night with us. We didn’t take anything from them. Then we came into one town where the Krauts hadn’t wanted to move out. We didn’t leave a building untouched. Only bad part about it was an elderly woman now and then standing crying by what had been her house. But they asked for it!
All these town are small (nearly all), but there’s one striking thing about them--their churches. That’s always the most beautiful building in town. I’ve really seen some beautiful chapels. They’re all old, too. But invariably the Germans put a sniper, observer, radio, etc., in the steeple. There haven’t been very many that we could let pass. From there they can lay too darn much artillery on us. We fire direct fire at the steeples with our big gun.
But it’s not all bad. There are lots of good people that are glad to have the Nazi’s out. And much more outstanding than the ‘run of the brook’ people at home is the way the religious have that religion in them. Lots of homes have every picture on the walls some kind of religious picture. I’ve seen some beauties. Crucifixes are very plentiful. From big statues along the roads to little ones in the homes. The other night I saw old women and little kids hurrying to the chapel and we’re under artillery fire. That took guts for those old people.
I think this is the one thing that I might say touched me most of the war. We were moving up in the dark as usual. Most of the mines had been removed from the road. They have plastic ones that we can’t detect. We came to five roadblocks. Just five piles of big trees they’d cut across the road. It was pitch black and we didn’t have any mine detectors. They took three guys from each squad to work on them. They sawed and winched till they got three of them out. We were cutting a big log in the fourth and it was nearly through. Two kids were on the saw and one bouncing on the log to break it. There was a booby trap tied to the log. One boy was killed almost instantly. The boy across the log got the flash in his face. We got back up to the truck (he is my best friend) and he asked me to help him in. I asked him if he was hurt and he started crying and said he couldn’t see. He couldn’t even see a flashlight in his face. That was what hurt me. To see him blind and crying and I couldn’t help him. But I guess God helped again ‘cause next morning he could see and he and I are just as mean as ever going through these places. Don’t worry ‘cause nothing like that will ever happen again. It’s not our job so we don’t do it again. We have it pretty easy considering ‘cause we stay back a little to stop a counter attack with tanks. The TD’s are usually in front of us and as yet they haven’t had enough to get through to us. They probably never will. Let’s hope so anyhow.
Sun is out now and I’ve got some more meat that needs cooking. You can send most anything to eat ‘cause it comes OK. Packages still come through Marseilles and they are held up bad there. I have one from you, Wilma, and Aunt Emma.
I guess that’s about all for now. Tell everybody ‘Merry Christmas and Happy New Year’. I expect I’ll cook our Christmas dinner. We called our chicken dinner Christmas just in case we don’t get another chance.
Lots of love,
Roy
P.S. - Send a box of something to eat.
P.S.S.- Just received Aunt Martha’s - good shape.
December 17, 1944
Dear Mother,
I’ve written once today, but I just got mail from you. One the 18th, 20th, and 24th all the same time. We get it in bunches that way. I have only one package from you, but they’ll come. Got a letter from the preacher, too. I got a letter from you about three days ago dated the 28th.
We’re down in the basement, hay on the floor, stove going, and the two small windows stuffed. We put salt in gas and burn it in our lantern. It’s nice down here and you need never worry ‘cause nothing can hit us.
It’s odd the time that guys pick to laugh. A few weeks ago they threw some big stuff at us. It was night and pretty cold. The squad leader, driver (an Indian), and I lit in a ditch several feet from the road. It was so cold we trembled violently and the big shells were shaking the earth. And there we lay giggling like school kids at our predicament. You’d get a laugh out of some of the things we do. Send food.
Love,
Roy


V-mail Letter (the inside of the envelope)
December 17, 1944
Dear Mother,
I’m surprised at you--asking what regiment I’m in when I have 411 Infantry on every letter I write. You should hear something about us on the radio or in the papers ‘cause we’re inside Germany now.
I got Aunt Martha’s package. As yet I have only one of yours, but they’ll get here. For goodness sake tell folks not to send any shaving cream or tooth paste. We’re issued more of that than we can possibly use and then every one adds a little. Don’t send anything I can’t eat unless I ask for it. I want a couple boxes of baking powder. We find some, but it might run short. Then any ready mixed something that we could fix--pudding or anything. We find lard, salt, and the general run of things so send anything we could fix. You know, something we could fix that would be different. You know we move in and take what ever there is. You might send a few recipes, too. Biscuits for eight.
Don’t worry about us being short on anything. We’re well fixed at least in this sector.
Now we’re in a basement. We stuck the pipe of a little stove in the soot box, covered the floor with hay, and are really cozy. The 88’s and mortars are landing outside, but we have more than a two-foot wall between us. It won’t penetrate that.
Some women in this town threw hot water on some of the boys. We didn’t like ‘em in the first place so I wont say what goes on after that.
Send what I asked for, candy and cookies, and a cheap $1.50 pipe.
Love,
Roy
December 20, 1944
Dear Mother,
Nothing at all to tell. Haven’t been doing much for the last few days. My army is the seventh, you know my division, and, darn it, my regiment is plastered on every letter I write. You can read the paper. I’m sending a few clippings from the Stars and Stripes, a paper printed for the troops. Can’t send the whole paper.
I see some of the guys in another outfit have a deer strung up. They shot it up in the hills. Yesterday we went looking for chickens and found some tame rabbits. We just had fried rabbit for supper. For noon we had fried potatoes and onions. We’re issued rations for every meal, but we save so many that way that we can take our pick.
We’ve been fighting for so long now that we’re due for a week or so break. The rumor goes we’ll probably get it over Christmas. The fowl of Germany will catch it then.
I still think I might finish college right quick when I get back if the US will pay my way. I would like to work on the farm with dad, though. But I’ll find out what I really want when I get back.
Put some air mail stationery with stamps on them in one of those eight-ounce packages that you can send. Save all the extra room there is for something to eat. Instead of using your own sugar just buy cookies and cake when you can. Send me another box of food. Getting enough requests now?
Is Ida still writing? I haven’t written to her for a long time, but I suppose I should.
You should receive $60.00 a month in bonds from the U.S. I still draw about $25.00 and I’ve spent less than $1.00 since I left Marseilles. We just got wool-lined leather gloves and are getting blanket-lined coveralls, have hoods, and I picked up two nice wool scarves. But I can use what you have sent.
Love,
Roy
December 26, 1944
Dear Mother,
Well, how was Christmas? All over now and I guess you’re tired. Have the folks up again?
I’d intended to write yesterday, but just didn’t get to it. I’m in Lorraine now. I know my different locations perplex you, but they have to fool better strategists than you so don’t worry about them.
The weather here is about like that at home. At night it’s been about 10 degrees F and is sunny during the day. Last few days we haven’t moved. We (our gun squad) are in a house that is to this town like George’s is to Burgin. All Christmas day seemed almost like home. We’re in a nice kitchen upstairs and have two bedrooms. It was sunny and the old hens sang like they do when it warms up. Right next to the kitchen is a little room with a window that slants with the roof. We use that for our O.P. Have two pair big glasses. We can see six towns of sizes ranging from under Burgin to a pretty big one.
The closest town is about like the farm to George’s. It’s a Jerry town, in fact, they all are. Here we sat on Christmas day in a nice warm kitchen taking turns looking at Jerry to make sure he didn’t slip any tanks in on us. There’s nothing between us and him but an open field, but just ever let him try to cross that field. Now we don’t bother him and he doesn’t bother us. If we fired a shot I guess there’d be a scrap. But you should see what our artillery does for him. They throw some beautiful barrages, and we take turns sitting at the window watching him fall. There’s a huge tower from an old castle about a mile away. Sorta resembles that at Casino. Yesterday they had a big flag on it. You should have seen the boys whang away at it. No flag there today.
It’s very easy and comfortable now. Big house and a nice old man. Have 10 in 1 rations. About the same thing the kitchen gets so we can cook ourselves. The Lieutenant got some turkey up around noon yesterday. And Thundercloud, our Winnebago driver, had a fruitcake. That boy is a pure blood and can see like a cat.
One thing I don’t like is the guard. Have to stay pretty well awake in the daytime, but at night we have to get outside and park all over the place. Lately it’s been very bright moon light and we can really see. But it’s cold and Jerry is so close that it puts you under quite a strain. However, it isn’t very likely that they’d try anything. Only thing you hear through the night is a few machine guns chattering now and then. We have one in the parlor. And you can see the big cherry blossoms as our shells hit. Planes go over, ack-ack bursts, but nearly all is ours. Now it’s mainly patrols we watch for. I get crowded down in some shadow and I’d freeze before I’d move a muscle. It even irritates me when my stomach growls. I have my rifle and 45, 2 grenades, and a trench knife. Some of the guys are absolutely terrified by the night, but thanks to my little jaunts with the dogs, darkness is my friend. I know the sounds of a rat, goat cough, and other farm animals, and I know that I have the advantage there in the dark.
Well, I guess there’s nothing else. Oh yes, I’ve seen several Christmas trees in the houses about. The old fellow here is very interested in what goes on. He’ll point out some activity to us before we see it. And he loves to look through the glasses.
Just got a bunch of mail and the Lieutenant’s here so I’ll hurry this on. Am doing fine, mustache and all.
Love,
Roy
December 28, 1944
Dear Mother,
There’s nothing new except the day. We’re still in the kitchen in northern Lorraine over looking Kraut soil only a few hundred yards away. There’s been little action. Ground frozen about a foot, but nice digging from there on.
Packages have been coming good lately. I’ve gotten about four from you, two yesterday. The two scarves, gloves and socks. They were very good, especially the scarves and gloves. Scarves are very warm. Socks good, too. I have plenty of clothes of all kinds now. The army gives us better and warmer stuff that you can hardly find at home. Our socks are all wool and heavier even than those you sent. I keep extra ones in my bedroll to dry. With all the packages the guys are getting, and cooking rations, we have the kitchen crammed.
Got your letter dated 15 December. We took the town you said news mentioned as taken by us. Everything any of us has gotten has been in perfect shape. Not even jars broken. Just keep sending stuff to eat. We get gobs of cheese and fruit bars (figs and prunes) so beware.
Can’t think of anything else now. Just don’t worry about me. I can’t tell names, etc. But I’ll take care of me--my Momma didn’t raise any foolish children.
Love,
Roy
January 1, 1945
Dear Mother,
Well, a new year has just rolled round. Wonder if this could be the one? Hope so, anyhow.
I don’t guess we got much more sleep than the celebrators at home. I saw fireworks last night like I’d only seen in the movies before. The squad leader and I brought the new year in lying in a shell-torn graveyard. These people have very ornamental graveyards and this one was a mess, as are all their churches. The stuff wasn’t coming at us, but just to one side. They didn’t get through, but we sure were kept guessing. Tell you about it when I get home. It was beautiful and weird, but---wow!!
The weather here is about like that at home, I guess, but it’s pretty darn cold. They’ve given us about the best clothes there are, but the cold just seeps through. We pull our shift at the gun and then come back to the house where it’s warm, though. Not too much sleep, but enough. And all we could eat.
When we get through here the guys will have a whole mess of ribbons. They gave the Combat Infantry Badge the other day. Rifle with a wreath.
I’ve a very good chance of seeing R.W., but I’m pretty sure I wont ‘cause units usually don’t mix, but still there’s a good chance. Don’t know just where Tad’s outfit is.
I can’t think of anything to tell ‘cause it’s all the same, just guard all the time.
Send a box of something to eat. The gloves and scarves are swell, but I have enough.
Love,
Roy
January 6, 1945
Dear Mother,
Same old stuff. Nothing new at all. We have a nice snow on now and it never gets around to thawing, but it’s not too bad. Good camouflage, anyhow.
Last night a couple of us and some French kids went sleigh riding. This is a very little town, and our squad is right in the middle. We’d ride right past our house. There are two very pretty girls in the same house and several others in town. These two girls both speak English as do most around here. Jerry made them learn. They wash our dishes and we have a lot of fun. We get rations to cook and buy bread from the baker for 10F or a package of cigarettes. The girls names are Mary Lou and Rose Marie. They had about four hand-made sleds. The one I rode on was no bigger than mine and was guided by the feet of the rear man. We got two G.I.’s, 3 girls, and 2 French kids on that one sled and away we’d go, right under the very noses of the Krauts. And all the while artillery and mortar sails over to burst a mile or so across the way. But it’s all ours. They don’t bother us, anyhow.
The latest letter I have from you ???, but I get mail pretty regularly. I forget how many boxes I have, but it’s 3 or 4. I got the gloves and scarves, but no cheese as yet. Send me a box of food.
Love,
Roy
January 11, 1945
Dear Mother,
Same old stuff, but not all of it is like war. In fact at times you’d marvel that there was a war at all except for the incessant roar of artillery. It is never quiet. Fire behind us and fall in front. Means no more than a chicken cackling---well, not much. Ha! Ha!
There are more girls in these little towns where we are now than you can shake a stick at. They all seem to be about the right age and are very pretty, speak both French and German, and quite a bit of English. Me, well, I put some of all three in practically every breath.
Believe it or not, we go sledding in sight of the Germans. Ground is frozen hard and never thaws. Snow comes and then comes some more. We G.I.’s, girls, and a few kids will sled all over the place, roll each other in the snow, and have some wonderful fights. Artillery going over never bothers anyone. They have dances, too. We go to them as we’re about the only males available. They have lots of new and very interesting dances. One, the “kiss waltz”. Lights dimmed, music, big circle of chairs, and a boy or girl in the center with a pillow. He or she places the pillow in front of the one they wish to kiss. They kneel and have two or three, dance a step or two and then the girl, if the first were a boy, takes the pillow and it goes on for quite some time. Oh, and a dozen other things that I’ll tell about sometime. But the grown girls really like to sleigh ride (nothing else to do), and there always seem to be more girls around than boys. I know more girls in several of these towns around than in any or all of the little towns at home. Anything we want to understand we do; what we don’t, we don’t. More fun talking when you don’t know what’s going on. More fun teaching some gal (just what you want her to be able to say). You should hear my German and French mixed.
There’s a very nasty rumor going about which I prefer not to believe as yet. It was said that quite a few tons of mail burned in Marseilles. I hope not. I forget, but I think I’ve received 2 or 3 packages from you. With the scarf and gloves, though. Soon as possible send what you can to help me with German and French. Also send a box of food. Are you getting bonds? I’m OK, so....
Love,
Roy
January 13, 1945
Dear Mother,
It’s a beautiful day (for the air corps). It’s pretty darn cold and the wind has a nasty howl, but we’re inside with a nice stove.
I’m sending a copy of our daily paper. * We also get a “Beach Head” once in a while. I can’t send clippings, only the whole paper. Just wanted you to see what it was like.
No packages for quite awhile now. One from each Aunt, one from Wilma, one from Betty, and either 2 or 3 from you. I know there’s several from both you and Margie somewhere.
Cigarette situation slipped so now I need cigarettes (any kind cause I know you can’t find many), a pipe (if you haven’t sent one), and maybe a bit of pipe tobacco. Also, drop in some candles every time (not many). Our light situation is drastic. But mainly send food. Not much smoke. Send a box of food and a bit of help with German and French Dictionary?
Love,
Roy
* A copy of STARS AND STRIPES was enclosed.
January 23, 1945
Dear Mother,
I know I haven’t written for quite awhile, but things just happen that way, and then part of it is my fault, too. I’m still the same as I was, not hurt or sick, and fairly well off in most other respects, too.
By the time you usually get some idea what part of the country I’m in I’m always somewhere else so you might as well settle by saying I’m still in Europe.
I received one more box from you awhile back. That’s about four. Very few boxes have come in since Christmas. I’m sending a box today with the flag and some other worthless junk in it--coins, old camera, etc.
Got a letter from Mrs. Fisk yesterday. Had a pair of ankle length socks in it. That’s a laugh when I wear four pair socks all the time. Our socks are even much heavier than the ones you sent, but I keep some extra in my bedroll to have dry ones.
This country is much colder than home. The snow came long ago and it’s stayed right with us.
We’ve a boy with us who’s very good with cartoons. He can draw anything we do and very quickly. Here’s one he ripped off.

The “Chicken” Patrol
Send me a box of something to eat, candles, and drop in some cigarettes. We don’t have as many as formerly. Taste those Kraut cigarettes!
Love,
Roy
January 24, 1945
Dear Mother,
Got a box from you last night and was glad to get it. Also got one from Mrs., T. and another scarf from Margie. Today I got 12 letters dated from Dec. 16 - Jan. 11. They just come at any kind of time.
I’ll explain rations to you so you’ll know more what to send. Breakfast is eggs and crackers and fruit bar; dinner is cheese, crackers and caramels; supper is pork loaf, crackers and chocolate bar. So no more crackers, cheese, or anything like canned pork or beef. We even love sardines, tuna fish, spreads, etc., but we’d rather have cookies which we can’t get at all. (Got letter from family and Pappy).
I’m still in same army and you can read and look at maps. Sent $60.00 home ten days ago, $30.00 today and a box. Getting bonds?
Love,
Roy
January 26, 1945
Dear Mother,
Just about hit the jackpot, I guess. Day before yesterday I got 12 letters and last night eight more. Nothing as yet today.
Wilma said Mrs. Beeler, our frat mother, died suddenly of a heart attack.
Ask Mrs. Lane what company Tad is in and what he does. I’ll probably know by the letter of the company. I’ve heard of some of what they went through and they deserved a rest, but I don’t think they needed to rest any worse than we. Oh, what the heck! I’m not getting hurt so why should I holler. That’s just a G.I., I suppose.
The snow seems to always be coming down. We have more than you’ll ever see around home, I expect. But here it doesn’t get so darn cold as it does in the northern sectors. Been around zero a lot, though.
One of the boys in my squad is on the way home and one is in England. Some say they’re lucky--others no. Neither were hurt bad, but both have stiff arms. Back in the states any one would have said permanent KP would be the worst fate imaginable. Here, they’re more proud to get back in that kitchen than an old hen with chickens. We’ll be a very good bunch of garrison soldiers when we get back. I have two battle stars to go on one of my campaign ribbons already.
Don’t mind what you say in your letters. I always destroy them pretty quickly, and I hardly think you know anything that would help Jerry by the time it got here. Some of your letters take well over a month, but Jan. 25 I got one of Jan. 18. You keep reading the same news you’ve been reading and you’re bound to know more than I. The papers give a picture of the whole story, but it always gripes the soldier when he knows only what’s in his little piece of it. Right now we’re all eyes for those Reds.
UK was going good until the Tennessee game. That was in the Stars and Stripes. But they lost that man to the army. We need those boys much worse than those darn ball clubs back home.
I’m sending you a picture of four (AC) infantry boys taken just around the corner from Times Square by a WAC. We only saw her a couple hours and never thought she’d write. She sent five pictures.
To heck with Ida. I can’t mess with all these fool women. Three or four and all have the same idea. Margie is the top kick right now and I’ve a good idea she’ll stay. She’s always telling me of some dream she had--and she has some pips. Send a box of candy, cookies, candles, etc. Tell Juanita a tanker friend of mine needed mail so he’s writing. No mail and his is a tough go.
Love,
Roy
January 29, 1945
Dear Mother,
I’m enclosing a $25.00 money order instead of a $30.00. There was a mix-up some place.
We now have more snow than we ever saw before. There was no wind at all so the snow is stacked on posts nearly two feet. On the level it’s over my knees. This morning it had that old squeak to it on the roads.
I’m in Alsace now and have been for quite awhile. I’ve been quite a few places on the front now.
Got another box from Mrs. T. Had a can of orange juice and pineapple in it. Good. Send me a box of something to eat.
Love,
Roy

Last one from the combat zone
February 3, 1945
Dear Mother,
Almost like spring today. In fact I got the fishing fever and couldn’t get it out of my head all day. But fishing just isn’t over here. They say some people will go just to be going, but that it’s a miracle if one ever catches a fish.
The snow, which was well over knee deep, melted like fire. It warmed up suddenly and just stayed that way. Hope it continues so. The sun still doesn’t get up high enough to be seen good, though.
Just received the package with the bouillon cubes that’s under Roger’s name. The cookies sure are good. I’ve lost track of just how many packages I have received, but if they’ll ever come, they’ll get here without either of us helping. Got about three from the Thompson’s. Does pineapple, peaches, or orange juice cost points? If it’s not too many points I wish you’d slip some in my boxes. Put sardines, etc. in place of veal loaf. That is a universal field ration and spam when you get to the kitchen.
Have seen two shows lately. First since I left Marseilles. Really brings back a lot of home when you see a show. “Hail the Conquering Hero” and “When Irish Eyes are Smiling”. Also saw my first American girl since we started. She was a Red Cross girl. It’s positively amazing to see one that can speak English.
I’ve been from one end of the 7th front to the other, but right now I’m in Alsace. That Russian steamroller is the best looking thing I ever saw. Sure hope it keeps going.
To heck with these women. I haven’t written to Ida since I don’t know when and I don’t intend to. I’d like to know what they all think I’ve got. Now, there’s Wilma telling me that one of her Aunts has some earrings that belonged to some VanArsdall way back and she’d give them to Wilma “if” we get married. Betty doesn’t come out and say anything--more than you’d say quinine if you meant bitter. Margie is still tops. We’ve encouraged one another so far. May wind up with a green plum, but......
Heard from Tom and Jack. Took 30 days V-mail from England for Tom’s. Send a box with the things I asked for and cookies, etc.
Love,
Roy

Tracks of the 103rd
From “Report After Action - The Story of the 103rd Infantry Division” ,Battery Press, Nashville, TN
Recollections……
We were in a small town much like the endless small towns we’d been in and through for the past three months. It was early February. We were sitting in reserve having been pulled off the front for the first time since we’d started in November. Our main job was rest and relaxation. Guard duty was intense, however, and we stuck a cocked gun in the nose of every person who came our way whether he looked like GI Joe or a General. Americanized Krauts speaking perfect English had just wrought havoc in the Bulge area and later in the Colmar Pocket. We’d just left there - Sessenheim I think it was - and suffered the worst beating of the war.
I wasn’t doing too well with the relaxation part. Having diarrhea plus a stomach that wouldn’t keep anything I sent down to it kept me more than miserably busy. Dropping pants is a simple operation in a warm bathroom. Umpteen layers of clothes in zero weather with no bathroom complicates the process and sure leaves a sore ass.
This went on for several days. One noontime I was going through the chow line. We had access to the cook tent and regular kitchen, a rare occurrence because our guns were always attached to other outfits. I had no appetite but I had to eat. One of the servers said, “Van, what’s the matter with your eyes?” Hell, I didn’t know I had any problem. Sure hadn’t looked in any mirrors. Then another made the same comment. My squad leader. Bill Angsten, who was ahead of me, turned and gave me a hard look. He said, “Van, your eyes are yellow as an egg. You’d better go see the medics and have them check you out.”
Little did I know that the war had just ended for me. The medics were nearby in an old house. As soon as I got there a medic offered, “While you’re waiting how about a snort of Scotch?” Not being much more than a beer man at that time I demurred by asking. “What kind?” He shot back, “What the hell do you care what kind it is? It’s Scotch!” And so I downed some Scotch that I really didn’t like.
A doctor type came in, took a look at me, said I was jaundiced and he was going to send me back to Division for a day or so. And so my trip back began. My meager belongings, weapons and gear remained with the squad. I’d be back with them shortly.
The first stop was a huge railway station with cots littering the floor space. I was assigned to one. Shortly a medic came by, had a brief look, departed and returned with a sack of lemon drops. He said, “Eat ‘em! They’ll be good for you!” That was that.
Next I found myself in one of the many large tents on the grounds of a large city hospital in Paris. The food was first rate - big steaks and all the trimmings. Quickly, though, a medic looked at me, and my papers, and informed me that this was not the place for me. I needed to be on a diet, and not one that included steak and gravy.
So next I’m on the fourth floor of the big hospital getting broth and jello. That lasted only a day or so. The first night a nurse was giving one of the other guys in my room a back rub. I must have been looking envious because she said, “Would you like to have one too?” Yes! Way out of character from the last several months.
The second morning I was told that I was being sent to England. Wow! I started to get up. The nurse said, “You stay right there! There’ll be stretcher bearers to carry you.”
“But I can walk”, said I. “And they can carry you!”, said she, as a pair of German PW’s came in with a stretcher and carried me the four flights down.
Next came a train ride to the coast, on a stretcher all the way. Then a hospital ship to Bournmouth, England; then to a GI hospital in the interior. That was the end of combat; now for the beginning.
The first day on the hillside above Marseilles was clear and warm. We could see a vineyard on the opposite slope with some men working in it. Gertsen, my pup tent mate, and I walked over to investigate. They were picking grapes, large bunches of table grapes such as I’d seen only in stores.
Via sign language we offered to buy some. They agreed and stacked our helmets full. Pay? They didn’t want our newly printed occupation money. They wanted cigarettes with which we were well supplied. One pack of Luckies for the two helmets of grapes. A hell of a bargain! We got most of our cigs for nothing. When we did buy them they cost only a nickel a pack.
Our joy was short lived. By the time we got back to the area there was an officer waiting to tell us in no uncertain terms that we were not to deal nor fraternize with the locals in any way. Besides, they could sell those cigarettes for $2 or more a pack. No more grapes!
We got an afternoon/evening pass into Marseilles. There were bombed out buildings with plumbing fixtures hanging from bare walls several stories up. I’d seen none of this coming in as we’d been confined to the hold of the ship; then disembarked and put into closed trucks in the dark. I watched people urinate in gutters with flowing water that ran parallel with the sidewalks next to the buildings. We could buy booze, trinkets and women, but nothing to eat.
As the sun began to set darkness descended, but no lights came on. The city went madly about its business with no lights except dim ones inside the places of business. Traffic continued at top speed and seemingly without control. Locals tried to grab onto buses or streetcars as they sped by. Sometimes they made it; sometimes they got hit and rolled into the traffic.
I watched a local try to pick up a discarded cigarette butt in the dark. He squatted on the sidewalk pinching with his thumb and forefinger round and round the glowing orb. Problem was that one of our guys had smoked it to near nothing before tossing it down. There was little left but the ash. Poor guy!
Brothel? Certainly! That seemed to be a mandatory expedition. Everyone on the street knew the location of one or more. They were ‘officially’ off limits, but the MP’s did not raid them. Pro stations were close by. So half a dozen teenagers plus and a staff sergeant, maybe 24, took the plunge.
We entered the front door of a big multi-story house with not the slightest idea what to do. No problem. The madam was directly inside at a little desk. She barked out the charge, the equivalent of six dollars US, as I recall. As soon as a guy paid one of the many bottomless girls filling the lobby area grabbed his hand and led him up stairs. Just inside the chosen bedroom a maid appeared, and whiffed her dust cloth over an item of furniture to show she’d been preparing for you. She then held out her hand for a tip. The girl then held our her hand for a tip. The payment to the madam was just the entry fee.
Next came a compulsory wash at the sink and a visual VD check. Might as well have gone to see the medics!
OK. Time for action? Yes! But no! Don’t take off your boots! It was a come and go operation. On the way out we could see through an open door a group of black troopers, the fellows who wear red fez headgear and carry long knives. Gurkhas I think they are called. They were having quite a party with some of the girls. First trip to a whore house; most certainly the last.
Our train of old box cars rolled slowly north. It was a pleasant ride. We ate, slept and lounged in the cars with no work to do. Occasionally the train stopped for piss call. I thought of the years my Dad did the same thing with two carloads of Chester White and Berkshire hogs - three months of traveling to large fairs and living in freight cars to show his hogs every fall.
At night we could see heat lightening to the NNE of our route. There was no sound, but we knew the flickering light on the horizon was not weather related. We didn’t discuss it, but all of us wondered what it would be like when we got there.
We were stopped in a rail yard. Bombs and aircraft cannon had done a lot of damage. Several locomotives had holes in their boilers ranging from fist to large bucket size. A locomotive moved slowly into the yard. There, parked on the cow catcher, was our company bugler. Evidently he’d missed getting back on our train at the last piss call and hitched a ride on this train.
We moved toward the front with our own equipment. We’d been hearing the sounds of artillery for some time, but nothing had yet come our way. Daylight was fading. Our unit stopped along side a row of rather large trees. We put up our pup tents and got settled for the night.
About the time sleep should be coming the earth literally exploded. The sky was lit by brilliant white flashes. The ground kept jumping. Whether true or not I felt as if I were continually being tossed several inches into the air. What happened? Three batteries of Long Toms or 155-mm rifles were on the other side of the trees. They had a firing mission. We were later to learn first hand what happened when Corps artillery concentrated on a target.
It was a cold gray day. The ground was lightly covered with snow. We had moved up to replace another outfit on the front. This would be our first experience under fire. None of us knew what to expect. We milled around uncertainly in a bit of woods along side a gravel road waiting for orders.
We could hear small arms fire, including the stutter of machine guns. Corporal Taggart, assistant AT gunner in one of our other squads, was going ballistic, yelling that the Germans were right out there and we had no ammunition. We’d all be killed without even a chance to fight back. So for the first time the officers issued ammo from the A & P truck. All of us knew Taggart to be somewhat lacking in his upper story. He’d been in the army for twenty years and couldn’t make and keep grade because of repetitive drunkenness. But his antics did get us youngsters a bit excited.
Shortly some guys decided that since they now had ammo, they ought to get in some practice. So they picked out targets here and there and whanged away. That lasted only a few minutes. A jeep careened around the corner and a very mad colonel jumped out. He informed one and all that shortly he’d show us something to shoot at. For now the shooting here would damn well stop. The outfits on the front thought the Germans had broken through behind them.
A flat bed ton-and-a-half came down the road from the direction of the front. Silence became total as it passed. The driver and another guy were chatting in the topless cab. It was their load that quieted us. They had, stacked like cordwood, eight or ten GI’s - guys dressed just like us - obviously dead and apparently frozen. How could they be so nonchalant hauling their dead buddies down the road. Before long we discovered how.
We had not yet been on the front, and had spent only one night within range of enemy artillery. Nevertheless, Gertsen and I fully shared the conviction that we had little chance of surviving the war. If the Germans didn’t kill us the weather most certainly would.
Never having been shot at or even heard an enemy shell come in how could we possibly be so pessimistic? Easy! We were moving up. Dark was not far off so we were ordered to dig in for the night. But, we were told, a plain fox hole wouldn’t do. Shells would burst in the tops of trees and shower shrapnel down from above. Fox holes and trenches had to be covered.
So what did the two of us do? We decided to do the job right, went to an A & P truck parked nearby, got an axe and a shovel, settled in near some downed trees, and started digging. We laid out a grave size perimeter, dug it down about 18 inches, spread our blankets on the bottom, laid logs across the top except for a small opening at one end, shoveled the dirt over the logs, then stood back to admire our fort. We figured it would take a direct hit to bother us now. So in we crawled quite pleased with our efforts.
Unfortunately, near panic quickly grabbed us. First, our trench was a tight fit. We had difficulty turning because of the lack of depth. Then we discovered that while crawling in was rather easy; getting out was a backup operation. Feet and legs couldn’t move up and over the square end of our ‘grave’ as easily as they followed our bodies in. We just lay there fearful that if anything disturbed the opening we would be trapped. Then the warmth from our bodies began to melt the quarter inch of sleet that was on the logs we’d used.
When we finally hauled our cold wet muddy bodies out of that hole the next morning despair came easily. No bullets, no shells, no Germans, real winter had not yet arrived, and still - in our minds - we had almost died. How could we ever hope to survive the real thing? But every day we learned more; every day we found it easier to adapt to and accept tough situations.
The sun wasn’t quite up. We were strung out along the main drag of a little town carrying supplies and ammo from a storage building on one end to our trucks at the other. Some of the rifle company guys were doing the same. As I recall the load on my shoulder was a case of ‘C’ rations. That’s about the weight equivalent of a case of beer.
A shell screamed over. My adrenaline level surged, but I kept walking. We’d not been under fire long enough to judge incoming fire. It hit way off to the left. OK. Then another went across hitting far off to the right. Piece of cake, I thought. They aren’t shooting at us.
Immediately there was a short scream and a big explosion at the far end of the street. Then they came Whomp! Whomp! Whomp! Right down the middle of the street. Get off the street and under cover? Good idea, but it was one of those walled affairs that you couldn’t easily get through. The concussions knocked me down - a couple of times I think, though I wasn’t sure even at the time.
I got to house at the end of the street where our drivers were waiting, and I still had those damned ‘C’ rations. Some didn’t make it. How many I don’t know. But I saw wounded people close up for the first time - two guys from the rifle company.
One was really groaning obviously in considerable pain. Someone had slit his left pant leg to reveal a nasty entry wound near his shin bone. The other guy sat quietly saying nothing. His pants were pulled down exposing his belly. His only wound was a small bluish hole below and to one side of his navel from which a tiny bit of blackish blood was dropping. He seemed in no pain - and probably wasn’t. Weeks later I had learned enough to realize that the leg wound, though it most surely hurt, was insignificant. The guy with the gut wound was doubtless in shock, felt no pain, and probably died. There weren’t any medics around and they may not have been able to do much for him anyway.
Our convoy was skirting the base of the mountains on a nice blacktop highway, but we had come to a standstill. The Germans had blocked the road by laying a tangle of trees across it. They had a most effective procedure. Saw big trees part way through on the off road side, strap some blocks of explosives on the cut side, then set them off when the time was right. That way when the good guys came along and had to stop, the Germans could shell them at their leisure.
This time, though, it was dark. They couldn’t see that we were there. We’d move the stuff and go on through. The lieutenant got two guys from each gun crew, cross cut saws from the A & P truck, and they went to work. Martin and Gross went from our truck. Martin was single, but Gross, a little guy with curly blond hair, was married and had one kid.
Some time later there was a commotion at the back of our truck. Martin was getting in with the help of someone else. I grabbed his hand. He said, “Van, I can’t see! I’m blind!” And he began crying. That was a hard moment.
What happened? He and Gross were working the cross cut on a big tree. They had it almost through. Gross leaned on it and tried to bounce it down. The Germans had set booby traps with grenades. One went off right against Gross’ stomach. The explosion there in the deep darkness flash-blinded Martin. That was his only injury and it didn’t last the night. He said Gross cried out, “Help me, lieutenant! Help me, lieutenant!” There was no chance of help. The fat from Gross’s belly area was plastered all over Martin’s helmet and jacket front.
There must have been other bad outcomes from the roadblocks that night. From that point on we abandoned the highways, and went through and over the mountains as the crow flies. That was a brutal experience sometimes bordering on the impossible, but it beat getting blown up.
We were going up the side of a mountain in the dark. Mud was knee deep in the roadways we’d cut. Logs had to be cut and laid in some of the worst spots. The procedure was to drag the winch cable out to its full length, fasten it to a tree, then winch the truck to that point. That truck could then be turned around to winch up other vehicles many of which did not have winches on them.
We were filthy, wet, cold, and hungry all the time. A major precaution was to hide good when you took a crap. White asses made excellent sniper targets in those black mountain forests. More than one of our guys had been found dead with his pants down. So we were all in a ‘love your fellow man’ mood. Yeah, right!
A bunch of us, maybe 30 or more, were working in a huge mud hole area. Out of the trees came a couple of rifle company guys escorting four Germans carrying a stretcher on their shoulders. Flat on his back on the stretcher was a German officer - quite a young guy from his appearance. His jacket was open. From a hole in the middle of his chest came a bloody froth of bubbles with his every breath. He had obviously had no medical attention. There were no medics near us to give him any help. One of the riflemen said, “Sarg, what do you want us to do with these guys?” “Take ‘em to the bottom of the mountain”, he said, “and be back in five minutes.”
Thundercloud (Emerson), our Indian member from northern Wisconsin, was driving as always. Our truck, loaded with land mines, 57 mm shells, cases of hand grenades, lots of 30 and 50 cal ammo, rations, gear, and 12 guys, and pulling the 57 mm, wasn’t the most sprightly vehicle on a level hard road. Here on a goat path following a contour high up in the mountains movement was nearly impossible, especially as it was pitch black. Only Thundercloud could drive in such conditions; only Thundercloud had the nerve to even try. We trusted him with our lives; trusted him without reservation. Did so many times.
I was riding in front with Thundercloud. Suddenly he yelled, “Guys! It’s tilting! Everybody out! Hang on the up side!” That we did. Despite all of us hanging on the side and leaning toward the mountain I could feel the truck sway toward the down slope. More than once it almost went. How far down? I don’t know, but several hundred feet for sure. My aversion to any height above one story is well known. That cool Indian eased us to safety with only a guy ahead with a flashlight pointed at the ground for guidance.
Another night in a similar situation the A & P truck did roll. Shovels, saws, axes, picks, ammo, rations - the works - spewed out and down the side of the mountain. Some of our guys went to help in the recovery operation. The rest of us were sent into the timber above to make sure we got no unwelcome visitors.
Surprising how much you can see at night with nothing but star light when there is a snow cover. I saw enough movement and heard sounds such as to be sure some other folks were up there with us. There was nothing sure to shoot at. They didn’t start anything; we sure didn’t want to. Our goal was to get through those mountains. Likely it was a small patrol just keeping watch on us.
We waited in our trucks on a road leading out of the mountains just above a small village. We’d been in that village an hour earlier, but had been ordered out and back into the foothills just above it. There was another village a mile or so further on. It was still occupied by the Germans. Division artillery was set to hammer it. They didn’t want us in the way.
Great! We liked nothing better than to see the places we had to take get thoroughly blasted. Artillery was good. Bombers were good. Hit them with both and we didn’t have much left to do. So there an hour or so after dark we waited in the trucks. The mood was good. We were through the mountains. And then with virtually no warning they came.
A short WOOSH! followed by a violent explosion. Then came more and more. We jumped out of our truck and flung ourselves flat in the roadside ditch which was partly filled with slushy snow and ice. The combination of cold and nerves got guys to trembling. With people lying across other people, feet sticking in faces, and all trembling the situation hit some as comical. Someone started giggling and it spread. Near continuous earth shaking explosions, a bunch of half frozen guys lying in a ditch, and what happens? Uncontrollable laughter spread to everyone.
The aftermath, however, was sobering. One of our cannon companies (they used stubby 105’s) had the wrong village in their firing program. So they plastered our village - and us - with 105 mm shells. None of us got hurt, but there was an orphanage in town. I and some of the others had been in it earlier looking for a place to set up for the night. The kids, all little girls, were on the top floor. A couple of nuns ran the place. I talked with both the nuns and the kids. We decided we’d look for another place, but the order to go back up the hill came too soon for that. The 105’s hit that building, and hit it hard, so we learned. That’s what bombs and shells do. They take anyone and everyone without discrimination. We passed it by an hour later on our way to the next town.
We rolled into the next town about midnight. It was a bit noisy as some of our tankers were trying to clear the area. The Germans had street 88’s and were doing a lot of shooting. I think we lost 7 or 8 of the dozen Shermans that were in there.
I learned another lesson there. Fortunately, all of my ‘lessons’ came in time to do some good. I wanted to go from the building we had occupied across the main drag, for what I do not remember. Small arms fire was rather heavy, but all seemed relatively safe. Tracers were cris-crossing the area, but at second story level. No problem - I could go right under the stuff.
I started. A rifleman grabbed me by the arm. “Hey”, he said, “Watch yourself! Don’t go across there. They’re suckering us. Those tracers are purposely high. They’ve got the ground level covered with lots of other stuff.”
Geeze! That was close.
After we left the mountains we rarely had to spend a night without shelter, sometimes just a barn, but shelter. How did we get shelter in a house? Easy. We moved into the best house we could find when it was time to stop for the night. Sometimes they were unoccupied; sometimes not. That made no difference. If the residents were at home did we ask if we could stay? No. We simply went in, made it clear that we were staying, and indicated the rooms we would occupy.
When we encountered the occupants they were nearly always friendly, often even helpful. Then we tried to do them a good turn if we could. As a minimum we took none of their food or possessions and tried not to damage their place unnecessarily.
All of us quickly grew to hate army K rations. The only alternative was to gather food from the countryside. Such was strictly against army regulations, but the regulators weren’t on the front lines to enforce anything. So we filled our grocery baskets at every opportunity. Once we discovered a bakery in shell shattered village. There on a table were several dozen loaves of brown bread. Fantastic! Bakery bread was a luxury we seldom got. It was a quite heavy and bit coarse, but most tasty! We even found some jam to go with it.
A few days later in another little town we went into a house of our choice. A mother and her two daughters, they some 14 and 16 years of age, lived there. All were most gracious, fixed hot soup for us, and the girls spoke English fluently. That alone was a real treat - females who spoke English!
What could we do for them in return? Bread! We still had a few of those loaves of bread in the truck. I went out, got two loaves and brought them to Ma Ma. “Ahhh!” said one of the girls, “Schwine brot! Danka! Danka!”
Seeing the puzzled look on my face she shifted to English. Seems that bakers in their area cleaned their counters, tables and floors after each days work. Then at the end of the week they made the accumulated sweepings into bread to be fed to hogs. Small wonder that bread was a bit rough tasting. It contained dirt, sawdust, and who knows what else in addition to flour. We had eaten and relished several dozens of such loaves! Little wonder that hepatitis came along later. For the record those two girls were Rosemarie and Marie Louise Houlle.
One nights lodging involved no pleasantries or comedy. Buildings in the town we entered near dusk were mostly shattered shells. Our top brass had a policy which was loved by GI’s, tough on German troops, and a disaster for civilians regardless of nationality. If the lead elements of our force met any significant resistance when they entered a town they simply backed off. Then our artillery proceeded to flatten the place. This was one such case.
We chose one of the few houses that had any part standing. It had only half a roof, but it was bitter cold. Cover of any kind was welcome.
Inside were an elderly man and a woman of perhaps thirty. With no apparent bitterness she told us that her small daughter and mother had both been killed in the shelling. Both lay on a table in an adjoining room which was exposed to the elements. Much of the rest of her family had lost their lives elsewhere in the war. The old guy (65 maybe) said nothing. Shortly, both went to an adjoining room and we didn’t see them again.
Our sleeping room (their living room) had a small stove thus some heat. Guard shifts, however, were spent in the cold room where the corpses lay. A broken wall allowed a full view of the street. There was little light during my tour, but I could still see the bodies a few feet away. Worse was the occasional scurrying sounds made by the resident rodents. What were they doing? The whole situation was a mite unsettling. Thankfully, we left early the next morning.
“Bak Pouvre”?? I hoped that meant “baking powder”. I was trying to put together the makings for pancakes using ingredients from the pantry of the house we occupied. Certainly we couldn’t create anything tasty from our supplies.
We’d just found the flour, at least I thought it was flour, hidden in a dresser upstairs. Yep! The folks did their best to hide their stuff; we always found it. That trip upstairs almost got exciting. When I was nearly at the top of the stairs I did a quick up and down with my head just in case one of the wrong guys was there in a shooting mood. I saw someone with a gun make a quick move and almost blasted away. Had I done so I would have shattered a large mirror across the room.
The pancake operation was in full swing when a man, a civilian, knocked on the kitchen door. Someone opened the door and he asked, “Parle Francais?”, and encompassed all of us with a swinging finger. All the guys immediately pointed at me. Damn! I could speak and understand just enough to get myself in trouble. Didn’t matter. He got me by the arm and we headed across the yard to the barn. Inside he just pointed and spread his arms in a gesture of futility.
There was a pair of beautiful big draft horses, Percheron I think. One had a gash at least four inches deep running diagonally across its right hip. The guy was distraught. I felt for him and the horse. By word and gesture he asked me to do something to help that horse.
This one couldn’t go to our medics. Of that much I was sure. Nothing our squad had would do any good, so I suggested that he try Schnapps as a disinfectant. As soon as I said that I regretted it. That would burn like fire; the wound could not heal unless it got sewn shut. That probably was not possible. A sadness rolled over me as I left that guy standing with his horse.
We’d been in combat continuously for at least a month when Lt. Engen said one gun squad at a time would go back to a town we’d recently taken and clean up a bit. Same clothes, including underwear, for the last month! Same dirty carcass for the last month!! About time!
The operation took place in a commercial automobile garage. They’d rigged for hot showers and there was a change of clothes for all of us. The order was, “Guys, pile your dirties here, take a shower, and get your cleans there.”
Simple enough! The ‘dirties’ we took off would stand alone. Good to have a change. The ‘cleans’ presented a bit of a problem. They were piled by type - pants, shirt, underwear and such. Handy! But sizes?? Sort through and find something that fit or was close enough! They collected from a bunch of men of random sizes; they provided a pile of clean clothes of random sizes.
That was the first cleanup. I’m certain we must have gotten another before I left the lines, but I sure don’t remember one.
The sky that morning was heavily overcast. A few snow flakes sifted through the trees on the heavily wooded mountain side. Our platoon had dug in during the night. Clanking sounds below us worried Lt. Engen. Rather than send one of us to investigate he’d said, “You guys sit tight. I’m going to move down slope and warn you if anyone comes during the rest of the night.” He soon returned and said that ‘K’ Company had just moved in below us.
By daybreak the rifle company guys had already moved out. A convoy of our vehicles was struggling around the side of the slope. Our guys were heading across to join the vehicles as our trucks and guns were part of them.
A shell screamed over and landed not too far away. Then another and another. Whether they were ours or theirs I didn’t know. Regardless they were falling a bit close for comfort. Then I saw them. Down below me less than a hundred yards away were two people - old people - a man and a woman. Each time a shell screamed and exploded, the woman would cringe and try futilely to run. The old man was trying to hold her arm and help.
I didn’t know where they’d come from or where they were trying to go, but this certainly was no place for them. What I could do I didn’t know, but I walked down to them. The old woman, skinny and bedraggled, was crying. She had lost her shoes. With each WOOSH, BLAM, she would cringe and take a few steps, her bare skinny feet going deep into the mud.
I don’t remember the old mans face. What did strike me was that the pair of them were almost exactly like my grand parents, Ma and Pappy Reeves. I simply could not leave them there. I pulled my extra wool socks from inside my shirt, squatted down, and put them on the woman’s feet. When I stood she reached to her neck, grabbed a string and broke it free. On it was a tiny cross. She shoved that into my hand and kept repeating, “Merci, mon capitan! Merci, mon capitan!” (The only time I ever got higher than private!) (I told grandson J.T.V. the story and gave him the string and cross in the fall of 2000.)
At that moment I saw one of our ambulances in the line of vehicles straight across from me. I grabbed their hands and started for it. About that time Cpl. Taggart started yelling at me to get with the platoon and leave those people alone. I ignored him. He threatened to shoot me if I didn’t do as he said. I continued to ignore him. By that time I was close enough to the ambulance to talk to the driver.
“We can’t take civilians,” he said. “These two old people will die if we leave them out here,” I argued. “We just can’t leave them.” He then said what I knew to be right. “What happens if I take these people to the rear, and some of our guys get hurt while I’m gone?” But he and another guy got out, opened the rear doors and helped the folks in. Perhaps they reminded him of his grandparents, too.
I hurried away to catch up with my squad. I never saw whether the ambulance kept coming or went back. Many times since I’ve been plagued with the worry that my actions may have cost one of our guys. I’ll never know. Assuredly, we could not interrupt our work to help civilians in distress. There were many thousands in need. Nor could we worry that we might hurt or kill some people. We literally blew towns away killing who knows how many in the process. We knew it, and it didn’t bother us much because it saved our butts.
A bit later someone said that there was a dead German up ahead. We went by a cabin with a small orchard along one side. The German, a guy in uniform, was lying on his back in the orchard. I walked over and stared down at him. Frost had formed on his whiskers - light blonde whiskers a quarter inch long on a face that had yet to meet a razor. I saw no evidence of a wound. Our guys must have whacked him a day earlier. He engendered no emotion from any of us. We went on our way leaving him where he lay.
Rumors were standard daily fare and usually harmless, but these were different. The Germans had attacked or bombed or done something that had messed up some of our stuff. We’d not be getting the good 10 in 1 rations we expected. Bad! Some mail had been destroyed. Terrible! Christmas stuff from home was likely involved. Absolutely awful!!
Sarg came by and said we’d be moving out in a hour. Where? He didn’t know - just be ready. So we headed out. Something about a break through up north. We were going as reinforcements.
They picked the antitank guys as road guides. Seems everybody was headed up the same main road, but all weren’t going the same place. So each place a driver had to make a decision as to which way to go a couple of guys were dropped off. Whenever one of our battalion vehicles came along our job was to point the direction it was to take.
On the surface that doesn’t seem difficult. Stand, sit, whatever; then point when a truck comes along. It wasn’t, except that we were at it some three days - and nights. And the ground was snow covered. And it was windy. And it was around zero.
My last stand was on a sort of causeway running across one end of a lake. A road teed off right in the middle of the causeway. There were a dozen or more GI’s there. They had a barrel with a fire in it - and plenty of booze.
My part ended about midnight. Despite a frigid wind coming off the ice covered lake I slipped into my mummy bag, a tiny almost useless little thing, and collapsed by the edge of the concrete. Some time later I vaguely heard a guy yell, “Don’t piss on that man, you son-of-a-bitch!” The reply was, “Fuck you!!” I was getting pissed on! Then a fist fight commenced almost on top of me. Never knew the pisser, my defender nor what happened. At that stage I could have slept through anything - and did.
At the end of this trip we were at the southern edge of the Battle of the Bulge area. We replaced outfits that were closer to the break through and could get there sooner. All was mostly quiet there when we moved in.
It was about ten PM - half way through our four-hour duty shift. There was no moon, but the heavy snow cover reflected starlight so we could see everything around from the vantage point of our gun position in the cemetery. Cemetery? Oh yes! Cemeteries were an ideal location from which to watch the surrounding country as they almost always lay on the highest ground.
This perimeter wall of stone and mortar of this cemetery had crumbled a bit on the east side. We had put our 57 just inside the wall giving us a bit of protection and coverage of the entire valley to the east. A heavy machine gun crew had dug under the wall and extended a tunnel a few yards down the east slope. There they set up their gun with no disturbance of the snow for searching eyes to see.
Less than a quarter mile below and to the south lay the tiny village where we headquartered. Smoke curled from the chimney of ‘our’ house. Perhaps the French folks with whom we shared the house were making some holiday goodies. Christmas was only three days away.
Everything beyond the valley that led eastward was held by the Germans. We were their closest neighbors, there to make noise hence alert our MLR people should the Germans come our way. We could not have stopped them had they tried; we could hardly stop anything. The extent of our power was one 57 mm AT gun manned by our squad, one heavy machine gun from Heavy Weapons Company, and probably a platoon of riflemen somewhere to the south of us.
Four of us, enough to work the 57 were there a need to do so, sat around trying to keep warm. The machine gunners were listening to guitar music produced by the daughters of our home ‘family’, and piped up via the phone line the crew had strung. We watched the ‘heat lightening’ that flickered continuously on the northern horizon. We knew full well what it meant. Some poor devils were getting plastered.
Then came a big show. Rockets! Seemingly thousands of reddish streaks arced across the sky, east to west. Screaming Meemies, we called them. No sound. They were too far away. Geeze!! Our guys must really be getting a pounding.
When our four hours were up we went back ‘home’. The women had made some sort of cherry desert. Different from anything I’d ever had, but good. They used a shallow pie crust, thinly covered it with gooey red cherries, then baked it.
During off duty hours, day or night, ‘sleighter fodden’ was the choice of the younger folks, civilians and GI’s alike. That was sledding or sleigh riding. The phrase above, spelled by sound only, sticks in my mind. I know it was spoken by a girl more German than French. I can almost ‘see and hear her’ now; almost but not quite.
This area was our destination at the end of our mad dash north. We filled the gap left by the less fortunate guys who were thrown into the Battle of the Bulge. Here we ‘fooled around’ for nearly a month.
It was about 8 PM Christmas Eve. Our squad had just moved into the big house on the corner of main street in Morsbach. That put us maybe a mile closer to German held territory than when we had our 57 in the cemetery. Apparently the rear echelon brass thought we should be able to see the whites of their eyes.
Our truck was parked in the alley along side. Gertsen was rummaging through it for rations. I was standing guard a bit farther down the alley. Having decided that it was imprudent to be totally exposed, I’d gotten up on the five-foot high stone wall that ran along side the buildings the length of the alley. There in a prone position feeling safer and much more comfortable I faced the back end of the alley.
Shortly someone came around the far corner of the alley and started walking leisurely toward me. The snow cover allowed some visibility, but at a hundred yards I could tell nothing about the person. So I waited. He came closer and closer.
I could make out the helmet - a GI looking helmet. It appeared he had a rifle across the back of his shoulders with his arms draped over each end. He certainly wasn’t coming at us in a threatening manner. He was close enough so that I couldn’t miss, so I opened my mouth to call, “Halt!” I never got it out.
There was an ear-splitting explosion. A streak of fire came from one of the far windows, past the guy I was watching, and right by my head. He staggered and started sinking to the ground, calling out, “Me ‘merican! Me ‘merican!” He’d been shot; I’d nearly been hit by the same shot.
I rolled off the wall and turned to run to get behind the truck. And I ran squarely into the new replacement who had just joined us. I don’t remember his name. He’d been stationed in the Aleutians. They didn’t need him there any more so sent him to us. He said Bill (squad leader Angsten) had told him to go out and help Van on guard.
So what happened? He had eased carefully up behind me; stood there with the muzzle of his M1 just back of my head, put his finger on the trigger when he saw the guy come around the corner, and just unconsciously tightened it until it fired. The streak of fire that passed my head was his tracer only it was going the other way. Why he had tracer ammo no one knew. We sure didn’t use it. Why didn’t he let me know he was there? Said he was afraid he might scare me if he said anything. Geeze!!
The guy he’d shot was platoon sergeant from K Company - one of our rifle companies that had moved up to our right. He was coming to see where we were going to position our gun. The shot hit dead center in the chest. The word came back that his vitals were missed and he lived. I’ve always surely hoped so. What a useless and unnecessary way to die.
Later that evening Lt. Engen came in face just beaming. “Merry Christmas, guys!” he called out. He then pulled out a small brown paper bag and went around the room presenting each and every one a combat infantry badge.
I don’t remember what happened to the replacement guy. I never saw him again. Perhaps Engen took him rearward that night for assignment behind the lines.
Early the next morning we moved to the north edge of town and took over a big two-story stucco house. That was a whole two-block trip, but center of town was no place for an AT gun position and the view to the east was obstructed.
We went in the back door and found the owners at home. Burbin Kenni and his wife (rue chemin de fer 30, Morsbach, Moselle) seemed to be in their late sixties. As soon as we entered the man motioned for me to come into the kitchen where his wife sat. He pointed to her right forearm. A piece of shrapnel had ripped it the full length. It was a nasty red and puss covered.
We had nothing to treat wounds of this nature. Sarg thought we just ought to let it be, but I simply couldn’t wave them away. So strictly on my own hook I barged into the civilian sector again.
I walked back across town (population 2-300) to where the rifle company guys were dug in. First I had to listen to a tirade relative to the shooting of their sergeant the night before. I’d have done the same, maybe even more. Then one of the medics attached to them agreed to go and treat the lady. That he did. I can’t say how she fared because from then on they stayed out of the way.
The French-German border was the center of the street in front of the house. Straight east was Forbach, German occupied, and close enough to hear a tank engine or see a person if he went into the open. The land sloped down from the house to the north. Maybe a quarter away was part of the Maginol line - the French counter to the German Sigfried line, both worthless fixtures in this war. Just beyond that was the valley we’d watched from the hilltop cemetery. A rail line cut the center of it.
Now for our defensive plan. May as well be comfortable! So we hauled the 50-cal machine gun up stairs, shoved a bed next to an east facing window, and parked the gun in the middle of it. About that time Lt. Engen showed up to check on progress.
No sale! The fifty had to cover that north slope. So out it went. But that side of the house was totally naked. Our gun position could easily be seen from anywhere. Behind the house was a small walled garden. We remembered what the guys from heavy weapons had done with their machine gun. So under the garden wall we went - fifty on the outside pointing where it should - gunners coming and going unseen from behind the garden wall. The fifty-seven? We hid that planning to roll it out were it needed.
We stayed in that house a week or more. It had become apparent that both sides had only skeleton forces. Early on we were a bit shaken when an engine roared to life in Forbach and we heard the clanking of tank treads. We soon figured out that there was just one engine; just one tank. We had one tank in our sector too. Each day the guys started it and ran it around the streets for a bit, then parked it for the day.
Only once did our tank go into action. The Germans had an observation post well out in an open field. On occasion our tankers saw a white clad figure cross the field to the position. They watched. When he started back they cut loose with their fifty-caliber machine gun, but kept their bursts well behind him. They had a wild time running him all the way back to town. Fortunately this action did not start a fight.
The weather was bright, clear, and not too cold. One day when duty was done a couple of us took a look at the big concrete pillbox below us. We took a chance that it was not occupied by the wrong folks. It wasn’t, but the main door was closed. I wanted to see inside. Was the door booby trapped? Only way to find out was stand to one side, and push it open with the barrel of my carbine. Nothing happened. The inside was bare.
It would be some time before another train would roll on the tracks in our valley. Every so often the thin part of the rail had been blown out. I assumed that the Germans had done it, but it could have been a French action. The rails would no longer carry the weight of a train. They probably used little blocks of explosives such as I saw tied to trees the Germans intended to drop across highways.
We occupied two more houses in Morsbach, both on the German side. First was another two-story house on the southeast side. I was upstairs trying to get an east facing window open. It wouldn’t budge, so I cut away vigorously with my trusty old Sears hunting knife. That sure brought the owner. “Nein! Nein! Nein!” he cried. Then he set to work successfully to get it open.
I remember only two other things about this stay. First, I found a GI flashlight in the yard facing Forbach. Was it booby trapped? We were frequently warned of such sneaky tricks. But I wanted that flashlight. So I held it around the corner of the house. If it blew when I turned it on I’d lose only that hand. Good thinking, huh?
Then there was my buddy, Martin. He showed me something he was going to try to ship home. Could home owners hide anything from us? Hardly. Martin had been poking around in the stoker coal pile in the basement. Hidden there was an absolutely beautiful egg-shell thin tea set. Eight places as I recall. Stealing? Naw! These were Germans!
The next place not too far away was also German, but we were treated kindly by the occupants and responded in kind.
All were women; four as I recall. They had limited foodstuff, but theirs was different from ours. For example, they could make pancakes; we had canned meat and cheese. So we shared meals with them doing the cooking.
Some of us were outside one day when a large number of our bombers went over. A sizable German city to the east, was apparently their target. The bombers dropped streams of tinsel like stuff to mess up anti-aircraft radar. We could see the bursts of ack-ack, and both feel and hear the bombs exploding. We danced in glee and did no small amount of cheer leading. Then we noticed the look of horror on the faces of the women. They probably had both relatives and friends under those bombs. Their plight dampened our joy a bit.
All of us, GI’s and women alike, stayed in the large basement of the house. Occasional shells had fallen close a number of times. They sounded like mortars, whether ours or theirs we didn’t know. But their shrapnel or ours, it made no difference. The pieces I brought back came from the yard of that home, Route National, Morsbach No 39, Moselle.
I spent many hours talking with one of the women, a friendly buxom gal in her mid twenties. We strained both my German and French. None of them spoke English. Early on she said that she had been married and further that, “Mein mon vas gerfallen en Rusland”. She was Elizabeth Houlle. Whether kin by marriage to the recipients of our bread gift I never thought to ask.

Elizabeth Houlle, Moselle
The day we left we were in the basement when the order came to pull out. Had I not been wearing my helmet I most surely would have earned a Purple Heart. Elizabeth gave me a goodbye hug by wrapping her arms around me and lifting vigorously. Wham! My helmet met one of the floor joists with enough force to almost knock me out.
We thought the war was going great for us and the French people. We thought we had finished the job where we were and were just heading off to do another. As always, we knew nothing but what we could see. Only later did we learn that the Germans had successfully attacked on both our flanks. We were leaving not as winners, but to keep from being trapped. The people who had given us their homes and friendship for more than a month would again suffer from German troops and their sympathizers. Many probably lost their lives soon after we left. Though we didn’t know at the time we were headed for the Colmar area and our worst time of the war.
Enough garden peas for twelve guys really isn’t a big order. It is, however, when those peas have been canned in wine bottles. They only come out one at a time. I had two guys assigned to the pea bottle shaking operation.
The chicken hunters had been successful. Four hens, scalded and plucked, bubbled away in a big kettle. There would be lots of gravy to go with the bread we’d retrieved from various hidey-holes in the house. Potatoes, apples and cherries rounded out the menu.
Stuff was almost ready. For the hell of it I spread a nice linen cloth on the table and set it with the good china. While doing this I saw a movement at the dining room window. The face of a middle-aged woman stared at me with a look of consternation.
I wont try to explain what I did next; I’ll just tell you what I did. I gave her as evil a look as I could muster, drew my old Sears hunting knife from its scabbard, raised it high, drove it hard into the center of the dining room table watching her face all the while. She threw her hands to her face, consternation changed to horror, and she disappeared.
Doubtless her house, her stuff. Not a very nice thing for a kindly American soldier to do? Perhaps not, but these folks were strongly pro Nazi Germany. I’d found a nice large swastika flag (sent it home) in the house plus evidence that a captain in the SS resided there. When our chicken hunters came back they reported that some women had been pouring boiling water from second story windows on our guys as they passed on the sidewalk below. In return they got stitched with burp gun fire. We didn’t think these people deserved much if any consideration from us.
The line of creeping vehicles came to a stop. Lt. Engen came back from his jeep and motioned us to pull into a little depression back of some other vehicles. There we were mixed in with a mortar outfit using 4.2 mortars. They were just beginning a firing mission. It was quite an interesting operation. We sure hoped they didn’t generate any return fire.
We had no idea what they were shooting at, but there was an awful lot of noise up ahead. For sure, though, someone out there knew the target. His voice came clearly over their radio saying, “Couple clicks to the right”, “Little higher”, then finally yelling excitedly, “You’re right on ‘em, pour it on! Pour it on!” And that those guys did. Four tubes they had, I think, and they were still methodically dropping mortar rounds into them when we were ordered to move on. The noise ahead was deafening.
When we got out of the tree cover into the open it was clear there’d been a hell of a fight. Wrecked trucks, half-tracks and 90 mm guns were scatted all along our route.
We rolled into town and proceeded to the far end of the wide main drag there to await orders as to what to do next. Black GI’s, the first I’d ever seen, occupied the near end we’d just passed through. We learned they were what was left of the tank destroyer outfit whose equipment we’d passed along the road coming in.
There was a shot. Everyone crouched. Then another and another. At the other end of the street a jeep wobbled slowly back and forth down the street toward us. The black guy driving repeatedly fired a 45 pistol in the air. He was obviously drunk as a lord, as the saying goes.
Cpl. Massey, our resident redneck, member of one of the other AT squads, twenty years regular army, tall, pot gutted, near worthless like Cpl. Taggart, charged out in the street with a German burp gun he’d picked up somewhere. He yelled, “Let me shoot him, Lieutenant. Please let me shoot him!”
Before anything could happen a black officer overtook the jeep on foot, jumped on the side of it, then whacked the driver so hard on the side of his head with a 45 that the pistol flew apart in pieces. That ended the episode. I wont speculate as to the tragedy that might have occurred had Massey shot the guy or even fired at him.
We seldom knew where we were going, where we were when we got there nor where we’d been when we left. That was the case here. Not until I read the report after action could I confirm that this was part of the battle for Climbach, the last major German holding of French territory in that region.
One platoon of the 614th Tank Destroyer Battalion had taken their four guns right into the valley in knee deep mud. There they had slugged it out with German 88’s and Tiger tanks firing down on them from high ground. They lost three of their guns and most of the ten-man crews which manned them, but they finally took out all of the German armor and artillery.
Had it not been for those black TD guys we would have come under those guns. They literally saved our asses. For that action they later received a Presidential Unit Citation. And our old southern redneck wanted to shoot one who had taken on a bit too much Schnapps!
The fox hole I made that afternoon was without doubt the best to date. I lined it with a couple of extra blankets from the truck, then spread my treasure, a nicely tanned angora goat hide I’d recently found. That long soft hair provided pure luxury.
Things were really looking up. The big German break through around Bastogne had been taken care of, and we had been sent south to the Colmar area. General McAuliffe had changed from command of the 101st Airborne to command of our division.
The afternoon before I’d been in a house with a bunch of other guys. A lieutenant came in and asked for volunteers to be part of an honor guard for our new general when he came through town. Eddie Van Arsdall, my uncle and a rifleman in the Rainbow Division in WWI, had given me three rules to live by in the service: (1) keep your mouth shut; (2) keep your peter in your pants; and (3) never volunteer for anything. I wanted to honor at least one of his rules. Most raised their hands; I didn’t. The ‘honor guard’ those guys went on was a night combat patrol charged with bringing back some prisoners.
Lt. Engen came by while we were lounging around our foxholes. He said, “You guys might as well get a good nights sleep. Tomorrow we’re going to reoccupy a town the Germans have moved back into. It won’t be much of a problem. Intelligence reports they’re mostly old men and boys. They have no armor”.
My recollections of the next two or three days seem different than all others. I have mostly only snap-shot stills. My memory generates only a few action scenes.
We were in some woods. There was a road with a ‘T’ junction just out from the woods. Someone said we must steer clear of the road, especially that junction, as the Germans had it zeroed in with artillery.
We seemed to do nothing but wait. Sounds of heavy firing came from ahead. A guy came striding through the woods toward us. He was almost totally black - covered with soot and oil. He’d been in one of the Shermans that had gone around the woods toward town. He slowed only long enough to say the Germans had let them get part way across the field in front of town; then rolled 88’s wheel to wheel into the streets. Only two of the tanks escaped.
Grabstein, a heavy set Jewish guy from NYC, member of our battalion’s intelligence platoon, came lumbering by. They had been following the tanks when all hell broke loose. He and another guy (a tall, slender fellow who wore glasses - a grad student in math in one of the big Eastern colleges - I can only remember that about him - not his name) rolled into a shell hole and lay flat. Grab said he had no desire to see what was going on. ‘Math’ kept poking his head up for a look. They drilled him right in the center of his forehead. Grab left him there.
A few shells kept falling into the woods. The ground was frozen too hard to dig into. For protection we stood behind large trees. Surprise! For the first time in memory one of our kitchen vehicles came up with big kettles of hot food. It was dark. I’d lost my spoon. I lay down behind a large tree, hooked my lower lip over the edge of the mess kit, and raked the food in with my hunting knife.
It was well into the night. We were in some sort of small cellar or bunker in the woods. Lt. Engen came in and said there were some of our wounded in the basement of a farmhouse near town. Extra stretcher bearers were needed to go get them. Volunteers? No hands went up. “We’ll draw straws”, he said, and started breaking some little twigs. Short ones go, he said, as he assembled the straws in his hand. Someone burst in. The order was to pull back - now!
We had our 57 in the corner of a brushy fence row well out in a large flat area near the woods we’d been in earlier. Right beside us was one of the surviving Sherman tanks. We knew we were rear guard; everyone else had been pulled back. We were there the rest of that night and up into the next day. Nothing happened. A jeep roared up. Someone yelled, “Lets get the hell our of here!” We did.
We stopped near some buildings. A guy from one of our other squads (our three guns never worked together) walked up and said Andrew Sneller (one of his squad members) had just been killed. Bunch of guys were in a big room. Pot bellied stove was going strong. Sneller was standing warming his butt and smoking a cigarette. Someone was cleaning a carbine. Dropped the barrel. It still contained the bolt - and a round in the chamber. Hit Sneller dead center. He was a quiet guy, a bit older than most of us, home Paonia, Colorado.
Sessenheim was the town we’d tried to take. I knew that much, but little else. Report After Action says, “……..on January 19, Later I learned that the attack included the first battalion of the 410th Infantry and the first and third (mine) battalions of the 411th. Progress was good at the start, but the ‘old men and boys’ our intelligence said we’d be facing turned into a much larger force of crack troops equipped with tanks, self-propelled weapons, and flack wagons. Eight of the tanks that went past us and into the open field facing the town did not come back.
I later heard that of the some 1500 men who went in less than 300 got out unscathed. Some were captured. A few were stripped, tied to trees naked, and left to freeze to death. Buddies later exacted retribution by tying some German prisoners to lampposts in a village; then dropping grenades into their blouse fronts.
How about I get a few shorties off my mind and be done with this campaign?
Open a box of K rations hoping for some coffee and maybe a tin of good meat. Invariably there would be a little envelope of solidified lemon drink and a rubbery gob of cheese that could not have been melted with a blow torch.
Bill Perdew, a soft-spoken member of our squad from San Bernadino, crawled out of his foxhole in answer to a call from our squad leader, Bill Angsten. Seconds later a mortar round fell squarely into that foxhole. Bill Angsten hadn’t said a word.
A GI was marching two German PW’s down an icy street. An old Frenchman charged up behind one of the PW’s, aimed a mighty kick as his rear end, came up short, and landed flat on his back. No one laughed.
We got out of the mountains and found the first real shelter we’d had in weeks - a haymow. The new mummy bags had just been distributed. I slipped into mine, zipped it closed with all of me inside, wedged myself into the hay, and went into a state of sheer panic. The zipper was stuck; I couldn’t move it either way. What would I do if the bad guys came!!
Always we looked up when the white streaks, usually by the dozens, crossed the sky high above west to east. Many thoughts my mind: Sure glad they are ours. Someone’s going to get it today! I could have been flying one of those big babies. Take a few hours to do my job; then back to a shower, hot food and a warm bed.
A guy from one of the other squads walked up to the back of our truck and said, “This is Doney’s helmet. He was trying to make contact with the FFI and they shot him by mistake.” It was a center shot through his head. Louden Doney, Houston, was son of a Colonel and member of our Intelligence platoon. He was the fullback on our Camp Howze ‘touch’ football team. At the outset I thought that platoon was the place for me. What could happen to a guy in intelligence?
Shells started falling. Gertsen desperately tried to batter down a door into one of the places along the street. He made it. But there was no building on the other side. Bennie Gentile ran madly around a Sherman tank seeking shelter, slipped on a fresh cow pie, and fell flat on his face in it. Two guys tried to crawl through the tracks of a half-track to get under it. We didn’t like to be around tanks no matter whose they were. They always either fired or drew fire or both.
‘I’ Company had just been through its first major battle. Twins were riflemen in the same platoon. They came back to the CP with two prisoners, discovered that their platoon sergeant had been killed, then shot both their prisoners. An officer started to take some action against them, but stopped when a noncom said, “Sir, I wouldn’t, if I were you. They loved that guy.”
‘I’ Company’s first battle involved some rather savage close quarter fighting. One of the lieutenants was at least six feet six and weighted maybe 250 pounds. He wounded a German soldier, was wounded himself so that he couldn’t use his weapon. He therefore simply stomped the German to death.
Early on there was a spate of short rounds from our artillery. The regiment’s second in command, a lanky Lt. Col., found the guilty battery of 155 Long Toms, ordered them to follow his jeep, and after some traveling, stopped and pointed to a place up the mountain, and said, “There’s your damned target! Now see if you can hit it!” Unfortunately, the so-called short rounds never ended.
The commander of the 411th, my regiment, was Colonel Donovan P. Yeuell. Though it may have been my imagination, he seemed a rather decrepit man from another era. I saw him once near his tent as his oriental house boy was placing his potty chair. He apparently stayed till the end. His home? Harrodsburg, Kentucky, county seat of my home county.
Did I purposely omit all tales of my squad laying 57 mm rounds into Tiger tanks, hurling grenades into German bunkers, smothering charging troops with small arms and 50 cal machine gun fire? Hardly! When I left the outfit for the hospital on Ground Hog Day ’45 we still had every round of ammo, every shell, grenade, and mine, that we started with on day one. Why? We never had a target. Anti-tankers were primarily defenders hence were among the most fortunate of warriors when their forces attacked most of the time. When there was a pull back the enemy did not come our way. Our two other 57’s were occasionally charged with firing on suspected German observation posts, like church steeples. Our squad never got such a mission. We got lots of crap thrown at us, but never had a chance to sling any back. And that was OK by me.
Despite the cold, snow, slush and miserable living conditions I never got so much as a sniffle. No bad colds, no flu, no pneumonia. One wintry day I went to a medic tent to get a cut finger treated. While waiting my turn I almost lost my cookies. Too warm! They had an oil stove going and the temperature must have been at least forty degrees. That was the closest I came to getting sick until poor eating habits finally did me in.
Our mail was censored? We thought each and every letter we wrote was censored. Lt. Engen’s personal stamp was on the envelopes of all of my letters. But when I look at the volume of mail I sent just to my mother…………and there were thirty six of us in the anti-tank platoon which Engen commanded…..he had to have help just to stamp them!
Heck! I thought I could quit here, but my old buddy, Don Martin, wrote a letter that just has to be part of the record. From the hospital in England I had written to my squad leader, Bill Angsten. Don replied.
Don was one of our squad members, a Californian from middle of the state - never got his home address - off-red hair, freckled face, burr hair cut, balding a bit, age 20, 5’8” and 150 pounds, tough as nails. He was our ‘cartoonist’ - could and did turn any situation into a comic strip cartoon in two minutes. He used cartoons as a way to write home. He could have written a cartoon book rivaling the best - maybe he did get one out. Here’s his letter:
May 20, 1945
Steinach, Austria
Dear Van:
Bill is on furlough to England so will do the honor of answering your letter of May 1.
Say, boy, it’s been a long time no see. We certainly missed you and we mean it. Remember when you left us? Well, it wasn’t long after that, that we moved to Ingweiler just a few miles from where you left us. There we stayed for nearly a month. We had it fairly nice. Once in a while we’d dodge a few of our own artillery, but that’s about all. Then came the day of the big push off. Our artillery laid down one of their biggest barrages that a person ever heard. It lasted for 35 minutes. My ears are still ringing.
We went into Mulhouse where our boys in the morning had most of the casualties. The foot mine did it’s dirt in that sector. We pulled into Mulhouse at night and the town was ablaze from what our artillery did. Well anyhow there was a hot fire here and there so a person didn’t have to worry about a field jacket to keep warm. We got 7 or 8 120 mm from the Jerries that night, but that was all. The next morning we pulled out. It was clear sailing from there to the Siegfried.
We made it to Bobenthal, “our old stomping grounds last winter”, about two days after the push off. That was a rat race I’ll never forget. We were continually trying to out run the artillery, AA, TD’s, Generals, Colonels and whatnot to Bobenthal. Broadway NY on a Saturday night couldn’t have been more complicated.
Finally when we arrived at our old stomping grounds, we moved into that big house where the C.P. was last time. Remember? There we were committed as litter bearers - yes - all of anti-tank. The rifle boys stayed in the same dugouts that they made last winter. There we watched our artillery peck at a pillbox and every time a 155-mm shell would hit it the Jerries would fire a burp gun out of the slits just to mock our artillery. It got to be a joke after a bit.
Two days later the Bat. pulled out and by-passed many of the pill boxes. Then a mad scramble to the Rhine. It was the same as the first rat race. The Jerries were giving up by the Battalions and even more in groups. Every town had its white flag out and hardly a shot was fired. And no casualties.
Those poor Jerries! They were frisked and frisked and refrisked. By the time our Regiment had passed them they were lucky if they had the hair on their chest left!
I remember one time we were building a bridge and the General, “Nuts”**(Don drew two stars here) was there hurrying us up, when two Krauts came up to give up. No one would bother to take them prisoner so they pitched in and helped us. We pulled out leaving them looking at us. I guess they went home.
The boys and yours truly had plenty of wine, champagne, etc. Yes, I did see what our air corps did. Let me tell you that what I saw was hell in any man’s language. From the Sigfried to the Rhine were remnants of what was left of Jerry convoys - hundreds of dead stinking horses and many dead Krauts sprawled all over the place. We passed one Kraut who was still alive on the bank just above the road. No one paid any attention to him. Guess he’s buried by now.
We stayed in a little burg near the Rhine where one outfit ran across 127,000 quarts of champagne. Each man in the Regiment got a bottle and the officers a case. They had a hell of a time pulling me out of the clouds. It was a damn good thing the enemy didn’t attack. Everyone was drunk as the lord. The sober ones, and that was damned few, pulled all night guard.
We dilly dallied around a couple of weeks on this side of the Rhine where the refugee trail was free, then we crossed the Rhine. I found some more champagne, the best a person ever tasted. I landed back to normal a day later.
We went into reserve for a while. Boy that was the life. Finally we pulled out and committed again only this time it was a picnic. More wine, champagne, schnapps, cognac and whatnot. Everyone in the outfit has a Jerry pistol and many have 7 or 8. Also watches. I’ve got 20 watches and a little 32 cal. Mauser.
The only trouble we had or rather a sweat bath was when we went past the Kaisers castle. There it stood about 800 feet above us like a huge medieval fortress and the previous orders for the convoy was to go like a bat out of hell past it. Now I don’t have to tell you what happened. We crawled slowly up the hill and then finally stopped with the damned thing staring down at us. No shots were fired and all was OK.
The only soldiers that we were up against were the Volkstrom “home guard” made up of local yokels from 7 to 70. They were armed with small arms, but a bazooka or artillery round would disarm everyone of them who heard it. They would come running and yelling ‘Kamrad!’ and all that sort of junk.
It got to be such a nuisance that hundreds and hundreds would be walking down the convoy without one guard. We were on such a rampage that we didn’t have time to bother with them.
Finally, Lt. Engen got permission to corral a few so our platoon rounded up about 1800 and put two of our men and three or four liberated Frenchman on guard. It was a silly idea. They could have trampled us into the ground if they’d wanted to. I stood my guard and went to bed. When I woke in the morning we had 3000 PW’s who had come in on their own. Lt. Engen told the Kraut officer to order his men to shell out all of their watches and knives. We got a bushel basket full of watches of every type and double that amount of knives. We took what we wanted and gave the rest to the French guards. About a couple hours later we pulled out and left the poor devils to their lonesome with no one to guard them.
We landed in Landsburg where our outfit was. There I got my first eye view of the German concentration camp for political prisoners. Before I never believed fully what our propaganda used to say about such a place existing in Germany. Boy it was a hell of a sight. The camp was in charge of SS troops where they tortured, beat and starved every prisoner. Most were Jews. There were dead bodies everywhere. There was a cart stacked full of the dead. Nothing but skin and bones. I stood and watched one die. There was nothing a person could do to save him. Most of them were half crazed and fought like mad dogs over a scrap of food. The medics said not to stay long nor let them touch you or let them have cigarettes. They were diseased and they would have to have a hospital diet for months. Smoking might have killed most of them.
Well, that’s that about the dirty mess. Anyway, we pulled out of Landsburg with plenty of liquor and warm Kraut clothes for we had the mission to go through the Brenner Pass and meet the 5th Army or rather the 88th Division and we heard that there was two foot of snow.
We had a picnic. I went fishing with grenades and got results.
Now we are situated about 16 miles from Innsbruck which you’ve no doubt read about in the papers. 409 took that burg. The boys have been taking it easy and enjoying them selves in a few wild parties with a few wild things around here that you’re missing out on.
Well, Van, I’ll sign off for now. If there’s any more you’d like to know just write. Censorship has been lifted.
Sincerely yours, As ever,
Don Martin
Now stories about my time in combat have really ended. When Germany surrendered the 103rd Infantry Division was disbanded. My ‘Cactus’ friends and comrades were split up and sent to other outfits. I suspect that few of them had to make the trip across the other ocean.