by Leo Barron
Friday, 22 December 1944
Area of operations, 101st Airborne Division
Bastogne and environs
Although it did not come as a shock, the first major snowfall of the season was certainly an unpleasant experience for the Americans dug in around Bastogne. Soldiers shivered as they woke up from their foxholes, shaking off the snowflakes and brushing their tarps and weapons clean. The ground was now rock-hard, making it almost impossible to build new positions or expand trenches. Water had frozen in canteens, and the cold remnants of K rations had no appeal as an early morning breakfast. Fingers and toes were still numb after the bitter-cold night, and many of the GIs were already reporting cases of frostbite.
Temperatures had dropped so low the night before that many of the men had slept on top of one another in bundles, using their own body heat to keep from freezing. Usually two to three soldiers were crammed into a foxhole. As they crawled out of their cramped holes to urinate, the paratroopers stretched stiff muscles and cracked their backs. Here and there a cigarette was lit and shared.
There wasn’t much holiday cheer. Any thoughts of Christmas were buried under jobs to do, and the pure struggle to survive the cold and their predicament. Men grumbled and cursed the snow. They pulled their jacket collars up to protect their chins and necks and tried to warm their hands under their armpits. Some even stayed in their bedrolls, wearing the sleeping bags and wool blankets as makeshift parkas. Flurries continued that morning, driving the men to huddle around their small stoves for the little warmth they provided. Those who could find shelter in a barn or farmhouse quickly did so. It was clear to both armies now that they would be fighting a brand-new enemy for survival—Mother Nature.
The Germans didn’t wait long that morning. Elements of the 26th Reconnaissance Battalion struck the overextended lines of Charlie and Able companies of the 1/401st Glider Infantry, west of Mande Saint-Etienne. Sergeant Robert Bradley and Sergeant Robert Bowen from Able and Charlie companies, respectively, rounded up some troops and a Sherman tank to evict the German intruders. After a brief firefight, they restored the lines with minimal casualties, while inflicting severe losses on the German grenadiers. Bowen, though glad they were victorious, knew the Germans would soon try again.27
Morning, Friday, 22 December 1944
Area of operations, Able Company, 1/502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment
Champs, Belgium
Like any old soldier, Private Ted Goldmann was used to being left in the dark concerning the bigger picture. But Friday morning, as the wind continued to blow snow through the tree lots and down the gullies near the town of Champs, Goldmann was starting to wonder just what the hell was going on. Once again A Company was ordered up and marching. When they first arrived near Bastogne, Able Company had dug in around the town of Monaville. Then, on Thursday, the company was told to desert their freshly dug foxholes and head eastward to reinforce the 506th. Goldmann had been part of the group that had gone to Recogne. While they had waited in their assault positions, word had come down to Captain Swanson, Goldmann’s company commander, that Able Company and the rest of 1st Battalion were no longer needed. Picking up his rifle, bedroll, and musette bag, Goldmann marched with the rest of the Able boys to another position outside of Longchamps in some nearby woods. There the men spent the day digging new holes.
Now it was Friday morning, and once again A Company was ordered to move. Where, Goldmann had no idea. All he knew was that once they arrived they would have to dig more foxholes again, and this time it would be worse. They would first have to dig through the snow, then the ground, which had frozen rock-hard since yesterday. The small entrenching tools the paratroopers had carried with them since D-day were not up to the task.28 Now he was trudging through the snow to another town. Where or why, he had no clue. All he could guess was that the Germans might be coming, having finally picked on the boys in the 502nd for a fight. The rumors flying around among the “dogfaces” were so bad that a few days ago he thought the Germans had surrounded and isolated part of the 502nd. It wasn’t until the next morning that he found out to his relief that he wasn’t alone: It was the entire division the Germans had surrounded. The news was no big deal to the paratroops. Goldmann shared the grim humor and spirit expressed by another soldier in a different regiment that had been making the rounds: “So they’ve got us surrounded, the poor bastards!”29
When Goldmann arrived in Champs, he found the townspeople incredibly friendly. They were hard-pressed like everyone else, but despite this adversity, they managed to scrape and scour to provide the paratroopers with bread, butter, and chicory for coffee.30 While Goldmann enjoyed some Belgian hospitality, Captain Wallace Swanson, his commander, surveyed the area on the outskirts of the town. Swanson decided to place his 2nd Platoon on the southern flank, 1st Platoon on the northern flank, and 3rd Platoon would occupy a position in the center, but on the western outskirts of Champs. Like a good zone defense in football, Swanson had also ensured that he had backup in the form of solid artillery to cover the bowl-shaped vale encompassing Champs. The 377th PFAB sent him a forward observer so that his company would have immediate communication and on-the-spot artillery support. At 1015 hours, he radioed to Rolle that his company had established a roadblock in Champs. Luckily for Swanson, Chappuis had made sure that more help was on the way.31
For the past twenty-four-hour period, Lieutenant Claude Duvall’s platoon (minus one section) of tank destroyers had been waiting for a new set of orders. The twentieth had been a day of frantic action, as Duvall had tangled with panzers in support of Lieutenant Colonel John P. Stopka’s 3rd Battalion in Recogne, but on Thursday, Duvall’s truncated platoon remained south of that town, sitting around, observing and reporting enemy movements.
At 1000 hours Duvall received an order to vacate his current position and link up with Captain Swanson’s Able Company of the 502nd at Champs. Duvall was responding to the urgent call for armor that had gone out from Swanson that morning. When Duvall’s M8 rolled into the town, he was pleased to find two M18 tank destroyers from Charlie Company of the 705th already there. Although this section of TDs had originally belonged to Lieutenant Paul Long’s 3rd Platoon, it would now be considered under his command, since he was the senior 705th officer at that location. Luckily for Duvall, the TD commanders were both top-notch: Sergeant Tony D’Angelo and Sergeant Larry Vallitta.
Duvall quickly went to work establishing a defense. First he sent one Hellcat to occupy a battle position just to the south of Champs adjacent to a building. Next he directed the other TD to a spot on the main north–south road running through town so that it could watch over the first one and provide direct fire support against any vehicle coming down the Champs road from Rouette. In addition to Long’s section, the division allocated one M18 tank destroyer from the 811th Tank Destroyer Battalion.
The story of this lone tank destroyer and its adopted crew was an interesting orphan’s tale. The M18 was originally from 3rd Platoon, Charlie Company, of the 811th. The five-man crew had lost its original TD, fighting in support of Combat Command Reserve, 9th Armored Division, during the battle of Longvilly on the nineteenth. Then, by a stroke of luck, the crew discovered an abandoned M18 the next day. The remnants of their platoon and the rest of the company found themselves attached to Combat Command B of 10th Armored Division, which directed several Hellcats to man one of the many roadblocks east of Bastogne. On the morning of the twenty-second, CCB, 10th Armored, relieved the adopted M18. The crew decided on their own initiative to head west to Champs. It was a crew with a borrowed vehicle, in a unit that had borrowed them. They didn’t know anyone else, but were willing to help defend Bastogne to the best of their ability. In Champs, Duvall positioned the “orphan” M18 by the village church to cover the approaches to the northwest.32
Satisfied with the positioning of the tank destroyers, Duvall drove his own M8 to a spot on the northwest side of town so that he could fire 37mm canister rounds anywhere in Champs to help break u
p any potential infantry attack. He knew the additional firepower would help Swanson and his boys feel a little better about their precarious hold on the town. With three TDs, an M8, a towed 57mm AT gun, and a slew of extra machine guns, Swanson had amassed enough firepower to beat back any probe with relative ease. But what if the Germans attacked with something more than a probe? Neither Swanson nor Duvall would know that answer until Christmas morning.33
Morning, Friday, 22 December 1944
Headquarters, 1/502nd Parachute Infantry Battalion
Hemroulle, Belgium
It was snowing again in the small Belgian village of Hemroulle. So much flurried from the skies that it clung to the spire of the local church. In house billet number thirteen near the end of the village, Major John Hanlon, 1st Battalion commander of the 502nd, kept his headquarters. A native New Englander, Hanlon, twenty-six, was nicknamed “Long John” for his skinny build. A top graduate of his 1940 ROTC class at the University of New Hampshire, Hanlon, like so many young officers in the airborne, had initially wanted to join the paratroopers when he heard they made fifty dollars more a month than the average soldier. But it was more than the money to Hanlon; it was the chance to play an important part in the war. Hanlon had served with the 502nd in Normandy and Holland. A German sniper had wounded him in Holland that September. It was a close call. He was shot in the back, and doctors were at first concerned that he was paralyzed, but luckily that was not the case. Shortly after his recuperation, Hanlon found himself heading out for Bastogne.34
Hemroulle was a small town with about a dozen farmhouses and less than a hundred inhabitants, and most of them had been sheltering in the basements of their homes since the beginning of the siege. There was not much in the way of cover nearby. There were some patches of trees near the town, a few hedgerows, but to Hanlon his men seemed terribly exposed. Their dark olive drab uniforms seemed conspicuous against the newly fallen snow.
Hanlon held an impromptu staff huddle.35 During the brainstorming session, one of his staff suggested procuring bedsheets from the local villagers for camouflage. Hanlon nodded. It was worth a shot. He sent Captain Edward Fitzgerald, the battalion executive officer, and several members of his headquarters staff to contact the burgomaster of the town, Victor Gaspard, who had seen the Germans occupy his town twice (once in 1914 and again in 1940) in the seventy-some years he had lived near Bastogne. Gaspard, grinning behind a large white mustache, agreed to help the Americans. The two men rang the Hemroulle church bell. When villagers arrived to investigate the commotion, Gaspard explained to his people the need for white linen: anything—bedsheets, pillowcases, tablecloths, even window curtains—that would help the Americans hide their positions and vehicles.
Hanlon was moved when he saw the villagers disperse quickly, and then return with their arms full of white linen—more than forty-eight sets, individually some two hundred or more sheets, which were all the citizens owned, were turned over to “Long John” and his staff without a complaint. None of the Belgians even asked when the items would be returned. As Gaspard explained to them, the Americans were here to save their town from the Nazis. Anything they could give that could help in that goal was worth the sacrifice of a few bedsheets.
Hanlon searched in his field jacket pocket for a receipt to write the mayor. Finding none at the moment, he felt embarrassed as his troopers carted the linen away. Gaspard smiled and touched Hanlon’s hand. “Long John” promised he would reimburse the villagers after the war.
Soon paratroopers of the 502nd sported pillowcases for helmet covers; mortar and machine gun pits were blanketed under linen; and great white sheets helped disguise the hoods and frames of trucks, half-tracks, and jeeps.36
Morning, Friday, 22 December 1944
Headquarters, 115th Panzergrenadier Regiment
Roggendorf, Germany (111 kilometers northeast of Bastogne)
Earlier that morning, as Colonel Heinz Kokott pondered how he was going to take Bastogne, a middle-aged Wehrmacht Oberst (colonel) with thinning hair stepped out onto a darkened street in the town of Roggendorf, Germany. Like most towns in the Heimat, Roggendorf’s homes and buildings were under strict blackout orders from the Reichsminister to keep Allied bombers from using the lights to guide them to their targets.
To Colonel Wolfgang Maucke, the whole atmosphere was deathly depressing. He glanced down at his leather riding boots. He noticed how quickly the bottoms had become caked in ice and snow. During the night, snowstorms had covered much of northwest Germany, Luxembourg, and Belgium. Now the soft white snow created a scene reminiscent of Christmas paintings and postcards. Maucke knew deep in his heart that once again, as in the past few years, there would be no Christmas rest. There would be no chance to spend time with family and friends in, for once, a peaceful Christmas season. No, for Maucke, commander of the 115th Panzergrenadier Regiment, Christmas would likely be another day of war.
It was still dark in the town of Roggendorf that morning as he hopped into his staff car. Snow continued to fall, and the warmth of the car was welcome as he leaned back in his seat and recalled the events of the last few days. Maucke had arrived in Roggendorf the night of the twentieth with the rest of his regimental staff. He waited in Roggendorf that day for his orders, which he assumed would dictate the role he and the 115th would play in the great offensive now under way. Finally, during the night, the commander of the 15th Panzergrenadier Division (and Maucke’s superior), Colonel Hans Joachim Deckert, issued instructions for each of its regiments to move down to the town of Prüm, Germany.37 The movement would have to be made during hours of limited visibility in hopes the American fighter-bombers would miss the convoys.38
For Maucke, this was not the first time he had led his men into battle against the American army. Unlike his brethren in the 26th Volksgrenadier Division, who had fought mostly against the Russians prior to the Bulge, the 15th Panzergrenadier had fought in Italy against both the American and British armies. The veterans of the division were well-versed in American tactics. They knew the Americans preferred to use firepower over manpower. They also knew the American eagle was faster and cleverer than the Russian bear on the battlefield. For the German soldiers of the 15th Panzergrenadier Division, Italy had been a crash course in learning to defend against an enemy who ruled the air, moved in unexpected ways, and typically had more firepower.
Luckily for Maucke, the 15th Panzergrenadier was a different kind of division. It was neither a panzer division nor an infantry division, but a bastardization of both—a balance of mobile infantry and armor. Whereas Kokott’s 26th Volksgrenadier was heavily reliant on trains and horses to move its men and supplies around, the 15th Panzergrenadier was almost completely motorized, to the point that OKW considered it a mobile division. The only downside to being mobile was that Maucke’s division had to rely completely on trucks, making it roadbound.
By 1944, the Wehrmacht’s Panzergrenadier divisions had only two infantry maneuver regiments. In the case of the 15th Panzergrenadier, these were the 104th and Maucke’s own 115th Panzergrenadier Regiments. The 15th also had a battalion of tanks and self-propelled assault guns, and almost an entire battalion of self-propelled tank destroyers (Panzerjägers). In the case of the 15th, two of these companies of Panzerjägers were self-propelled, and one company had towed Pak 40 antitank guns. Finally, like most infantry divisions, it had an antiaircraft battalion, an artillery regiment, and a reconnaissance battalion. In short, the typical Panzergrenadier division packed significant punch for getting the job done and going head-to-head with any Allied infantry division.
As Wehrmacht divisions went, the 15th Panzergrenadier was relatively new. It was born in the summer of 1943 on the island of Sicily from the remnants of the 15th Panzer Division. From there, it fought the Allies up the Italian peninsula. In August of 1944, OKW transferred the division northward to help stem the collapsing front in France. The division didn’t get there in time to help prevent the Allies from liberating France. Instead, it wound up fight
ing in the Aachen campaign, where it suffered serious losses slogging it out with the U.S. First Army. As a result, OKW withdrew it from the front lines to refit the division in October 1944 in preparation for Wacht am Rhein.39
Like his division, Wolfgang Maucke was a survivor. At forty-four years of age, Maucke was aware that he was getting a bit long in the tooth to be an Oberst in the Wehrmacht. From photos, he bore a bit of a resemblance to the famous Afrika Korps commander, the Desert Fox—Field Marshal Erwin Rommel. Like Rommel, Maucke had proven a steady and reliable officer, but unlike Rommel, he had led a fairly lackluster career in the German army. His career had not enjoyed the meteoric trajectory of von Manteuffel’s; nor did he enjoy the nepotistic relationship to high offices that Kokott did. Still, he was a trustworthy battle leader held in regard by his superiors. He had taken command of the 115th Regiment in April 1943 and successfully led it through various battles in Italy.40
Maucke first heard of the big push on December 14. Ironically, his regiment had been preparing for another operation in the area northeast of Aachen. In fact, his division staff had already briefed the regimental commanders on the twelfth of December, so purely by luck, his men, equipment, and vehicles were ready, stocked with ammo and supplies, and fueled. When the Aachen operation was postponed, Maucke was hoping his men could relax for the holidays, before the anticipated Allied spring offensive. On the fourteenth, Maucke and the rest of his fellow commanders received a summons to meet with the division staff the very next day. As with Kokott, the message piqued Maucke’s curiosity, especially when he was informed that only commanders could attend the highly secretive meeting.