By late Friday, American machine guns: TT, 459; Royce L. Thompson, “The ETO Ardennes Campaign: Operations of the Combat Group Peiper,” July 24, 1952, CMH (burned secrets in the cellar); Reynolds, Men of Steel, 126; Ardennes, 374–77; TT, 457–59 (Luger pistols), 465 (hit Malmédy instead).
“Position considerably worsened”: H. Priess, “Commitment of the I SS Panzer Corps During the Ardennes Offensive,” March 1946, FMS, #A-877, MHI, 40–43; Reynolds, Men of Steel, 133 (coded message); Reynolds, The Devil’s Adjutant, 225–35 (shot for desertion); Ardennes, 376–77 (last twenty-eight panzers).
At two A.M. on Sunday, December 24: Ardennes, 376–77. Other accounts cite fewer German wounded and more American prisoners left behind (Reynolds, Men of Steel, 133).
During a brief firefight with an American patrol: Hal D. McCown, CO, 2nd Bn, 119th Inf, “Observations of an American Field Officer,” n.d., MHI; TT, 462–63 (“Yankee Doodle”).
At a ford in the frigid Salm: Reynolds, Men of Steel, 134–35 (human chain); Royce L. Thompson, “The ETO Ardennes Campaign: Operations of the Combat Group Peiper,” July 24, 1952, CMH (German line at Wanne); TT, 462–63; Reynolds, Men of Steel, 134–35 (770 remained); “Malmédy Massacre Investigation,” Senate Armed Services Committee, Oct. 1949, 2; Ardennes, 262; Royce L. Thompson, “Bibliography of the Malmédy Massacre Case,” Dec. 9, 1954, CMH, Geog Belgium, 370.2.
Across the Ardennes, heavy snow: Royce L. Thompson, “Weather of the Ardennes Campaign,” Oct. 2, 1953, CMH, 29; Ardennes, 470; Moorehead, Eclipse, 228 (a “radiant world”); William A. Carter, “Carter’s War,” 1983, CEOH, box V-14, XII, 22 (stacked like sandbags); Wellard, The Man in a Helmet, 209 (women’s dresses); Lewis, ed., The Mammoth Book of Eyewitness World War II, 441 (“Everyone seems about the same age”).
Troops fashioned sleds: “Ardennes, Supply Installations, Withdraw of,” FUSA, Apr. 29, 1945, NARA RG 498, ETOUSA HD, UD 584; “Chief Engineers Report on Camouflage Activities in the ETO,” Nov. 15, 1945, Howard V. Canan papers, HIA, box 3 (lime wash and salt); Schrijvers, The Crash of Ruin, 208 (Belgian lace); “Third U.S. Army After Action Report,” n.d., chapter 21, CMH (mattress covers); “Unit History, 93rd Evacuation Hospital, 1944,” Donald E. Currier papers, MHI, box 1, 42–43 (gloves dipped in paint); Simpson, Selected Prose, 138 (“out like a match”); Mary Ferrell, 101st Evacuation Hospital, ts, March 1970, NWWIIM (“like an untuned radio”).
Clumsy skirmishes and pitched battles: Ardennes, 438–39; “Engineer Troops in Ardennes Breakthrough,” NARA RG 498, ETOUSA HD, UD 584, box 2, 2 (impeded the north shoulder); Liddell Hart, The Other Side of the Hill, 463 (exposed Manteuffel’s left flank); Horst Stumpff, OB West chief armored officer, Aug. 11, 1945, ETHINT 61, MHI, 61 (new panzers in the Rhine valley).
But west of St.-Vith in the German center: Gilmore, ed., U.S. Army Atlas of the European Theater in World War II, 142–43; Cirillo, “Ardennes-Alsace,” 33 (twenty-five-mile battlefront).
New anxiety beset First Army headquarters: Sylvan, 231; war diary, Dec. 24, 1944, 0615 hrs, MBR papers, MHI, box 59 (“The situation is normal”).
Others were far less sanguine: “Report on Allied Air Force Operations,” May 21, 1945, SHAEF, A-3, CARL, N-9371; AAFinWWII, 773 (“processing the terrain”); Royce L. Thompson, “Weather of the Ardennes Campaign,” Oct. 2, 1953, CMH, 29–30 (GIs craned their necks); Davis, Carl A. Spaatz and the Air War in Europe, 532–33 (heaviest attacks of the war); Richard Henry Byers, “Battle of the Bulge,” 1983, a.p., 36 (“The bombers have fine, feathery”); Ardennes, 649–50 (horse-drawn plows); Quesada, “Operations of the Ninth Tactical Air Command,” lecture, May 29, 1945, NARA RG 334, E 315, ANSCOL, L-10-45, 13; diary, Martin Opitz, 295th VG Div, Dec. 25, 1944, NARA RG 407, ETO G-3 OR, box 8 (“The American Jabos”).
Clear skies also permitted resupply of Bastogne: “Report on Air Resupply to 101st Airborne Division at Bastogne,” Jan. 11, 1945, in “Battle of the Bulge,” and OH, Carl W. Kohls, G-4, et al., NARA RG 407, E 427-A, CI, folders #229 and 230. Of 900 sorties to Bastogne, 23 planes would be lost (Royce L. Thompson, “Air Resupply to Isolated Units, Ardennes Campaign,” Feb. 1951, CMH, 2-3.7 AE P, 73).
General McAuliffe also had the invaluable services: OH, James E. Parker, “Air Support Part at Bastogne,” Jan. 1, 1945, NARA RG 407, E 427-A, CI, folder #230; Marshall, Bastogne, 134–56; “Bastogne,” n.d., NARA RG 498, ETOUSA HD, UD 584 (Tracks in the snow).
Bastogne was reprieved: OH, William L. Roberts, CCB, 10th AD, Jan. 12, 1945, NARA RG 407, E 427-A, folder #305; “Bastogne,” n.d., NARA RG 498, ETOUSA HD, UD 584 (rationed to ten rounds); Ardennes, 474 (sixteen miles in circumference); Ingersoll, Top Secret, 250 (“steel filings”).
More than three thousand civilians remained trapped: Toland, Battle, 255–57; “Medical Evacuation and Supply, Bastogne,” n.d., NARA RG 407, E 427-A, CI, folder 230 (Several hundred wounded); Cowdrey, Fighting for Life, 265–66 (“their faces were old”); Rapport and Northwood, Rendezvous with Destiny, 469–70 (toiled by flashlight and rifle range); Cosmas and Cowdrey, Medical Services in the European Theater of Operations, 418 (the moribund lay along a wall and cognac); “Bastogne,” n.d., NARA RG 498, ETOUSA HD, UD 584 (coffee and Ovaltine); Schrijvers, The Crash of Ruin, 166–67.
Napalm fires ringed the town: Ardennes, 475.
“Do not plan, for God’s will”: Weintraub, 11 Days in December, 137; Simpson, Selected Prose, 140 (“Those who are attacking you”); Toland, Battle, 255–57 (“Santa Claus Is Coming”); Ardennes, 475 (“Xmas eve present”); Marshall, Bastogne, 169 (“We have been let down”).
At 5:10 P.M. an intrepid pilot: “Medical Evacuation and Supply, Bastogne,” n.d., NARA RG 407, E 427-A, CI, folder 230; author visit, Bastogne, June 3, 2009, signage; OH, William L. Roberts, CCB, 10th AD, Jan. 12, 1945, NARA RG 407, E 427-A, folder #305 (civilian nurse); Rapport and Northwood, Rendezvous with Destiny, 471; “The Battle of Bastogne, 19–28 Dec. 44,” n.d., CMH, Geog Belgium 370.2, 4.
Patton attended a candlelight communion: PP, 606; corr, GSP to Bea, Dec. 25, 1944, GSP, LOC MS Div, box 12; D’Este, Patton: A Genius for War, 691 (enthroned with Bradley); Codman, Drive, 235 (crowded, frigid).
“brick-red face”: PP, 852–53.
Scanning the starry sky outside: Allen, Lucky Forward, 184 (“Noel, noel”); Wellard, The Man in a Helmet, 210 (personally challenged sentries); Allen, Lucky Forward, 184 (“root-hog or die”); D’Este, Patton: A Genius for War, 682–83 (“war in the raw”); Blumenson, Patton: The Man Behind the Legend, 1885–1945, 251 (asked God for fair weather); PP, 606 (“clear cold Christmas”).
Patton had made good on his brash promise: H. P. Hudson, “The Intervention of the Third Army: III Corps in the Attack,” n.d., NARA RG 498, ETOUSA HD, UD 584, box 3 (feat was prodigious and “Drive like hell”); Allen, Lucky Forward, 180 (108 artillery battalions); Rickard, Advance and Destroy, 167 (No SS prisoners were to be taken alive); Baily, Faint Praise, 120 (“Jumbo” tanks).
Both commander and commanded had also made missteps: Albret Praun, Wehrmacht signal chief, “German Radio Intelligence,” n.d., FMS, #P-038, CMH, 84–85; Holt, The Deceivers, 647–48, 658–59; Cirillo, “Ardennes-Alsace,” 36 (plodding frontal assault); Robert R. Summers et al., “Armor at Bastogne,” May 1949, AS, CARL, N-2146.71-2, 123 (first time since October); Ardennes, 526 (perilous night attack); Fox, Patton’s Vanguard, 388 (just fourteen Shermans), 382–84 (“manure-strewn hell of a village”); “The Intervention of the Third Army: III Corps in the Attack,” n.d., CMH, 8-3.1 AR, II, 12–13; Taylor, General Maxwell Taylor, 130 (“The troops built little fires”).
“This was probably my fault”: PP, 605.
“it takes a long time to learn war”: Rickard, Advance and Destroy, 172; Fox, Patton’s Vanguard, 388; Robert R. Summers et al., “Armor at Bastogne,” May 1949, AS, CARL, N-2146.71-2, 128–31 (German paratroopers kept infiltrating); notes, Dec. 26, 1944, SHAEF main, James M. Robb corr, DDE Lib, PP-pres, box 98 (Patton twice phoned); “The Intervention of the Third Army: III Corps in the Attack,” n.d
., CMH, 8-3.1 AR, II, 12–13 (“I am unhappy”).
In search of a seam: Sorley, Thunderbolt, 22, 55 (eating aspirin); Fox, Patton’s Vanguard, 399.
“shooting, clubbing, stabbing melee”: Ardennes, 552–55; “The Intervention of the Third Army: III Corps in the Attack,” n.d., CMH, 8-3.1 AR, VIII, 10 (“They are through Assenois”).
Five Shermans and a half-track: Sorley, Thunderbolt, 80–81; Toland, Battle, 282–83 (“Come here!”); Capa, Slightly Out of Focus, 212 (“It’s good to see you”).
“Kilroy Was Stuck Here”: Capa, Slightly Out of Focus, 212; Ardennes, 607–9 (seven hundred enemy prisoners), 480–81 (two thousand American casualties); Hastings, Armageddon, 234 (smashing his rifle butt); “Bastogne,” n.d., NARA RG 498, ETOUSA HD, UD 584 (division’s tank strength); “Answers to Questions Asked General Westphal,” 1954, FMS #A-896, MHI, 11 (“failure to conquer Bastogne”).
“as important as the battle of Gettysburg”: PP, 613.
“Glory Has Its Price”
Time in the last week of December: “Man of the Year,” Time (Jan. 1, 1945): cover; TT, 600 (current German salient); Royce L. Thompson, “Ardennes Campaign Statistics,” Apr. 28, 1952, CMH, 2-3.7 AE P-15; “Ordnance,” n.d., “History of the Ardennes Campaign,” NARA RG 498, UD 584, box 2; “Tactical Air Operations in Europe,” XIX Tactical Air Command, May 1945, Frederick L. Anderson papers, HIA, box 83, folder 1, 56 (ordered to bomb any column).
Of greater concern was a German armored spearhead: Rickard, Advance and Destroy, 202–3; Ardennes, 430–35, 535 (four-night round-trip), 426–27; TT, 577–79 (five miles from Dinant); Collins, Lightning Joe, 292 (nearly 100,000 strong).
Savage fighting raged from the Salm: William E. Dressler et al., “Armor Under Adverse Conditions,” 1949, AS, Ft. K, 41–48; TT, 583; Ardennes, 570 (equipment from six battalions), 595–603 (Sixth Panzer Army’s last sally); Harmon, Combat Commander, 240 (British flame-throwing tank).
Eisenhower for the past week: Weigley, Eisenhower’s Lieutenants, 545.
An Ultra intercept decoded just after Christmas: Sent on December 21, the message took five days to decode (Bennett, Ultra in the West, 214); Royce L. Thompson, “Ardennes Campaign Statistics,” Apr. 28, 1952, CMH, 2-3.7 AE P-15 (almost four thousand tanks).
Patton favored driving from the south: Ardennes, 610-11; Rickard, Advance and Destroy, 191–96.
Collins, in a memorandum on Wednesday: memo, JLC to C. Hodges, “Plans for Offensive Operations,” Dec. 27, 1944, JLC papers, DDE Lib, box 3, 201 file.
Montgomery hesitated: war diary, Ninth Army, Dec. 28, 1944, William H. Simpson papers, MHI, box 11; corr, JLC to Bruce C. Clarke, Feb. 21, 1975, CARL, N-8467.297; OH, JLC, 1973, G. Patrick Murray, SOOHP, in “Courtney Hodges Story,” MHI (“Nobody is going to break through”); OH, JLC, 1972, Charles C. Sperow, SOOHP, MHI, 235–38 (“You’re going to push the Germans out”).
Falaise could hardly be blamed solely on Montgomery: Weigley, Eisenhower’s Lieutenants, 539; msg, BLM to DDE, Dec. 22, 1944, 2155 hrs, DDE Lib, PP-pres, box 83 (doubted Patton’s ability); memo, JLC to C. Hodges, Dec. 30, 1944, JLC papers, DDE Lib, box 3 (“definitely expended itself”).
“Praise God”: notes, James M. Robb, Dec. 27, 1944, DDE office, DDE Lib, PP-pres, box 98.
“Monty is a tired little fart”: PP, 608; notes, James M. Robb, Dec. 27, 1944, W. B. Smith office, DDE Lib, PP-pres, box 98 (“our masters in Washington”); Rickard, Advance and Destroy, 193, 198–99 (Bradley also favored pinching the enemy at Houffalize); Hogan, A Command Post at War, 225 (counted seventeen uncommitted German divisions); Ardennes, 614 (clear skies ended).
Time magazine had catalogued: “The Presidency,” Time (May 8, 1944): 8; Altman, “For F.D.R. Sleuths, New Focus on an Old Spot,” NYT, Jan. 5, 2010, D1; Bruenn, “Clinical Notes on the Illness and Death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt,” Annals of Internal Medicine 72, no. 4 (Apr. 1, 1970): 579+ (260 over 150 and “Can’t eat”); Goodwin, No Ordinary Time, 494, 496–97 (digitalis); Burns, “FDR: The Untold Story of His Last Year,” Saturday Evening Post (Apr. 11, 1970): 12+; Kimball, Forged in War, 341 (“abdominal distress”); Tully, F.D.R. My Boss, 351–53 (“Lots of sleep”); Brinkley, Washington Goes to War, 265 (official photographs).
Yet if the body was frail: Burns, “FDR: The Untold Story of His Last Year,” Saturday Evening Post (Apr. 11, 1970): 12+; King and Whitehill, Fleet Admiral King, 587 (SHAEF plan).
Another trill of the bosun’s pipe: Argonaut files, UK NA, PREM 4/77/1B; “Trips of the President,” FDR Lib, container 21, file 6-1 (TUNGSTEN); Moran, Churchill: Taken from the Diaries of Lord Moran, 232 (“very wordy”); Eden, The Reckoning, 590–91 (bezique); Leahy, I Was There, 294–95 (Declaration of Independence); Black, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1031 (“pushing Winston uphill”); Stettinius, Roosevelt and the Russians, 70–72 (defeat of Japan).
Churchill retrieved an eight-inch cigar: Stettinius, Roosevelt and the Russians, 70–72.
Off he went for thirty miles: William M. Rigdon, log, “The President’s Trip to the Crimea Conference and Great Bitter Lake, Egypt,” Averill Harriman papers, LOC MS Div, 16–18; notes, Feb. 2, 1945, Anna Roosevelt Halsted papers, FDR Lib, box 84 (half an hour late); Coffey, Hap, 349 (fourth heart attack).
“complete agreement”: FRUS, 542–43; Kimball, ed., Churchill & Roosevelt: The Complete Correspondence, vol. 3, 523 (impede Soviet expansion).
Roosevelt nodded: FRUS, 542–43, 548 (eight o’clock); King and Whitehill, Fleet Admiral King, 587.
This amiable gathering concealed: Wilmot, The Struggle for Europe, 666; Charles H. Donnelly, “Autobiography,” May 1979, MHI, 711 (bundled in their overcoats); FRUS, 464–66, 471 (“heart of Germany”); LO, 55–56. SHAEF on January 28 calculated that thirty-three Allied divisions could defend the Rhine line, compared to the forty-two needed if German forces continued to occupy the Colmar Pocket and other salients west of the river (ALH, 178).
Again Field Marshal Brooke: DOB, 281–82; Danchev, xv (“Men admired, feared”); Kennedy, The Business of War, 329 (Monograph of the Pigeons); “Notes About Alan’s Childhood and Boyhood,” 1943, LHC, Alanbrooke papers, 1/1 (hoped to become a physician); Fraser, Alanbrooke, 24–29 (“gunner of genius”), 215, 448, 514; Keegan, Six Armies in Normandy, 47 (“searching back”).
The tactic befitted the man: Danchev, 649.
The British chiefs, Brooke said: FRUS, 472; Weigley, Eisenhower’s Lieutenants, 578 (Bulge had revealed the folly); minutes, CCS, Jan. 30, 1945, FDR Lib, Map Room conferences, box 29 (“Closing up the Rhine”).
This argument had dragged on: FRUS, 473 (“every single division”); minutes, CCS, Jan. 30, 1945, FDR Lib, Map Room conferences, box 29 (barely two dozen divisions); GS VI, 91; John E. Hull, “Unpublished Autobiography,” n.d., MHI, 14-2.
Marshall concurred: FRUS, 473; Chandler, 2463–64 (“You may assure”).
“I am feeling very tired”: Danchev, 652.
Worse was to come: OH, Field Marshal Viscount Alanbrooke, Jan. 28, 1947, FCP, MHI (“hands too full”); Ambrose, The Supreme Commander, 586–87 (“Let’s have it out”); Crosswell, Beetle, 862–63; Danchev, 652 (“talk did both of us good”).
That was unlikely: SC, 409; GS VI, 90; Crosswell, Beetle, 862–63 (“Please leave this to me”).
As the chiefs convened again: Crosswell, Beetle, 862–63; Cray, General of the Army, 502–3 (“practically never sees General Eisenhower”); Pogue, George C. Marshall, 516–17 (“wrong foot”).
He had not finished: Chandler, 2461; Cray, General of the Army, 500–501; SC, 413; Bland, ed., George C. Marshall Interviews and Reminiscences for Forrest C. Pogue, 400–402 (“everything he asked for”); Crosswell, Beetle, 862–63 (“over-cautious commander”).
“Marshall clearly understood nothing”: Danchev, 653.
“Marshall’s complaint was not unjustified”: Cunningham, A Sailor’s Odyssey, 626–27; Roberts, Masters and Commanders, 577.
For another month, the British conspired: corr, F. L. Anderson to C. A. Spaatz, Feb. 2, 194
5, “Operation Argonaut,” HIA, Frederick L. Anderson papers, box 95, folder 14; Orange, Tedder: Quietly in Command, 297; Hastings, Armageddon, 195 (“a very, very small man”); Chandler, 2480–82 (“no question whatsoever”).
“The P.M. was sore”: Orange, Tedder: Quietly in Command, 297.
Light rain spattered Luqa airdrome: Pogue, George C. Marshall: Organizer of Victory, 519; Stettinius, Roosevelt and the Russians, 28–29 (Mission No. 17); “Argonaut,” No. AR/2, n.d., UK NA, CAB 120/172 (black bands and yellow tags).
Roosevelt in recent months had proposed: Olsen, “Full House at Yalta,” American Heritage (Jan. 1972): 1+. Stalin initially proposed Odessa, but that port city remained within range of German bombers (Mason, ed., The Atlantic War Remembered, 447–48).
“I emphasized the difficulties”: memo, A. Harriman to FDR, Dec. 27, 1944, NARA RG 165, E 422, OPD, box 31; cable file, ARGONAUT, NARA RG 165, E 422, OPD, box 31 (“toilet facilities”); Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, 844–45 (“his adventurous spirit”).
Roosevelt and Churchill had agreed to limit: memo, William Leahy to GCM, E. King, Dec. 28, 1944, NARA RG 165, E 422, OPD, box 31; Clemens, Yalta, 111; Mason, ed., The Atlantic War Remembered, 447–48 (Americans numbered 330); “Argonaut,” No. AR/2, n.d., UK NA, CAB 120/172; admin papers, UK NA, CAB 104/177 (“plausible cover story”).
In view of the rustic conditions: admin papers, UK NA, CAB 104/177; memo, M. Moritz, Malta Command, to E. A. Armstrong, War Cabinet Offices, Feb. 23, 1945; admin papers, UK NA, CAB 104/177 (“Yalta Voyage 208”); Harriman and Abel, Special Envoy to Churchill and Stalin, 1941–1946, 390 (“good for typhus”).
“We left Malta in darkness”: Charles H. Donnelly, “Autobiography,” May 1979, MHI, 719–23; Leahy, I Was There, 295–301 (set their watches ahead).
Churchill boarded a four-engine C-54: Kuter, Airman at Yalta, 103; Goodwin, No Ordinary Time, 575 (“hot pink baby”).
The Liberation Trilogy Box Set Page 330