Lieutenant Piszarak was assigned to the First Platoon and I was sent to the Second Platoon. Lieutenant Plume and Lieutenant Tawes had the Third and Fourth platoons.
One thing I felt important was learning the names of my men. So I made a real effort, and the men were pretty surprised to have me call all forty of them by name the very first day.
My first concern was my noncoms. Sergeant “Chick” Reid was the platoon sergeant. The assistant platoon sergeant was Otha Anders. These men had landed on D day and had about one month’s combat experience. I was grateful they were both willing and able to give me a lot of useful pointers on what it was like at the front. At least four other officers had already been casualties in my platoon, and only five men of the original forty who landed on D day were still assigned.
I was lucky to have a few days with my new platoon before going into battle. Later, I saw many green lieutenants sent up to take over platoons in the thick of battle. They had no chance to meet any of their men or to find out who the noncoms were. I can’t imagine a tougher, more demanding job being thrust upon any young man than that of a frontline infantry platoon leader.
My platoon was dug in behind a hedgerow directly across the field about two hundred yards in front of our battery of 105mm self-propelled artillery. At first this didn’t concern me, but it proved to be quite disturbing as they began firing during the night. Not only was it very noisy, but the concussion caused the sides of my foxhole to cave in several times. Of course, sleep was almost impossible, even without the artillery, for my mind was filled with fears and questions about what it would be like to lead men in combat. How would I face my responsibilities? Perhaps tomorrow would tell.
One evening just before dark while standing in line for hot chow we got a real thrill. Four German fighter-bombers zoomed right over us at treetop level. We scattered instantly and dove for the nearest cover. But their targets seemed to be somewhere near the coast. In seconds just about every antiaircraft gun and machine gun within range opened fire, and we could easily follow the path of the planes by the red glow of the tracers. Every fifth machine gun bullet was glowing white phosphorus to help the gunners see where they were shooting. The display looked just like the fireworks back home on the Fourth of July, but the planes were so fast and so low that they were gone before anyone could take good aim, and none of them appeared to be hit.
About July sixteenth, our regiment moved northeast, close to Saint-Lô. Here we got the news that we were to become part of a special task force of tanks and infantry—with no other purpose than making a major breakthrough of the German lines. This was the first large-scale tank-infantry team action ever undertaken by the Allies. The enemy in our immediate front was to be carpet-bombed before our jump-off, and then a large army of tanks and infantry would drive through any hole created.
The crucial problem was the hedgerows. In Normandy, for generations the farmers had grown hedges to separate their fields, however small. They had started by digging small ditches around the edges of the fields. The earth was piled in rows between two fields, and over the years many of these dirt piles grew to become over two feet thick and three feet high. Hedges were planted on top, and their roots prevented erosion. Various bushes and trees also took root to form a barrier strong enough to fence in livestock.
The Germans, of course, seized upon hedgerows as the natural earthworks they were. They were excellent for the defense. Easy to hide behind, the thick dirt embankment served as a very good shield against our small arms. Usually the Germans put machine guns near the corners of each field, giving them a crossfire that made a frontal attack by infantry nearly suicidal. Sometimes the poor infantry would fight a whole day to gain a few hundred yards—and that only if they were lucky.
The special tactics that were developed called for the tanks to break out into a field and spray the next hedgerow with their machine guns while the infantry walked or ran behind the tanks, using them as shields. When the tanks got close enough to the hedgerow they’d raise their fire a little, and the infantry would run ahead, keeping as low as possible, throwing grenades over the hedge. The tanks would plow through the hedges and the infantry would follow closely, then fan out to either side to capture any remaining enemy.
Originally a tank could not handle a hedgerow very well, because the dirt mounds would tilt them up and expose their relatively vulnerable underbellies to the German panzerfaust—a lethal, armor-piercing rocket grenade similar to our bazooka, capable of knocking out a tank. After a while a sharp steel scythelike bumper, fashioned from old train rails and the scrap iron from German beach obstacles, was welded to the front of tanks about a foot above the ground. It sliced a chunk out of the hedge, which allowed the tank to keep low as it burst through and took the Germans by surprise.
If all went as planned, we would mop up the enemy and continue the attack across to the next hedgerow, and the one after. The tactic seemed practical enough, but even in dry runs it was utterly exhausting to carry all our gear while running behind tanks, bathed in their hot fumes and the churned-up dust.
After several days of grueling drill in the new tactics, we were ready to go. Every day we got our gear together and waited for orders to jump off. That went on for about a week, because the bombers that were to do the carpet bombing were grounded by the rotten weather. All the waiting didn’t do our nerves any good.
Meanwhile, there were a few sidelights. One day I came upon one of my young soldiers who had his pistol in hand, apparently getting up the nerve to use it on himself. He was terribly depressed because he hadn’t received any mail from home since his landing in France. I sat down and quietly talked with him alone for quite a spell until he was assured his family really did care, but that our mail was all messed up because of the fighting. The very next day he received a couple of letters, and that snapped him out of his depression.
One day our ever-resourceful cooks decided to treat us. They said that a nice young cow had wandered into enemy mortar fire, and that fortunately they had been nearby and so knew it was fresh meat. The steaks were a marvelous change from regular Army rations. A little later, however, Captain Holcomb was comewhat embarrassed when a French farmer came calling and excitedly demanded payment for his slaughtered cow. He was turned over to a major from Military Government, and I suppose something was worked out.
Another day Major General Barton, our Division Commander, held a regimental review to award medals for heroic actions since the invasion. As we marched by companies to the parade field some German fighter planes roared over at treetop level—and men and heroes scattered in every direction, with some diving right through dense hedgerows. The planes never fired on us, and may never have seen us, so we resumed our march to the review. We kept looking over our shoulders, but the planes never circled back.
One of the men had some barber tools, so we took turns sitting on a stump for a quick haircut. I don’t remember getting my hair cut again during the next eight months.
II
SAINT-LÔ BREAKTHROUGH
(First Day)
It was probably very boring for most of the men to sit quietly and wait for the attack to begin. Especially since the jump-off dates were changed several times.
All of the officers were very busy. We spent hours studying maps of our objectives. Aerial photos were very accurate. With the use of special angles in glass, the photos showed orchards so close we actually could count the trees. Some of the photos were only a few days old. I was impressed with all the information at our disposal. I hoped the Germans didn’t know as much about us but felt they could not because of our air superiority.
On July 25, 1944, the big attack finally got under way. The faraway drone of planes grew to a deep rumble as hundreds of huge bombers passed directly overhead, filling the sky. We were told there would be three thousand bombers and five hundred fighter-bombers in the raid.
Ours was a grandstand view just behind the front lines, and we watched in complete awe as wave after w
ave paraded over us. There seemed to be about two hundred planes in each formation. What was splendidly inspiring for us must have been terrifying to the Germans.
The earth beneath us shook as strings of bombs began to explode just to the front of our infantry lines. The rush of air from the blasts gave us a good push, even though we were a half mile away.
Our orders were to jump off in attack immediately after the bombing to take advantage of a stunned, confused enemy. Staggering misfortune stepped in, however, with a cruel blow. One whole wing of bombers miscalculated and dropped its entire load on the front lines of one of our divisions. The losses in dead and wounded were over eight hundred, including the killing of Lieutenant General Leslie McNair, Army Ground Forces Commander. This tragedy and its confusion caused the postponement of the attack one more day.
The Germans, meanwhile, used the respite to bring up reserves to fill in much of the area the bombs had knocked out. The enemy we faced thus were a mixed lot of survivors of the bombing plus newly arrived paratroopers.
My personal “longest” day began as we jumped off—my first attack—the next morning, July 26, 1944. As soon as we crossed the Saint-Lô-Periers Road, just west of Saint-Lô, we came upon a dreadful sight. The destructive power of those thousands of five hundred-pound bombs overwhelmed the senses. The dead from both sides lay twisted and torn, some half buried by overturned earth. Bloated cows with stiff legs thrust skyward in death lay everywhere, as did burned-out vehicles and blasted equipment. I’ve never been able to erase it from my mind.
When the order to move out had first come, my muscles had been taut with fear. After a while I realized that somehow my body was moving forward behind the tanks as my platoon took the lead. It seemed to me like the first few moments of a football game. As we advanced I began to feel my mind and body working together again—still very scared, but functioning.
Our tank company was wonderfully aggressive, shooting up everything in sight. The tank commander’s tactics were very sensible, it seemed to me. Since no Americans were ahead of him, his orders were to shoot and shoot. All that tank firepower blasting away kept the enemy pinned with his head down, unable to return fire, and allowed us to advance rapidly and capture many prisoners with very few losses.
Many of the Germans were still in shock from the bombing, and many had no desire at all to fight. Actually, I don’t understand how any of them even survived. Bomb craters big enough to swallow a jeep were so close together in some areas it was difficult for our tank drivers to zigzag through.
Once, as we rounded the hedgerow at the corner of a big meadow, one of our tanks accidentally ran over a dead cow. It was bloated, and when it burst its entrails wound around the tank treads—and there was the terrible mouth-filling stench to add to the gore.
It was too much for me. I fell down on my hands and knees and was retching miserably when the sudden roar of a diving plane made me look up—just as one of our P-47s let go two bombs directly above me. I dove down flat in my own vomit—needlessly, for the bombs sailed on another two hundred yards ahead and knocked out a Jerry armored half-track I had not even known was there.
A few minutes later I lost my first man. He stood right up in an open spot and tried to match his rifle against an enemy half-track. They machine gunned him down and fled. I shuddered at his futile death, for a rifle was not much use against steel plate, and letting yourself get caught in the open by a machine gun is fatal. Better to take cover and fight again than to take foolhardy risks. If he’d armed himself with a rifle grenade or bazooka, it might have been a different story. I felt sick.
Our first village, Saint Gilles, now was close in front, and we approached with caution. It was just a small crossroads hamlet with about thirty buildings that seemed to go about a block in each direction from the one intersection. The buildings were close together, like stores, and built right up to the narrow street, with no sidewalk. The back yards were open country.
My platoon swung to the right across the fields and came into the village from the right, or west end, and headed toward the central crossroads. My men and I were walking on either side of the road following our lead tank into the little burg. As we approached I was on the left beside a high stone wall, and the first buildings were just ahead, not over ten yards beyond the end of the wall.
Suddenly a shell exploded inside the first building beyond the wall, and instantly I hit the dirt. When I looked up a few seconds later from my prone position in the brick gutter, a Jerry Mark IV medium tank was cutting around the corner only a short block away and heading directly toward me. Our Sherman tank and the Mark IV began to fire at each other at once from point-blank range. Our tank began to back up as it was firing, apparently looking for some kind of cover. And this left me in front, actually between the two tanks.
I looked around frantically, but the stone wall appeared impossible to climb, and the buildings ahead were too close to the oncoming Mark IV, so I stayed flat in the gutter and watched the tank battle. Each tank fired as rapidly as possible as the distance closed to less than one hundred yards. The muzzle blasts shattered windows in the houses and storefronts, and each explosion knocked my helmet halfway off my head. The narrow, walled-in street seemed to act like a sound tunnel, and the concussion smashed at my ears. (My wife tells me today I’m somewhat hard of hearing, and I’m not very surprised.)
The Mark IV kept firing as it came toward us. Both tanks somehow kept missing at this close range or their armor-piercing shells were bouncing off. Finally, after an exchange of about a half-dozen rounds each, the Jerry suddenly went up in flames. Two Krauts crawled out of the tank’s belly escape hatch and ran back for the corner. Both were knocked down by machine gun fire from our tank.
The German tank commander, a sergeant, then jumped down from the turret—and charged right at me. I struggled to my feet but could not raise my M-l rifle to my shoulder. As I shook with excitement and fright my rifle came up to my waist and fired three times—and was empty. Had I been more experienced, I would have reloaded my rifle before walking into the burg with a clip of eight bullets.
On the other hand, it was probably better for my peace of mind that I didn’t have a full clip, for I probably would have killed him. After he had fallen, I did my best to reload but was all thumbs. I just couldn’t get that damned clip to fit into the breech.
The Kraut sergeant had blood seeping from his ears and mouth due to the concussion of his tank being hit, and, with his eyes staring directly into mine, he grabbed his thigh where my bullet had struck and then hobbled across the street into a doorway—all before I managed to get my rifle reloaded.
Luckily, he never attempted to shoot me with the pistol he wore as a sidearm. He must have been in much greater shock than I and had every right to be unable to function. We didn’t pause to search the buildings, so I don’t know how badly he was hurt.
The shooting of my first man, face-to-face, was not covered by the infantry school back at Fort Benning, and I was deeply shaken. I’m glad I didn’t kill him. The shock was bad enough. Going through the slam-bang tank duel beforehand hadn’t helped. I was still trembling a few seconds later and would have been unable even to defend myself. My first hour in combat had been enough for my lifetime, and I was wondering if I’d last the day.
Because of the burning Mark IV in the middle of the street, another rifle company from our Second Battalion detoured around the buildings on our right. When this company came to the crossing road, they turned to their right and continued the attack toward Canisy. The artillery forward observer flying in a Piper Cub overhead mistook this company for Jerries retreating out of town and called down a very heavy barrage of 105mm artillery on them.
This blasting of our own men was stopped as soon as possible, but not in time to prevent many casualties. I’ll never forget one GI lying in the road with a huge gash all the way through his shoulder, one leg badly mutilated near the ankle. A medic gave him a shot of morphine and slipped a cigarette into his m
outh. The wounded man raised his good arm to us as we passed and yelled at us to go get the SOBs. Of course, he didn’t know he was talking about our own artillery. Most of the time our flying forward observers were great, but identification from a maneuvering plane can be tricky, and mistakes resulted in a few tragedies.
Our progress was good, and we had taken quite a few prisoners as we approached the next town, Canisy. It was getting along into the late afternoon of a long, long day, and we were near exhaustion when one of the commanding officers gave us a chance to rest. He called for fighter-bombers to hit the town before we went in. We flopped down where we were in an apple orchard and sprawled out with our backs against a hedgerow, hoping we’d never again have to move.
During this delicious respite, one of my sergeants had a premonition. He came to me and asked if I’d make sure his personal effects were sent home if he didn’t make it. I tried to talk him out of his obvious depression but got nowhere.
A little while later, as we rested against the hedgerow facing the front, we heard one of our tanks making a big racket coming up to the hedgerow behind us. We got out of there fast, except for the sergeant. We yelled at him to get moving, but he just sat in a daze as the tank plowed through and buried him alive. A bunch of us dug him out at once, but it was too late.
Thus my second man was gone—and he as needlessly as the first. I knew then I’d never survive if I let myself get tied in with every case. It was vital for me to build some sort of protective shield within myself and concentrate only on what had to be done in the present and how to do it. I forced myself to suppress all thoughts of prior losses and gruesome mental pictures of the tragedy of war.
If You Survive Page 2