The Bloody Forest: Battle for the Huertgen: September 1944–January 1945

by Gerald Astor

  The two battalion commanders, Lutz and Ladd, conferred and made plans for the defense of their positions. The men in Kesternich were told to hold the town “at all costs.” In the afternoon, the enemy began to bombard the Americans with deepening intensity. The explosions destroyed the telephone lines, and darkness denied any opportunity to reinforce with tanks.

  From a heavily wooded area about 300 yards from town, a large number of soldiers from the 272d Volksgrenadier Division advanced under the protective cover of self-propelled guns. Darkness enveloped the counterattackers, rendering the American forward observers unable to spot targets for 78th Division artillery. No one thought to arrange for registration on critical areas, permitting the big guns to fire blind. A message from the 310th’s Company E commander reported “an endless line” of Germans accompanied by either a tank or an assault gun.

  Rifleman Sol Lederman in F Company of the 310th was among those who left the hedgerows and moved through an open field toward Kesternich. “No sooner had we advanced approximately 100 yards, we were pinned down by enemy fire. A man about fifteen feet to my right was suddenly hit. I asked where he was struck—he said in the belly. I told him to crawl back to the road and wait for the medics.

  “I noticed there was enemy fire coming from the haystacks in the field, which were about 1,500 to 2,000 feet to my right. I fired a couple of rounds into the haystack and the shooting ceased. After what seemed an eternity, we were told to advance ahead toward our objective. When we arrived at the top of the open area, we were in Kesternich and the enemy was gone. We received orders to dig foxholes and secure the ridge overlooking a wooded area. My squad leader, Sergeant Suskind, and I dug our foxhole. Then I realized I had to urinate, which I did, but my fingers were somewhat frostbitten. I couldn’t close my fly. Did it really matter?

  “After a short time, the enemy began to shell our position with 88mm fire. A shell burst about six feet from our foxhole, and it felt like my helmet was pushed over my shoulders. Suddenly, my leg, my shoulder, and my face felt wet and warm. I then realized that I was hit by shrapnel. I had no trouble maneuvering. It was getting toward dusk when our squad was told to find a basement in one of the houses, secure the house, and get some rest. Meantime, another squad had secured our positions overlooking the forest area below.

  “We were cleaning out the basement and had men at the doorway to check for enemy soldiers. Suddenly, the man at the door said there were German soldiers coming toward the house that we were in. I asked him if he was sure and he said ‘yes’ and that they were all wearing overcoats. We were told to shed our overcoats and that anyone we saw with an overcoat we should kill immediately.

  “The Germans surrounded the house and started to throw grenades into the basement. Luckily, we had all jumped into the stairs leading down the basement and no one was injured. By that time, it had gotten dark outside, and they could not discern what or how many of us were in the house. We quickly stationed another man on the other side of the door, so that we had one man on either side. I stationed myself about ten feet inside the door, facing out.

  “The Germans started to yell ‘Kammen ze rause’ [come out]. One man, Beldegay, started being hysterical and said, ‘Let’s give up and surrender. Think of my wife and two kids.’ We had a much greater problem, that our BAR man, Hirshmann, had come to the United States in 1939 from Germany and he was Jewish. We were very concerned about his life. In the meantime, two German soldiers entered the kitchen. As soon as they stepped over the threshold, I and another man by the door opened fire and killed the two Germans, who now lay dead. Another German was running in from the side of the house. I saw his silhouette running toward me, so I fired and must have hit him, because he went down and never moved.

  “The Germans kept hollering for us to surrender. We could have killed many more of them because we had grenades, but Hirshmann suggested that we surrender and take our chances. The problem then arose, who would be the first to go out of the kitchen door and have to step over the two dead Germans laying there. I asked Beldegay to be the first one, since he was so adamant that we surrender. He refused, but the Germans were hot under the collar and yelling at us to surrender. No one wanted to be the first to step out over the dead Germans.

  “I finally decided that I would be the first and it was scary. I prayed that they would not kill me. I put my hands over my head after laying down my M1 in the dark kitchen and stepped over the two dead Germans. The Germans immediately put me against the wall of the house. I thought that this was it, but instead they did the same thing with the rest of the squad. They frisked us. They took my phosphor grenade, and one of them started to play with the mechanism. I had a hard time trying to tell him not to play with it because it would go ‘boom.’ He finally realized what I was talking about and left it alone.

  “Then the German soldiers marched us toward their lines. We stopped at a German aid station, and they asked us if anyone was wounded and needed assistance. I told them I was wounded and they took me into the bunker. There I met one of our colonels and some lieutenants whom I recognized from our regiment. The German medic checked my wounds, and I think he sprinkled some sulfa powder on them. My hands were frostbitten, and he placed them next to the stove. It hurt like hell! He asked me what was inside my shirt and I told him, rolled-up socks. He took the six pair. They gave me a medic slip that had my wound, the hour 11:30 P.M., and the date 15 December 1944.”

  As the enemy approached, other outnumbered Americans still in residence crouched in the cellars. They held out during the night, but the relentless assault featuring automatic weapons and heavier caliber guns led to the surrender of fifty-six soldiers, mostly from Company F of the 310th.

  In a frantic attempt to reinforce the besieged Americans, the battalion commander committed Company G. John C. Wagner, with a machine gun section in the ill-fated unit, said, “There were about twenty of us, including my battalion CO [Lieutenant Colonel Ladd] and four other officers in a small house waiting to stop a Jerry counterattack. First, the boys across the street [from Company E], after taking a terrific beating, came out to the shouts of ‘Come out! Hands up!’ by the cocky Krauts. We were next, surrounded on all sides, and it’s in sort of disgraceful tone that I saw we surrendered without much resistance. One wonders if he isn’t a traitor giving up instead of battling it out, but I was so tired physically and mentally that I remember telling the battalion CO, ‘It’s better to be a live prisoner than a dead hero.’

  “So, some 100 of us were gathered together, searched, and given water inside fifteen minutes of capture. Although I was searched, they took nothing but some rounds of ammo and a K ration. I had thrown my new .45-caliber pistol in a corner of the room that I had just left. I looked around for buddies and asked how badly our machine gun section was wounded—all the time chain-smoking cigarettes because I knew they would be sought by our guards. I downed two D bars rather quickly, too.”

  The Volksgrenadiers dispatched their captives toward the rear, and Wagner recalled marching four or five hours ever deeper into Germany. “I, along with everyone else, thought of escape, and it was very possible, but how far had the Germans driven? It was extremely cold. I was too tired to spend the night moving and evading the enemy. We stopped occasionally in order the guards might rest and also to duck intermittent artillery fire. All the while, we were passing German armor. I figured the Jerries were making quite a push.” The dispirited GIs from the 78th hiked, rode in wood-burning trucks, and traveled by train to a series of stalags.

  Captain Frazier led a patrol from his 2d Battalion, 309th Infantry, to the houses at the edge of town. Hopes that some Americans still clung to a foothold ended when the only voices heard were those of the enemy. Another probe sneaked into a house, from which they quickly retreated behind a screen of hand grenades as the German occupants realized the presence of intruders. A third patrol composed of clerks, cooks, and heavy weapons people entered a few buildings on the outskirts and discovered only dead Americans. />
  With his mortar squad from Company H of the 310th, Clete Henriksen had endured an uncomfortable night. “We continued to exist on our K rations in the absence of something better. We were getting cold, and sometimes wet feet, and there were reports of fellows being evacuated for trench foot. We continued our firing as directed, but reports of activity to the front were not good. There was talk of heavy losses, especially in the rifle companies of our battalion and even word that some of our men were unaccounted for, either killed, wounded, or captured by the enemy. Sometime during the day, I received the additional bad news that my friend James Penick of the 2d machine gun platoon had been killed by a direct hit from an artillery shell. Jim Penick and I had been air cadet trainees together at the University of Tennessee and were both sent to the 78th Division when the cadet program was shut down.

  “As late afternoon approached, a revolting development occurred. We were ordered to knock down our standing mortars, put on light packs, grab rifles and ammunition, and prepare to move up to assist the beleaguered men at the front. I was not sure if the intent was to stem a feared German counterattack or to make a concerted effort to wrest control of Kesternich from the Germans. I remember being scared as I, along with other mortar squad members, began moving out of Simmerath in the direction of Kesternich.

  “It was getting dark, and we moved slowly and silently in a single file, dispersed so as to minimize the possible effect of enemy artillery fire. We were being led and directed by Section Sergeant Blackford. I can still see his stern countenance as he admonished us to prepare for the worst. As we left the outskirts of Simmerath and headed into the darkness of the night, I saw a headquarters platoon soldier driving his blacked-out jeep into town from the west and thought how lucky he was to be a jeep driver for some officer and not having to go out to meet the enemy with rifle in hand, as we were.

  “Some distance out of Simmerath, Sergeant Blackford had us form a skirmish line, and we hunkered down, each of us approximately ten to fifteen yards apart. We each tried to find a shell hole or previously occupied foxhole for protection and still with a line of sight to the front. With the exception of artillery fire seeming to go over our heads into Simmerath and some sporadic rifle or machine gun fire in the distance, we were without close combat activity.

  “After shivering in this manner for several hours—it seemed like all night—Sergeant Blackford came along and said we were going back to Simmerath. That seemed like good news, going back to our heavy weapons and the tools that we felt we really knew how to operate. When we got back, I learned that the jeep driver I had seen heading into town as we trudged out had struck a mine and been killed instantly. And I had envied him for being able to stay back in the relative security of Simmerath.”

  A day later, Henriksen’s outfit boarded trucks for a trip to a rest and relaxation bivouac. They were able to bathe, eat hot food, draw new clothing, and be billeted in private homes. “We were not sure if we were in a German household [or a Belgian one]. Even though we were somewhat wary of staying in that house, we fell in the thick, soft feather bed provided for us and had our first good night’s rest in days. Needless to say, we locked the bedroom door and kept our rifles handy.”

  The engineers from the 303d switched from picking up mines to laying them down to protect the embattled GIs, particularly against tanks. Jeeps carried the devices forward, and then soldiers from A Company of the 1st Platoon plus an additional detail from the 3d platoon hand-carried them into the no-man’s-land near Kesternich. Staff Sergeant Gus Schmidt and Sgt. Francis Skelly led the men out ahead of the front lines. Those in foxholes were warned to hold their fire at moving targets that night.

  “Jerry is sitting over on that hill, looking down your throats, so don’t talk, keep as close to the ground as possible, and don’t bang those damn mines together,” Sergeant Schmidt reminded the GIs as they began to move forward. Occasionally, a German shell fell short of its destination in Simmerath and exploded nearby.

  According to the account of the action, Pvt. John Welch then whispered, “What’s wrong with those Heinies? Don’t they know how to shoot? One notch down on that barrel, and we’re all done.”

  “Don’t worry about a thing,” replied Cpl. Leo Larrabee. “If they hit this pile of mines, it’ll look like the Grand Canyon around here—you’ll never remember it.” The mission proceeded, even though at one point the Americans ran into an unexpected obstacle, enemy concertina wire with flares and booby traps. They cut a hole to allow passage for those bearing mines, and the work continued. After six hours and as the sun struggled to appear, the job was done, with 1,000 mines rigged to thwart any approach by armor.

  The lines between Simmerath and Kesternich temporarily hardened, and only small-scale actions occurred. The 2d Battalion of the 310th figured its losses amounted to six officers and sixty-three enlisted men killed, five officers and nearly 100 enlisted men wounded, and nearly 300 soldiers MIA. Another seventy-five men were disabled by trench foot or nonbattle injuries. The toll on the 309th was just about as severe.

  16

  THE CAPTURE OF THE DAMS

  Although the enemy seemed as determined as ever to resist, in the Huertgen area, it was losing the wherewithal and the will to fight at a quickening pace. A major cause of the decline was a few miles south of the forest. On 16 December, German soldiers, under a strategy devised by none other than Adolf Hitler, crashed through the thinly spread lines of the Americans in the Ardennes, turf dominated by steep ridges overlooking deep valleys, fast flowing streams, and wooded areas. To mount this assault led by Panzer forces, the Wehrmacht had siphoned off all available resources in men, ammunition, fuel, and movable guns.

  Failures in intelligences, the thinness of the American lines, the assignment of green troops from the 106th Infantry Division to defend a key area, and the terrible beatings absorbed by the outfits engaged in the Huertgen from September until December left the First Army vulnerable to the attack. Notably caught by the unexpected juggernaut was the 28th Division, still trying to regroup and assimilate replacements. Antitank sergeant John Chernitsky and rifleman Ed Uzemack were among the “bloody bucketeers” taken prisoner. The 1st and 9th Divisions struggled on the northern shoulder to contain von Rundstedt’s legions. At the same time, portions of the 4th Infantry Division, like the 28th still trying to regain its strength through infusions of recruits fresh off boats, were overrun in Luxembourg. George Mabry, for his heroism during the Battle of the Bulge, almost became the first American to earn a second Medal of Honor, an award apparently denied because of faulty communications.

  As successful as the opening onslaught of the Germans was, there could be no reinforcements or adequate supplies for the troops committed in the Huertgen. To add to the difficulties of both sides, the worst European winter in forty years drove temperatures to record lows, while the skies dumped ever-deeper snows.

  In mid-December, Michael DiLeo was with Company B of the 5th Armored Division’s 46th AIB as it seized the hamlet of Schneidhausen. “We had lost all of our officers with the assaulting platoons. Sergeant Walter Jones, later commissioned a lieutenant, took command. That night we found a safe basement in a large house in Schneidhausen, where we had the wounded brought. First Sergeant Jones radioed the artillery to drop a flare over the bridge to see from the attic if the bridge over the Roer was still up. I went up to the attic with Sergeant Jones. The flare was fine, but we could not tell whether the bridge was still intact. Jones then led a patrol to check the bridge. Two of the men with him were seriously hurt by antipersonnel mines. Jones continued alone. He found the bridge to be in place.

  “We had thirty-two wounded in the basement. T/5 Angelo Aquiieri, the medical aid man, even though he was wounded himself, throughout the night worked on the wounded as they were brought in. ‘I was tired and hungry, had no food with me. I found some raw potatoes in the cellar, cleaned them with my hands, and ate them. I found a spot in a coal bin, made myself comfortable, and had a good sleep.’ DiLe
o spent three days in Schneidhausen. “By morning, around 22 December, news came that we had relief. The 8th Infantry Division was coming in. I was in the first group to leave. Some of our wounded were left behind but help was coming for them.”

  The status of other 5th Armored units was equally dismal. On 19 December, the 15th AIB seized the tiny enclave of Bilstein with support from the 81st Tank Battalion. The infantrymen, riding on the rear decks of the armor, which raced across open ground, encountered surprisingly little resistance. The enemy appeared to have fled in the face of the tanks’ cannons and machine guns after being subjected to heavy doses of artillery shells and bombs from P-47s. But the Americans were not granted rest, as orders directed them to roust the defenders who held high ground west of Winden. Technical Sergeant William H. Guinn of C Company, who in the course of a few weeks in the campaign went from squad leader to platoon sergeant to platoon leader and finally to leader of two combined platoons, said, “There were only thirty-two of us left in our company, and we thought this attack would certainly finish off the rest of us.”

  Despite their shrinking numbers, the GIs succeeded in pushing the defenders out of their hilltop emplacements and into the village of Winden, the main objective. Still in a loose marriage, the 5th Armored and the GIs of the 83d Division bagged Untermaubach and Udingen also on the western banks of the Roer within a few days.

  The push through the forest and to the river had been slow yet inexorable. The casualties had been fearsome during December. The 83d Division counted 589 dead, another 1,400 or so wounded, and almost 800 nonbattle losses. The 5th Armored toll was 70 dead, 505 wounded, and 223 injured or disabled and out of combat.