None But The Brave: A Novel of the Surgeons of World War II

by Anthony A. Goodman

  Schneider cut in. “Hey, Marsh, how many morphine Syrettes you have in that pack?”

  “‘Bout three dozen, Doc. Maybe a few more. There’s a lot in the main surgical kit, but I haven’t found it yet. Must be around here somewhere.”

  “OK, give me a dozen Syrettes, some rolls of gauze and something to splint the lieutenant’s leg here. He’s got an open fracture. I need to get him back to a clearing station. Wherever the hell that is.”

  Marsh looked at Sorenson’s leg and whistled softly. He saw the deformity in the limb and the ring of blood rapidly spreading through the pant leg.

  “Got the gauze and morphine, but I don’t have any splints, sir. They’re all in the main supply kit. But I’ll round up something from the field here. Be right back.”

  With that, he disappeared into the darkness faster than he had arrived. Schneider was about to call out after him for something else but hesitated to shout for fear of giving away their position. He turned back to Sorenson. “Let’s get some morphine into you, Jim.”

  “You sure this won’t fuck up my head?”

  “No, no. You’ll be fine. You’ll be lucky if it does anything for this kind of pain.”

  “I’ve got to be clear-headed.”

  “Listen, these Syrettes have a standard dose of ten milligrams each. A big guy like you could take fifteen milligrams easy, even if you didn’t have all this pain. With a fracture like yours, you’ll be lucky if you get any relief.”

  Schneider took out a single Syrette, a hypodermic needle attached to what looked like a miniature toothpaste tube holding the dose of morphine. He popped off the needle cover with his teeth, and spit it away. He found a patch of skin uncovered by the torn pants, and stabbed the needle deep into the muscle beneath. Then he slowly squeezed the contents of the morphine dose into Sorenson’s muscle. Sorenson looked at him and said, “Thanks, Steve.”

  It was the first time in all those months he’d used Schneider’s first name. Schneider didn’t know what to make of it.

  They were both quiet for a moment. They stopped and listened to the night. The gunfire had ceased momentarily. They strained to hear the next shots and to try to assess where they were coming from.

  “What now?” Schneider finally asked.

  “Well, we got to get the hell out of here. But, I don’t know where we are. That glider is our biggest problem,” Sorenson said motioning with his head. “The Krauts’ll know exactly where we are from its location, and they’ll just zero in on it. It’s gonna get very dangerous around here very soon.”

  It was as if the Germans were listening to him. As soon as he spoke there was the sound of a bottle whistling through the air. Only it wasn’t a bottle, and both Sorenson and Schneider knew it. They ducked as a terrible explosion rocked the ground near the glider. Earth and rock flew up and rained down upon them. Schneider found himself pressing his face into the mud, his arms covering his head. Cowering would have described it better. He wondered if Sorenson were watching, or if he were doing the same thing.

  “Fuck that! Let’s get out of here now!” Sorenson said. “We need some distance between us and that glider.” He tried to roll over and crawl, but the bolt of pain that shot through him literally knocked him back to earth more forcefully than the blast from the German mortar.

  “Don’t move. Let me do it.”

  “How the hell you gonna carry me?”

  “I’m not. I’m going to drag you.”

  As Schneider moved to Sorenson’s shoulders, Marsh burst through the brush again. This time, Sorenson made no move to get his gun. He was in much too much pain.

  “Gotta get the hell outta here, LT!” Marsh said.

  “Just do it,” Sorenson said through his teeth.

  Marsh moved in before Schneider could get a grip on Sorenson. He grabbed the lieutenant under the armpits and began to drag him off into the brush. Schneider quickly collected his own gear as well as Marsh’s and followed the disappearing trail.

  The morphine may have been changing Sorenson’s experience of the pain, but he was still clearly in agony. As gentle as Marsh tried to be, the going was bumpy. There was no trail, only the path through the brush that Marsh was clearing with Sorenson’s body. Schneider followed behind, trying not to become separated from the only real soldier in sight.

  Finally, the firing stopped, bringing an ominous quiet to the night. Behind them, the remains of the gliders burned in the field, giving an eerie orange cast to the dark night sky. The only noise was the dragging of Sorenson’s heavy body over the wet brush and grass. The three of them stopped near the edge of a clearing. From their position, they could see the land rise as it approached a small country road. They waited in the cover while Marsh rested and Sorenson collected his jangled nerves. He admitted to Schneider that in all his career as a professional soldier, he had never known such pain.

  When he caught his breath, he whispered to Schneider and Marsh, “Now hear me. We’re in a lot of shit here. The men are scattered. They don’t know where we are, and I don’t know where they are. God only knows where they scattered to since that mortar attack. So, keep your heads down and your voices down until we can regroup and find our way to our target. We don’t want to go shooting each other. Well, at least you guys aren’t gonna shoot anyone.”

  Schneider pursed his lips and just shook his head. Marsh laughed silently.

  They sat in silence for a moment and watched the road. The night was slowly giving way to the coming dawn. Schneider looked at Sorenson and could see what he was thinking: If they didn’t regroup by daylight, they would be slaughtered.

  In the short time since the crash, Schneider had begun to feel the fear that had quieted down in the earlier lull, and was now welling up inside his core. He found himself giving way to panic. He wanted to run, to run far away to anywhere but where he was. He knew he couldn’t because if he did he would be killed. But still the urge was there, and it took all his will to stay put.

  To do something positive, Schneider drew his knees up under his abdomen, and unbuttoned his pants. Pointing away as best he could, he urinated awkwardly in that position, trying all at once to hurry the process while keeping himself dry. Marsh and Sorenson seemed not to notice, and Schneider wondered if they had already relieved themselves.

  As the night ebbed, the quiet remained. The men all leaned back in silence and waited.

  Chapter Seven

  6 June 1944, 0630 Hours

  Rhino Ferry 47-Fox, the English Channel, Normandy

  Four wet hours after they left the LST, Hammer, McClintock, Antonelli and Higgenson were all huddled together again, this time in the lee of one of the ambulances on board Rhino Ferry 47-Fox. They had been off-loaded from the LST before first light, and Hammer was none too happy to be on board this slow tub of a barge. They presented too easy a target for the German 88s mounted high up on those cliffs.

  Salt spray was coming in from windward, and the ferry was mushing along in the frothing waves at less than three knots. Their entire complement of sixty men was still vaguely green and, now that they were within earshot of the battle, overwhelmed with fear.

  “Hey, Doc. We’re not exactly racing into that beach yet, are we?” Antonelli said.

  “Nope. Not exactly, Gene,” Hamm said.

  Earlier, at 0400 hours, the call had come for all navy personnel to man battle stations. Orders went out for the other groups to assemble at their pre-arranged positions. The men began climbing down into the thousands of assault craft that would take them to the beach. Hamm’s surgical group mustered on deck and was transferred to the Rhino. The craft was a flat-bottomed barge with two large outboard motors to propel it to the beach after it was cast off from the LST towline. It was slow, unstable, and un-maneuverable. With only two feet of freeboard, the Rhino provided a trip that was more like swimming into battle than riding.

  Though the night was still black, they had all watched the pre-assault bombardment with a mixture of awe and terror. When the big
guns from the great battle ships and cruisers opened up behind them, it was hard to tell what was happening. The nearly continuous blast from the huge naval artillery dominated the sky, lighting up the bottom of the clouds with flashes of white and orange. Hamm couldn’t imagine that anyone on the receiving end of that terrible barrage could survive. They all stared open-mouthed at the fury of the blast.

  Earlier in the night, they could hear the deep-throated drone of the bombers and glider tow planes. Hamm wondered which of those planes might be carrying Schneider. He feared for his friend’s life, and he sensed the terror that must pervade such a mission.

  Aboard the Rhino, they were all glad not to be on the receiving end of that bombardment, though they knew full well that their safety was a temporary and relative condition. In a few hours, they would not only be treating victims of the coming carnage, but would be, for the first time in most of their lives, under fire as well. And the Germans had had a long time to prepare for them.

  “Think this coxswain knows what the hell he’s doing?” Antonelli asked.

  “Why?” Hamm said.

  “Well he’s weavin’ all over the fuckin’ place. I could puke just watchin’ our wake.”

  “I don’t think he’s got any choice. Those two outboards don’t do much for him. This vessel is just not maneuverable.”

  “That doesn’t instill very much confidence, does it?” said McClintock.

  “It sure don’t,” said Antonelli.

  The Rhino waddled in the chop stirred by the wake of the hundreds of landing craft scurrying toward the beach. Longer rolling waves threatened to crest over the sides of the ferry. A hundred yards to the right, another Rhino struggled to keep on course. Then they all watched in horror as, without warning, shells from German 88s high on a cliff bracketed the other Rhino. The first shell exploded about ten yards to the starboard side. The second was closer and to port.

  “Oh, shit,” Antonelli said in the dull monotone of inevitability, pointing to the Rhino. “Those poor bastards are done for.”

  Everyone strained to see what Antonelli was pointing at. To their horror, the third explosion landed directly in the center of the slow-moving target. Flames and sequential explosions ripped up and down the surface of the ferry as the gasoline tanks of the ambulances exploded. Men were hurled into the air, silhouetted against the yellow-orange flames. Others in the stern and the bow dived into the sea to escape the fire. Some of the men were already ablaze as they leaped into the churning ocean, their bodies silhouetted in the light of their own fires. Some disappeared under the weight of their packs; others clung to life jackets and floating debris. Burning gas and oil soon engulfed every man left in the water, and they, too, disappeared into the blackness of the water and smoke.

  “Dear God,” Higgenson whispered.

  “You were wondering about the protective value of these red crosses…” McClintock said.

  “No fuckin’ way,” Antonelli said.

  Hamm could only stare, feeling a combination of rising anger and overwhelming fear.

  Suddenly, the Rhino’s outboards roared as the coxswain added full power. The craft responded sluggishly to the port helm, but it was too late. While their focus was on the Rhino ferry under attack, their own course had strayed into the path of another of the Rhinos. The two heavily laden craft slowly collided, port bow against starboard bow. The impact threw everyone to the deck. Metallic voices shouted angrily through loud hailers; orders flew back and forth between the ferries.

  Their coxswain gunned his outboards in reverse, and after an eternally long response time, the craft shuddered, finally pulling off from its connection to the other Rhino with the scream of tearing metal.

  “Fuck all! I told you this asshole couldn’t drive,” Antonelli said.

  Hamm pulled himself to his knees. He was soaked with seawater up to his thighs. His boots sloshed in the bilge water, several inches deeper since the crash. The officer on the other ferry was still screaming through his loud hailer, but nobody paid any attention to what he was saying.

  “Nice way start to our war, eh Hamm?” McClintock said, his voice calm.

  “Yeah, great.” Hamm glanced at him.

  McClintock looked at his own drenched pants. “Y’all tell the cox I need to stop back at the hotel and have the valet clean and press these trousers.”

  Hamm laughed and shook his head. “Me, too.”

  They both started laughing. Antonelli sat in seawater up to his waist. Then he, too, began to laugh.

  “Yeah. I think we should call this whole invasion shit off ‘til we get some dry skivvies.”

  They were still laughing when an explosion knocked all three of them flat onto the deck again. Only their helmets kept them from suffering severe head injuries.

  “What the fuck was that?” Antonelli yelled.

  McClintock and Hamm stayed down, lying prone in the bilges. The seawater soaked into their ponchos and jackets, and they immediately began to shiver.

  A shrill voice from the bow broke through the roar of the water and the engines and the explosions from the 88s.

  “Medic! Medic! Help me!”

  Antonelli, Higgenson, and Hamm scrambled forward together, all three on their knees, splashing through the oily bilge. More explosions from the 88s bracketed the boat. Several blasts of heavy ordinance struck directly on board, destroying at least one ambulance. Mercifully, no fire or secondary explosions followed.

  “Medic!” the voice cried again.

  They followed the sound, weaving their way between the rows of ambulances.

  “There he is,” Antonelli said.

  The soldier lay in the bilge, nearly covered with water. He was shivering and still whimpering, “Medic!” when they got to him. All around, enlisted men sprayed streams of firefighting foam onto small fires spreading along the deck. Others sloshed seawater from the bilges, using their helmets as buckets.

  “It’s OK, pal. We’re here. We’re here. Where are you hit?” Higgenson asked.

  “My thigh! Oh, Christ it hurts.”

  “Take it easy. We’re here now.” He turned to Hamm. “You wanna take this, Doc?”

  Hamm looked down to examine the wound. Even in the darkness, he could see where the shrapnel had torn through the soldier’s thigh and exited from the groin. His pants were torn open, a pulsatile stream of blood squirting from the wound. The bloody fountain trailed into the bilge water, making dark frills as it diluted away in the rocking of the ferry with seawater sloshing around the wounded man.

  “Get some pressure on that wound, Dick.” Hamm said. “It’s the femoral artery. Probably the vein too. He’s bleeding like hell. We’ve got to control that first, then we’ll see what else we can do. Put some pressure on the wound with this. Here,” he said, handing Higgenson a large wad of gauze from his pack. “Hold this tight as you can.”

  Higgenson wadded up the gauze and pressed it into the wound. The man howled with pain as Higgenson pushed down with the heels of both hands, his arms locked at the elbows, all his body weight on the wound. The bleeding slowed, but crimson streamers still flowed between his fingers.

  Hamm started to get up. He turned to Higgenson and said, “Dick, try to focus the pressure on a smaller area. You won’t have to press so hard. See if you can get your fingertips right on the artery and vein.” Turning to Antonelli, he said, “Gene, come with me. I’m going to open one of these ambulances so we can work in there. We’ll make a little operating room and get him out of this filthy water.”

  McClintock soon arrived and moved in next to the soldier. He said, “Get a couple of IV’s started, Dick. You got any in your pack?”

  “Yessir. But, you’ll have to get it. I’m only just keeping up here with the bleeding.”

  “OK. I got it,” McClintock said, rummaging through Higgenson’s pack. He came up with a bottle of plasma, and some more morphine Syrettes. For the moment he was thrilled to see such abundance in the medication he was sure to need in great amounts.
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  He found some IV tubing, and a large-bore needle. McClintock fit the needle onto the tubing, placed a rubber tourniquet and found a vein in the man’s arm. He inserted the needle and watched as the blood flowed back into the tubing, appearing black in the subdued light. He flushed the tubing with some of the plasma and hooked up the bottle. Then he taped the needle to the skin, making an extra loop to keep it from getting accidentally tugged out when they moved the man.

  Higgenson was still applying pressure to the wound. The soldier had stopped screaming and was now moaning softly to himself.

  “What’s your name, soldier?” Higgenson asked, trying to divert the man’s attention from his pain.

  “Thomas, sir.”

  “You don’t have to call me sir,” Higgenson said. “I’m not an officer.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  McClintock looked around for some more help. Two figures appeared from behind the truck. They were carrying a litter. McClintock yelled, “Over here!”

  The men hurried out of the darkness. They were both medics in their platoon.

  “Get him on the litter,” McClintock ordered. “Where’s Major Hammer?”

  “He’s back in that ambulance, sir,” one of the men said. “He’s setting up an OR.”

  The three men placed the litter into the water and floated Thomas onto it. Higgenson continued to hold pressure on the wound. While the other medics lifted the stretcher, McClintock held the freely flowing plasma high overhead. They rose as a unit and made for the ambulance.

  Meanwhile, Hamm and Antonelli were working fast. They set up a place for the litter in the middle of the floor. Then Hamm opened a small operating pack and was busy setting out the instruments and suture material he would need.

  McClintock appeared in the doorway. “Hey, honey. We’re home.”

  “Very funny, Ted.”

  Hamm and Higgenson lifted Thomas into the crowded space. McClintock moved to the head of the makeshift operating room.

  “Well if it ain’t Philly General Hospital!”

  Hamm shook his head and said, “You think it’s going to get better when we hit that beach?”