by Griff Hosker
I went to the fire and retrieved my Bergen and spare weapons. If we had to fall back I would not have the time to look for them. Sergeant Ford was leading men from the houses with mattresses. “These come in useful, sir. They saved a few guys in St. Vith. They don’t stop a bullet but they stop shrapnel. The Krauts used H.E. on us!”
Sergeant Hall had returned by the time I was back at the bridge. “Everything done, sir. Where do you want me?”
“Grab your gun and choose your spot.” The Sergeant had a western accent and I asked, “Where are you from Sergeant?”
“Texas sir, why?”
“Then you will know all about the Alamo! This is our Alamo!”
Corporal Hewitt hurtled over the bridge, “They are on their way sir!”
I shouted, “Take cover. There is no point firing your rifles at the tanks. That will waste ammunition. Corporal Powers, have you men ready to throw the hammer?”
He grinned, “Yes sir!”
“Wait for my command. We are going to have to endure some shellfire but I think they will try to avoid damaging the bridge. It is an old one and their tanks are heavy.” I looked up at the working Sherman. They had placed, beneath the camouflage netting, a mattress covered by a sheet of corrugated iron they had found. It would not stop a shell but it might slow it down. The sergeant was leaning out of the turret with the unlit stub of a cigar in his mouth. I shouted up to him. “Don’t fire unless you have a target you can hit. I want you to come as a surprise to them.”
“Don’t worry, sir, I ain’t gonna waste any shells on the front of a Panther. I might as well spit chewing tobacco at them! I will fire if they give me a flank shot. We will only get the one sir but if they are on the other side of the river then they are just a hundred yards from us. We might just punch a hole in the side of a Panther.” He descended into the tank and closed the hatch. The tank was now hidden.
The first flakes of snow fell. The weather was changing. The wind was getting up. I joined Hewitt, Sergeant Barker and Sergeant Henry in the centre of the road by the bridge. The old bath was there as well as a wheelbarrow.
Corporal Hewitt said, “There are six tanks. I recognised two Panthers. The others were the Mark IV, I think although there was a bigger one at the back that could have been Tiger or King Tiger. They have some self-propelled guns, too, sir. There were three of them. I think they were Wespes.”
“They can do some damage. Better batten down the hatches. I suppose now is the time a tin lid might come in handy.”
Sergeant Henry reached over and pulled a mattress from in front of the bath. “Sergeant Ford reckoned this might come in handy sir. He said he owed you.”
“I shall thank him later. Just keep it behind us until they actually start firing.”
Five minutes later there was the sound of two explosions. They were not the 105 mm howitzers. It was the sound of the booby traps in the woods. “They are here.” Then the artillery fired. It soon became obvious that they were clearing the sides of the river. Some of the shells landed short, in the river. Others peppered the bank and then they began to creep north. I saw the unmistakeable 75 mm barrel of the panzer as it turned the bend in the road. The barrel rose as it climbed over the trees. Even across the road, I heard the crack and splintering sound as they were crushed beneath the tank; there were infantry on either side of it. I was tempted to use my Mauser and hit them but that would reveal our position. I wondered if the Panther would try to blow up the damaged tank. If it did the bridge would still be blocked but the Panther would survive. The machine gun on the tank opened fire and tore into the top of the wrecked tank. It then sprayed both sides of the bridge in case we had men hiding there. Then it edged forward.
I turned. Sergeant Hall was behind me, “I think we will see if your bomb works, sergeant.”
“It will work, sir. I am just not certain how much damage it will do. Those Panthers have thick armour.”
The shells from the howitzer were moving north and I heard more from the east. Colonel Devine was under attack too. That did not surprise me. They would coordinate their attacks. It was a pincer movement intended to crush us. The Panzer Grenadiers were firing across the river too. They were hidden in the woods. Their bullets were wasted as my men were dug in. I heard them clang off the tank behind us. The Panther edged forward. I saw that they had elevated the barrel. It explain why it had not fired. They did not want to risk the barrel being damaged when they rammed the Sherman.
The driver used a low gear so that he would have maximum power. The tracks slipped a little on the icy surface and the slight slope which led to the bridge and then they bit when they reached the flatter section. It lurched forward and struck the Sherman. The effect was spectacular. There might not have been much T.N.T. but there was plenty of petrol. The wrecked Sherman actually rose in the air as the bomb exploded. The petrol spurted on to the Panther and it began to burn too. The explosion must have damaged the tracks for it seemed unable to move.
“Stand by! If you have a target then fire on my command.” I levelled the Mauser and aimed at the turret. “Fire!” My men had been awaiting the order and the Panzer Grenadiers in the woods bore the brunt of the firepower. I saw a figure emerge from the Panther and I fired. The commander fell backwards. The tank was going nowhere and the crew tried to bail out. Sergeant Ford shot one who came out of the rear hatch. I saw a figure push the commander from the turret and then try to climb out. He was on fire. When I shot him it was a mercy. The tank was now engulfed in flame. When the fire spread to the ammunition there was an enormous explosion and the turret flew a few feet in the air before landing in the road behind the tank.
“Cease fire!” There was little point in firing any more as thick black smoke filled the other side of the road and we had no targets. The German shells also stopped. They were conserving their ammunition. The fire burned for long time. The air was filled with the aroma of burning flesh, gasoline and oily smoke.
A runner threw himself into the mattress. “Sir, Colonel Devine asks if you can hold on. Things are pretty bad at the crossroads.”
“How bad?”
“We are down to two Shermans sir. They are bringing more of our armour up. On the bright side sir we now have PIATs. A truck made it to us from Malmedy.”
PIATs would not stop the kind of tanks we were fighting. We needed anti-tank weapons. “Tell the Colonel that we have managed to knock out one Panther. We are holding on.”
“Right sir.”
He raced off.
Sergeant Henry shook his head, “Of course you neglected to tell him that we have used our one and only weapons which might do some good.”
I nodded to Corporal Powers, “Don’t be so negative, Sergeant, we still have our secret weapon! That should come as a shock to them.”
“You have six of those things, sir!”
“And they only have five tanks left. That means we have one to spare.”
Sergeant Barker burst out laughing at Sergeant Henry’s face, “Don’t worry Sarge, you will get used to the Major’s optimism.”
I looked up at the sky. Something had caught my eye. The snow shower had been brief and I saw a patch of blue. Against it I saw a flight of aeroplanes. They were Thunderbolts. Pointing I said, “The Air Force have sent a flight up. We have a chance.”
I watched them as they swooped to the south west. They were attacking something on the road. I could not see what it was but it had to be the Wespes. I saw the rockets streak and then heard the explosions. The three aeroplanes rose into the sky and then rolled to head north and low. They had another target in mind. This time they fired to the north and west of us. They used both their remaining rockets and machine guns. I heard an explosion and then a column of smoke rose into the sky.
Sergeant Ford said, “That evens up the field a little eh sir?”
“It does indeed but don’t count any chickens yet, Sergeant.”
After a while the sky began to darken. It was not the snow but the clouds were
bringing night a little earlier. Ominously the fire on the two tanks had now gone out and I heard the rumble of more tanks as the Germans advanced.
“Now we are for it.”
“Possibly, Sergeant Barker but so far we are holding on. Let’s keep that attitude eh?”
“Sir.”
I glanced up at the sky. The darkness might help us. Corporal Powers and his bomb hurlers would be harder to see against the night sky. We just had to hold the Germans at bay until then. The second Panther did the same as the other one had. Its machine gun opened fire. I heard shouts and cries from my right. Some of our men were hit. The Panzer Grenadiers were not to be seen. They knew we had teeth. The tank commander turned the turret around so that it faced the rear and then it began to push its sister and the Sherman towards the river. The Sherman might have been damaged but it was not going to a watery grave without a fight. Its front jammed itself on the barrels and then the parapet of the bridge. It would not budge.
I saw a chance now. “Sergeant Powers. The barrel is facing the wrong way. Try three of your bombs.”
“Yes sir. Lebowski and Hellberg, with me.” They scrambled over the front of our defences. Keeping low they were well hidden by both the parapet and the skeleton of the burned out Panther. I saw them run and then whirl around like a sort of manic Scotsmen. They hurled them high. Turning, they ran back to our lines. The tank’s machine gun could still fire and chips of the bridge parapet flew into the back of Pfc Hallberg. Corporal Powers and Pfc Lebowski picked him up and hurtled back across the bridge. The three projectiles landed. Two hit the tank and one missed. Although neither projectile appeared to cause any damage we watched as the commander tried to turn the turret. It whirred and it stuck. The rockets had managed to damage the turret mechanism. The only way it could fire would be if it turned around. It pushed harder but the two burned tanks refused to slip into the water.
The Panther backed up. All the time night was falling. It moved to get a better angle and then a Mark IV joined it. It too crunched and cracked over the two logs. It turned slightly and, like the first Panther, began to raise its barrel. It reached the other tank. The two of them began to push. It was working. The Mark IV began to slip on the frozen ground and one end began to swing around. It was the chance that our Sherman’s commander had been waiting for. There was a flash of flame from above our heads and a loud crack that hurt my ears. The shell hit the Mark IV squarely on the side. There was just over an inch of armour there and the shell went through as though it was paper. The tank exploded spectacularly. Flames shot out and set fire to the second Panther’s tracks. It began to reverse away but the fire had caught hold. I took out my glasses and saw that it had lost one of its tracks. The second Panther was out of the battle. It could fire its machine gun but that was all.
I felt hopeful for the first time. We had, effectively, halved the German tanks. With night falling we had a chance. Then I felt the ground begin to vibrate. I had felt that sensation a few days earlier when we had been in the attic of the house. Now I felt the vibration even more. I turned and shouted, “Sergeant, get out of the tank. It is either a Tiger or King Tiger coming up the road!”
The crew did not need a second urging. Suddenly the gun flamed again and I was deafened again. A shell shot towards the 45 ton Panther. The shell hit it on the side. Although it had thicker armour than the Mark IV the fire had weakened it and it, too exploded. The sergeant threw himself next to me, his unlit cigar still in his mouth. “We might not survive this sir but at least I took out two big tanks!”
“You did well, Sergeant.” I looked up and saw the barrel of the King Tiger. It belched smoke and flames from its gun. This time the concussion was so bad that it actually hurt my ears. My head seemed to vibrate and I felt as dizzy as when I had hit the brick wall. Then that was as nothing for the shell struck the Sherman. The tank seemed to jump up and then crash down before it was engulfed in flames. Four soldiers who had the misfortune to be close to the rear burst into flames. As others ran to put them out the German machine gun in the tank sprayed them and their suffering was ended. Ten men lay dead or dying. We could do nothing. We had to endure it.
The King Tiger raised its enormous barrel and began to push. This time the Sherman did move as the Panther and Mark IV were pushed against it. This was a 70 ton tank and it had power. The Mark IV was the first to tumble into the river followed by the Sherman carcass. Finally the Panther, blackened and without a turret now, rolled into the river.
The King Tiger backed up. I knew what it would do now. It would come over the bridge and there was nothing we could do to stop it. The other two Mark IV tanks would follow and our little force would be destroyed. I wondered if I should order a retreat and then I realised that would be condemning the men to death. The German machine guns would wreak havoc. I glanced around and saw that even Hewitt and Barker were looking terrified. We had to do something.
“Everyone, open fire at the trees, let’s see how many we can kill before they kill us.”
Sergeant Hall shouted, “Remember the Alamo!” Men began to whoop and cheer. I had seen this before. When you knew you were going to die and there was nothing you could do about it, you embraced it. You and death became lovers!
The bridge had a slight crown on it and as it lumbered it could bring neither its main gun nor its machine gun to bear. I levelled my Mauser. Amazingly the commander of the tank was out of his turret. I would, at least, make him pay. He was only a hundred feet from me and I could not miss. My bullet threw him back and then I watched as the King Tiger’s sides struck both sides of the bridge. It was too wide. The commander was dead and the noise inside must have been horrendous. The driver kept driving. He had no idea that they were stuck. As the King Tiger squeezed, bricks fell into the river and suddenly both sides of the bridge tumbled into the river. The barrel dipped as it crested the crown and the machine gunner fired. We ducked behind the cast iron bath. Then I heard a cracking. It grew louder and the machine gun stopped. I risked looking over the top of the bath. Even as I looked the bridge collapsed. The King Tiger was too heavy for the ancient bridge. It had caused its own death by damaging the side of the structure. With its integrity gone the ancient bridge died! It disappeared from sight as it fell into the water.
Sometimes soldiers do things which, if they thought about it they would never attempt. Hurling the Mauser to the ground I jumped over the barricade, oblivious to the bullets zipping over my head. Even as I ran I was pulling out a grenade. The tank lay six feet below me. I jumped and landed next to the barrel. I made the mistake of grabbing hold of it and it was hot. A hatch next to my foot opened and a head appeared. I swung my boot at it and felt bones crunch as I hit the driver. I clambered to the open turret. I pulled the pin on the grenade and dropped it in. I slammed the hatch shut and then ran for the bank. I hurled myself in the air and grabbed hold of grass. Hands reached over as the grenade went off inside the tank. I heard shouts and screams and then flames began to lick out of the driver’s visor.
As I was pulled up the two remaining Mark IV tanks began to drive closer to the river. They would have to negotiate the trees. “Everybody, fall back to the square, now!”
The call was taken up by the American sergeants. We knew what was coming. They would blast our lines with HE and rake the bank with machine guns. We would achieve nothing by staying. I followed Sergeant Barker and the others from the centre of the bridge; we ran towards the end house where, a few days ago Corporal Cooper and his men had helped us to take this bridge. I ran through the open door and kept going out of the back. I threw myself on the ground.
The two tanks began to fire. It seemed to me that it was as a punishment for destroying their comrades. They could not cross the river. They would have to drive along it and try to cross at Trois Ponts. They kept firing with all of their weapons. It seemed an age but I doubt that it lasted more than fifteen minutes. The house through which we had run was demolished. The front fell first and, when the walls were weakene
d the back fell in on itself. We were lucky. If it had fallen backwards then we would all have been killed. The air was filled with the smell of cordite and the sound of fury as the Panzers wreaked revenge on us. When it stopped the silence was almost painful.
I waited for a good five minutes before I risked standing. Sergeant Ford began to shake his head, “Well sir, I thought, twenty minutes ago that I was going to die. I was thinking of all the things I haven’t done. They say when you are going to die your life flashed before your face. All that I could see was my girl, Sue Ellen. I had put off marrying her. Now all that I want to do is marry her and have kids so that I can tell them about this day. They won’t believe it!”
Sergeant Hall said, “Amen to that brother, Amen.”
Chapter 11
The medics and Corporal Hewitt saw to the casualties. The Germans realised the futility of shelling buildings and we heard them head towards Trois Ponts. Leaving Sergeant Henry in charge, I went with Gordy to the square. The number of American casualties there told me that they had suffered just as much as we had. There was a make shift hospital using the old hall. Half the front was missing but it had a roof and a couple of walls. In Stavelot that passed as a building. I found Sergeant Major O’Rourke amongst them. He did not look happy.
“Major, tell these guys that I need to be back with the Colonel. It is just a scratch.”
The medic who was treating him shook his head, “Major, his arm is cut almost to the bone. He needs stitches or he could die!”