8

The Battle of the Bulge: Phase II, the Counterattack

The Germans Regroup

By December 24, the situation in the Stavelot–La Gleize– Stoumont area had stabilized, and CCB was relieved and reverted back to 3d Armored Division control. In the meantime, 3d Armored Division headquarters with elements of CCR had moved on the night of December 19 from Stolberg to the vicinity of Hotton.

They had to contend with the same horrible driving conditions of ice, sleet, and freezing rain, and when they arrived at Hotton the next morning they had numerous vehicles scattered up and down the seventy-mile route of march. It was an enormous effort for the maintenance people to unsnarl this mess and get the damaged vehicles repaired and back on the road. With CCB at Stavelot and CCA still committed south of Eupen, the division was vastly understrength. The division’s mission was to establish contact with the 82d Airborne to the east along the Grandménil-Manhay-Hotton highway and at the same time try to contain the flow of German armor north until more reinforcements arrived.

The Battle of the Bulge now entered the critical second phase. The plan to hold the hinges north and south of the bulge appeared to be gaining success. Kampfgruppe Peiper, leading the 1st SS Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler Panzer Division, had failed to capture the gasoline dump and had suffered a crushing defeat. To the south, the 101st Airborne Division and elements of the 10th Armored Division doggedly defended Bastogne. Even though they were completely surrounded, they refused to surrender. General Patton’s Third Army had launched an all-out assault to relieve Bastogne. Both the northern and southern flanks appeared to be stabilizing somewhat, but the area between Bastogne and Saint-Vith was wide open, and German armor and panzergrenadier units were still going strong.

The virtual decimation of Kampfgruppe Peiper and 1st SS Panzer Division cost the Germans their most powerful attacking force. It appeared that the emphasis was now being shifted to the 5th Panzer Army, and the 116th Panzer Division had the mission to head north and seize the bridgehead across the Meuse River on the way to Antwerp.

On the morning of December 20, the 3d Armored Division rushed into the gap between Hotton and Manhay to confront this advance. With less than a third of its strength—both of its major combat commands were committed elsewhere—the division was thrown into the maw. General Rose faced some critical decisions.

Generally speaking, our intelligence about German movements was good. Rose knew that the Germans probably had less of an idea of American dispositions. For the 3d Armored Division to be in the Aachen-Stolberg area on December 19 and suddenly appear seventy miles away the next morning took the Germans completely by surprise; they didn’t realize that this was less than a third of the division. With our well-organized motor transport and maintenance system, American armor had a vast maneuver and logistic superiority over comparable German units. The Germans never quite comprehended this.

Here again we see the advantages of the heavier American armored division. The 3d Armored Division had a total strength of 390 tanks, 232 of them M4 Shermans. Although vastly inferior in armor and firepower, the heavy armored division had as many tanks as two and a half German panzer divisions. Rose’s 60 medium and 30 light tanks, together with accompanying units and artillery, gave him a lean and mean Combat Command R.

3d Armored Division at Hotton-Manhay

General Rose already had a reputation as an extremely aggressive division commander who had great confidence in his troops. He had his staff come up with a fast-moving, innovative plan.

At noon on December 20, the 3d Armored Division attacked southward against elements of one panzer and two volksgrenadier divisions. The attack called for an advance along the broad front from Hotton to Grandménil. The three American task forces moving southward and the Germans moving northward had a series of meeting engagements.

The terrain in this area of the Ardennes was extremely rugged. The ability to advance was limited, and sometimes columns would come around a bend facing each other less than a hundred yards apart. It was as if two blindfolded prizefighters suddenly found themselves in the middle of the ring and their blindfolds were removed. The guy who threw the first punch had the advantage.

If the lead German tank was a Mark IV, the American M4A1 with its 76mm gun and power traverse turret had a good chance. The German turrets were manually operated, and we could generally swing faster and get off the first shot quicker. If the lead German tank was a Tiger or a Panther, we had to back up, get out of there, and set up a roadblock.

A tank commander reported that he had come face-to-face with a Panther that had its gun turret turned ninety degrees from the forward position. He fired the first round from the 76mm gun and struck the Panther square in the middle of its forward glacis plate. There was a tremendous flash of sparks, like a grinding wheel hitting a piece of steel. When it was over, the tank commander realized that the round had ricocheted and not penetrated the tank. He quickly reloaded, fired the second round, and struck the glacis plate again as the German slowly turned its turret in his direction. Before the Panther could get its gun zeroed in on the M4, the tank commander got off a third round, with equal results. The Panther was finally able to fire its high-velocity 75mm, which penetrated the M4 tank like a sieve. Fortunately, the tank commander survived to tell this story.

Although the heavier Panther and King Tiger tanks were far superior in firepower and armor, our small task forces had additional capabilities, which tended to offset this. Our infantry rode in M3 half-tracks with one-half-inch and one-quarter-inch armor on the front and the sides. With three machine guns on each half-track plus their semi-automatic Garand rifles, our infantrymen had considerably greater firepower than comparable German units. The M2 half-track had a door in the back and mounted an 81mm mortar that could be fired directly from the half-track. It could also be removed and fired from the ground. Each task force also included several M16 half-tracks with quad .50-caliber machine guns and M15 half-tracks with a single 37mm automatic gun and two .50-caliber machine guns. This gave the task force a tremendous amount of automatic firepower. Armored and infantry firepower was supplemented by M7 105mm self-propelled howitzers, which generally rode on the tail of the column. Even though these task forces were small, they were highly mobile and could pack a hell of a punch if they got into a firefight. The task force commanders realized they were light on armor and they could not stand much of a chance when engaged by major panzer units.

For the next few days, the situation was highly fluid. With the exception of certain isolated supply units, such as the 7th Armored Division trains at La Roche, there were no major American combat forces in this area other than the 3d Armored Division. Its three columns advanced south as rapidly as possible. Once they contacted the enemy, they tried to slow down the enemy’s advance. As the overwhelming enemy strength built up, they withdrew.

General Rose’s mission was to establish a screen between the 82d Airborne on the east and Hotton on the west, where the 84th Infantry was due to arrive soon. All three task forces began to encounter heavy German resistance and started to withdraw slowly. The Germans brought in the 2d SS Panzer Division with the mission of driving up highway N15 toward Manhay and screening the flank of the 5th Panzer Army to the south. The 2d SS Panzer Division had become notorious for the cruel massacre of more than six hundred innocent French civilians including women and children during the earlier days of the invasion.

Task Force Hogan had proceeded southward from Soy to a point three miles south of Samrée. As the German pressure began to build, the task force slowly withdrew to higher ground at Berisménil, where they were completely cut off and surrounded by German panzer units. They set up a strong perimeter defense, and from this high ground could observe the movement of the German troops down below and fire on them while directing other division artillery into this area.

This was a constant thorn in the Germans’ side. A young German officer under a truce flag approached the outer perimeter defenses. He was met, blindfolded, and escorted to Colonel Hogan’s command post. His message said they were surrounded by three divisions and would be totally destroyed if they did not surrender. Hogan told him in his polite Texas drawl to go to hell, and the German returned with his mission unfulfilled.

The weather was beginning to abate somewhat, and there were patches of clear sky mixed with the clouds. An attempt to resupply Hogan’s unit with an airdrop missed the target completely. Another attempt was made to fire medical supplies in empty smoke shells. When this too failed, the situation became more critical. After four desperate days, General Rose ordered Hogan to destroy his equipment and evacuate as many of his men as possible.

To destroy his equipment without giving away his plans to the Germans, Hogan could not burn it or use demolitions. To the well-trained maintenance crews and gunners, the solution became obvious. All American teenagers know that when you get angry at your buddy and want to get back at him, you put sugar in his gas tank to destroy it. This is exactly what they did to all the engines. At the same time, they destroyed the firing pins of the tanks and the artillery pieces and buried the breechblocks in the dirt. They also dismantled many machine guns and heavy weapons and scattered their parts.

Finally, the men blackened their faces and under the cover of darkness began to slip out in groups of ten to twenty. Colonel Hogan had a difficult time walking in his air force boots, but he finally got back safely to our lines. When questioned by General Rose as to why he was the last man out, Hogan could have given him some heroic textbook answer. Instead, in his typical Texas drawl he said, “General, my damn feet hurt.”

Task Force Hogan kept the 116th Panzer Division from exploiting its quick advantage in obtaining bridgeheads across the Ourthe River. All three task forces slowed the Germans considerably and disrupted them until American reinforcements began to arrive.

On the morning of December 21, Combat Command A reverted back to division control followed by CCB on December 24. They were joined by two regimental combat teams from the 75th Infantry Division and some other units. The 3d Armored Division was practically up to the strength of a full armored corps.

The 2d SS Panzer Division, joined by elements of the 12th SS Panzer Division, had driven up through Manhay and occupied Grandménil. When they attempted to turn west and tried to outflank the 3d Armored Division, they were stopped cold and driven back. After major assaults and much back-and-forth fighting with small task groups, the line began to stabilize. The time had come to regroup and build up for the counterattack.

German Air Attack

When CCB reverted back to the division on Christmas Eve, I decided to return to the maintenance battalion headquarters company and deliver my combat loss report. I had heard that orders were issued to deliver at least one hot dinner on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day to all troops if possible. I was tired of eating cold K rations and 10-N-1s by this time.

Headquarters company maintenance battalion had moved into a large rock quarry in Aywaille. The quarry, big enough to hold the entire company and all its vehicles, was approximately half a mile square and had walls extending fifty to sixty feet above the quarry floor, which was relatively even and made an ideal working area. The entrance was down a gradual slope of crushed stone. A number of buildings provided cover for work areas.

By a rare coincidence, we arrived at headquarters company shortly before chow. I told my driver, White, to get the vehicle gassed up and checked out, get himself some chow, and be prepared to leave on a moment’s notice.

The officers’ mess was set up in a lean-to next to one of the buildings. I sat down at the table looking forward to a good meal. I couldn’t remember when I’d last had a real hot meal served in a chow line.

Suddenly, a low, rumbling noise erupted out of nowhere and exploded into an awesome crescendo as a low-flying plane came screaming over the quarry. A sentry rushed in and told Colonel McCarthy that it was a German fighter plane but it was flying so low and so fast that our antiaircraft gunners didn’t get in a shot.

There were disadvantages to being in a defiladed position such as this. The antiaircraft gunners had no visibility over the edge of the quarry, so they couldn’t see an approaching plane until it was right on top of us. Everybody ran out of the quarry shed and immediately took cover. We expected the plane to make a wide turn and come in on a strafing run. I found a perfect foxhole, about three feet wide by four feet deep by ten feet long, where a large block had been removed. There were similar holes all around the quarry, and they were soon filled with men.

After what seemed to be eons of time waiting for the German fighter plane to return, although it was actually less than a minute, we heard a low, rumbling noise. It was music to our ears. Directly overhead was a large group of B17 heavy bombers flying at about twenty thousand feet. We could see them clearly because the clouds had disappeared the night before and the sky was crystal clear for the first time in weeks. There were three squadrons staggered in a V formation. To the rear we could see other groups following. This was the first day since the German offensive began that large masses of American bombers were out to attack.

In my fascination at looking at these beautiful planes, I forgot momentarily about the German fighter plane. My binoculars were in the Jeep, so I strained my eyes to look up at this magnificent sight. The lead squadron, some twelve Flying Fortresses, was directly above the quarry and was leaving long contrails like a series of diamond necklaces in the sky. The column extended as far as the eye could see over the horizon. The sight was further enhanced by the eruption of dozens of small, flashing lights, like snowflakes rotating in the sun, around the planes in the lead squadron.

My fascination turned to horror as suddenly the lead plane in the squadron exploded in midair. Another explosion cut the tail off one of the Flying Fortresses; the main body of the plane tumbled toward the earth as the tail section slowly fluttered back and forth like a maple leaf descending in the breeze. Another explosion sheared off the entire wing of one of the Fortresses, and it spiraled toward the quarry. Two other B17s with their engines on fire broke out of the column and started spiraling like wounded birds struck with flaming arrows. The spirals became tighter and tighter as the planes plunged headlong to earth.

I was so engrossed by this sight that it was some time before I could discern nine German fighter planes lined up perpendicular to the direction of flight to the first squadron. They were flying several thousand feet to the rear of the lead squadron, just far enough to be out of range of the .50-caliber machine guns of the tail gunners. The rocket-firing German fighters were accurate. Out of twelve planes in the lead squadron, they shot down five.

The skies filled with parachutes. I counted twenty-five in the air and figured that approximately half the crews had escaped. The sky was also filled with the debris of broken, twisted airplanes as they plummeted downward. There were landing gears, engines, pieces of wing, parts of fuselages, and even bombs falling. Some of the bombs, even though they were unarmed, exploded on impact with the ground. Fortunately, none of them landed directly in the quarry. As if in some giant apocalypse, the heavens literally exploded, raining a deluge of fire upon the earth below.

The Flying Fortress with its right wing sheared off struck the ground about fifty yards beyond the edge of the quarry. The explosion rocked the ground as the gasoline and the bomb load went off. A column of flame and debris erupted some thousand feet into the air, scattering parts in all directions. Had the bomber crashed into the hard stone floor of the quarry, the blast might have annihilated our entire company.

Anytime an airman parachuted down in our area, we sent out patrols with medics to pick him up. When the patrol reached the fallen tail section of the Flying Fortress, they noticed a body in the tail gunner’s seat. The medics had to forcibly break the hatch to remove the body. Apparently, the tail gunner had not been able to escape because the crawl zone between his position and the rest of the plane was crushed flat.

As the medics removed the tail gunner from beneath the canopy, they discovered that he was still alive. They put him on a stretcher and after a quick examination determined that he had no wounds. When he regained consciousness, he told the medics that he thought he’d fainted.

Another parachute was about five hundred feet in the air and descending earthward when we noticed what appeared to be a section of wing falling directly on top of him. We screamed and waved frantically to get him to slip his chute to one side. He obviously did not hear us. The wing continued downward, shearing the parachute in half; the young airman fell to his death. It was terrible to think that he had parachuted safely from twenty thousand feet, then was killed by this falling piece of debris.

Yet another parachute was heading directly into the middle of the quarry. And this brought on something I did not believe could happen. I had heard of instances like this but did not think that they actually occurred. When it was about a thousand feet above the quarry, a lone German ME109 fighter dove down and headed straight toward the parachute with all of its machine guns wide open. We screamed and hollered and waved our arms to try to warn him, but we couldn’t fire any antiaircraft guns because we were afraid of hitting him. He saw us, and kicking violently he slipped his chute to one side. The German plane missed him on the first pass.

The German pilot was apparently obsessed with killing this helpless young airman, because he made a second wide turn and came back for another pass, firing the machine guns again. By this time the parachute was much lower, and the German pilot was so intent on cold-blooded murder that he crashed into the side of the quarry in a terrible explosion. If there was ever a case of retribution in war, this was it.

The medics brought in the airman, who turned out to be a bombardier. He had not been hit. His worst injury was a frozen foot as a result of having kicked off his flying boot when he was trying to slip his chute. All these airman were taken to the aid station and evacuated back to the army hospital.

In spite of the falling debris and exploding bombs and aircraft, our company in the rock quarry received no major injuries or damage. I finally figured out what the German plane that had buzzed the quarry a few minutes before the air battle started was doing. It was a low-flying reconnaissance plane radioing back the position of the lead bomber squadron. Because our bombers were still over friendly territory, they had not picked up any fighter escort.

If I’d had a color movie camera and could have laid on my back in my stone foxhole, I could probably have gotten the most spectacular aerial battle of the war on film. I realized the terrible risk the young bomber crews took. Air battles are sudden and last only a few seconds or minutes. Like all combat, you are killed outright or wounded or you survive to fight another day.

My Driver, White, Is Wounded

As CCB moved into the Hotton-Soy area, it relieved some of the pressure on CCR, which had been severely battered. Company C of the maintenance battalion moved into Werbomont to give CCB closer support. Werbomont was south on highway N15 between Harz and Grandménil.

I decided to spend the night at headquarters company and join C Company the next morning. My driver, White, wanted to visit some of his buddies, and I told him it was okay, so long as he was ready to move out at a moment’s notice. I returned to the section of the building next to Major Arrington’s trailer and put down my sack there.

That night, lying in my sack, I reflected on Christmas Eves past. I didn’t think about where I would be next Christmas, or if I would be. I don’t suppose anyone ever understands what goes on in a soldier’s mind in combat. We conjure pleasant memories of the past, think about the present in a fleeting moment, skip over the immediate future, and dwell on long-range possibilities. In this way, we can do what is necessary yet at the same time maintain a low anxiety level about the immediate future. This is how the soldier survives physically and emotionally. This process must be magnified many times for the combat infantryman or tanker who is constantly exposed to enemy fire. It mounts up, in various levels, for those of us in maintenance who are exposed to direct fire only periodically.

Before I went overseas, my mother sent me a small book titled Prayers for the Day. It was divided into 365 days, each dated with a separate section of scripture and a prayer for each day. My mother could open her copy to a given date and read the same prayer I was reading. That night, I was comforted by reading the Christmas story about the birth of Christ, and I thought what a beautiful idea it was for my mother to give me the book with excerpts for us to share. I was thankful to almighty God that my parents had taught me Christian values. The faith based on these values was essential to my survival both physically and emotionally.

After chow the next morning, I went to find White. The Jeep was gone and White was nowhere around. Some of the men who had been with him said that Warrant Officer Macklin had come over around midnight and asked White to drive him to division headquarters rear to deliver a report. Neither White nor Macklin had returned, and no one knew where they were.

I was angry that Macklin had taken my Jeep without asking. He knew that liaison officers had to be prepared to move out at any time. Checking with headquarters company, I found out that White had been seriously wounded and had been evacuated to the army hospital. My first thoughts were that White had died. Because it was extremely difficult to get information about wounded evacuated to an army hospital during combat, it was several years after the war before I heard that White had survived. Here is what happened.

The Luftwaffe had committed well over a thousand planes to the Ardennes offensive. As in Normandy, it concentrated its attacks at night. This was the first night with clear weather, and the planes attacked every target site, as our planes had done during the daytime.

Because the roads were covered with ice and there were no leaves on the trees, my Jeep must have looked like a dark object moving across a mirror. As it approached a crossroad on its way to division headquarters, a rocket-firing ME109 came screaming down in a strafing run. A rocket exploded alongside the Jeep on the driver’s side. The blast blew the Jeep off the road into the ditch, and some of the fragments struck White behind his left ear at the base of the skull. Fortunately, there was a Red Cross ambulance at the crossroads, and Macklin and some of the aidemen loaded White into it. Macklin was apparently uninjured, but the Jeep was damaged. I felt terrible about White being wounded, particularly not knowing at the time whether or not he had survived. We had developed a bond that is understood only by soldiers in combat who live together on a daily basis and depend on each other for survival. I would miss him.

A Problem with Frostbite

For the next few days, the division consolidated its position. The 2d Armored Division to our west was mopping up the 2d SS Panzer Division, which it had caught on the road at Celles and virtually annihilated. Our maintenance people worked feverishly to get everything ready for a new offensive. The maintenance effort was complicated because we had no buildings or hard ground to work from. Company C, located in Werbomont, was scattered in this small village and set up shop in the rolling fields between the farmhouses. It was bitterly cold; if a mechanic tried to grab a hand tool without his gloves, his skin would stick to it. Yet wearing heavy gloves while working with hand tools makes it hard to get down in the small recesses on a tank engine.

Even under these conditions, the maintenance people were lucky compared to the combat infantrymen and tankers trying to hold the line. The continuous cold weather had frozen the ground, and it was difficult to dig a foxhole. In some cases the infantrymen and combat engineers used grenades to penetrate the ground.

By this time, the driving was becoming hazardous. The constant packing of the snow by the tanks and other vehicles had created sheets of solid ice. Even with the metal grousers, some tanks would slide like a sled if they attempted to stop on a slope. We constantly used our wreckers to get tanks out of the ditches and back onto the roads. For several days, it snowed almost constantly, and the buildup on some of the little-used side roads would reach two to three feet.

Major Arrington issued me a new Jeep to replace the damaged one, and I was assigned a new driver. Private First Class Wrayford, a tall country boy from Louisiana, was a good driver and mechanic and took a great deal of pride in keeping the Jeep in first-class condition. He transferred the contents of the damaged Jeep to the new one. From the looks of the driver’s side on the old Jeep, White had apparently lost a great deal of blood and it was a miracle that he had survived.

In transferring to the new Jeep, I was surprised to find how much equipment and other articles I had accumulated. We had two bedrolls, two backpacks, a wooden map box with a thermite grenade inside, two ponchos, my binoculars, a case of 10-N-1 rations, and a case of K rations. I was issued a .45-caliber 1911 automatic pistol and shoulder holster. Wrayford had a .30-caliber carbine mounted in a bracket on the windshield. In addition we had one 1903 Springfield bolt-action sharpshooter’s rifle, two .30-caliber M1 Garand rifles, a box of hand grenades, and two German 100-meter panzerfausts . Whenever we overran a German column, we would find some panzerfausts lying around. An excellent weapon for an individual, it could be fired one time and then discarded. It did not have the range of our bazooka, but it had much greater penetrating power. I explained to Wrayford that in the event of imminent capture, we definitely wanted to get rid of the panzerfausts , because the Germans had been known to kill American soldiers if they found German weapons on them.

I had also accumulated various other loot, such as German cameras, pistols, binoculars, and many miscellaneous items picked up along the way. (Technically, all of these items came under the classification of military contraband and thus were legal.) We traded these items constantly with other soldiers to upgrade our stock.

The snow continued to fall as we drove. We came to a snowdrift about three feet deep on a small side road and thought we could get through it. Wrayford put the Jeep in low-low gear and we started out, but the buildup of snow in front of the Jeep formed a wedge and eventually lifted the wheels right off the ground. The Jeep wouldn’t budge in either direction. We got out and started digging until a command and reconnaissance car with a winch on the front came down the main road near us and we flagged it down. One pull of the winch and we were free. I told Wrayford that I hoped we’d learned a lesson; if this had happened when we were following the combat units, we would have been in deep trouble.

The Belgian château at Pair that the headquarters maintenance battalion had moved into was the most luxurious quarters we’d had to date. During this part of the Ardennes offensive, when the situation was somewhat static, we would put the Belgian family in one part of the house and take over the rest. In this way we could get our men inside and at the same time take care of the civilians.

The Belgians were usually cooperative and welcomed us. They realized that we were fighting for them, and if the Germans had been occupying the area they would have probably been thrown out in the cold. Even the combat elements in forward areas tended to concentrate around the small villages, in order to keep as many men inside as possible. The men living in foxholes on the line and in the outposts suffered terribly in this cold weather.

During the early part of the Ardennes campaign, the soldiers were equipped with combat boots with a heavy composition sole, an unfinished heavy leather upper, and a smooth leather extension on the top that buckled about halfway up the calf. With one or more pairs of heavy GI cotton socks, the boots were adequate for normal conditions. They were, however, completely inadequate for the frontline soldier standing in a foxhole. In the constantly alternating sleet, rain, and snow, the foxholes often filled with water. Standing in the water for many hours at a time, without being able to walk around, caused serious circulation problems in the feet and lower legs. Wet feet would begin to swell, and severe pain would incapacitate the soldier. This was known as trench foot, which caused many casualties. In some cases the swelling became so severe that gangrene set in, and some men lost parts of or, in extreme cases, both their feet.

At first, the army was completely unprepared to cope with this. It wasn’t until almost the end of the Ardennes campaign that we received shoepacs, which were much better. They had a heavy rubber bottom and sides, similar to an overshoe, a one-inch heavy felt innersole, and high leather tops that extended halfway up the calf. They were completely waterproof at the bottom. Worn with extra socks and sized to provide plenty of room for our feet to move around, they worked well. The Germans wore a similar boot that had been developed after their experience on the Russian front.

One night at Pair, I was getting ready to get in the sack and had removed my combat jacket, shirt, trousers, and boots. All that was left was my long underwear and socks. I never took off my socks unless I could change into a new pair. New socks were rare, so this wasn’t too often.

My feet were usually numb during the day when I was outside in the cold, but they would warm up and the feeling would return once I got inside. I would rub my feet with the socks on before getting into the sack. This night I noticed that my feet were unusually sore, particularly on the bottom. On removing my socks, I noticed large black splotches on the ball and heel of both feet.

The next day, Captain Myzak, our battalion surgeon, examined my feet and told me I had bad frostbite spots and should go to an army base hospital for treatment. Apparently, the constant exposure of my thin-soled boots on the steel floor of the Jeep had caused the frostbite. I pleaded with the captain not to send me to an army hospital, because I was afraid I would be temporarily transferred out of the division and might never get back. I felt just the opposite of Brer Rabbit in the briar patch.

He offered to treat me at the combat aid station. With a scalpel he gently peeled the outer callus layer of skin from the spots on both feet. The spots consisted of dried blood from ruptured capillaries; it had come to the surface and frozen. I supposed this was nature’s way of protecting my feet from further freezing. Then he swabbed my feet and bandaged them with gauze soaked in antiseptic. I was cured after lying flat on my back for the next couple of days, and I went back to duty wearing the new shoepacs.

The (VT) Proximity Fuse

All of our plans were proceeding for a major counterattack. VII Corps of First Army was to attack southward along highway N15 from Grandménil toward Houffalize while Third Army attacked northward from Bastogne to Houffalize. The meeting at Houffalize should cut off any remaining German troops west of there.

VII Corps consisted of the 75th, 83d, and 84th Infantry Divisions and the 2d and 3d Armored Divisions. The 3d Armored Division on the east and the 2d Armored Division on the west were to pass through the 75th Infantry Division and, supported by the 83d and 84th Divisions, make the major attack southward toward Houffalize. With the U.S. Army’s only two heavy armored divisions supported by three first-class infantry divisions, VII Corps had the maximum available capacity.

One of the best-kept secrets of World War II, next to the atomic bomb, was the proximity fuse, or VT fuse—or pozit fuse, as it was commonly known. It was an improvement on the traditional overhead time-fire fuse, which until then had been considered one of the deadliest fuses.

The traditional time-fire fuse contained a series of annular powder rings that could be adjusted in length to provide a fairly exact time when a shell was supposed to explode. This adjustment was made by inserting the head of the fuse into a fuse cutter, which changed the length of the powder train so that the fuse would explode at the proper time. By knowing the range and the velocity of the shell, according to the number of charges used, the gunner could look at a chart and tell the exact setting to get the shell to explode at a prescribed number of feet in the air.

When a shell exploded in the air, a cone of fragments struck the ground with a devastating effect on the soldiers in the exposed area. Even soldiers in foxholes were vulnerable to this type of fire. To get the shells to explode at the optimum height overhead, an observer had to see the shell exploding and adjust the time fire accordingly by radio. This meant that the attacking group must have the enemy under observation.

The proximity fuse contained a small battery-powered radar system that was armed when the projectile fired from the tube. As the projectile approached the ground, the radar bounced the signal back and caused the fuse to detonate at the desired height. This was much more reliable than the traditional time-fire fuse. It also did not require an observer to actually see the explosion. This fire could be directed deep into the enemy’s rear against artillery and other targets that were not under observation.

The proximity fuse had been developed and used two years earlier by the navy in the Pacific. It had been effective against Japanese aircraft. Any rounds that failed to fire fell harmlessly into the ocean. To the best of our knowledge, neither the Japanese nor the Germans knew about this fuse.

The decision had been made to use the proximity fuse in the opening assault of this counterattack. It would be the first time it had been used in massive artillery barrages.

On New Year’s Day, Major Arrington called in the liaison officers and briefed us on the new fuse. We were to contact the artillery units in our combat commands and brief them. I contacted the 391st Field Artillery in CCB and told them about the new fuses, which were to be drawn at the ammunition point that day. I passed along all the technical data I had, which was relatively simple. The fuse was to be used in place of the time-fire fuse and required no further adjustments. Upon firing, the impact of the propellent charge armed the fuse. When the round reached a certain height above the target, it would automatically detonate. If the projectile was fired into a wooded area, tree branches might set off the fuse. I didn’t tell them anything about the radar system; the less they knew, the better, in case they were captured.

The next morning, the day before the counterattack was due to start, people from the division G2 section brought a civilian down to the forward line. He was dressed as a typical Belgian farmer with heavy boots and a greatcoat that hung almost to his ankles. He wore heavy wool mittens and a wool cap with flaps that pulled down over his ears. He had a small, thin radio mounted on his belt but also supported by shoulder straps. The straps had slip-type loops, so if he raised his arms as if to surrender, the loops would disengage the belt and the straps, and the radio would fall, hopefully undetected. He also carried several large envelopes filled with some type of chemical powder. He said he could rub this powder on his coat along with dry snow and the reaction would change the coat’s color. He had the password and parole for the next several days. After being briefed by the commander of the forward infantry company, he passed through our lines and wandered off into the woods between the German outposts.

His mission was to infiltrate German lines and radio information back to us about their positions. This was courageous, because the Germans would summarily execute him if he was caught. This is just one example of the many instances in which the Belgian underground assisted the U.S. Army.

The proximity fuse had been issued to all the artillery in both the First and Third Armies. The attack on the morning of January 3 was preceded by a horrendous artillery barrage. Using the proximity fuse, we got airbursts with 155mm and 8-inch shells directly over Houffalize. Although our forward elements were still five to eight miles from Houffalize, the Germans thought we had already broken through and were less than a mile from the city. We would have to have been that close to get direct observation from the surrounding hills. This created a panic among the retreating German troops and further added to the terrible congestion trying to jam through the narrow streets of Houffalize. This panic fed upon itself, and the traffic jams created further targets for the devastating airbursts.

The American Counterattack

By this time, the U.S. Army had gained a great deal of experience in planning a frontal assault. General Collins realized that the GHQ tank battalions and infantry did not have sufficient armored power to make a major assault in open country, where the enemy could bring large concentrations of fire against them.

From December 30 through January 3, the enemy, realizing our next possible move, had prepared a series of strongpoints in depth over the rolling open country immediately in front of us. The main line of advance went through this area for about three miles. The next couple of miles consisted of heavy woods, then open country again.

The planned tactics for this operation used the armored division with additional infantry to make the initial assault across the open country. When they reached the woods, with its narrow roads and logging trails, the infantry passed through the armored division. Once clear of the woods, the armored division again moved ahead of the infantry. This tactic seemed to take advantage of the best capabilities of both the infantry division and the armored division.

Accompanied by the extremely heavy barrage using the proximity fuses, the attack started on the morning of January 3. The 3d Armored Division and 83d Infantry Division were to the east of highway N15, and the 2d Armored Division and 84th Infantry Division were to the west. Because the German main effort had been to the north in this area, when we started our counterattack southward we were still opposed by scattered remnants of three German panzer divisions and two volksgrenadier divisions. They put up a terrific fight.

The Germans were past masters at defense against armor by using their own armor skillfully. They took every advantage of their superior armor and used the buildings and rubble of the small fortified villages to conceal their tanks and self-propelled guns. Even when attacking one of these strongpoints with a combination of infantry supported by armor and preceded by a quick, heavy artillery barrage, we still sustained heavy losses in our tanks.

The losses probably would have been much greater had it not been for the M7 self-propelled 105mm howitzer. Able to fire for effect immediately from almost any position, the M7 could put down a deadly fire of proximity fuse overhead airbursts. It could also fire white phosphorus shells, which put out a lot of smoke and inhibited the German observation. I have always felt that the M7 gun carriage was one of the most effective weapons we had.

With the weather beginning to clear up, we got more and more support from the Ninth Air Force P47 dive-bombers. We had to be extremely careful in calling for air strikes because of the close proximity of our troops to the Germans. In a fluid situation such as this, it was easy for the air force to be confused and bomb the wrong targets. We were always excited to see the air force come in because we knew that the Germans would really catch hell.

The heavy armor losses we had sustained so far in the Battle of the Bulge resulted in a critical shortage of tank crews. The M4 Sherman normally had a five-man crew: the driver; the assistant driver, who rode next to him and manned the ball-mount .30-caliber machine gun; the assistant gunner, who sat on the left side of the turret and loaded the main gun; the gunner, who sat on the right side of the turret and fired the gun; and the tank commander, who sat at the rear of the turret and operated the radio.

There was a small cupola with a periscopic sight in the hatch cover directly over the tank commander. When the tank was under artillery fire, the tank commander kept the hatch closed and buttoned up; however, the tank often rode with the hatch open for better visibility.

As casualties became more acute, we first had to eliminate the assistant driver. This denied the tank the use of the ball-mount machine gun, which was particularly effective against infantry. Later on, we had to eliminate the assistant gunner, and the tank commander had to double as the loader. This gave us a three-man crew, a bare minimum to operate a tank.

On the afternoon of January 8 at Werbomont, C Company was getting seventeen tanks ready to issue to the troops. Some had been knocked out previously and been repaired; some were brand-new tanks sent from army ordnance as replacements. It was our job to get the tanks ready and find crews to man them.

The 33d Armored Regiment had sent us seventeen tank crewmen who had limited experience with tanks in combat. These men had come in as replacements themselves only a few days before. The G1 had sent thirty-five men who had just gotten off the boat in Antwerp a few hours earlier and didn’t seem to have received previous indoctrination. We asked how many had previous experience with tanks, and they all replied negative. Most had never been in a tank or even close to one.

We selected thirty-four men and split them into two-man crews. These men, along with the drivers, made up seventeen three-man crews for the tanks. They were all given a brief orientation of what a tank was all about and shown various items of equipment, the machine guns, and the ammunition boxes. The tanks had already been filled with gasoline and were lubricated and ready to go.

Several artillery mechanics took the tanks to the edge of the field. They swung the turret to one side and loaded the guns with armor-piercing ammunition to prevent any explosion. Each crew member got to fire three rounds with the main gun. (The men had already had basic training, so they were familiar with machine guns.) This was all the training that time permitted before they were taken to their units by guides from the 33d Armored Regiment. It was about 1500.

Going down to the 33d Armored Regiment at about 1900 it was discovered that of the seventeen tanks issued, fifteen had been knocked out and destroyed along the side of the road. I was unable to find out how many, if any, of these young crew members had survived. This tragedy was destined to be repeated many times.

By January 9, the 3d Armored Division had completed the first phase of the operation and reached the edge of the heavily wooded area. The 83d Infantry Division passed through and cleared the woods for the next two to three miles. By January 13, the woods had been pretty well cleared of panzerfaust crews and mines along the small logging trails.

The division passed through the woods and through the infantry again, then started on its last and final push across the open rolling terrain, which was heavily fortified. For the last ten days, the Germans had fought a bitter rear-guard action, and we had advanced ten miles to the southern edge of the woods. On the thirteenth, the division passed through the 83d Infantry Division again, then proceeded toward its final objective: to cut the main highway east from Houffalize, then occupy the high ground in the vicinity of Brisy.

The Germans fought bitterly to keep us from cutting off their final escape route. German tanks and armored infantry jammed the highway and set up heavy fortified positions around Stommeln. On January 15, Combat Command B set up a roadblock just east of Stommeln, cutting the German escape route. They then proceeded southward to Brisy and occupied the high ground north of the river.

Having achieved our final objective, we held this ground, and the 84th Infantry and 2d Armored Divisions bypassed us to the west and proceeded toward Houffalize. On January 16, in the vicinity of Houffalize, elements of the 84th Infantry Division made contact with the 11th Armored Division proceeding northward from the Third Army, completing this phase of the Ardennes campaign. On January 20, our division moved into the Barvaux-Durbuy area for rest and rehabilitation.

The maintenance and supply units worked feverishly to get the division back up to strength. There were no trained tank crew replacements; all came from the infantry recruit pool. These men were integrated with the survivors of existing tank crews and given intensive training for the next few days. At least they had a much better chance for survival than the young crews brought down to us at Werbomont on January 8. Captain Tom Sembera secured our proper share of replacement tanks and other vehicles. We were now beginning to get a number of the new M4A1 medium tanks with a 76mm gun and a 550-horsepower V8 Ford engine.

Casualties

The Battle of the Bulge drew to a rapid and final conclusion. By January 28, the Germans had been driven back to their original line of departure. The fighting had been savage, and both sides were heavily bloodied. The approximate casualties were 81,000 Americans and 100,000 Germans. The 3d Armored Division alone, from December 16 through January 20, lost 125 M4 medium tanks, 38 M5 light tanks, 6 M7 self-propelled guns, and 158 half-tracks, armored cars, and other vehicles.

On Leave to Reims

After a few days in our new rest area, the division commander directed that as many officers and men as possible be given time off for rest and relaxation. During a visit to one of the ordnance depots at Reims, Captain Sembera was approached in the joint officers’ mess one evening by a young captain who had noticed the captain’s 3d Armored Division Spearhead shoulder patch. He also noticed the ordnance bomb insignia on his lapel. The captain identified himself as my brother George, and asked Sembera if he might know me.

Sembera broke out in a broad grin. “Hell, yes, I know him. He’s one of my old buddies. He’s always bitching to get him more damned tanks. He’s liaison with CCB and loses more tanks and fouls up more than anybody else. He really gives me a hard time. He’s one of the reasons I’m back here.”

George told him that he was an executive officer in one of the quartermaster truck groups stationed in Reims and gave him his address. The next time I saw Tommy, he told me about meeting George and gave me the address. Until then, I knew that George was somewhere in France but had no idea where. All I’d had was his APO number.

After a few days in the rest area, things seemed to be going a lot better, and I asked Major Arrington if I could take a couple of days to go back to Reims to visit my brother. The major told Captain Ellis to cut an order sending me to Reims for three days on official ordnance business, so it wouldn’t count against my leave. When I told Wrayford we were going to Reims, his face lit up. “Lieutenant, I’m going to have to shave extra good this time.”

Wrayford got water from one of the decontamination trucks and even managed to wash the Jeep. We straightened all our gear as best we could, then took off like a couple of foxes going to a chicken reunion.

We left maintenance battalion headquarters at Pair and headed toward Werbomont. The weather had warmed up considerably, and most of the ice and snow had melted. On the route through Marche and Sedan to Reims, the roads were littered with both American and German vehicles but mostly tanks and half-tracks from the German 2d SS Panzer Division.

The main highways in this part of France were straight and broad and lined with poplar trees. They were paved with blacktop in the country and with Belgian block near villages and small cities. I first thought that this would be an ideal area for a road net for the COMZ communication. To my surprise, however, the roads were in terrible condition. There were stretches along the main highway varying from a hundred yards to a quarter mile along where the road had completely collapsed due to heavy military traffic. We passed numerous engineering construction battalions rebuilding the roads, using both German prisoners and French civilians to help them.

After arriving in Reims, we located the headquarters of George’s quartermaster truck group. Although I had written down the address that Tommy gave me, I had committed it to memory many times. It was 32 Rue de Moisson and was located in an elegant neighborhood. The street contained a number of beautiful eighteenth-century French town houses with walled formal gardens in the backyard, similar to many English homes.

Number 32 was a three-story house, the highest on the street. It had an impressive gray granite facade with carved lintels over the door and windows. The upper windows had small balconies with wrought-iron grillwork. I knew that if George had anything to do with selecting these billets, he had chosen this one, because he always liked to go first class. We parked the Jeep in front and went inside.

The hallway had a black and white Italian marble floor and walls paneled and festooned with bronze sconces and French paintings. I was impressed, especially after having lived in barns and the cold stone basements of Belgian farmhouses. Even the château at Pair, where headquarters company was located, paled in comparison to this beautiful home.

A corporal sat at a desk in the main hallway, and I asked him if Captain Cooper was in. He said his office was upstairs just to the right of the stairway. I told him I was his brother but to be sure not to tell him.

He kind of grinned and picked up the phone. “Captain, some beat-up-looking lieutenant down here wants to see you.”

As the corporal escorted me upstairs, he told me that the house used to be a French bawdy house accommodating German officers. The walls were covered with erotic paintings of nude women in nefarious poses.

As I walked into the room, George was busy reading. When he raised his head, he looked shocked; he hadn’t known whether I was alive. It had been back in November when Sembera told him I was okay. We embraced warmly and both started talking at once. I told him that Sembera had given me his address and I’d just decided to come see him. In the meantime, Wrayford and the corporal had struck up an acquaintance. George told the corporal to get Wrayford some quarters, clean clothes, and a shower, then to take him over to the NCO club and show him around.

We went over to George’s quarters, around the corner and several doors down the street. It was a three-story French house facing the street with an entrance hall that went straight through to a garden in the rear. There was a spiral stairway, a large potbellied stove located on the ground floor, and a stovepipe that extended all the way up three floors through the roof. This apparently was the main source of heat for the entire house.

George said that Madame Fochée, the matriarch of the family, lived downstairs with her husband and three young children. The army had taken over the two upper floors. His room was on the third floor and looked out on the rear garden. After about two hours of intense conversation, we had exhausted all of our news and brought each other up-to-date on our respective lives for the last two years. He showed me pictures of my niece, Dotsie, who was now a year old. I remembered her birthday, October 3, because it was the day we had arrived in England in 1943 and was also the day before my birthday.

That evening we went to the joint officers’ mess club. The next three days I had plenty of good food, Cognac, and fine wine. Wrayford and the corporal apparently got along well and spent time seeing many of the charms of Reims. We were both sorry to see our visit end. It had been like a breath of fresh air injected into the devastation of war.