1944 – Drive into Germany
After the Battle of the Bulge, the 90th resumed its drive east. We had a short rest, a shower, a shave. Me, I shaved for the first time in my whole life. We got clean clothing and a renewed spirit by our Chaplain.
Our next mission was our old one, to take the Siegfried Line, the most dreaded objective in the war. The good thing was we had help to eliminate some of the best troops the Germans had in the Ardennes. The Battle of the Bulge did that. The Siegfried Line was held by German National Guard units, mostly old men and the real young. The bad part was we were introduced to the Jerries screaming-mimis. I never heard a sound lik-em before. Thank God the rain was over and our P-47’s took out the launchers.
The Battalion CO gave the company a talk about taking the Siegfried line. What he had to say, we knew we were in for a bad time. I didn’t really know what the Siegfried Line was. He told us it was a line of pillboxes covered by other pillboxes. Most of them were in a hundred yards of each other. “You can tell a lot where they are as fields of fire will be cleared of all trees and underbrush. The best time to move into an assault position will be just before daylight. Use the darkness to your advantage.” He kept talking, “You men will have to take-em one at a time. Use a lot of smoke and cover your ass.” He didn’t have to tell us that. That came with the territory. WOW, we all knew we were in for a hard time taking those pillboxes.
The Company Commander, Captain Will Crook, gave us a talk about how we would take on this mission. “We’ll attack by platoons. Here’s what you’re up against. The pillboxes are built, one in front, two on each side and one back a ways. They cover the flanks. A command box is further back, and it covers the two on the flanks. Men, this is a tough mission. Cover each man as he moves up. Take the apertures under fire with BAR and rifle fire, make ‘em button up. The hard part will be finding these boxes before you come under their fire. They are well camouflaged. You leaders, study the terrain well before committing your men. Try to locate all the boxes in your assigned area. We have tanks and tank destroyers to help us. Their 75s should do a good job on ‘em. We know there are places where a vehicle can’t get in close enough to bring accurate fire on ‘em. The trees and underbrush are damn heavy in places and the terrain is very hilly. In those places, you will have to do it on your own. Good luck, keep your ass down. I don’t want men killed in this operation. Now let’s get to it.”
This little talk didn’t help my feelings one bit. Anyway, I went to the Company CO and asked if he could find out anything about my brother Tom. I told him Tom had been shot down somewhere in France flying a P47. He told me he would get Battalion on it. “Al, you’re a fine soldier and if your brother is half the man you are, he’ll be okay. The French people are looking out for our fliers. If your brother is alive and the Germans don’t have him, he’ll be just fine.”
I thanked the Captain and returned to my platoon. He made me feel a lot better. In the morning, our platoon got its assigned area and we moved out to do the job just before it got light.
Holy cow, when we got where the pillboxes were supposed to be, I couldn’t see anything. Sgt. Rocky was looking thru his field glasses. We were all lying down and trying to make out what we thought were the pillboxes. Sgt. Rocky came over to me. I was down behind a tree trying to be invisible. I want-a tell ya, I was scared as much as I had ever been. This forest was thick and the underbrush was thicker. You could see where fields of fire had been cleared, so we all knew we were in view of a pillbox.
The Sgt. Asked, “Can you see the pillbox?”
“All I can see is a mound of dirt.”
“That’s it.” He handed me his field glasses and told me where to look. I could make out a dark place at the center and bottom of the mound of dirt. “That’s the aperture they’re watching us thru. Al, you’re the best shot in the platoon. I want you to fire at that aperture so they’ll close up. Two of us will move up on both sides and throw a grenade into the box when they open it up again. The rest of the platoon will fire at the flanking pillboxes. Ok? I’ll tell ya when to start shoot-n.” This sounded good to me. “Al, are you sure you can see where to shoot?” he asked me again.
“Yeah,” I told him, “I got it.”
He took off on his belly, hands and knees. I did some dry firing at my target, then pushed off the safety. I was ready.
I watched Rocky. Soon, he was waving for me to shoot. I opened up and fired four rounds into the target. The other guys started firing, too. I saw Rocky and one of the other squad leaders jump up and run up to the mound; one on each side. Good old Rocky, he was showing the rest of us how it was to be done. All the firing stopped; then I saw the two throw grenades into the slit; it worked to perfection.
Rocky had told the others to fire on the flanking boxes. Then, he motioned for me to come to him. I got up and ran as fast as I could and flopped down by him. He told me to call to the men inside. I yelled as loud as I could, “Cambered, war schultze nicht.” {We won’t shoot} “Come-n z-out.”
From inside, a man called back that they would surrender and come out. I didn’t see what happened next. I guess the men inside came out the back door with their hands up in surrender fashion. The pillbox in the rear shot all four of them dead. What a shame to kill men that way. Now we were all mad as hell.
That day, our platoon took four pillboxes and no one was even hurt. We captured two Germans. They were badly wounded. All the others were killed. Most of them were boys 14 to 16 years old. Some older men tried to give up, but the young ones shot them. How sad.
The engineers came in and blew the boxes to smithereens so they couldn’t ever be used again. That was a day I’ll never forget. Oh, how I wished Hank was with me. Oh God, how I missed him. I always cry about missing old Hank. I just hoped he was in a better place.
That night, I wrote a long letter home and one to Jennie. We had hot chow and plenty of hot coffee. It was strange as no one hardly talked at all. A day like this is hard to talk about. That night, I didn’t sleep too well either. I cried again over my buddy Hank, I missed him. I knew what was in store for us tomorrow.
Before it got light, our platoon had been assigned an area to assault. The Captain told us we had done such a good job that he gave us an easy one to take this morning. He said a tank destroyer with its 75 would be ours for the day; oh joy for us!
It was deadly quiet in the forest. Not even a bird could be seen or heard, only the wind in the trees made a sound We moved in position under the cover of the breaking light. The sky gave us a cover of clouds. I thought it might rain anytime. Sgt. Rocky studied the situation a while. Then he told the commander of the tank destroyer where it should shoot. We could see a pillbox in our front. Another was high up on a hill just back of the one to our front. We couldn’t see any on the flanks, but they were there.
CA-WAM! WOW, what a hole the 75 made in that bunker. Three guys came running out and ran right on past us. I guess they were picked up in the rear as I never saw them again.
Two of our guys started to go have a look when the flanking pillboxes opened up on them. They didn’t get hit at all, bad shots. Some of the German kids couldn’t shoot very well, thank God.
Rocky had the 75 take the one on the right. CA-WAM! It blew a nice hole in the pillbox. No one returned fire from there. Next, the 75 took the one on the left. He must have hit some ammo as the whole darn pillbox blew sky high. No one could have lived through that. Next, we had to take the pillbox on the hill. The 75 couldn’t get a good shot at it, so we had to take it on our own.
Sgt. Rocky called up a 60mm mortar squad from our heavy weapons platoon. Our boys laid down a perfect smoke screen. We moved up within fifty yards of the pillbox and waited for the smoke to clear. MY GOD, there was machine gun fire coming in every direction from that pillbox. We had a problem on our hands. We had to find the openings they were firing from and bring them under our fire. They had small slits to shoot thru. Once we found the slits, we poured a lot of BAR and rifle fire into them. That stopped their shooting at us.
When their shooting stopped, Sgt. Jimmy ran up to the pillbox and used his Tommy gun. He fired into the slits. Soon, all was quiet. I moved up and called as loud as I could for the men inside to come out. We heard nothing. A flame thrower came up and he let go thru a slit. There was a lot of screaming and yelling coming from the inside. That’s one mean weapon. I sure wouldn’t want to be hit by a flame thrower.
The men inside were begging to come out. I called for them to come on out. Sgt. Jimmy and I climbed on top of the pillbox. The men inside came out the back door with their hands in the air. The pillbox in the far rear started to fire on these men. With well-aimed shots, I hit the apertures where the firing was coming from, they closed up quickly. Our prisoners ducked and ran around to the front of the pillbox. These were three older men and two younger guys. They were all marched to the rear. Their time in war was over, I never saw them again.
Now, we had to go after the command pillbox that had been shooting at us. Again, the mortar boys laid a smoke round right in the German’s lap. They put two more in front of the pillbox. That smoke blew right into the faces of the men inside. What luck to have the wind on our side. It started to sprinkle a little.
Little PFC J.P Niles came up with a bazooka and fired a round into one of the apertures. Boy, J.P. was getting good with that thing. The rocket must have gone right into the pillbox as we could hear a lot of yelling coming from inside. Ammo started going off inside. Poor guys.
Rocky told me, “Get in close and tell them Jerries to surrender.” I did, to no avail. They didn’t come out.
Rocky charged up to the roof and dropped a white phosphorus grenade down the ventilator. That started a lot more screaming and yelling. Again, I called for the men inside to come out. This time, they came out. One thing we were told not to do was ever go inside to bring prisoners out. I never saw a GI do that all the time I was fighting on the Siegfried Line. It was easy to follow orders when your life depended on it.
I kind-a figured our day was over as we had taken these pillboxes in good time. It wasn’t. Sgt. Rocky was called to the CO’s command post for orders. The platoon hunkered down and waited.
Rocky came back with orders for us to dig in. An observer aircraft had spotted German Infantry in force preparing to attack us. We heard that places on down the line where our guys had been pushed back with heavy German counterattacks. We sure didn’t want to give up our hard fought ground. Once is enough to take a piece of real estate. So far, we hadn’t lost a man to the enemy. One of our guys got shot by one of our own; bad luck. That’s called friendly fire; some friend, huh?
The Jerries really gave us the works; they had artillery and mortars rain down on our position. I was glad I had dug my hole deep. They really had us zeroed in. It was as bad a barrage that I had ever been in. We had dug in around and between the pillboxes. We were told to stay out of the boxes. Now, it was raining hard. At first I though it felt good. Then I got real wet. Not so good.
The Jerries hit us with a strong Infantry attack just after dark. They tried to come around our flanks, but Rocky knew their tricks and they took a beating from our guys on the flanks. I guess they didn’t count on anyone protecting our flanks. They really got the sh–t kicked out-a- them. Two of our guys with an M1919 machine gun killed 10 of them. We counted that many the next morning. Don’t know how many got away or were wounded.
The ones who hit our front got a hell of a whipping. Our 60mm mortar crews lit the night with flares and turned the darkness into daylight. The enemy was sitting ducks. We had interlocking final protecting fire and it did its job to perfection. A rabbit couldn’t have made it thru there. Our Platoon alone killed over 35 of the enemy.
Looking at the dead the next morning, I could see most of the dead were young kids. Some looked to be only 12 or 13. What a shame. I was sick as I had ever been seeing those young people laying there. Not a pretty sight. What a waste of the young men of Germany. We were told most of these young guys had been in the Hitler Youth and had been brainwashed to the point that they were more than willing to give their life for Hitler.
That night, our Company was pulled off the line and we went into a quick rest camp. We got a shower and clean clothing. The best was we got a hot meal. The Company cooks outdid themselves. We got hot SOS and all the hot coffee we could drink. I wrote several letters, one to Mom and Dad, and one to each of my brothers. I hoped they would get to them somehow. Of course, I wrote a long letter to Jennie. I poured all the love I could into my words. God, I hoped it would find her. We had one day and one night out of the line.
The next day, we got another sector to take. I want-a tell ya, this wasn’t getting to be fun.
Holy Cow, we got a new platoon leader. A shave tail fresh from OCS. I tell ya, he looked like a kid to the rest of us. He was a sharp dresser, I’ll tell ya. He wore a well tailored uniform all starched and pressed. He looked like he had just stepped off the parade ground. He was still wearing his brass. The first thing the asshole did was to dress Sgt. Rocky down for not saluting when Rocky reported to him. Captain Cook must have heard him. The CO was talking to some of the men and hadn’t introduced the jerk to us yet. That kid got hell from the CO. Man, I never heard so much cuss-n a man got that our new platoon leader got from the CO. If the Captain hadn’t, the whole platoon would have had some target practice in the next engagement There’s no better leader of men in all the Infantry than Sgt. Rocky. Every man in our platoon would have given his life for Rocky. You couldn’t love a man more than that.
The CO told the jerk to get his ass behind Rocky and follow him around like a dog. “Every time Rocky says shit, you say where and how much!” He went on, “If you want to be a leader, you forget all the crap you learned in OCS. Rocky will teach you how to command men and be a leader.” There were lots of smiles from the men in our platoon. In combat, you go on your instincts not by the book some nitwit wrote sitting at a desk in a nice warm office with a pretty secretary hanging on his shoulder telling him what a great man he was. When the bullets fly, you get the feeling you don’t know a hell of a lot. There was no room for bull shit out here.
This new Lieutenant would learn darn quick or he wouldn’t be around long. Later, we found the guy was from a wealthy family. You gotta give him credit as he had volunteered for this assignment. One of our guys was from his hometown. He told us the Lieutenant’s father had been a bootlegger during the prohibition era. He said the old man was filthy rich and that he had all kinds of pull in Washington. “That kid can be anywhere he wants to be.” Turned out, he wasn’t too bad a guy. We took credit for that.
The next day, before daylight, we moved to our next mission. We were told this was the last group of boxes we would have to take. This was the end of the line for the Siegfried line.
Before we went in, Sgt. Rocky gave us a big talk. He said he was proud to serve with men like us. “You men are the best damn Rifle Infantry Platoon in the whole American Army, bar none.” I really felt good having this man I so admired say that. He sounded mad when he said, “I want you men to be careful today. I ain’t lost a man to enemy fire so far. I don’t want it to happen today.” I think he must have had a premonition about that day. Because he never gave anybody a pat on the back before, nobody.
We took the pillboxes easy. We were getting good at our job by then. We had taken ten prisoners. One was an older officer. The rest were young guys. The oldest must have been around seventeen or eighteen.
This was one of the saddest days in my life. Like when I lost old Hank.
Sgt. Rocky was searching the prisoners, when the older one was standing away from the group ten or so feet. As Rocky approached him, he pulled a pistol and shot Rocky point blank in the head. Rocky was dead before he hit the ground.
Me and several other guys, just by instinct, opened up on the bastard. I never emptied eight rounds so fast. Sgt. Jimmy jumped on top of the Jerry and fired his Tommy-gun until it was empty. That night, in my sack, I cried like a baby. I couldn’t stop. I’ll tell ya, I wasn’t the only one. We all loved Rocky.
Sgt. Jimmy was made platoon Sgt., Corporal Fred Henderson was made our squad leader. Guess what? I was made Assistant Squad Leader and promoted to Corporal.
Captain Cook talked to the platoon and said Rocky was the finest soldier he had ever served with. The tears ran down his face as he spoke. As I looked around, there wasn’t a dry eye in the whole damn platoon. Even the kid Lieutenant was sobbing.
That night, Sgt. Jimmy called the platoon together and told us about Rocky. Rocky had been born in the slums of Chicago, Illinois. His father deserted the family when Rocky was twelve. He helped his mother raise his brothers and a baby sister. From what Jimmy said, I surmised that Rocky would do anything to keep the family together. He had to fight all the time. Sometimes it might not have been legal what he had to do. He kept the family together until he joined the Army.
Rocky stood five foot nine or ten. Built like an outhouse and tough as nails. His ruddy face didn’t give away his soft heart and pleasant disposition. He just looked tough.
Jimmy said Rocky never had a girlfriend. Never had the time for a woman. He had told Jimmy he would have liked to have found a good woman to settle down with on some Army post and raise a bunch of kids.
Rocky found a home in the Army. He had joined a jump or two ahead of the law. He really liked being in the Army. Jimmy had told him he might find a nice German girl after the war. Rocky was a Bohunk and liked the Germans he had met at home. He was looking forward to finding a girl he could love. He would have made one hell of a husband and father. WAR is HELL.
The Siegfried line cleared, the 90th moved to the West bank of the Rhine River. The weather had turned bad and we crossed the river on bridges.
My platoon spread out in a field. Our squad was the point squad. We were moving toward a village in the distance, when all hell broke loose. We were in an anti-personnel mine field. Four of my Squad were killed. The new squad leader was the first to go.
I started yelling for everyone to move back. No one had to be told. We all moved back in a hurry.
Captain Cook called in artillery and air strikes. There wasn’t a foot of that field that didn’t have a hole in it. That village in the distance took a hell of a pounding. Every weapon that was brought up laid on that village for an hour. I felt sorry if there were any people in the place.
When we entered the village, nothing could have lived thru that barrage. The village was nothing but rubble. I saw a few dead bodies, some were kids. WAR is HELL.
From then on, we met nothing but light resistance. The 90th was on the way to Czechoslovakia.