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. Oh, I ll be back, sir, and he jeeped back to his company.I had met Captain Britton in the Twenty-third AIB area a few daysbefore.Tall, thin, slightly stooped, lean, weathered face, dark hair, and in-tense expression.Two Silver Stars and three Purple Hearts.Seemed to behyperactive.Stuttered.I inquired about him and looked over his record.Found that he was disliked by Colonel Rhea, was overaggressive, was High Ground 201liked by Colonel Wemple for the same quality, was an old Regular Armysergeant witha battlefield commission, was a fourth-grade dropout, anddisliked Reserve officers and college men.Always carried an M-1 rifleinstead of the carbine suitable to his rank. Reminds me of Abdul the Bul-bul Ameer, I commented. And a third-grade education, remarked Wemple. Just imagine himwitha college degree. Getting ThroughWe had had plenty of time for route and area reconnaissance so theunits moved into their jump-off positions after dark in good shape andwithout the usual pre-attack confusion.Most of the men set up lighthousekeeping for the night by coiling up in the nearly snow-free hollowsunder the evergreens.The temperature was way down but there was nowind, so the men were able to get some sleep.There was a flurry of small-arms fire during the early part of the nightwhen one of Griffen s patrols encountered a German combat patrol justsouth of Gut Eidt Farm, and our patrol returned two men short.Thatwas bad news.The enemy now might have our complete plan of actionfor the day.Came 0600, the morning was clear and cold and heavy artillery firingbegan in CCB s sector on our right.The blasting tapered off shortly toonly occasional concentrations, so resistance was probably light.Shortly after 0600 the two missing members of the Thirty-eighth In-fantry patrol came in, somewhat the worse for wear.They had both beenwounded during the clashwiththe enemy patrol and unable to keep upas our men withdrew.They had made their way to Gut Eidt Farm, wherethey had been hidden by the Belgian family during the German search ofthe place.Amazing.An exception to the pro-Nazi loyalty of the BelgiansI d seen so far.At 0800 the 424th jumped off on our left with a thunderous roar ofartillery and the rattle of machine-gun fire.The blasting, bickering, andsnarling continued in that area for the full allotted two hours.Just before 1000, I had Tiger Bait and the jeep on the road through Inder Eidt where I could observe the 4.2 mortar company.This was thefirst time I had been able to see these weapons in action.The plump andruddy captain assured me that with no wind his mission was a sinecure.He had ranged in with single rounds of high-explosive shells on the threeobjectives and was ready to drop the screen.At 1000 there was a hurtling, whishing of metal overhead and rollingthunderclaps on the hill-mass ahead announced that the 489th and hersister battalions were on the ball. 202 A Colonel in the Armored DivisionsA rapid muffled thudding from the mortar positions indicated that thesmoke screen was on its way.Tank exhausts roared as the anxious drivers jazzed their engines toprevent stalling when they moved out.No hurry, this was primarilyan infantry-artillery show and the armor would have to wait for crossingpoints and roads.In the meantime the riflemen emerged from the woodsin thin lines and irregular groups and started the long hard climb to theheights.Following the fall of the mortar shells, I was startled by the ineffec-tiveness of the smoke screen.It was scattered and thin by this time Ishould be unable to see the crest and we should be completely screened.I walked over to the battery. Pour it on, captain.I want a heavy screenup there. We re pouring it on, colonel.I don t know what in hell s the matter.Looks like defective ammunition. Both the captain and I learned something that day, or rather we finallythought it through.And our solution explained the inability of the 489thArtillery to screen our railroad-swamp crossing from the antitank andartillery fire three days before.Apparently when the phosphorus shellsburst in two or three feet of snow an initial puff of smoke shot upfrom the hole, but most of the phosphorus was driven sideways intothe surrounding snow while the other burning granules that had blownclear fell into snow and were extinguished.Then a recurring cycle wasset up.The dry phosphorus would start to burn and melt snow, formwater, wet the granules, and stop the burning.Latent heat would dry thegranules, start more burning, melt snow, and the burning would stop.Itwas fully ten minutes before we had a thin, fairly effective screen, butdue to the slow burn-melt-dry-burn cycle it certainly lasted the rest ofthe long day.Griffen s tanks moved out toward the railroad and Tiger Bait followedin their tracks.Passing Gut Eidt Farm, we halted and O Hare and I wadedup the short lane to the house.We knocked, and the door was grudginglyopened by an apprehensive-appearing, lean, stooped man of middle agewith his fearful woman peering past him. Ich danke Ihnen fuer die Hilfe Sie haben unser Verwundete gegeben, I told him, thanking him for hiding our men the night before.He bright-ened up and gabbled something that I didn t get at all, seemed to soundlike German but not quite.The woman seemed to be trying to control several children whowanted to get into the act, so I asked him how many people were in thefamily.And I got the answer clear one spread hand plus one thumb.An idea O Hare always kept the tire-chain lockers of his jeep full of High Ground 203D-rations bars of chocolate of an eighth of a pound each.Wonderful forwarming a person on a cold night and an instant restorative, but eat twoor three and, oh my. O Hare, get these people six D-rations, will you? My wild leprechaun dashed back, rummaged, and returned.I thinkhe exceeded his orders.There must have been at least ten bars in thepillow slip he passed through the door.Beaming, handshakes, and moreFranco-Walloon-Deutsch dialect that seemed to mean they wished us lotsof luck.In contrast to the neutral, sullen, or even hostile attitude of theBelgians I d seen to date, this family actually seemed to want us to win.Beyond Gut Eidt, I halted Tiger Bait and stood on the turret to get a bet-ter view over the hedges bordering the road.It looked good, considering.Griffen s platoon of tanks was up under cover of the railroad embank-ment.The riflemen were slowly, very slowly, floundering through thesnow in irregular groups all along the front.That long advance upgradethrough the snow was going to be deadly wearying.The haze above wasslowly thickeningWhile I was standing at gaze an assault gun or destroyer poked its noseout of the haze on the right front and blasted three rounds at Tiger Bait.Fortunately the scared German didn t take the time to aim well; he hitboth hedgerows and the road behind us and backed up fast.I had formerly complained that the M5 light tank turret wasn t bigenough for a man of my size, but by the time the second shell cracked inthe hedge alongside I had everything inside except my head and helmet,which took a sharp rap from a splinter [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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. Oh, I ll be back, sir, and he jeeped back to his company.I had met Captain Britton in the Twenty-third AIB area a few daysbefore.Tall, thin, slightly stooped, lean, weathered face, dark hair, and in-tense expression.Two Silver Stars and three Purple Hearts.Seemed to behyperactive.Stuttered.I inquired about him and looked over his record.Found that he was disliked by Colonel Rhea, was overaggressive, was High Ground 201liked by Colonel Wemple for the same quality, was an old Regular Armysergeant witha battlefield commission, was a fourth-grade dropout, anddisliked Reserve officers and college men.Always carried an M-1 rifleinstead of the carbine suitable to his rank. Reminds me of Abdul the Bul-bul Ameer, I commented. And a third-grade education, remarked Wemple. Just imagine himwitha college degree. Getting ThroughWe had had plenty of time for route and area reconnaissance so theunits moved into their jump-off positions after dark in good shape andwithout the usual pre-attack confusion.Most of the men set up lighthousekeeping for the night by coiling up in the nearly snow-free hollowsunder the evergreens.The temperature was way down but there was nowind, so the men were able to get some sleep.There was a flurry of small-arms fire during the early part of the nightwhen one of Griffen s patrols encountered a German combat patrol justsouth of Gut Eidt Farm, and our patrol returned two men short.Thatwas bad news.The enemy now might have our complete plan of actionfor the day.Came 0600, the morning was clear and cold and heavy artillery firingbegan in CCB s sector on our right.The blasting tapered off shortly toonly occasional concentrations, so resistance was probably light.Shortly after 0600 the two missing members of the Thirty-eighth In-fantry patrol came in, somewhat the worse for wear.They had both beenwounded during the clashwiththe enemy patrol and unable to keep upas our men withdrew.They had made their way to Gut Eidt Farm, wherethey had been hidden by the Belgian family during the German search ofthe place.Amazing.An exception to the pro-Nazi loyalty of the BelgiansI d seen so far.At 0800 the 424th jumped off on our left with a thunderous roar ofartillery and the rattle of machine-gun fire.The blasting, bickering, andsnarling continued in that area for the full allotted two hours.Just before 1000, I had Tiger Bait and the jeep on the road through Inder Eidt where I could observe the 4.2 mortar company.This was thefirst time I had been able to see these weapons in action.The plump andruddy captain assured me that with no wind his mission was a sinecure.He had ranged in with single rounds of high-explosive shells on the threeobjectives and was ready to drop the screen.At 1000 there was a hurtling, whishing of metal overhead and rollingthunderclaps on the hill-mass ahead announced that the 489th and hersister battalions were on the ball. 202 A Colonel in the Armored DivisionsA rapid muffled thudding from the mortar positions indicated that thesmoke screen was on its way.Tank exhausts roared as the anxious drivers jazzed their engines toprevent stalling when they moved out.No hurry, this was primarilyan infantry-artillery show and the armor would have to wait for crossingpoints and roads.In the meantime the riflemen emerged from the woodsin thin lines and irregular groups and started the long hard climb to theheights.Following the fall of the mortar shells, I was startled by the ineffec-tiveness of the smoke screen.It was scattered and thin by this time Ishould be unable to see the crest and we should be completely screened.I walked over to the battery. Pour it on, captain.I want a heavy screenup there. We re pouring it on, colonel.I don t know what in hell s the matter.Looks like defective ammunition. Both the captain and I learned something that day, or rather we finallythought it through.And our solution explained the inability of the 489thArtillery to screen our railroad-swamp crossing from the antitank andartillery fire three days before.Apparently when the phosphorus shellsburst in two or three feet of snow an initial puff of smoke shot upfrom the hole, but most of the phosphorus was driven sideways intothe surrounding snow while the other burning granules that had blownclear fell into snow and were extinguished.Then a recurring cycle wasset up.The dry phosphorus would start to burn and melt snow, formwater, wet the granules, and stop the burning.Latent heat would dry thegranules, start more burning, melt snow, and the burning would stop.Itwas fully ten minutes before we had a thin, fairly effective screen, butdue to the slow burn-melt-dry-burn cycle it certainly lasted the rest ofthe long day.Griffen s tanks moved out toward the railroad and Tiger Bait followedin their tracks.Passing Gut Eidt Farm, we halted and O Hare and I wadedup the short lane to the house.We knocked, and the door was grudginglyopened by an apprehensive-appearing, lean, stooped man of middle agewith his fearful woman peering past him. Ich danke Ihnen fuer die Hilfe Sie haben unser Verwundete gegeben, I told him, thanking him for hiding our men the night before.He bright-ened up and gabbled something that I didn t get at all, seemed to soundlike German but not quite.The woman seemed to be trying to control several children whowanted to get into the act, so I asked him how many people were in thefamily.And I got the answer clear one spread hand plus one thumb.An idea O Hare always kept the tire-chain lockers of his jeep full of High Ground 203D-rations bars of chocolate of an eighth of a pound each.Wonderful forwarming a person on a cold night and an instant restorative, but eat twoor three and, oh my. O Hare, get these people six D-rations, will you? My wild leprechaun dashed back, rummaged, and returned.I thinkhe exceeded his orders.There must have been at least ten bars in thepillow slip he passed through the door.Beaming, handshakes, and moreFranco-Walloon-Deutsch dialect that seemed to mean they wished us lotsof luck.In contrast to the neutral, sullen, or even hostile attitude of theBelgians I d seen to date, this family actually seemed to want us to win.Beyond Gut Eidt, I halted Tiger Bait and stood on the turret to get a bet-ter view over the hedges bordering the road.It looked good, considering.Griffen s platoon of tanks was up under cover of the railroad embank-ment.The riflemen were slowly, very slowly, floundering through thesnow in irregular groups all along the front.That long advance upgradethrough the snow was going to be deadly wearying.The haze above wasslowly thickeningWhile I was standing at gaze an assault gun or destroyer poked its noseout of the haze on the right front and blasted three rounds at Tiger Bait.Fortunately the scared German didn t take the time to aim well; he hitboth hedgerows and the road behind us and backed up fast.I had formerly complained that the M5 light tank turret wasn t bigenough for a man of my size, but by the time the second shell cracked inthe hedge alongside I had everything inside except my head and helmet,which took a sharp rap from a splinter [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]