Unit History
Intresting reading about Lt. Sam Magill
and
Information of an I&R Platoon
329th Itelligence & Reconnaissance
Awards and Decorations
to Units of the 329th I & R
Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon
329th Infantry Regiment
Attached is an extract from the War Department General Order cited for award of the PUC. The action described is also covered extensively in a detailed, fully illustrated article in Issue 48 (1985) of After the Battle Magazine ("Surrender on the Field of Battle: Group Elster, Beaugency, France, 1944.", pp 1-6).
J. McGrath - Historian
CMH Extract of Paragraph 24, General Order 11, War Department, 30 January 1946
The Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon, 329th Infantry Regiment, is cited for outstanding performance of duty in armed conflict with the enemy from 4 to 16 September 1944. On 4 September 1944, the Intelligence and Recon-naissance Platoon crossed the Loire River into enemy-held territory, with the mission of scouting enemy positions and movements. After about 6 days of ex-tended patrolling through an area some 70 miles wide and 100 miles deep south of the Loire River, the platoon received word through French Informants in Issoudon, France, that a large force of approximately 20,000 Germans was moving eastward in an attempt to escape through the Belfort Gap into Germany.
Racing through enemy territory, heedless of the threat of capture or annihilation which faced them at every turn, the Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon boldly effected a contact with the commander of the German forces and convinced him of the desirability of surrendering his force to the American Army. While the platoon leader returned to the regimental command post for instructions, the platoon was charged with the mission of maintaining contact with the enemy force and restraining the local FFI from making any premature show of force. Armed with but a few rifles, machine guns, and pistols, this courageous group virtually contained the entire enemy force by their sheer audacity and bold and aggressive patrolling.
Constantly patrolling the area, tracking down rumors of other enemy groups, being sniped at by isolated enemy armed with burp guns, and having their vehicles sabotaged by collaborationist French, the Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon held on to their prize until arrangements could be made to have the German commander meet with an authorized American representative. This meeting occurred on 11 September 1944 at the Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon command post at Romorantin. Arrangements were made to have the German force proceed to three assembly areas along the Loire River where they would formally surrender and turn in their weapons.
The long trek to the river began with the Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon acting as guides, flank guides, and liaison agents with the French forces along the way. Only the timely intervention of the men of the platoon prevented frequent outbreaks by the FFI who were not familiar with the situation or the terms of the surrender. Finally, on 16 September 1944, at Beaugency, France, the German commander surrendered himself, his troops, and all of their equipment to Major General Macon, Commanding General of the 83d Infantry Division, acting on behalf of the Army commander.
The outstanding gallantry of this intrepid group of soldiers in arranging and executing the first and largest mass surrender of the war up to that time is without parallel in the annals of military history. The courage and devotion to duty of every man of the Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon, 329th Infantry Regiment, reflect the finest traditions of the armed forces of the United States.
(General Orders 221, Headquarters 83d Infantry Division, 2 November 1945, as approved by the Commanding General, United States Army Forces, European Theater (Main).
to Units of the 329th I & R
Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon
329th Infantry Regiment
Attached is an extract from the War Department General Order cited for award of the PUC. The action described is also covered extensively in a detailed, fully illustrated article in Issue 48 (1985) of After the Battle Magazine ("Surrender on the Field of Battle: Group Elster, Beaugency, France, 1944.", pp 1-6).
J. McGrath - Historian
CMH Extract of Paragraph 24, General Order 11, War Department, 30 January 1946
The Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon, 329th Infantry Regiment, is cited for outstanding performance of duty in armed conflict with the enemy from 4 to 16 September 1944. On 4 September 1944, the Intelligence and Recon-naissance Platoon crossed the Loire River into enemy-held territory, with the mission of scouting enemy positions and movements. After about 6 days of ex-tended patrolling through an area some 70 miles wide and 100 miles deep south of the Loire River, the platoon received word through French Informants in Issoudon, France, that a large force of approximately 20,000 Germans was moving eastward in an attempt to escape through the Belfort Gap into Germany.
Racing through enemy territory, heedless of the threat of capture or annihilation which faced them at every turn, the Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon boldly effected a contact with the commander of the German forces and convinced him of the desirability of surrendering his force to the American Army. While the platoon leader returned to the regimental command post for instructions, the platoon was charged with the mission of maintaining contact with the enemy force and restraining the local FFI from making any premature show of force. Armed with but a few rifles, machine guns, and pistols, this courageous group virtually contained the entire enemy force by their sheer audacity and bold and aggressive patrolling.
Constantly patrolling the area, tracking down rumors of other enemy groups, being sniped at by isolated enemy armed with burp guns, and having their vehicles sabotaged by collaborationist French, the Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon held on to their prize until arrangements could be made to have the German commander meet with an authorized American representative. This meeting occurred on 11 September 1944 at the Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon command post at Romorantin. Arrangements were made to have the German force proceed to three assembly areas along the Loire River where they would formally surrender and turn in their weapons.
The long trek to the river began with the Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon acting as guides, flank guides, and liaison agents with the French forces along the way. Only the timely intervention of the men of the platoon prevented frequent outbreaks by the FFI who were not familiar with the situation or the terms of the surrender. Finally, on 16 September 1944, at Beaugency, France, the German commander surrendered himself, his troops, and all of their equipment to Major General Macon, Commanding General of the 83d Infantry Division, acting on behalf of the Army commander.
The outstanding gallantry of this intrepid group of soldiers in arranging and executing the first and largest mass surrender of the war up to that time is without parallel in the annals of military history. The courage and devotion to duty of every man of the Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon, 329th Infantry Regiment, reflect the finest traditions of the armed forces of the United States.
(General Orders 221, Headquarters 83d Infantry Division, 2 November 1945, as approved by the Commanding General, United States Army Forces, European Theater (Main).
A LITTLE STORY ABOUT LT.SAM MAGILL
Heres is a small piece that I found on line from the Book "NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER" that was written by COL. Barney Oldfield ,and is out of print
"Doesn't that flank worry you?" Eddy asked Patton one day as they
were scanning the map.
"Not me," said Patton blithely. "It just depends on how nervous you
are by nature."
With the German Armies now clearing out of France very rapidly
and falling back on the prepared positions in the Siegfried Line, Hitler
had sent a direct order to Generalmajor Erich Elster to round up all
German forces in the south of France, from Bordeaux to Marseilles, and
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 119
bring them back in column to Germany. Even though Lt. Gen. Alex-
ander M. Patch, with his Seventh Army, was rolling up from the
Riviera, on Hitler's map it looked easy for Elster to skin between
Patton and Patch through the Belfort Gap. None of this was known to
Colonel E. B. Crabill, of Palm Beach Shores, Florida, whose 329th
Infantry Regiment of the Eighty-third had surveillance from seventy
miles west of Blois to the vicinity of Orleans. He summoned his Intel-
ligence and Reconnaissance Platoon leader, First Lieutenant Samuel
W. Magill, of Ashtabula, Ohio. MagilTs area extended from Blois to
Orleans, about forty-five miles along the eastern edge. His unit had
been beefed up by a platoon of quadruple .50-caliber-mounted half-
tracks, a platoon of 105-mm. howitzers, and a hundred Frenchmen
of the FFI. In using the latter, it was necessary to teach them scouting
and patrolling and reporting.
The colonel was disturbed for an unusual reason. "Sam," he said,
"what's happened to all those Germans who were shooting at us from
the other side of the river?" Sam indicated his own worries about it,
too. Both of them knew they had orders not to cross the Loire, but
between Magill and Crabill there was an understanding. The colonel
did not tell Sam to violate any orders, he just told him he wanted him
to know what was going on. He had never been in the habit of spelling
out method for Sam.
Magill went back to his I&R platoon and talked over his problem
with his driver, Corporal Christopher Vane of Baltimore, Maryland.
Leaving the major portion of his unit in charge of Sergeant Herbert
E. Beraer of St. Louis, he told his Belgian interpreter, Felix van de
Walle and his radio operator, Robert A. Alvey of San Diego, Cali-
fornia, to get aboard. At Mer-sur-Loire, Magill crossed in a rowboat
to Muides, a small village where the French were so happy to see the
American they built him a raft to bring the jeep and his crew over
as well. Contact was established almost at once with a member of the
Free French, who said the Germans had all withdrawn farther to the
south. He had heard a rumor that there was a German element of
unknown strength willing to surrender to the Americans, but not to
the French. Magill sent a message back to Beraer telling him of his
plan to move deeper into German-held territory and instructing Berner
to get other members of the twenty-four-man platoon across the river
and placed at intervals to insure a radio relay.
Magill found his forward movement suddenly restricted when his
120 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
small patrol ran into the flank guard of the Eleventh Panzer Division,
a tough tank battalion. Thousands of German troops, in columns and
in every kind of conveyance, were filtering past it on all sides. Alvey
cranked up his radio and fed back dozens of messages to the 329th,
giving locations, march objectives, strength and state of equipment.
One of these radio messages brought an air strike which destroyed two
thirds of a ten-mile-long German column on the Route Nationale east
of Chateauroux. The Magill patrol took frequent cover, once spending
five hours in the woods. Eventually the main body of the Germans,
behind the formidable Eleventh Panzer, flowed by.
With the XIX TAG, commanded by Brig. Gen. O. P. Weyland,
strafing a column miles further to the south, Magill now thought
seriously of the possibilities of prisoners from whom he could get the
more detailed information which Colonel Crabill wanted. With his
mind on Germans who might surrender, Magill ran up a white flag of
truce and Vane drove the jeep ahead toward Issoudun. There was
occasional, desultory fire from the roadsides, as much from surprised
French as from the disorganized Germans.
The bridge leading into Issoudun was alive with German guards,
who held their guns on the approaching jeep, but let it come up to the
bridge. Van de Walle, in German, asked to talk to the commander,
and they settled back to await some major or, at most, lieutenant
colonel. "Look," said Van de Walle suddenly, "that officer coming up
on the other side of the bridge. See the red stripes on his pants leg.
That's a major general." Hastily Magill got out .of the jeep with Van
de Walle and they moved forward to meet the German, who asked
what they wanted and how they came to be there.
Sam's mouth was dry, but through the Belgian, he said: "I came
here to see you because your cause is hopeless. I know you're trying
to get back to Germany, but thousands of troops are in your way now
waiting for you to come in range. I thought if I came to talk to you,
you would see that you could surrender with honor and save the
lives of your men who will otherwise die unnecessarily." Because of
the shambles he had noted in his 100-mile penetration, Sam was of
the opinion that the General's strength at most, would be around two
battalions.
The German consulted a moment with his staff. "How much strength
do you represent?" he asked.
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 121
Sam was thinking only of his platoon, rather than the division.
"I've got my platoon "
The German turned apoplectic. "What?" he spluttered. "Surrender
twenty thousand men to a platoon? Phantastischr
When Van de Walle translated twenty thousand he choked a little
and Magill almost fell off the Issoudun bridge. In carrying out
Colonel CrabilTs simple order to find out what had happened to the
Germans, he had stumbled right into the main column. Stunned as he
was, Magill, who had once thought he wanted to be a minister, turned
his seriously honest face to the German general, and repeated that
it was not the platoon which was important, but the inevitable clash
of arms which awaited the column up ahead. General Elster quieted
somewhat. The lieutenant was not so wrong, after all. The column
had been sniped at constantly by the Free French and the Commu-
nist FTPF (Force Tireur Partisan Frangais), while the planes of XDC
TAG came out of the sky at all daylight hours to harass him. His
losses had already been great. A surrender, he said, might be nego-
tiated if certain terms could be met terms which would insure sur-
render with honor.
"What are the terms?" asked Magill.
"A show of force," said Elster.
"How big?"
The German studied a moment, looked at his tired but determined
men. "If you can confront me with two battalions," he decided, "it
could be a surrender with honor." He might as well have asked Magill
for the moon, but Sam told him he would be back the next day with
word from the division commander.
Night was fast falling, and on the way back, Sam changed drivers
to give Vane a rest. Big, burly Ralph Anderson of Lancaster, Ohio,
took the wheel and pointed it toward Beaugency. The road was
blocked from time to time by logs which had been thrown across it by
snipers. The rules demanded that headlights be blacked out, but as
long as Magill was way out of the rule book already, he told Anderson
to turn on the lights for quick flashes to see if the road was clear, then
run for it to the next turn. By using this harrowing method, they
avoided roadblocks. By the time Sam got back across the Loire and
reported to Colonel Crabill in his bed, it was past midnight. Crabfll
thought enough of the proposal to get into his clothes and drive to
Chateau Renault, where General Macon was awakened and informed.
122 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
Macon shook his head. "We're stretched paper-thin now," he said.
"We've got 185 miles covered by a bare 16,000 troops as it is. I don't
know where I'd get two battalions. Besides, we might get over the river
and get caught in the wringer and lose a lot of men." Sam talked
earnestly of his belief that the German wanted to give up, not fight,
and he pointed out that if the German column came on, it was
eventually sure to clash with some elements of the Eighty-third in a
fire fight anyway. Macon still said no, but did send the news forward
to Ninth Army headquarters in Mi Foret, six kilometers from Rennes
itself. Crabill and Magill walked away from the General's quarters
unhappily, but Crabill was not through backing up his lieutenant.
"You go back down to the General at Issoudun," he said, "and talk
to him some more. Let me know if you have any ideas of anything
else I can do."
Still with no sleep and, worse yet, with no solution, Magill again
put the Loire behind him. His brain was numb and he dozed in his
seat, while Anderson watched him out of the corner of his eye and
pulled him back each time he began to slump precariously to the out-
side of the jeep. Van de Walle was better off, having caught some
snatches while Magill had been with Crabill and Macon. Suddenly
an idea struck Anderson. "Remember when we were talking to
Elster," he said to Sam, "and he brought up the damage by American
planes?" Dull as his senses were at that moment, Magill immediately
woke up. Maybe Elster would accept a show of force in the air! Magill
had never asked for air support before, since his mission was to find
out things, but wherever possible to avoid getting entangled in a
scrap. The lonely party in the jeep took on considerably more elation
than they were entitled to and, by the time they met with Elster on
the Issoudun bridge again, they were eager.
Meantime, the field telephone on my tent pole rang. It was Capt.
Tom Roberts, PRO of the Eighty-third, to give me a brief rundown.
The Ninth Army's reaction to the news of a possible 20,000-prisoner
bag was contrary to expectations. Brest and the other ports looked like
an elusive prize, and Ninth Army, characterized by General Bradley
as "green and ambitious" was now showing its ambition. They wanted
those 20,000 prisoners. My tipster didn't have to spell out the chance
Lieutenant Sam Magill had to dwarf the famous Sergeant York exploit
of World War I when he picked up 132 Germans single-handed. By
the phone circuits available, it was finally possible to get Twelfth
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 123
Army Group at Versailles and Lt. Col. Bert Kalisch came on. By
yelling as loudly as we could, I described for him the situation below
the Loire and the possibilities for story and pictures. Asking him to
send any interested war correspondents first to Beaugency for a check-
in with Colonel Crabill, I told him of my plan to leave on September
8 and the hope that I could join Magill among the Germans to get a
running account of his adventure to fill in the later arriving press.
The Ashtabula lieutenant, at the time I was phoning, was again
talking to General Elster. "My general has asked me if you will accept
a show of force in the air," he said. Elster was mystified. "I will radio
to my division," explained Sam, "asking them to send a group of
planes. They will be instructed to look for a flare we will place on this
crossroads. After they come over, they are to return and look for a
cloth panel on the ground. If I put out a white one, it means you are
satisfied and will negotiate. If I put out a red one, they are to wait
twenty minutes, then strafe and bomb your column." The General was
not convinced that Magill was not running a colossal bluff, and that
went double for Magill. But Magill had that honest face. General
Elster agreed and Alvey cranked up the radio. Back over the relay
went the message to Colonel Crabill. The time for the show of force
was set for 2 P.M., September 8. In a few moments, a return message
came through from Crabill: "Have made request through Ninth Army.
Am also going myself to XIX TAG to get everything I can."
Magill set up shop in the small lobby of the Hotel d'Angleterre in
Romorantin. It was a soldier's dream come true. The FFI gave them
six German PW's to do the cooking, washing and other chores. It was
as if they were installed for good.
At 1:30 on the afternoon of the eighth, Magill and the Germans
reported to the Issoudun bridge, and the flares were installed at the
intersection letting their smoky trails go upward on the still day. As
the two o'clock deadline neared, Magill and the Germans looked
speculatively up at the sky. The deadline came and went. It was 2:15
and the Germans began to mutter. Then, 2:30 and the sky was still
blank overhead. Magill told Van de Walle to request patience, but the
Germans were fast running out of it. What's more, they felt they had
been bluffed and almost successfully. Then, at 2:47 P.M., sixteen
Thunderbolt fighter-bombers came over in formation. Sam had no
way of knowing whether they were the ones, but he had to chance it
124 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
"Van," he said, "ask him, quick! Which'll it be, white or red panel?"
Van de Walle put the question.
Elster looked at the planes, making a graceful bank, so pretty yet
so lethal and ominous. "Make it white," he said, and the panel was
immediately spread in the field. The planes had come so low, some of
the German soldiers hit the dirt. Now they looked on in wonder and
relief as the sixteen Thunderbolts returned, waggled their wings, then
flew off to the north to do battle elsewhere.
This was the crucial time for Magill. Had he now been bluffed?
Had he sent his only chance of salvation flying off, and would General
Elster now refuse to negotiate? But General Elster kept his bargain.
"Will you send an officer with full power to discuss terms?" he asked
tiredly. "I will send one of mine to act as liaison with you." Sam
agreed, took on a non-communicative German colonel in the already
crowded jeep, and headed back to Romorantin with the tidings. When
the word came through to Beaugency, Crabill designated Lt. Col.
Jules French, of Menifield, Virginia, as exchange representative with
the Germans, while Macon himself went down to talk with Elster.
"I could hardly stir up any interest in Paris for this story," Kalisch
said, "and I don't know if anyone is coming. I told 'em any tip from
you was good enough for me, but it's tough to buck the Folies Ber-
gres these days."
We crossed the Loire on separate ferries late on the eighth and
Kalisch, to make plans for his photographers, went straight to Ro-
morantin to join Magill. Shep and I went by easy stages down Magifl's
primitive trap line of communications a radio link here in a house,
there in a corner of an inn, and over there in an attic. Gathering
background materials on each man, I had a story on them all. 1
1 The members of the platoon south of the Loire included: Sgt. Edward
Hatcher, of Beckley, W. Va.; Corporal Lemuel Sistler, Batavia, HL; Albert
Biro, Cleveland, Ohio; Robert F. Glasgow, Wheeling, W. Va.; Michael J.
Marino, Willoughby, Ohio; Edward J. Monk, Lawrence, Mass.; Michael J.
Demeter, Cleveland, Ohio; Donald E. Wilkinson, Wellsville, Ohio; William
Reeves, Cincinnati, Ohio; Sgt. Robert W. Roller, Clover, Va.; Corporal David
Alcala, La Verne, Calif.; William Longmire, Elizabethtown, Tenn.; Corporal
Arnold Goodson, Wolf Creek, Tenn.; James H. Reilly, Thomaston, Conn.;
James E. Townsend, Petoskey, Mich.; Robert H. Housenecht, Muncy Valley,
Pa.; Arnold J. Marcum, Marlinton, W. Va.; Robert J. Burns, Watertown, Mass.;
Stanley Pope, Caledonia, Mum.; Sgt. William L. Adams, Baltimore, Md.;
Corporal Morris Weisburd, New York City, N. Y.; John W. Baird, Jr., Embar-
rass, Wise.; and Sgt John North, Bryan, Ohio.
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 125
Immediately upon our arrival at the Hotel d'Angleterre, new logis-
tics obstacles began to appear because it had become clear that the
final act of taking the 20,000 troops was not going to come off
quickly. We informed Twelfth Army Group that the surrender was on,
but at least ten days away. Three correspondents, however, were on
the way: Collie Small, UP; Charles Haacker, Acme Newspictures;
and Fred MacKenzie, Buffalo Evening News. They were charging by
jeep down the Paris-Orleans road, and Collie had come away so fast
he was still wearing his pajamas under his clothes. Highly upset to
find they were so early, they nevertheless came down to Romorantin.
Shortly afterward, Hal Boyle, AP, and Ivan H. "Cy" Peterman, Phila-
delphia Inquirer, arrived.
Kalisch's negotiations with Lt. Col. French and Generalmajor
Elster were going along famously, it being Kalisch's plot to be sure
every phase of this spectacular achievement would be on film record.
To start the movie, he needed a day with his cameramen in the Ger-
man assembly areas, and a guarantee that General Elster would not
at the last minute demand the film. General Elster agreed to talk it
out. Driven to the headquarters by Private First Class James B.
"Sandy" Sandeen, Kalisch was presented to Elster, who found that
Kalisch's mother had come from Wurttemberg, birthplace also of both
Field Marshal Erwin Rommel and Elster himself. After a chat, as
always, Kalisch was in, this time because of his German-born mother.
So friendly was their relationship that Kalisch suggested a public sur-
render, like that of Cornwallis. Certainly it would be with honor, but
this could only be proved if he had pictures to show, and outdoor pic-
tures at that. Kalisch needed this condition badly, because he had no
lights for indoor shooting. "Agreed," said General Elster, after fifteen
minutes of Kalisch's oratory, "I will make a public surrender, but it
must be with an honor platoon and a proper military ceremony."
Kalisch promised to deliver his end, and suggested that the token
of capitulation be a Luger rather than a sword which would look as
out of place as cameras would have at the time of Cornwallis. This
arrangement was approved by General Macon, who told Kalisch he
could select the spot and time of the surrender.
Kalisch inspected the area from Orleans to Blois. He first thought
of the main square in Orleans at the foot of the statue of Joan of Arc.
Pictorially it was perfect, politically it was dynamite. The French
authorities convinced him that masking 20,000 armed Germans in a
126 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
town full of armed Maquis might result in riot and massacre. Re-
luctantly Kalisch looked elsewhere and found another suitable spot
Beaugency. Two roads converged on the blasted bridge. At the junc-
tion stood a house which provided a perfect camera platform and press
gallery. He spoke to the proprietor, M. Hertschap, and got him to clear
the second floor. Carefully, Kalisch figured out the best time for shoot-
ing film and set the surrender hour at 3 P.M. Some of the staff wanted
to change the time but when General Macon agreed, the camera-
men heaved a sigh of relief.
General Charles de Gaulle was extremely interested in the details
of this surrender and asked for strong assurances that the weapons of
the 20,000 Germans be placed under U. S. Army guard. De Gaulle
already saw France's up-coming troubles with the lawless FTPF Com-
munists who were raiding and pillaging the countryside and would
submit to no orders. De Gaulle knew what might happen if the
weapons of 20,000 men fell into Communist hands. He could order
the FFI one day to give up their arms, and they would, but he was
equally sure the FTPF would not
This posed Magill and his platoon with another problem, and the
problems were serious enough already. There was the need to provide
hay and feed for a thousand horses in the German column, fuel for
2,000 commandeered vehicles, and bread for twenty thousand troops.
The big risk, however, was that the Germans, having refused to sur-
render to the French, were being allowed to carry their arms, loaded,
all the way to the Loire.
A secondary concern was the Chateau Valancey, home of the Due
de Talleyrand, grandnephew of Napoleon's foreign minister. A British
agent got in touch with Lieutenant Magill and said it was absolutely
necessary that all German columns be diverted from the Chateau, the
reason being that, under the Chateau, 480 of the most priceless of the
Louvre art treasures, including the Winged Victory and the enigmatic
Mona Lisa, had been hidden for safekeeping. Immediately, a part of
Sam's platoon had to spot hundreds of mines across the Chateau road
in order to make it noticeably impassable and divert any stray
detachments.
As we were first looking over the CMteau grounds with one of the
household staff, it was early in the morning. We were all startled when
a sparkling-eyed, black-haired girl in her late teens appeared suddenly
at one of the spacious second-floor windows sans a stitch of clothing.
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 127
She held her arms wide in a gesture of welcome and greeting. "Ooo,
la-la," she said blowing a kiss, "les Americainsl" We all waved, then
she seemed to sense for the first time her state of nakedness, crossed
her hand over her breasts, and pulled back from the window. We
saw her no more. "Who was that?" somebody wanted to know. The
guide explained that she was a proteg6e of the duke's. A little later we
met the duke, who was seventy-three.
The war correspondents were busily writing day-to-day develop-
ments of the Magill-Elster saga, but did not know that all their copy
was being held up by the censor. The ruling was that not one line of
the story would hit print until the last PW walked into the Beaugency
cage. Although this news disturbed our Romorantin contingent, they
were somewhat sobered to realize how delicate our situation really
was, seventy-five-miles deep in German territory. Who really had who
south of the Loire was something nobody knew for sure. The Ger-
mans were armed, the French were hostile, the custodial force was
small, and some of the correspondents trying to join us were being
nipped by Germans over whom General Elster seemed not to have
control.
On September 12, the extreme fluidity of the situation was illus-
trated when a trio of correspondents departed the Third Army press
camp to cover the surrender. In the jeep were six-foot-six and skinny
Wright Bryan, Atlanta Journal, who had weathered two aerial D-Day
runs with both paratrooper and glider-tug planes; Ed Beattie, UP; and
John Mecklin, Chicago Sun. They were tooling down the road near
General Pershing's old World War I headquarters town of Chaumont
and found themselves less than a hundred yards from a German road-
block before they recognized it as such. All three of them were cap-
tured, and Wright was wounded in the shinbone. He was carted ofi to
a German hospital. Beattie was a major coup, the Germans thought.
He had been based in Berlin before the war and was well known to
the crowd around Dr. Josef Goebbels.
John Mecklin, who had fallen young and whole into the hands of
the Germans, was waved off and sent back to the Third Army press
camp, which got him a lot of needling. He was compared with the
fish too short to cook which is thrown back in the lake, but his worst
blow came from the traitorous conduct of his colleagues. When
Mecklin returned to the Third Army press camp, he was loquacious
about his experience. The rest of the correspondents fed him on
128 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
brandy, questioned him closely, and at intervals, left the tent where
he was holding forth to file their stories. Mecklin got around to send-
ing his own version a day later and got a blast from the Chicago Sun,
which reminded him next time to file first, then talk, since he had been
scooped on his own adventure by every paper in the states.
News flashed into Atlanta, Georgia, contained the statement that
Wright had been "wounded in the fleshy part of the leg." An Atlanta
Journal cohort, Sam Dull, called Mrs. Bryan in an attempt to be
reassuring. "I wouldn't worry yet, Ellen," he said, "because we both
know there ain't no fleshy part of Wright Bryan. They must have
captured somebody else."
Kalisch had sent a message to his old roommate, Lt. Col. George
Stevens, the celebrated Hollywood producer-director, asking him for
a sound-on-film crew to be emplaced at the Beaugency bridge. George
dispatched a unit bossed by Captain Joseph Biroc, whose professional
Hollywood lensing had never presented anything to equal this genuine
article, and backed him up by Lieutenant Bill Montague, late of Co-
lumbia Pictures in Hollywood, and First Lt. Joseph Zinni of Phila-
delphia, photo unit head with the Eighty-third. Midway in the march-
up of the Germans, two more correspondents joined us, Robert Barr,
BBC, and Alton W. Smalley, St. Paul Dispatch-Pioneer, nailing down
a Minnesota angle. Smalley found it in Stanley L. Pope, one of
MagilFs platoon, and Pope had a good story in that, while he was
completely courageous in the face of desperate odds, he had a horror
of the day when he would actually be in a spot where he would have
to kill. This package capture had uncommon appeal to Pope. By
stretching his circulation field somewhat, Smalley included John W.
Baird, Jr., who came from the town of Embarrass, Wisconsin.
The German columns, three of them, moved up toward the desti-
nations of Orl6ans, Beaugency and Blois. They included Wehrmacht
(Army), Kriegsmarine (Navy), and Luftwaffe (Air Force) troops,
with the Navy admiral making the trek in a horse and buggy of
ancient vintage. MagflTs platoon had broken camp and parts of it
were riding at the head of each column.
Colonel Crabill was still anxious about these armed columns and
wanted nothing to excite them. Hal Boyle and Cy Peterman had
almost been in an incident when they planted their jeep at an inter-
section where the column made its turn for the last miles. Peterman
was standing in the jeep, taking pictures.
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 129
A German lieutenant worked himself into a lather. "Look pretty,"
he said to his men. "Look nice for the American photographer. Let
him show the Americans what real German soldiers look like." Then
he lashed himself with his riding crop and was getting a little frothy at
the mouth. "Get the hell down from there with that camera," said
Boyle to Peterman, "and let's get out of here. First thing you know,
you'll be shooting pictures, and he'll start shooting pistols."
At this point Major Charles Madary of Baltimore, Maryland, Army
manager of the Scribe, arrived from Paris with a coeducational group
of correspondents, including Geoffrey Parsons, New York Herald
Tribune; David Anderson, New York Times; Erika Mann, Liberty;
Lady Margaret Stewart, Australian Consolidated Press; Betty Knox,
London Evening Standard; and Lee Miller, Vogue.
Crabill did not want this new batch of sightseer correspondents to
go across the river until the next day, so we made arrangements for
them in an Orl6ans hotel and prepared to sweat out the next day, the
seventeenth, when Generals Elster and Macon would perform the
last rites.
The Paris correspondents were briefed the next morning on the com-
plete plans, then Crabill authorized me to take them over. "Tell them
to be careful," he said. "We haven't got the Germans in the cage yet,
and their guns are loaded." One of the feminine war correspondents
was Erika Mann, daughter of the famous Thomas Mann, who had
suffered persecution and endured exile because of Hitler. As we came
upon the leading elements of the column and passed alongside it down
the road, Erika was emotionally moved, began to talk incoherently,
then uttered profanity in the German tongue, and finally as the com-
mand car slowed, she got out. When I could get the jeep stopped and
get back to her, she was less than a yard from the marching Germans,
her hands on her hips, her tongue stuck out, rendering a juicy Bronx
cheer right in their faces. That was the end of the ride, because she was
bundled up and the retinue went back to the Beaugency bridge to
await the rest of the affair. By then, no Germans would be armed, and
it would be a lot safer for her to stick out her tongue.
At 3 P.M. Generalmajor Eric Elstex came up to the bridge in his
battered Citroen, got out, surveyed the scene: the battery of motion
picture cameras, the microphone, and General Macon backed by divi-
sion, corps, Air Force and Ninth Army staff representatives. He prob-
ably did not notice some hasty scurrying at the left of the receiving
130 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
group, where I hustled Lieutenant Sam Magill into position with the
staff. He had been sitting on the fence, because nobody had seen
fit to include him. As Magill came up, one of the Ninth Army colonels,
fresh from the States, and seeing his first German soldier, looked about
with some disgust, wondering at the discipline of the Eighty-third In-
fantry Division for having "gate-crashing" lieutenants at a time like
this.
Lt. Col. Jules French placed himself on General Elster's left. "Shall
we go, Herr General?" he asked, quietly.
Elster, pulling down on his tunic and straightening his cap, managed
a smile. "Ja, mein Oberst" he said, and they moved out.
The whir of the cameras was like a hive of bees, and New York
Timesmzn David Anderson wrote that this must have been "the best
covered surrender of this, or any war." What no one knew then was
that the story was being smothered by a trio of airborne divisions the
American Eighty-second, and 101st and the British First being
dropped in the Netherlands at Nijmegen, Eindhoven, and Arnhem. 2
The censor pulled the stop off both events at the same time, and rele-
gated Magill s tremendous exploit to second-string position. But Para-
mount News made a special out of the movie film, labeling it unre-
servedly, "The Strangest Story of the War," and afterward, in the
November 11, 1944, Saturday Evening Post, Collie Small, UP, wrote
of the event and described the setting:
"News of the war south of the Loire drifted into the bar at the
Scribe Hotel in Paris where correspondents gather nightly to plot new
ways of poisoning the censors, who also drink at the Scribe bar, but
from different stools like big-league umpires and ballplayers. The
inevitable happened almost immediately. Army public-relations offi-
cers, who never tire of devising new ways to torture weary correspond-
ents, announced prematurely that 20,000 Germans were surrendering
1 For months, Walter Cronkite, UP, and Bill Boni, AP, had been earmarked
as post-Netherlands liberation bureau chiefs in Amsterdam for their respective
agencies. Neither expected in his wildest dreams that they would become
journalistic "firsts" by going to their jobs in gliders. Cronkite, with William
Wade, INS; Oladwin Hill, AP; Homer Bigart, New York Herald Tribune; Bob
Post, New York Times (who was lost in action) ; and Andy Rooney, Stars and
Stripes, had been original members of the close coterie, "the Writing Sixty-
ninth," or air correspondents who covered the first B-17 raids on Berlin. When
Cronkite and Boni set forth with the 101st and Eighty-second Airborne Divi-
sions on September 17, 1944, it was the thirteenth airborne mission for which
Cronkite had been briefed all the others having been scrubbed.
The Nervy Exploit oj Sam Magill 131
the following morning. Three hours later, they frantically announced it
was all a mistake, and for everyone to stay as far away as possible,
because the Germans might not surrender after all. Unfortunately,
three of us left between announcements " "Unfortunately," Collie
Small wrote, but this exploit of Sam Magill got Small a contract with
the Saturday Evening Post, and tripled his salary, among other things.
Sam Magill, who crossed the English Channel a lieutenant, went
home a lieutenant at war's end. This was partly because Colonel
Crabill said he felt Sam's platoon "was more valuable to the security
of the regiment than another battalion of infantry would have been,
and I never considered him replaceable in that job." Once, much later,
he was offered a captaincy if he would leave the platoon, but he
refused, saying he would see the "boys" through to the end of the war,
which he did. The nervy exploit of Magill, who violated orders, pene-
trated into German-held territory a hundred miles, and brought off
the first big PW bag for the Ninth Army, finally was put on orders for
the Legion of Merit eleven months after the incident. The war was
over, and he was about to go home with the Ninety-ninth Infantry
Division. They didn't give him the ribbon in the Scribe bar, or even in
a ceremony. He had to go to a Ninety-ninth Division supply room
and draw it.
"Doesn't that flank worry you?" Eddy asked Patton one day as they
were scanning the map.
"Not me," said Patton blithely. "It just depends on how nervous you
are by nature."
With the German Armies now clearing out of France very rapidly
and falling back on the prepared positions in the Siegfried Line, Hitler
had sent a direct order to Generalmajor Erich Elster to round up all
German forces in the south of France, from Bordeaux to Marseilles, and
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 119
bring them back in column to Germany. Even though Lt. Gen. Alex-
ander M. Patch, with his Seventh Army, was rolling up from the
Riviera, on Hitler's map it looked easy for Elster to skin between
Patton and Patch through the Belfort Gap. None of this was known to
Colonel E. B. Crabill, of Palm Beach Shores, Florida, whose 329th
Infantry Regiment of the Eighty-third had surveillance from seventy
miles west of Blois to the vicinity of Orleans. He summoned his Intel-
ligence and Reconnaissance Platoon leader, First Lieutenant Samuel
W. Magill, of Ashtabula, Ohio. MagilTs area extended from Blois to
Orleans, about forty-five miles along the eastern edge. His unit had
been beefed up by a platoon of quadruple .50-caliber-mounted half-
tracks, a platoon of 105-mm. howitzers, and a hundred Frenchmen
of the FFI. In using the latter, it was necessary to teach them scouting
and patrolling and reporting.
The colonel was disturbed for an unusual reason. "Sam," he said,
"what's happened to all those Germans who were shooting at us from
the other side of the river?" Sam indicated his own worries about it,
too. Both of them knew they had orders not to cross the Loire, but
between Magill and Crabill there was an understanding. The colonel
did not tell Sam to violate any orders, he just told him he wanted him
to know what was going on. He had never been in the habit of spelling
out method for Sam.
Magill went back to his I&R platoon and talked over his problem
with his driver, Corporal Christopher Vane of Baltimore, Maryland.
Leaving the major portion of his unit in charge of Sergeant Herbert
E. Beraer of St. Louis, he told his Belgian interpreter, Felix van de
Walle and his radio operator, Robert A. Alvey of San Diego, Cali-
fornia, to get aboard. At Mer-sur-Loire, Magill crossed in a rowboat
to Muides, a small village where the French were so happy to see the
American they built him a raft to bring the jeep and his crew over
as well. Contact was established almost at once with a member of the
Free French, who said the Germans had all withdrawn farther to the
south. He had heard a rumor that there was a German element of
unknown strength willing to surrender to the Americans, but not to
the French. Magill sent a message back to Beraer telling him of his
plan to move deeper into German-held territory and instructing Berner
to get other members of the twenty-four-man platoon across the river
and placed at intervals to insure a radio relay.
Magill found his forward movement suddenly restricted when his
120 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
small patrol ran into the flank guard of the Eleventh Panzer Division,
a tough tank battalion. Thousands of German troops, in columns and
in every kind of conveyance, were filtering past it on all sides. Alvey
cranked up his radio and fed back dozens of messages to the 329th,
giving locations, march objectives, strength and state of equipment.
One of these radio messages brought an air strike which destroyed two
thirds of a ten-mile-long German column on the Route Nationale east
of Chateauroux. The Magill patrol took frequent cover, once spending
five hours in the woods. Eventually the main body of the Germans,
behind the formidable Eleventh Panzer, flowed by.
With the XIX TAG, commanded by Brig. Gen. O. P. Weyland,
strafing a column miles further to the south, Magill now thought
seriously of the possibilities of prisoners from whom he could get the
more detailed information which Colonel Crabill wanted. With his
mind on Germans who might surrender, Magill ran up a white flag of
truce and Vane drove the jeep ahead toward Issoudun. There was
occasional, desultory fire from the roadsides, as much from surprised
French as from the disorganized Germans.
The bridge leading into Issoudun was alive with German guards,
who held their guns on the approaching jeep, but let it come up to the
bridge. Van de Walle, in German, asked to talk to the commander,
and they settled back to await some major or, at most, lieutenant
colonel. "Look," said Van de Walle suddenly, "that officer coming up
on the other side of the bridge. See the red stripes on his pants leg.
That's a major general." Hastily Magill got out .of the jeep with Van
de Walle and they moved forward to meet the German, who asked
what they wanted and how they came to be there.
Sam's mouth was dry, but through the Belgian, he said: "I came
here to see you because your cause is hopeless. I know you're trying
to get back to Germany, but thousands of troops are in your way now
waiting for you to come in range. I thought if I came to talk to you,
you would see that you could surrender with honor and save the
lives of your men who will otherwise die unnecessarily." Because of
the shambles he had noted in his 100-mile penetration, Sam was of
the opinion that the General's strength at most, would be around two
battalions.
The German consulted a moment with his staff. "How much strength
do you represent?" he asked.
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 121
Sam was thinking only of his platoon, rather than the division.
"I've got my platoon "
The German turned apoplectic. "What?" he spluttered. "Surrender
twenty thousand men to a platoon? Phantastischr
When Van de Walle translated twenty thousand he choked a little
and Magill almost fell off the Issoudun bridge. In carrying out
Colonel CrabilTs simple order to find out what had happened to the
Germans, he had stumbled right into the main column. Stunned as he
was, Magill, who had once thought he wanted to be a minister, turned
his seriously honest face to the German general, and repeated that
it was not the platoon which was important, but the inevitable clash
of arms which awaited the column up ahead. General Elster quieted
somewhat. The lieutenant was not so wrong, after all. The column
had been sniped at constantly by the Free French and the Commu-
nist FTPF (Force Tireur Partisan Frangais), while the planes of XDC
TAG came out of the sky at all daylight hours to harass him. His
losses had already been great. A surrender, he said, might be nego-
tiated if certain terms could be met terms which would insure sur-
render with honor.
"What are the terms?" asked Magill.
"A show of force," said Elster.
"How big?"
The German studied a moment, looked at his tired but determined
men. "If you can confront me with two battalions," he decided, "it
could be a surrender with honor." He might as well have asked Magill
for the moon, but Sam told him he would be back the next day with
word from the division commander.
Night was fast falling, and on the way back, Sam changed drivers
to give Vane a rest. Big, burly Ralph Anderson of Lancaster, Ohio,
took the wheel and pointed it toward Beaugency. The road was
blocked from time to time by logs which had been thrown across it by
snipers. The rules demanded that headlights be blacked out, but as
long as Magill was way out of the rule book already, he told Anderson
to turn on the lights for quick flashes to see if the road was clear, then
run for it to the next turn. By using this harrowing method, they
avoided roadblocks. By the time Sam got back across the Loire and
reported to Colonel Crabill in his bed, it was past midnight. Crabfll
thought enough of the proposal to get into his clothes and drive to
Chateau Renault, where General Macon was awakened and informed.
122 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
Macon shook his head. "We're stretched paper-thin now," he said.
"We've got 185 miles covered by a bare 16,000 troops as it is. I don't
know where I'd get two battalions. Besides, we might get over the river
and get caught in the wringer and lose a lot of men." Sam talked
earnestly of his belief that the German wanted to give up, not fight,
and he pointed out that if the German column came on, it was
eventually sure to clash with some elements of the Eighty-third in a
fire fight anyway. Macon still said no, but did send the news forward
to Ninth Army headquarters in Mi Foret, six kilometers from Rennes
itself. Crabill and Magill walked away from the General's quarters
unhappily, but Crabill was not through backing up his lieutenant.
"You go back down to the General at Issoudun," he said, "and talk
to him some more. Let me know if you have any ideas of anything
else I can do."
Still with no sleep and, worse yet, with no solution, Magill again
put the Loire behind him. His brain was numb and he dozed in his
seat, while Anderson watched him out of the corner of his eye and
pulled him back each time he began to slump precariously to the out-
side of the jeep. Van de Walle was better off, having caught some
snatches while Magill had been with Crabill and Macon. Suddenly
an idea struck Anderson. "Remember when we were talking to
Elster," he said to Sam, "and he brought up the damage by American
planes?" Dull as his senses were at that moment, Magill immediately
woke up. Maybe Elster would accept a show of force in the air! Magill
had never asked for air support before, since his mission was to find
out things, but wherever possible to avoid getting entangled in a
scrap. The lonely party in the jeep took on considerably more elation
than they were entitled to and, by the time they met with Elster on
the Issoudun bridge again, they were eager.
Meantime, the field telephone on my tent pole rang. It was Capt.
Tom Roberts, PRO of the Eighty-third, to give me a brief rundown.
The Ninth Army's reaction to the news of a possible 20,000-prisoner
bag was contrary to expectations. Brest and the other ports looked like
an elusive prize, and Ninth Army, characterized by General Bradley
as "green and ambitious" was now showing its ambition. They wanted
those 20,000 prisoners. My tipster didn't have to spell out the chance
Lieutenant Sam Magill had to dwarf the famous Sergeant York exploit
of World War I when he picked up 132 Germans single-handed. By
the phone circuits available, it was finally possible to get Twelfth
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 123
Army Group at Versailles and Lt. Col. Bert Kalisch came on. By
yelling as loudly as we could, I described for him the situation below
the Loire and the possibilities for story and pictures. Asking him to
send any interested war correspondents first to Beaugency for a check-
in with Colonel Crabill, I told him of my plan to leave on September
8 and the hope that I could join Magill among the Germans to get a
running account of his adventure to fill in the later arriving press.
The Ashtabula lieutenant, at the time I was phoning, was again
talking to General Elster. "My general has asked me if you will accept
a show of force in the air," he said. Elster was mystified. "I will radio
to my division," explained Sam, "asking them to send a group of
planes. They will be instructed to look for a flare we will place on this
crossroads. After they come over, they are to return and look for a
cloth panel on the ground. If I put out a white one, it means you are
satisfied and will negotiate. If I put out a red one, they are to wait
twenty minutes, then strafe and bomb your column." The General was
not convinced that Magill was not running a colossal bluff, and that
went double for Magill. But Magill had that honest face. General
Elster agreed and Alvey cranked up the radio. Back over the relay
went the message to Colonel Crabill. The time for the show of force
was set for 2 P.M., September 8. In a few moments, a return message
came through from Crabill: "Have made request through Ninth Army.
Am also going myself to XIX TAG to get everything I can."
Magill set up shop in the small lobby of the Hotel d'Angleterre in
Romorantin. It was a soldier's dream come true. The FFI gave them
six German PW's to do the cooking, washing and other chores. It was
as if they were installed for good.
At 1:30 on the afternoon of the eighth, Magill and the Germans
reported to the Issoudun bridge, and the flares were installed at the
intersection letting their smoky trails go upward on the still day. As
the two o'clock deadline neared, Magill and the Germans looked
speculatively up at the sky. The deadline came and went. It was 2:15
and the Germans began to mutter. Then, 2:30 and the sky was still
blank overhead. Magill told Van de Walle to request patience, but the
Germans were fast running out of it. What's more, they felt they had
been bluffed and almost successfully. Then, at 2:47 P.M., sixteen
Thunderbolt fighter-bombers came over in formation. Sam had no
way of knowing whether they were the ones, but he had to chance it
124 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
"Van," he said, "ask him, quick! Which'll it be, white or red panel?"
Van de Walle put the question.
Elster looked at the planes, making a graceful bank, so pretty yet
so lethal and ominous. "Make it white," he said, and the panel was
immediately spread in the field. The planes had come so low, some of
the German soldiers hit the dirt. Now they looked on in wonder and
relief as the sixteen Thunderbolts returned, waggled their wings, then
flew off to the north to do battle elsewhere.
This was the crucial time for Magill. Had he now been bluffed?
Had he sent his only chance of salvation flying off, and would General
Elster now refuse to negotiate? But General Elster kept his bargain.
"Will you send an officer with full power to discuss terms?" he asked
tiredly. "I will send one of mine to act as liaison with you." Sam
agreed, took on a non-communicative German colonel in the already
crowded jeep, and headed back to Romorantin with the tidings. When
the word came through to Beaugency, Crabill designated Lt. Col.
Jules French, of Menifield, Virginia, as exchange representative with
the Germans, while Macon himself went down to talk with Elster.
"I could hardly stir up any interest in Paris for this story," Kalisch
said, "and I don't know if anyone is coming. I told 'em any tip from
you was good enough for me, but it's tough to buck the Folies Ber-
gres these days."
We crossed the Loire on separate ferries late on the eighth and
Kalisch, to make plans for his photographers, went straight to Ro-
morantin to join Magill. Shep and I went by easy stages down Magifl's
primitive trap line of communications a radio link here in a house,
there in a corner of an inn, and over there in an attic. Gathering
background materials on each man, I had a story on them all. 1
1 The members of the platoon south of the Loire included: Sgt. Edward
Hatcher, of Beckley, W. Va.; Corporal Lemuel Sistler, Batavia, HL; Albert
Biro, Cleveland, Ohio; Robert F. Glasgow, Wheeling, W. Va.; Michael J.
Marino, Willoughby, Ohio; Edward J. Monk, Lawrence, Mass.; Michael J.
Demeter, Cleveland, Ohio; Donald E. Wilkinson, Wellsville, Ohio; William
Reeves, Cincinnati, Ohio; Sgt. Robert W. Roller, Clover, Va.; Corporal David
Alcala, La Verne, Calif.; William Longmire, Elizabethtown, Tenn.; Corporal
Arnold Goodson, Wolf Creek, Tenn.; James H. Reilly, Thomaston, Conn.;
James E. Townsend, Petoskey, Mich.; Robert H. Housenecht, Muncy Valley,
Pa.; Arnold J. Marcum, Marlinton, W. Va.; Robert J. Burns, Watertown, Mass.;
Stanley Pope, Caledonia, Mum.; Sgt. William L. Adams, Baltimore, Md.;
Corporal Morris Weisburd, New York City, N. Y.; John W. Baird, Jr., Embar-
rass, Wise.; and Sgt John North, Bryan, Ohio.
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 125
Immediately upon our arrival at the Hotel d'Angleterre, new logis-
tics obstacles began to appear because it had become clear that the
final act of taking the 20,000 troops was not going to come off
quickly. We informed Twelfth Army Group that the surrender was on,
but at least ten days away. Three correspondents, however, were on
the way: Collie Small, UP; Charles Haacker, Acme Newspictures;
and Fred MacKenzie, Buffalo Evening News. They were charging by
jeep down the Paris-Orleans road, and Collie had come away so fast
he was still wearing his pajamas under his clothes. Highly upset to
find they were so early, they nevertheless came down to Romorantin.
Shortly afterward, Hal Boyle, AP, and Ivan H. "Cy" Peterman, Phila-
delphia Inquirer, arrived.
Kalisch's negotiations with Lt. Col. French and Generalmajor
Elster were going along famously, it being Kalisch's plot to be sure
every phase of this spectacular achievement would be on film record.
To start the movie, he needed a day with his cameramen in the Ger-
man assembly areas, and a guarantee that General Elster would not
at the last minute demand the film. General Elster agreed to talk it
out. Driven to the headquarters by Private First Class James B.
"Sandy" Sandeen, Kalisch was presented to Elster, who found that
Kalisch's mother had come from Wurttemberg, birthplace also of both
Field Marshal Erwin Rommel and Elster himself. After a chat, as
always, Kalisch was in, this time because of his German-born mother.
So friendly was their relationship that Kalisch suggested a public sur-
render, like that of Cornwallis. Certainly it would be with honor, but
this could only be proved if he had pictures to show, and outdoor pic-
tures at that. Kalisch needed this condition badly, because he had no
lights for indoor shooting. "Agreed," said General Elster, after fifteen
minutes of Kalisch's oratory, "I will make a public surrender, but it
must be with an honor platoon and a proper military ceremony."
Kalisch promised to deliver his end, and suggested that the token
of capitulation be a Luger rather than a sword which would look as
out of place as cameras would have at the time of Cornwallis. This
arrangement was approved by General Macon, who told Kalisch he
could select the spot and time of the surrender.
Kalisch inspected the area from Orleans to Blois. He first thought
of the main square in Orleans at the foot of the statue of Joan of Arc.
Pictorially it was perfect, politically it was dynamite. The French
authorities convinced him that masking 20,000 armed Germans in a
126 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
town full of armed Maquis might result in riot and massacre. Re-
luctantly Kalisch looked elsewhere and found another suitable spot
Beaugency. Two roads converged on the blasted bridge. At the junc-
tion stood a house which provided a perfect camera platform and press
gallery. He spoke to the proprietor, M. Hertschap, and got him to clear
the second floor. Carefully, Kalisch figured out the best time for shoot-
ing film and set the surrender hour at 3 P.M. Some of the staff wanted
to change the time but when General Macon agreed, the camera-
men heaved a sigh of relief.
General Charles de Gaulle was extremely interested in the details
of this surrender and asked for strong assurances that the weapons of
the 20,000 Germans be placed under U. S. Army guard. De Gaulle
already saw France's up-coming troubles with the lawless FTPF Com-
munists who were raiding and pillaging the countryside and would
submit to no orders. De Gaulle knew what might happen if the
weapons of 20,000 men fell into Communist hands. He could order
the FFI one day to give up their arms, and they would, but he was
equally sure the FTPF would not
This posed Magill and his platoon with another problem, and the
problems were serious enough already. There was the need to provide
hay and feed for a thousand horses in the German column, fuel for
2,000 commandeered vehicles, and bread for twenty thousand troops.
The big risk, however, was that the Germans, having refused to sur-
render to the French, were being allowed to carry their arms, loaded,
all the way to the Loire.
A secondary concern was the Chateau Valancey, home of the Due
de Talleyrand, grandnephew of Napoleon's foreign minister. A British
agent got in touch with Lieutenant Magill and said it was absolutely
necessary that all German columns be diverted from the Chateau, the
reason being that, under the Chateau, 480 of the most priceless of the
Louvre art treasures, including the Winged Victory and the enigmatic
Mona Lisa, had been hidden for safekeeping. Immediately, a part of
Sam's platoon had to spot hundreds of mines across the Chateau road
in order to make it noticeably impassable and divert any stray
detachments.
As we were first looking over the CMteau grounds with one of the
household staff, it was early in the morning. We were all startled when
a sparkling-eyed, black-haired girl in her late teens appeared suddenly
at one of the spacious second-floor windows sans a stitch of clothing.
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 127
She held her arms wide in a gesture of welcome and greeting. "Ooo,
la-la," she said blowing a kiss, "les Americainsl" We all waved, then
she seemed to sense for the first time her state of nakedness, crossed
her hand over her breasts, and pulled back from the window. We
saw her no more. "Who was that?" somebody wanted to know. The
guide explained that she was a proteg6e of the duke's. A little later we
met the duke, who was seventy-three.
The war correspondents were busily writing day-to-day develop-
ments of the Magill-Elster saga, but did not know that all their copy
was being held up by the censor. The ruling was that not one line of
the story would hit print until the last PW walked into the Beaugency
cage. Although this news disturbed our Romorantin contingent, they
were somewhat sobered to realize how delicate our situation really
was, seventy-five-miles deep in German territory. Who really had who
south of the Loire was something nobody knew for sure. The Ger-
mans were armed, the French were hostile, the custodial force was
small, and some of the correspondents trying to join us were being
nipped by Germans over whom General Elster seemed not to have
control.
On September 12, the extreme fluidity of the situation was illus-
trated when a trio of correspondents departed the Third Army press
camp to cover the surrender. In the jeep were six-foot-six and skinny
Wright Bryan, Atlanta Journal, who had weathered two aerial D-Day
runs with both paratrooper and glider-tug planes; Ed Beattie, UP; and
John Mecklin, Chicago Sun. They were tooling down the road near
General Pershing's old World War I headquarters town of Chaumont
and found themselves less than a hundred yards from a German road-
block before they recognized it as such. All three of them were cap-
tured, and Wright was wounded in the shinbone. He was carted ofi to
a German hospital. Beattie was a major coup, the Germans thought.
He had been based in Berlin before the war and was well known to
the crowd around Dr. Josef Goebbels.
John Mecklin, who had fallen young and whole into the hands of
the Germans, was waved off and sent back to the Third Army press
camp, which got him a lot of needling. He was compared with the
fish too short to cook which is thrown back in the lake, but his worst
blow came from the traitorous conduct of his colleagues. When
Mecklin returned to the Third Army press camp, he was loquacious
about his experience. The rest of the correspondents fed him on
128 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
brandy, questioned him closely, and at intervals, left the tent where
he was holding forth to file their stories. Mecklin got around to send-
ing his own version a day later and got a blast from the Chicago Sun,
which reminded him next time to file first, then talk, since he had been
scooped on his own adventure by every paper in the states.
News flashed into Atlanta, Georgia, contained the statement that
Wright had been "wounded in the fleshy part of the leg." An Atlanta
Journal cohort, Sam Dull, called Mrs. Bryan in an attempt to be
reassuring. "I wouldn't worry yet, Ellen," he said, "because we both
know there ain't no fleshy part of Wright Bryan. They must have
captured somebody else."
Kalisch had sent a message to his old roommate, Lt. Col. George
Stevens, the celebrated Hollywood producer-director, asking him for
a sound-on-film crew to be emplaced at the Beaugency bridge. George
dispatched a unit bossed by Captain Joseph Biroc, whose professional
Hollywood lensing had never presented anything to equal this genuine
article, and backed him up by Lieutenant Bill Montague, late of Co-
lumbia Pictures in Hollywood, and First Lt. Joseph Zinni of Phila-
delphia, photo unit head with the Eighty-third. Midway in the march-
up of the Germans, two more correspondents joined us, Robert Barr,
BBC, and Alton W. Smalley, St. Paul Dispatch-Pioneer, nailing down
a Minnesota angle. Smalley found it in Stanley L. Pope, one of
MagilFs platoon, and Pope had a good story in that, while he was
completely courageous in the face of desperate odds, he had a horror
of the day when he would actually be in a spot where he would have
to kill. This package capture had uncommon appeal to Pope. By
stretching his circulation field somewhat, Smalley included John W.
Baird, Jr., who came from the town of Embarrass, Wisconsin.
The German columns, three of them, moved up toward the desti-
nations of Orl6ans, Beaugency and Blois. They included Wehrmacht
(Army), Kriegsmarine (Navy), and Luftwaffe (Air Force) troops,
with the Navy admiral making the trek in a horse and buggy of
ancient vintage. MagflTs platoon had broken camp and parts of it
were riding at the head of each column.
Colonel Crabill was still anxious about these armed columns and
wanted nothing to excite them. Hal Boyle and Cy Peterman had
almost been in an incident when they planted their jeep at an inter-
section where the column made its turn for the last miles. Peterman
was standing in the jeep, taking pictures.
The Nervy Exploit of Sam Magill 129
A German lieutenant worked himself into a lather. "Look pretty,"
he said to his men. "Look nice for the American photographer. Let
him show the Americans what real German soldiers look like." Then
he lashed himself with his riding crop and was getting a little frothy at
the mouth. "Get the hell down from there with that camera," said
Boyle to Peterman, "and let's get out of here. First thing you know,
you'll be shooting pictures, and he'll start shooting pistols."
At this point Major Charles Madary of Baltimore, Maryland, Army
manager of the Scribe, arrived from Paris with a coeducational group
of correspondents, including Geoffrey Parsons, New York Herald
Tribune; David Anderson, New York Times; Erika Mann, Liberty;
Lady Margaret Stewart, Australian Consolidated Press; Betty Knox,
London Evening Standard; and Lee Miller, Vogue.
Crabill did not want this new batch of sightseer correspondents to
go across the river until the next day, so we made arrangements for
them in an Orl6ans hotel and prepared to sweat out the next day, the
seventeenth, when Generals Elster and Macon would perform the
last rites.
The Paris correspondents were briefed the next morning on the com-
plete plans, then Crabill authorized me to take them over. "Tell them
to be careful," he said. "We haven't got the Germans in the cage yet,
and their guns are loaded." One of the feminine war correspondents
was Erika Mann, daughter of the famous Thomas Mann, who had
suffered persecution and endured exile because of Hitler. As we came
upon the leading elements of the column and passed alongside it down
the road, Erika was emotionally moved, began to talk incoherently,
then uttered profanity in the German tongue, and finally as the com-
mand car slowed, she got out. When I could get the jeep stopped and
get back to her, she was less than a yard from the marching Germans,
her hands on her hips, her tongue stuck out, rendering a juicy Bronx
cheer right in their faces. That was the end of the ride, because she was
bundled up and the retinue went back to the Beaugency bridge to
await the rest of the affair. By then, no Germans would be armed, and
it would be a lot safer for her to stick out her tongue.
At 3 P.M. Generalmajor Eric Elstex came up to the bridge in his
battered Citroen, got out, surveyed the scene: the battery of motion
picture cameras, the microphone, and General Macon backed by divi-
sion, corps, Air Force and Ninth Army staff representatives. He prob-
ably did not notice some hasty scurrying at the left of the receiving
130 NEVER A SHOT IN ANGER
group, where I hustled Lieutenant Sam Magill into position with the
staff. He had been sitting on the fence, because nobody had seen
fit to include him. As Magill came up, one of the Ninth Army colonels,
fresh from the States, and seeing his first German soldier, looked about
with some disgust, wondering at the discipline of the Eighty-third In-
fantry Division for having "gate-crashing" lieutenants at a time like
this.
Lt. Col. Jules French placed himself on General Elster's left. "Shall
we go, Herr General?" he asked, quietly.
Elster, pulling down on his tunic and straightening his cap, managed
a smile. "Ja, mein Oberst" he said, and they moved out.
The whir of the cameras was like a hive of bees, and New York
Timesmzn David Anderson wrote that this must have been "the best
covered surrender of this, or any war." What no one knew then was
that the story was being smothered by a trio of airborne divisions the
American Eighty-second, and 101st and the British First being
dropped in the Netherlands at Nijmegen, Eindhoven, and Arnhem. 2
The censor pulled the stop off both events at the same time, and rele-
gated Magill s tremendous exploit to second-string position. But Para-
mount News made a special out of the movie film, labeling it unre-
servedly, "The Strangest Story of the War," and afterward, in the
November 11, 1944, Saturday Evening Post, Collie Small, UP, wrote
of the event and described the setting:
"News of the war south of the Loire drifted into the bar at the
Scribe Hotel in Paris where correspondents gather nightly to plot new
ways of poisoning the censors, who also drink at the Scribe bar, but
from different stools like big-league umpires and ballplayers. The
inevitable happened almost immediately. Army public-relations offi-
cers, who never tire of devising new ways to torture weary correspond-
ents, announced prematurely that 20,000 Germans were surrendering
1 For months, Walter Cronkite, UP, and Bill Boni, AP, had been earmarked
as post-Netherlands liberation bureau chiefs in Amsterdam for their respective
agencies. Neither expected in his wildest dreams that they would become
journalistic "firsts" by going to their jobs in gliders. Cronkite, with William
Wade, INS; Oladwin Hill, AP; Homer Bigart, New York Herald Tribune; Bob
Post, New York Times (who was lost in action) ; and Andy Rooney, Stars and
Stripes, had been original members of the close coterie, "the Writing Sixty-
ninth," or air correspondents who covered the first B-17 raids on Berlin. When
Cronkite and Boni set forth with the 101st and Eighty-second Airborne Divi-
sions on September 17, 1944, it was the thirteenth airborne mission for which
Cronkite had been briefed all the others having been scrubbed.
The Nervy Exploit oj Sam Magill 131
the following morning. Three hours later, they frantically announced it
was all a mistake, and for everyone to stay as far away as possible,
because the Germans might not surrender after all. Unfortunately,
three of us left between announcements " "Unfortunately," Collie
Small wrote, but this exploit of Sam Magill got Small a contract with
the Saturday Evening Post, and tripled his salary, among other things.
Sam Magill, who crossed the English Channel a lieutenant, went
home a lieutenant at war's end. This was partly because Colonel
Crabill said he felt Sam's platoon "was more valuable to the security
of the regiment than another battalion of infantry would have been,
and I never considered him replaceable in that job." Once, much later,
he was offered a captaincy if he would leave the platoon, but he
refused, saying he would see the "boys" through to the end of the war,
which he did. The nervy exploit of Magill, who violated orders, pene-
trated into German-held territory a hundred miles, and brought off
the first big PW bag for the Ninth Army, finally was put on orders for
the Legion of Merit eleven months after the incident. The war was
over, and he was about to go home with the Ninety-ninth Infantry
Division. They didn't give him the ribbon in the Scribe bar, or even in
a ceremony. He had to go to a Ninety-ninth Division supply room
and draw it.