Bob Galloway, the Battle of the Bulge, and the 99th Infantry Division

BOB GALLOWAY, THE BATTLE OF THE BULGE,

AND THE 99TH INFANTRY DIVISION

Copyright 2001 by Tom McMullen

The 99th Division was in the thick of the fighting 1) in the Battle of the Bulge, 2) holding onto the Bridge at Remagen, and 3) during the final drive into Germany. Sgt. Bob Galloway, a medic from Bloomington, Indiana, was a part of all this action.

From Mississippi to Belgium

The 99th Infantry Division (Div.) was activated Nov. 15, 1942, at Camp Van Dorn, Mississippi. Bob Galloway had graduated from Bloomington High School and had started attending Indiana University when he was drafted. When he and the others arrived in early December, the picture they viewed was far from rosy. Camp Van Dorn, hastily built as the Army mushroomed in every direction, was a tar paper shanty town sprawled across the red mud of southern Mississippi. Most men of the division, like Bob, came from northern states. They not only faced basic training, but one of the most miserable winters in years. Both service clubs burned down by Christmas; there was only one small theater for 20,000 men. Any town of more than two thousand population was fifty miles distant; besides, there were no busses. The men had to help dig ditches to drain the camp, build walks, paint signs and ready the camp for training, which began Jan. 4, 1943.

The early spring produced more than green grass and blue skies. Men of the 99th began to look like soldiers. They felt the bond from training together extensively. Unit cohesion developed. Originally planned as a Pennsylvania outfit, the 99th had taken its checkerboard insignia from the city of Pittsburgh's coat of arms, which was William Pitt's coat of arms.

Meanwhile, the division underwent the various growing pains of an outfit destined for combat. Prior to its departure for Louisiana Maneuvers in the fall of 1943, Gen. Lauer assumed command.

After giving a good account of itself during maneuvers, the 99th moved to Camp Maxey, six miles north of Paris, TX, and within weekend range of Dallas. Here, Checkerboarders spent nearly a year in putting on the final polish. Brig. Gen. Hugh T. Mayberry, Peekskill, NY, who organized and served as first commandant of the Camp Hood Tank Destroyer School, joined the 99th as assistant division commander in February 1944.

The following month division strength was boosted by the arrival of more than three thousand men released by the Army Specialized Training Program. These men trained as a provisional regiment until absorbed by the 99th three months later in time to take part in the hasty box-building program that began in August.

The division entrained for Camp Miles Standish near Boston the second week in September. After two weeks of final preparations, Checkerboarders boarded ships including the Army transport, George W. Goethals; the ex-freighter, Explorer; and the one-time luxury liner,Argentina, and sailed for England at 2100 hours on Sept. 29. The trip took less than a dozen days and Bob was seasick for all but one of them. Joseph Coco of Syracuse, NY was in even worse shape, and was hospitalized. Bob saw no U-boat activity, only convoy ships as far as he could see. Arriving at a number of English ports (Bob at Plymouth), the division assembled at Dorsetshire near the city of Forchester. Three weeks were spent in hikes, calisthenics, and sports. Charlie Cook broke his ankle playing football. Meantime, the job of final staging with its myriad supply problems and last-minute checks was carried on. Bob remembers a lot of time spent practicing climbing down nets into Higgins boats.

Forty-eight hour passes, most of them to London, but some to points as far as Scotland, were the rule rather than the exception. There were company and battalion parties at which English girls enjoyed the fresh doughnuts and hot chocolate. Then, starting on a cold night, Nov. 1, 1944, the division left for France. After a smooth trip, Bob's unit landed on 3 Nov.

The Checkerboard Division saw war's ravages the first time at Le Havre, France, where it landed on D plus five months, between Nov. 3 and 7. The voyage from Southampton was made in various types of crafts. Bob was in his truck in a LCT. They needed a bulldozer to make a road through the ruins. Then they drove all night, arriving at an apple orchard near St. Lucien on the 4th.

Everybody who could drove trucks and jeeps during the motor march across northwestern France and southern Belgium. Destination was Aubel, a small farm town north of Verviers in the easternmost portion of Belgium near the Liege-Aachen Military Highway No. 3. Here Bob saw the first of many buzz bombs while bivouacked in a woods. It was cold and rainy.

There were no delays now. With little sleep and few hot meals, elements of the division moved south from the assembly area into the line. They were to relieve the 5th Armored Division. Names like Monschau, Elsenborn and Honsfeld meant little to the Checkerboarders in those first few days. Bob's unit was at Kolt-Rherberg and then Elsenborn. But all knew, as they marched into the Ardennes, that the biggest chapter in their lives was about to be written. They made up for the loss of good food by going after every chicken and egg in the area. The medics started receiving their first bad casualties - from mines and self-inflicted wounds.

99 Days with the Fighting 99th

Bob's outfit was the Company "C," 324 Medical Battalion of the 99th Division. As part of V Corps, the 99th was alerted for the attack Dec. 12, 1944, and doughs moved out at 0830 the following morning. In deep snow, 1st and 2nd Bns., 395th, and 2nd and 3rd Bns., 393rd, swung northeast to seize objectives in the outer belt of the Siegfried Line. These new positions were strengthened immediately despite intense enemy mortar and artillery fire. It was give and take the next two days as the Germans' stubborn pillbox defenses slowed the progress. The medical battalion went first to Rockerath, and then moved on to Krinkelt, where there was more room.

It was a long way from the hot training grounds of the deep south to the misty, snow-hung Ardennes Forest, smack up against Hitler's vaunted Siegfried Line. And it had taken some time, in November and early December, for 99th doughs to become accustomed to the freezing cold of the foxholes and the unmerciful whine of German artillery. There had been little action in this sector for some time and it was a good spot for a new division to get used to burp guns, snipers and the sounds of different shells. But, as an active front goes, there was little fighting. Occasionally, a pillbox was cleaned out and frequent patrols probed deep into the Siegfried Line. This was a quiet, strange sort of warfare.

Dec. 16, 1944: All hell broke loose!

With lightening speed and savage fury, Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt's forces rolled forward on the heels of a pulverizing artillery barrage. They attacked along an eighty-mile front with the 5th Panzer, 6th Panzer, and the 7th Armies. But the Germans made a mistake that would slow them down. The infantry led the way for the tanks. It should have been the other way around. Nevertheless, American outposts and front-line companies reeled under the blow. The final effort of the Nazi war machine was under way in the chilly mist and fog that grounded Allied planes for days.

Striking in the same place where in 1940 the French and British forces had been driven to defeat, the Germans knew every road and hillock of the countryside before them. But the road net was not extensive enough to maintain the offensive, and this, too, would work against the Nazi plan timetable as traffic jams on both sides occurred.

Von Runstedt was opposed to Hitler's overly ambitious plan, but he carried it out. Behind the 99th was the highway to Eupen; paratroopers would drop there in strength. Panzers would follow SS troops, hook up with paratroopers, and strike for Liege before the Americans could shift their forces. Hitler's overall goal was Antwerp which, if achieved, would divide the British, Canadian, and 9th U.S. Armies from the rest of the Americans. The hoped-for political goal was to create dissension among the allies.

The 106th was on the right flank of the 99th and both divisions had trained together stateside. The brunt of the German attack fell on the newly-arrived 106th, which did not even have its artillery set up. The men held out as long as possible, but after two days, the 106th was overrun and the 99th had to retreat and turn to keep from being flanked. The 99th was a little more prepared than the 106th. Word had been passed down to the troops before the attack that there was increased enemy activity. They at least knew something was up and this helped them hold the north shoulder of the bulge.

The initial weight of the attack against the 99th fell on its 393rd Inf., holding the center, and on 1st Battalion (Bn.) 394th, maintaining the right of the division line. The blow was parried but the Germans came on. Each successive thrust was beaten off with greater difficulty. As platoons, companies and battalions faced the terrifying prospect of being cut off and hacked to pieces, many Checkerboarder heroes stepped forward.

When the ring of German steel tightened around Company (Co.) C, 393rd, a makeshift relief of cooks, KPs, and Anti-Tank Co.'s mine platoon was sent to the rescue. En route, artillery blasted them from their vehicles, pinned them flat in the snow only 200 yards from their goal. Casualties mounted. It was time for inspired action or the situation was hopeless. Lt. Harry Parker, Johnson, VT, leader of the relief squad, rose to his feet. "Hell, there's no use lying here and getting killed," he said. As the lieutenant advanced, every man moved forward, although no order was given. Bayonets were fixed. Men broke into a run, yelled as they ran.

It was a wild, screaming bayonet charge by desperate men. German infantrymen in the woods ahead couldn't see what was coming, but they could hear it. They fled in the opposite direction. The relief squad succeeded in saving what was left of Co. C as well as reestablishing a line from the company Command Post (CP) to the platoons.

Still, the German attacks spread, beating with fury all along the line. Crack ski troops glided silently over the snow in one sector to be cut down by machine gun crossfire. Half a Nazi company lay dead in the drifts. The Volksgrenadiers charged on, but they had not been trained to fight on the offensive. Some were swatted down like flies; others emptied their burp guns and surrendered. By nightfall, every available man in the division was on the line - a line that held.

Before the next morning, panzers were on the rampage in the 394th's area - the same panzers that had been held up eighteen hours by that regiment's intelligence and reconnaissance (I & R) platoon. Under 1st Lt. Lyle J. Bouck, Jr., St. Louis, the platoon had fought to the last man in staving off the furious attack astride the Lanzerath/Losheim road. Clerks dropped their portables and grabbed M-1s when these tanks roared up from Losheim and Lanzerath into towns that were rest areas only a few days before.

At Losheimergraben railroad station Capt. Neil Brown's Company L, 394th Infantry, held through the day. Lt. Dewey Plankers and his rifle platoon beat off attacks from what should have been an overwhelming force. At one point, when a Tiger tank appeared, Plankers ran up to it and launched an antitank grenade up the bore of the cannon before it could fire. These, and scores of unrecorded actions, were taken independently, as communications between platoons was poor, between companies and regimental headquarters nonexistent. It was a soldier's fight, with the command elements a minimal influence. A frenzied battle raged at Bullingen where the 801st TD Bn. succeeded in piling up German vehicles and foxing the panzers into bypassing the town temporarily.

S/Sgt. Elmer E. Kenner, Sanger, CA, 393rd Unit Personnel Section clerk, was so busy firing at Mark Vs that he was left behind when the remainder of his section, alternately loading service records and firing at Germans, pulled out. Kenner then teamed up with two doughs and the trio, blazing away with a bazooka, knocked out three tanks before rejoining a division unit.

While German infantry and armor roared ahead to the Elsenborn-Eupen road where they were to join forces with their paratroopers, Nazis cut off and surrounded the 1st Bns. of both the 393rd and 394th Inf. Regts. The 324th Engr. Bn. was split, nearly trapped. Although most of the artillery planes got off the ground, pilots underwent fire from a German tank at one end of the field. S/Sgt. Richard H. Byers, Cleveland, 371st FA Bn., whisked his artillery survey section out the back door of a house as German soldiers entered the front.

Green Troops Build A Stone Wall

But what was happening didn't make sense to the Germans. They slugged this green division unmercifully, yet it still jabbed back. Cut off and surrounded in part, many of these newcomers to battle were fighting like veterans, but the going was bitter. By Sunday night, Dec. 17, Germans were using every trick in the book to make their last-stand offensive click. English-speaking enemy donned U.S. uniforms and rode in captured vehicles. Division doughs couldn't be sure who was in the next foxhole. In the German rear, staff cars and ammunition trucks carried large red crosses to disguise them as ambulances.

There were also planned atrocities. The worst one was the murder of eighty-six POWs of the 7th Armored Div. on Dec. 17th near Malmedy. Hitler had ordered "a wave of terror and fright and that no human inhibitions should be shown." Elements of Lt. Col. Jocahim Peiper's SS command had committed the "Malmedy Massacre." In the first four days of the battle, Peiper's men murdered approximately 350 American POWs and 100 unarmed Belgian civilians. Word of this activity spread surprisingly fast. American soldiers started to retaliate in kind, especially against SS prisoners.

Bob and his medic team were surrounded for twenty-four hours. Then the engineers cut a road through the woods. The 99th QM Co. entered the battle at Krinkelt when it sent a convoy of trucks into the town to evacuate the wounded. At Elsenborn, the company suddenly found itself in a hot spot during an air raid. While some members of the unit issued clothing over truck tailgates, others manned the ring-mounted machine guns on the front of the 6-x-6s and poured a steady stream of lead into German planes.

The medics had 200 patients in a commercial building. The building had a big plate glass window that was never hit in spite of all the shooting going on. Bob credits this to God's intervention. A hit on that window would have further injured many men. It was past time to evacuate. They took the walking wounded and left two volunteer medics. Those on stretchers tried to get up and walk rather than be captured. The aid station had become an outpost and needed to evacuate. A 2nd Lt. came by, pulled out his 45 pistol and pointed it at the lead driver of a column of trucks, who stopped. They loaded up everyone that way. Cpl. Olie Williams was hit. So was T/Sgt. Tucker who was the last to get on when a mortar hit him. They stopped and threw him on board. Most of the equipment was left behind. They moved to a big dairy barn near Sourbrodt. They reissued what equipment they had and set up shop.

At the extreme northern tip of the line, 3rd Bn., 395th, gave such an account of itself between Saturday and Monday that it was awarded the Distinguished Unit Badge. The citation read:

"During the German offensive in the Ardennes, the Third Battalion, 395th Infantry, was assigned the mission of holding the Monschau-Eupen-Liege Road. For four successive days the battalion held this sector against combined German tank and infantry attacks, launched with fanatical determination and supported by heavy artillery. No reserves were available . . . and the situation was desperate. On at least six different occasions the battalion was forced to place artillery concentrations dangerously close to its own positions in order to repulse penetrations and restore its lines . . .

The enemy artillery was so intense that communications were generally out. The men carried out missions without orders when their positions were penetrated or infiltrated. They killed Germans coming at them from the front, flanks and rear. Outnumbered five to one, they inflicted casualties in the ratio of 18 to one. With ammunition supplies dwindling rapidly, the men obtained German weapons and utilized ammunition obtained from casualties to drive off the persistent foe. Despite fatigue, constant enemy shelling, and ever-increasing enemy pressure, the Third Battalion guarded a 6000-yard front and destroyed 75 percent of three German infantry regiments."

Throughout the division, this extraordinary record was duplicated in spirit and to a degree in fact. South of the 395th, two companies of the 324th Engineers, under Lt. Col. Justice R. Neale, Oberlin, KS, were cut off. Sunday night alone, these companies knocked out sixteen self-propelled guns and killed 400 Germans. Then they built a road back to Elsenborn and pulled marooned 99th vehicles out of the snow with their "cats."

The 394th fought on the south flank where it battled strong Nazi patrols and tanks. When his unit was pinned down by machine gun fire from a roundhouse, T/Sgt. Aavino Travellini, Mt. Shasta, CA, picked up a bazooka and crawled towards the German gun. His first bazooka shell silenced the enemy fire. When some of the roundhouse occupants fled, the sergeant dropped them with his M-1. Travellini duplicated the procedure four times, neutralizing the strong-point.

First Bn., 394th, commanded by Lt. Col. Robert H. Douglas, Swarthmore, PA, also received the Distinguished Unit Badge. The citation read:

"The Germans' Ardennes offensive was spearheaded directly at First Battalion, 394th Infantry Regiment, which was defending a front of 3500 yards . . . The enemy launched its initial attack against the First Battalion with an unprecedented artillery concentration lasting approximately two hours, followed by an attack of six battalions of infantry, supported by tanks, dive bombers, flame throwers and rockets. For two days and nights the battalion was under intense small arms fire and continuous artillery concentration, with little food and water . . . this battalion . . . repeatedly beat back the superior numbers of the enemy forces . . . Many times the men rose out of their foxholes to meet the enemy in fierce hand-to-hand combat . . . By its tenacious stand, First Battalion prevented the enemy from penetrating the right flank of an adjacent division, and permitted other friendly forces to reinforce the sector . . . "

When the panzers hit Krinkelt, the 393rd's communications were cut off. Lt. Col. Thomas E. Griffin, Brooklyn, regimental executive officer drove to a high terrain point as shells fell on all sides and relayed messages with his radio until an enemy tank drove him away.

Fresh infantry from rest camps and A/T outfits arrived Sunday evening, Dec. 17. Artillery reinforcements pulled in to back up the division's 370th, 371st, 372nd and 924th FA Bns. Time was running out for the Germans as panzers were shoved from Krinkelt and Bullingen.

The 99th drew back to form a defense line east of Elsenborn, along a ridge. The men arrived there exhausted, but dug in immediately. It was a good thing. For the next few days, the enemy kept up his terrific artillery spree. But the new line held fast and every German infantry attack was repulsed. All around the Elsenborn corner, Nazis could count the cost of a futile effort. More than four thousand enemy were dead; some sixty tanks and self-propelled guns knocked out. Checkerboard doughs, even when their lines were pierced, had kept on slugging, died on their guns, had neither given way nor given up. After five days and nights of hell, the Germans, tired of beating their heads against the 99th's stone wall, turned south.

Two months later, when the division transferred to VII Corps, Maj. Gen. C.R. Huebner, V Corps Commander wrote Gen. Lauer:

"The 99th Infantry Division arrived in this theater without previous combat experience early in November 1944. It . . . was committed to the attack on Dec. 12 . . . Early on the morning of Dec. 16, the German Sixth Panzer Army launched its now historic counteroffensive which struck your command in the direction of Losheim and Honsfeld. This armored spearhead cut across the rear of your division zone with full momentum. During the next several days, notwithstanding extremely heavy losses in men and equipment, the 99th Infantry Division redisposed itself and . . . succeeded in establishing a line east of Elsenborn. Despite numerous hostile attempts to break through its lines, the 99th Infantry Division continued to hold this position until it was able to pass to the offensive. On Dec. 18, the 3rd Battalion of the 395th Infantry gave a magnificent account of itself in an extremely heavy action against the enemy in the Hofen area and was the main factor in stopping the hostile effort to penetrate the lines of the V Corps in the direction of Monschau . . .

The 99th Infantry Division received its baptism of fire in the most bitterly contested battle that has been fought since the current campaign on the European continent began . . . Your organization gave ample proof of the fact that it is a good hard fighting division and one in which you and each and every member of your command can be justly proud . . . "

German prisoners volunteered praise of the 99th's effective work. A Nazi lieutenant colonel said the division was the best American outfit he ever had faced. At the 99th's POW cage in Linz, a German lieutenant asked his interrogator the name of the "elite" American unit that had defended Hofen during the Battle of the Bulge.

This regiment, the 395th, had allowed his company to come within nine feet of its lines before opening up with such terrific small arms and machine gun fire that the Germans couldn't even remove their dead and wounded in their rapid retreat.

After a quiet Christmas, Bob's outfit left the barn and set up tents in the deep snow northwest of Sourbrodt. Bob helped put up a big hospital tent and was setting up a stove pipe when he heard a buzz bomb coming. He slid down from the tent top and got face down on the ground, because they had not yet dug slit trenches. Also, he witnessed his first aerial combat as a P-51 chased a German fighter overhead. The weather had cleared and Allied planes were taking a toll on the German forces.

The 99th Drives on to Fatherland

After the fury of the first week of the breakthrough, men of the 99th hugged their snow-filled foxholes in the open land before Elsenborn, repulsing weakening German thrusts until the division switched to the offensive in late January. Company "C" moved around the area, but never found warm quarters. Frostbite became a formidable enemy.

Limited patrolling, then more and more aggressive forays into the enemy-held woods beyond Elsenborn revealed a thinning Nazi line and signs of withdrawal. The Bulge was becoming a complete bust. Constantly hammered by artillery and bombings, the Bulge was flattened out until it ran parallel to the line so valiantly held by the 99th in front of Elsenborn.

Reinforced by new men from training centers in the States, the 99th received the order to advance at 0300, Jan. 30. In a concerted attack with divisions on either flank, Checkerboarders moved out through hip-deep snow for the Monschau Forest. Their mission: to recover the ground they had so bitterly contested the month previous.

So fast were Germans pulling out of some sectors that a Co. M, 394th, machine gun squad under Sgt. Richard Daugherty, Curwensville, PA, advanced 8,000 yards through waist-deep snow and took its objective without ever spotting the enemy. Daugherty's squad carried a gun, tripod, and tool kit weighing a total of 160 pounds but didn't fire a shot.

It wasn't all that easy. The 393rd, moving along a draw towards Krinkelt and then swinging north into the woods, was caught and pinned down by rear guard action of retreating Germans. Only through sheer guts, advancing through murderous small arms fire, did the regiment reach the edge of the woods and clean out the Nazis. Krinkelt itself lay in ruins with dead soldiers and cows lying around. Bob's unit went to the school house where they had hastily left their equipment, but it was gone.

Casualties were still coming in faster than the medics could handle. The pressure on the front was so great that some shot themselves to get out of it. A shell-shocked soldier would light a cigarette, put it in his mouth, and let it burn down so far as to burn his lips.

In early February 1945, the division wheeled across the country through the bitterly-remembered towns of Wirtzfeld, Rocherath, and Bullingen. CPs were set up again. Then, Checkerboarders ripped anew into the Siegfried Line, past Losheim and Hollerath, and through the first belt of pillboxes to points in advance of their past drives. During a lull some of the medics went up to see pillboxes for themselves. Battle Babies probed inner defenses when, after three months of continuous action, the 99th was relieved by the 69th Inf. Div., Feb. 13, 1945.

By the last week in February, all three regiments had arrived at Aubel, which the division previously used as its assembly point before going into combat in November. It was a country of long, soft ridges, sloping pastures, and wide valleys. The sun was shining and the grass in the apple orchards already green when the soldiers moved in to rest.

During the ten days the 99th stayed in the area, it engaged in mild doses of training, principally for the benefit of the reinforcements, and in rehabilitation of equipment. Showers, haircuts, movies and food - pies baked by Belgian farm wives, and eggs "liberated" from farmhouse coops, featured the stay. Also, there were formations for awards presentations. Meanwhile, the 799th Ord. Bn. had the opportunity to give division vehicles and weapons their first thorough checkup. The pass percentage was increased and men went to the U.K., Paris, Brussels and the VII Corps "Jayhawk" Rest Camp at Verviers.

"Battle Babies" (so dubbed by U.P. War Correspondent John McDermott) knew that big things were ahead and when the order came, Feb. 27, to move out, they were rested, ready.

Checkerboarders Span the Rhine

Since the fall of Aachen, there had been no impressive gains on the Western Front. Soldiers under Gen. Hodges sensed that First Army was winding up for a Sunday punch, but there was no assurance that it would smash open the Siegfried Line or that Germany would not defend every inch of ground, as Goebbels had promised, to the last man.

There still was little indication of a walkway when the jump across the Roer River was made. The spearheading 3rd Armd. Div. threw a bridge across the Erft Canal near Bergheim, whose ancient gates stand astride the road to Cologne. Then the 395th took over the job of enlarging the bridgehead. When it had finished clearing the town and the woods, up went the sign: "You are now entering Bergheim, courtesy of the 395th Infantry Regiment." The pace picked up to give the Germans no rest. The medics left seventeen litter bearers behind at Bergheim, and then sent vehicles back later for them. Casualties were very heavy. 1st Sgt. Lepczyk was evacuated due to frozen feet. In one incident, a doctor pointed to a patient with a gunshot or shrapnel wound and put him in the "loser" group. Bob said to Tucker, "Can't we help this guy?" Tucker obtained plasma and had trouble finding a vein, but succeeded, and the patient was stabilized and lived. After a stay at a Baron's castle, they moved so fast, day and night, that one medic cracked under the pressure.

Meanwhile, the 393rd and 394th bridged the Erft further downstream, all set to battle their way to the Rhine where it curves northwest from Cologne to Dusseldorf. Goebbels' "last man" also was on the run for the Rhine, and he had a pretty good head start.

The 393rd, on the division left flank, swung in a 20-mile arc toward Dusseldorf, spearheaded by Task Force Lueders, a specially designed armored unit commanded by Capt. Roy C. Jeuders, Cincinnati, 99th Recon Troop, which included elements of the 786th Tank Bn. and the 629th TD Bn.

As the task force whipped northeast toward the Rhine, Sgt. Cliff "The Chief" Etsitty, Mexican Springs, NM, herded a column of prisoners as he rode on the back of a tank. The sergeant, a veteran of Attu and a member of 2nd Bn., 394th, was without a weapon. He had lost his rifle when an artillery shell landed near the tank and blasted off the other doughs riding on the armor. Because the tank was buttoned up, Etsitty couldn't inform tankers he was unarmed.

Almost before doughs could catch their breath, they had staked out a claim on the Rhine's west bank at Grimlinghausen. Capt. Felix Salmaggi's Co. K, 393rd, filled a bottle with Rhine water and sent it to Gen. Lauer as a memento of his return after twenty years to this world-famed and war-famed river.

It wasn't easy pickings. The 394th, in the center, was slowed up in the woods below Gohr while the 395th had a stiff scrap before taking Delrath. Artillery changed the Germans' mind about defending the town and the regiments rolled through the ruins.

It was on the Rhine that the big guns of Lt. Col. John R. Brindley's 370th FA Bn., with 1st Lt. Percy J. Pace directing fire, caught two German ferries and a houseboat, sinking the craft for the division's biggest "naval" victory.

Checkerboarders were the first infantry division in First Army to reach the Rhine. They moved so fast that when a phone rang at a coal briquette factory at Neurath with the home office at Dusseldorf calling to find out where the Americans were, a lineman from the 99th Div. Sig. Co. offered first hand information. Beer still was on tap where division headquarters set up its mess at a gasthaus. Bob's unit found a cellar with plenty of wine in it. The Battle Babies approached so fast that Germans had time to plant only a dozen mines between the Erft Canal and the Rhine. Then came a rare opportunity and commanders moved to take advantage of it. Due to a series of circumstances, the Americans seized the railroad bridge over the Rhine, at the village of Remagen.

The night was wet and miserable as doughs climbed on trucks and headed southeast. When they reached the hills above Remagen, they could sense history was being made nearby, and that an ordeal was ahead. For the details on the bridge's capture, see "George Rogers and the Bridge at Remagen." The 99th's job would be to hold the bridge.

The crossing of the Ludendorff Bridge was a nightmare. Every 99th soldier who hiked or rode across this spidery steel framework with its squat brownish towers long will remember this operation. Underfoot were but a few unsteady planks and rails; overhead, nothing. Doughs felt naked in the sights of enemy guns.

First Sgt. Vernon A. Selters, South San Francisco, Co. L, 393rd, said: "The closer we got to the bridge the more scared I got. I wanted to run across but couldn't. The captain ahead of me had to walk, and I had to walk, and every man behind me had to walk. I'd heard of foxhole religion. Well, I believe that day I had bridgehead religion." This applies to Bob, too, when his turn came to cross at 1600 hours on Mar. 11. He noted that there was plenty of air activity at that time as the Germans were frantically trying to destroy the bridge. Bob remembers that a large railroad gun also was firing on them. An artillery man told him they were going to get it. Later they unleashed a huge bombardment that did silence the gun. It was Saturday, March 10, the fourth day of the bridgehead drive, when the 394th led off across the river to relieve the 9th Inf. Div. just south of Linz. Division Command Post was set up the next day at the Gebrueder Blumenthal winery at Linz. Meanwhile, the 393rd took up the left flank of the division zone and hurled back two counterattack within a half hour. The 395th was held in Corps reserve.

Besides caring for the division's casualties at Linz, the 324th Med. Bn. furnished medical supplies and equipment for several hospitals filled with German soldiers and civilians. They watched thousands of German prisoners move through the POW cage across the street. They had access to a large amount of wine from a nearby distillery.

At some point in the fighting, Bob remembers, medics with a patrol turned in their medic cards and took rifles. Another time, a new medic was shot, fixed up, returned, went out, was shot again while saving a guy. He had two days of combat and received two Purple Hearts and a Silver Star. In another instance, a medic ran out to an unmanned machine gun mounted on a truck to shoot at a plane strafing them. The aircraft came right down the road, creating a head-on duel that the medic won. A colonel said he wanted to reward such bravery, but couldn't since the soldier was a medic.

As tired Battle Babies plunged on into the hills, they could well recall the perilous hours of forcing a foothold on the east bank of the majestic Rhine, as no invader had done since Napoleon's white-gaitered grenadiers. It had been a harrowing, frightening experience.

In the week that followed, the 99th played a vital part in expanding the bridgehead from a precarious grasp to a broad, firm grip on Festung Germania. The 394th drove south beyond Honningen. Col. James K. Woolnough's 393rd pushed east to the Wied River over the toughest terrain it ever had encountered. In advancing two miles, the regiment covered four miles uphill, another three miles down. The 324th medical battalion set up for a day in a church at Hahen. There Hendricks received a purple heart. Then they were on the move again with the 7th Armored Div., which had moved into their area. When they went through Rossbach, the town was on fire, but they still found some cognac and wine. At Vebshide, Cesar Pacheco of Brownsville, Texas, hit a mine.

The Wied was no bed of roses either. By midnight, March 22, the three regiments were abreast and after Brig. Gen. Frederick H. Black's artillery unleashed a thirty-minute barrage, doughs slid down cliffs and waded the hip-deep river. Taking a brief but heavy shelling as they sloshed up the east bank toward their first objectives, the regiments gained momentum. By dawn, these same Battle Babies reached the Cologne-Frankfurt superhighway. With this last ribbon cut, the prize package of the inner Reich was ripped wide open. Bob's unit crossed the Autobahn at Oberhonnfel on March 27th. At Mogendorel, Bob slept in a cellar full of potatoes. Wondering why there were so many, he dug down and found a huge cache of wine. He started to hand it out to the troops going by until the Captain put it off limits because there was so much. The next day at Hintermillgen, they caught a woman sniper.

"Battle Babies" now Combat Veterans

In 99 days, the 99th Division had learned much and done plenty. It was a green outfit when the last iron-spiked thrust of the Wehrmacht caught it smartly on the chin in Belgium. But even after von Rundstedt's panzers were blasted, the world still wondered when the big crackup would come - the fatal blow to Nazi might and morale.

It was the Rhine crossing that broke the German back; in this important action the 99th took effective part. On March 24, 1945 - 99 days older and wiser - the Battle Babies were seasoned fighting men who saw before them the demoralized, shriveled forces of their enemy running away.

Disappointed because it wasn't included in the drive to Berlin, the division suddenly faced west and was assigned the important job of helping to liquidate the Ruhr pocket. Spearheaded by the 7th Armd. Div., the regiments roared across the province of Hesse-Nassau, through Wetzlar and Giessen.

Between 25,000 and 150,000 Germans were cut off in the Ruhr pocket. No one bothered to count the number of steep-wooded hills and valleys the Checkerboarders would have to travel to sew them up. Soldiers prayed with Lt. Col. Henry B. Koon, Columbia, SC, Division Chaplain, at services in Krofdorf.

The 99th's sector in the Ruhr drive followed the twisting Eder River towards its source in the Rothaargebirge (Red Hair Mountains), and wound down the north slope along the Lenne River to the Ruhr. When time permitted, using grenades instead of Royal Coachmen, fish lovers caught trout for breakfast. At Arfeld, on the Eder, Pfc. Priel took off his clothes and dove into the cold water to retrieve the fish.

At Berleberg, Bob's unit came upon a big art gallery, which was put Off Limits, but they were able to stay at a classy hotel. This was April 7th and 8th. The next day at Lenne, Eddie Epstein, a Jew from Brooklyn, and Ben Herb of New York City, were hit by a direct burst from an antiaircraft gun being used against infantry.

But mostly, it was steady day and night fighting through the mountains; rugged terrain added to the tough going. Because Germans chose to do most of their fighting in towns and on every hillside, doughs had to head straight up fir-clad hills and across crooked ridges. Air and artillery put the "convincer" on such villages as Oberhundem, Altendorf and Bracht before infantry went in to mop up. At Bemenhol, on April 12, Bob's outfit encountered a large German convoy of prisoners.

The division now set its sights northwest on Iserlohn, largest Ruhr city in the 99th's path. When 7th Armd. right-hooked the middle of Field Marshal Model's Army Group B, the Battle Babies moved on as fast as they could march.

By April 13, prisoner-of-war (POW) counts doubled; the Nazi cave-in was underway. More than twelve hundred POWs were taken that day followed by a 2315 count on Saturday, 9043 more Sunday and a staggering total of 23,884 on Monday. Overwhelming loads of Germans, many driving their own vehicles, including horse-drawn carts, converged on the POW field at Sundwig, outside Iserlohn.

In four days, the division had corralled and processed 36,453 Germans. Monday's catch included three lieutenant generals, eight major generals and a landlocked rear admiral. The famed 130th Panzer Lehr Div., credited with the finest soldiers, equipment and highest morale of any unit in the pocket, surrendered intact to the 393rd. The roundup also included the 22nd AA Div. (Luftwaffe), the 338th Volksgrenadier Div. and the 3rd Panzer Grenadier Div., an old enemy from the breakthrough days.

Iserlohn gave up at noon, April 16, when a battery of 128mm "Jagdtiger" self-propelled guns surrendered to Lt. Col. Robert L. Kriz, 2nd Bn. CO, 394th. Unlike other last-ditch artillery units, the "Jagdtigers" still had plenty of ammunition left.

At Hemer, the 99th and 7th Armd. set free more than 20,000 Soviet and Polish POWs, who had gone without food for a week. In a building sheltering the sickest Red troops, Lt. Col. K.T. Miller, Detroit, Division Surgeon, found them three to a bed while two German soldiers shared a room. Col. Miller immediately corrected the situation, much to the dismay of the Nazis.

As the Battle of the Ruhr ended, before the division could collect all its prisoners, the 99th was shifted to the farmlands of Bavaria to smother more German resistance. Checkerboarders now came under Gen. George S. Patton's Third Army, leaving Gen. Hodges, under whom the division had trained and maneuvered in Louisiana in 1943, held the shoulder of the Belgian Bulge in 1944 and crossed the Rhine in 1945.

After a long convoy trip, the 99th entered the line again April 21 near Schwabach, with the Austrian border and Salzburg as its objectives. With the 86th Inf. Div. on its right and the 14th Armd. Div. on its left, the 99th was the veteran division in III Corps.

Now came the fast drive across such barriers as the Altmuhl River, where the 99th forced a crossing against stiff resistance. Third Bn., 395th, waded the neck-deep river while 2nd Bn., 394th, held the enemy's attention on the opposite bank. Doughs forced another breakthrough and a fast drive across the Ludwig Canal down to the Danube. German towns hung out white flags before the Americans got there.

As the division neared the Danube, the end of World War II in Europe was near. Far to the north, Red troops had joined hands with the Americans; Berlin was being pounded. To the south lay Munich, and Alpine Berchtesgaden, the heart and home of National Socialism. Time means nothing to the infantry, but men of the 99th were certain time was running out fast for the "Supermen."

Fight and drive, both day and night. Give no rest for the Germans, but that meant no rest for the 99th. The Nazis were off-balance and they wanted to keep them that way. Nevertheless, casualties were heavy. Fox Company took a beating trying to cross the Danube. Landshut was captured - but not without a fight. Moosburg, another big POW camp with 40,000 Americans, was cleared. Bob was first into the Moosburg POW Camp. The POWs asked for newspapers, as they were being given food. On to the Isar River . . . Keep hammering . . . across the Isar . . . Clean up the area and on to the Inn and the Austrian border.

Then it came. "Halt in place!"

The war was finally over. The 99th had lost 1,130 men killed, 3,954 wounded, 421 missing, and 598 captured for a total of 6,103 battle casualties. Non-battle casualties were 5,884 for a grand total of 11,987 casualties.

After occupation duty, Bob got out of the Army, returned to Bloomington, married Louise, settled down, and had a daughter, Carrie.

Several years ago, a soldier sought out Bob to thank him for saving his life in WWII - Bob didn't remember him. The memories of those trying days are fading. Perhaps it is just as well. A soldier might see his buddy get hit, but he had to move on. However, the medics worked on that buddy along with a great many others. They saw the carnage of war up close and personal, day in and day out. How does one cope? Not remembering is one way. Another is not to mention it. Bob didn't talk much about these things until a few years ago, as Louise was dying. He told me a few things about himself as we discuseed WWII in general, and when we left, his son-in-law, Butch Winkel, told me that this was the most he had ever spoken about the war. Bob later found a company history, which brought back a few more memories. This brief company history had to omit a lot of information, but it seems to note every time wine was "liberated." That may have been another way to cope.

Bob has since remarried - Eddie is her name. His health is good. He enjoys fishing with Butch and playing with his grandson Kyle. I wish the best for Bob.

References

Most of the information in this article is edited from "Battle Babies" The Story of the 99th Infantry Division, a booklet produced at the end of WWII by the Information and Education Division, European Theater of Operations, United States of America.. The stories in it reflect the American attitude at the end of the war and the desire to tell the story of the ground fighting. Of course, it does not have the approach a historian would make in telling the same story. One paragraph is from Ambrose'e Citizen Soldiers.