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Text: Captain Frederic E. Pamp Jr. Public Relations Officer

Reproduction: 62d Engr Topo Co.

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The drawings reproduced here are from watercolors and sketches by T/4 Henry J. MacMillan, who brilliantly illustrated much of the Corps'progre8& beeidee carrying out hie duties in the Corps Engineer Section.
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The photographs are by official U. S. Army Signal Corps Photographers.

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MAJOR GENERAL WILLIS D. CRITTENBERGER 20 August 1942 to 12 February 1944

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MAJOR GENERAL CHARLES H. CORLETT 10 March 1944

to 18 November 1944

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LIEUTENANTGENERAL RAYMOND S. McLAIN

Corps Commander

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XIXCORPS GENERAL STAFF

CHIEF OF STAFF

Brigadier General Hamilton E. Maguire

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DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF (Colonel Carl T. Jones) Colonel George G. Elms CORPS ARTILLERY COMMANDER Brigadier General George D. Shea

A C of S G-l Colonel Louis LeR. Martin

A C of S G-2
Colonel Washington Platt

A C of S G-3. (Colonel Gustavus W. West) Colonel George B. Sloan

A C of S G-4
(Colonel Kevin O'Shea) Colonel James E. Boush
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A C of S G-5 (Colonel Terrill E. Price) Lt Colonel Herbert M. Bosch

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XIXCORPS SPECIALSTAFF

ANTI-AIRCRAFT OFFICER (Commanding 12th AA Group) ANTI-TANK OFFICER (Commanding 2nd T D Group)
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Colonel Donald

J. Bailey

(Colonel George G. Elms) Colonel Paul B. Bell Colonel Hubert S. Miller Colonel Steven S. Cerwin Colonel Carl W. Rumpf (Colonel James E. Boush) Colonel Leo F. Kelly (Colonel Charles M. Wells) Colonel Lloyd R. Garrison (Lt Colonel George R. Forsythe) Lt Colonel John J. Mikell Lt Colonel Vernon W. Smith Colonel FrederickG. Crabb, Jr

CORPS ENGINEER SIGNAL OFFICER CORPS SURGEON CORPS QUARTERMASTER ADJUT ANT GENERAL

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HEADQUARTERS COMMANDANT PROVOST MARSHAL ORDNANCE OFFICER CHEMICAL OFFICER

Lt Colonel John B. Cobb Colonel HaHY E. Reed (Lt Colonel Stanley G. Saulnier) Lt Colonel Leland F. Adair Colonel Hamilton M. Peyton Lt Colonel George H. Goodwin (Colonel James G. De La Vergne) Lt Colonel Loren Jenks Lt Colonel Stephen P. Kenny

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FINANCE OFFICER INSPECTOR GENERAL JUDGE ADVOCATE :..f SPECIAL SERVICE OFFICER CORPS CHAPLAINS

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INTRODUCTION

,
fro

The function' not

and drama of a Corps in the Divisions carry

organized

hell

of war is in and the im-

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very well publicized. contact with the

out tactical individual their

operations personalities mass takes

actual

enemy and develop headlines

reputations.

Armies capture

because

a gination
swaying
'.

of the public mind, which wants the ultimate

lines, or thrusting arrows of both, on a map. and insert

simplification

of

Somewhere in between are the element of flexibility But the eneI!\'{

the

Corps,

which partake

between

the mass of the Army and the unity parts of a Corps could be the best and for mst until

of the

Division.

component
..., .

indication

for the

of the high co.mnBnd intentions, carefully

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of the war they after the

have been upon

..

screened

from any publicity

operations

,.

whd.ch they

have been engaged are and function in Europe.

long over and done. in Il8ny ways of the Corps

The life in the Artillery, attacks

~'

of XIX Corps has been evident In the Il8ssed thundering fires

fighting

seeking before ll3th

out assembling

German tanks

and destroying swift, screening

counterprogress

they can get under way; in the Cavalry Group on the flanks

of the

or out ahead of the Divisions; under small arms and

in the Engineers
4' ,<

of the Corp! putting in the AA guns guarding major rivers that lie

in bridges

artillery over the

fire; eight

DivisionCP's, XIX Corps;

or the bridges in the Tank

behind

b--

~--'-~

~... .--a

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Destroyers tank lar ning defense

rolling for

fast

across

the

first

bridges,

to set Less

up antispectacuplan-

the Infantry important

in a new bridgehead. decisions In the

but equally of the

are the basic

and careful

())rps

())lIllIWlder and his Staff. that party lie now behind Continent

000 odd miles the land$~

of fighting ing outfit of its

progress advance

XIX Corps since

on the

on June 10, 1944, this for the units Its ess ential and charac-~

has built

up a personality

and a meaning

individuals teristic

with whom it is a dedica. tion Almost every

has been associated. to the needs of the imaginable tactical

doughboy and tanker and strategic Corps. problem

~. ".

down front.

has been faced

been done with

and satisfactorily
only one

solved

by this

This has

...
1',

PUrPDS e in mind:

to do it

fast,

am at the
'i"..

lowest

possible

cost

in livest to sUIIllIBrize the same time which try facts Provide to give of the Corps'

This book is an attEmpt achievements ground in battle,

and at the

a !'UIUling backthe details of

. ..
...

of incident, that

and description

a few things

had to be done and be done well and faithfully

in

order there. this

that the facts

as shown on the record could have found record to tell all the details and facts at once;

No book can pretend one is only p3.rt.ially

of impression

complete; this

framework of fact and viindividual meoories

~

gnettes

must be rounded }:S.rt..

out by the

of each man who took

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HISTORY OF XIX CORPS

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XIX Corps began lite as the Camp Polk,

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III

Armored Corps,

activated

at Willis in

Louisiana,

on August After the trainfu.g

A>, 1942 under Major General

D. Crittenberger. Louisiana in 1943,

at Camp Polk and two maneuvers left for left England on January to head a Corp' in

headquarters Crittenberger Charles

7,

Q'

1944. Italy,

In mgland

General

and Major General settled planning in France,

H. Corlett

took over command. near Wanninster, Neptune,

The

headquarters where active

at Knook Camp in Wiltshire, for the Corps' pirt

in Operation

for

.
'-,'.

the
.
,',

landing

got under way in the old Manor House of Boyton.

While the divisions

and perfected drew up their their plans

that were to operat e under nx

plans for on the Salisbury landing soon after Plain,

Corps maneuvered
the Corps Staff first of

D-Day, as the

the build-up
St. Le, the

Corps, to take over the central

strategic communications center

sector
of that

and advance on
f8.rt of Normandy.
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It W9.Snot merely a question

plans, to take The soft the target advantage English date,

of one plan,

but of many alternate as could be for-

of as many eventualities April passed into

..

seen.

M1y, and many of us were for D-Day. of June, With everyand wondered IOOnth? or an-

told
~

arid finally we waited

the date for the fifth

thfu.g set

and ready,

,
~

when it
0 ther

passed

uneventfully.

Were we to wait another

year?

Finally The Invasion

the morning was ont

of the

sixth

found the air it

full

of news. the

It was going 3

well;

was going badly;

" ~

Germans

said

it was being

swept off

the beaches.

~The official Omaha, they

news

was mixed, but without the extremes.

were having sCheduled, 8th, a rough time. and everyone But the

On our beach, plans

for XIX Corps 'WOuld go as Two days later, on the

got ready to move. left

the headquarters

Knook in two motor convoys near Dorchester. along

for Camp D4,

,
.~

one of the assembly lined lanes, up under

areas

Th ere we s pent two days what had been country and equipment, prepared

the trees

in the rain

rraking final

checks

of wat!rproofing

to move to our ships. conclusions

The news was good, and then bad.

We drew our was hurriedly

+'

when a part of the Second Armored Division ships.

pushed through ahead of us and to their

the Chief of Staff, and a few of the

The Corps Commander, Sections went

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Chiefs

of Staff

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ahead in a motor torpedo boat to size up the situation and be ready with their Finally, plans when the headquarters

on the ground

came ashore.

on the evening of the 10th, we made the JOOve over the and loaded the vehicles .on two IST's loading and

darkened roads to Portland, during the night. lash1J1g all night,

The next moming we were off,

after

in one of the gigant ic convoys that almost days. By the next morning
of sunken of

covered the Ehglish Channel those first

we had hove to off Omaha Red Beach, Liberty Ships, the marks of flame,

lDarked by the breakwater shell, and mine, ceaseless the

. . ... , I! ,. ~ ~

fox-holes of supply

the men who had "WOn the beach,

and the

traffic

and reinforcement.

Most of us had braced ourselves fire,

for the prospect

of being under artillery ly aerial inland

perhaps even small arms, and certainBut by this time the battle the little was farther ham-

and torpedo attack.

on Omaha Beach.

St. Laurent-sur-Mer,
4

fishing

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HISTURY OF XIX CORPS

...

XIX Corps began life Camp Polk,

.,

as the

III d),

Armored Corps,

activated

at Willis in

Louisiana,

on August After the training

1942 under Major General

D.

Crittenberger.
in 1943,

at Camp Polk and two maneuvers left for England on January left to head a Corps in took over command. near Warminster, ~1 eptune,

Louisiana
d

headquarters Crittenberger Charles

7,

1944.
Italy,

In Ehgland

General

and Major General settled planning in France, divisions their plans Corps, strategic that plans for

H. Corlett

The

headquarters where active the landing

at Knook Camp in Wiltshire, for the Corps'

p3..rt in Operation

for

got under way in the

old Manor House of Boyton. XIX Corps maneuvered the Corps Staff first of on
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'Nhile the

were to operat e under on the Salisbury landing over soon after the central center

and perfected drew up their ,the St.

"f..

Plain,

D-Day, as the sector of that

build-up 10, the

to take

and advance

communications

JE.rt of Normandy.

It
..

was not merely to take The soft the target set

a question

of one plan,

but of many alternate as could be for-

plans,
seen.

advantage English date,

of as many eventualities April passed into

Mly, and many of us were for D-Day. of June, With everyand wondered zoonth? or &n-

told
~

arid finally we waited

the date for the fifth

thing "

and ready,

when it other

passed

uneventfully.

Were we to wait another

C-;

year?

Finally
The Invasion

the morning of the sixth

was ont

found the air

it

full

of news.
the

It was going well; 3

was going badly;

i"'"

let,

showed where the battle Farther

had pass~, but our landfall convoys filled hulk of the the horizon, piers

was undisheading

t urbed. for

west the great and the great

Utah beach,

floating

loomed high

and mysterious.
#

To the east a French battleship its broadsides

lying

swung inshore

at inoperations

tervals,

to deliver

in support of the British

off-shore aU

moving down o.n Caen.

After

day, our LST's

finally

ran up on the made its the roads

high tide,

and landed past

us drys hod at lS30. the line

The convoy and country fields

way across

the beach,

of German prisoners, down the

knocked-out thick with

88' s which had comnanded the defiles, dust, to our first bivouac

in one of the So far, ones;

sunken

we were to know so well have often

.""

in the next months. that we were the lucky

we felt, our safety that

as we had been and

felt

since,

bought taken
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dearly these

by the blood of the men woo had stormed roads and towns. We ow~ them all

beach,

we could find

of energy

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and service.
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Once ashore, that

with the Corps units IOOving across turning for

coming in after the Cotentin

us,

we found which

VII Corps was rapidly was to cut off before

peninsula

it

Cherbourg.

On our left,

V Corps

under whomthe combat teams of the 29th and 1st Divisions the beach, was rooving south in conjunction
:;;

had won On

with the British.

the 14th of June, XIX Corps became operational, 29th Division, which despite -s the agonizing

taking over the

punishment it had sueof

4)'
,.:,,-,

tained
'..

on landing,

fighting

its way forward into the first

came across the beach,

the hedgerows.

The 30th Division

and lIIOVe:i

in on the r~ght of the 29th.

Our job was to get as far as we

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could and then hold, while First could muster into cutting Geruan defense, an attack

Army threw all

the strength To test

it the

off and reducing Cherbourg.

was ordered for the next day, and inched and defense that was to Finally the
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forward for three days through the terrain try American fighting attack Canal. rested 'cpalities

for more than a mnth.

on the 11ne of the Vire River and the Vire and Taute little more than a chateau and a
.. ,

The CP moved to Castilly,

church at a crossroad. (You came by the church as you rounded the corner on the road from the beach, and there was a long lane of trees that met overhead, and it it was Sunday the Fren ch would be walking to or from church in their stiff black clothes, and not even looking curiously at Jeeps any more. The CP tents clung to the hedgerows, back to back in three fields, and down at the far comer of the field was the War Tent, a big British hospital tent, and close beside it the 0-2 and G-3 tents. There was usually a liaison officer or two from one of the outfits sleeping on the grass if the sun was out, because he knew he was due for a .hard night, and Colonel West and the 0-3 Officers would go in and out. .Downto the right at the far end was the General's

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CASTlLLY NORMANDY.
Here began the long reels of XIX Corps wire which were to stretch over much of Europe.
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caravan, and when he came up to the War Tent most everyone left. This got to be alu!ost home aft er a while, and you came back to it with relief if you'd been up front, and maybe there would be a drink of Calvados around somewhere, and you'd wonder if they'd bomb the place that night. They certainly must know we were here by this time. But maybe we weren't important enough. There was the time that those two Jerries came in fast to begin a strafing run from over the schoolhouse, but it just happened that there were two P-47' s loafing around behind a cloud on the other side; who jumped them before they could start, and shot one down over to the west. But every night there was plenty of fireworks over the beaches, and we slept in our slit trenches most nights. The 12th AA Group set up in business, and began the shooting which was to net them 293 planes before V-E ray.) Day by day the Corps units came in, got their assignments and dug effect-

into

their

jobs.

The Corps Artillery

began its

'WOrk, and its

iv~ness was apparent

between the

at once.

16ny of us carried
learning

on our jobs shuttling

which roads

CP and the Front, fire,"" how a burp-gun

by hard experience

were under

and an 88 sounded,

and what the fighting

was like down where efficiency

...~

or inefficiency:

in our jobs meant lives.

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The 66th AGF Band was

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with

us almost from the 6egining"

Here they play for the men .. of the 2nd Signal Battalion

in the typical surroundings of a Normandy apple orchard.

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Almost at once however there

was the

supply

problem.

Artillery

ammunition was rationed, sat with our fingers

ing would happen. little affected

and when the terrific

four-day

storm blew in we

crossed,

only a few rounds to a gun, and hoped nothin Normandy seemed crouchICII

The slow tempo of peasant. life

by our presence. down near Airel unconcernedly his, cows. A double or St.

row of men and officers

ed in some ditch a peasant mortars, had waited to see us, wandered

Clair

would look up in surprise fire of Gernan

as

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.
JI

down the

road under the

going after

But in Isigny

we found the individuals

who
J'
p,

'.
~
,

\'

for us as Liberators, even in the

the FFI of the area. of their homes.

And they were glad

powdered ruins

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ISlCNY. with one of the armored Tank Retrievers. (When the French Major with Civil Affairs came into Isigny he had the first French uniform they had seen for all that time, and they crowded around hi;-n, with
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.all the news at once. And soon every town you went to had the office of XIX Corps "kffaires Civiles", and a ~ptain and a couple of sergeants in the mayor's office, with an interpreter; and the patient farmers sat in the ant&-room waiting to go in and see the officer and ask their questions. There was that creamery Civil Affairs fixed up at St. Y.arguerite where the refugees were taken and fed, and sat around gossiping, waiting for a chance to go back to their homes. And in St. Clair on the 14th of July, Bastille Day, the barn of the 29th played in the little square, and the children of the town carried flowers to the monwnent of the poilu, and the veterans of the last war stood stiffly in their black suits, and Colonel Price made a speech, and they couldn't seem quite to realize that France was free, at least this little part of it. Isigny was a wreck, the center of it, but there was still the cheese factory, and you could get wine once in a while, and the combination was good for eking out K-rations. We began t,o get pretty tired of K-rations.)

'..., ,

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BASTILLEDAY
at St. Clair sur Elle.

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The first
..

week in July the 30th Division river

went to work on the Vire, a salient

salient

which the Germans had kept west of the ed menacingly toward 'the sea at

which reachto keep fire. On

Carentan,

where they were able artillery

...

the bridge

on the

one road there the

under intermittent east

cIuly 7th t he 30th crossed

Vire from the

and the Vire and Taute slugged its way

Carial from the north, and, joined by the'3rd Arloored, .~" down through St. Jean de Day, to erase the salient. 9

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(The Corps Commanderneeded more and fuller ~formation on the yard-by-yard situation than he '"Could get from the Regimental Commnders and staffs, who had their own worries. He talked about it to Colonel Carl Jones, the Deputy Chief of Statf, and JajorRoy Attebury went to work to organize it. Men from the 2nd Signal Battalion drove the jeeps and worked the 193 radio, and every day the off i.cers of the Conbat Liaison Section went out to where the attack was the hottest to radio back the details the Corps Commanderw:>uld need to nake his decisions. Whenever you came to the CP of whatever regiment or battalion was making the attack, there would be a familiar face from the headq1arters: Capt. Bill Dollahite, or Sam Salzman, scribbling up the dope for his radio operator to encode. Toward evening they'd come back to the CP and go report to the Chief of Staff, General M3.guire, G-3 Colonel Gustaws West and the G-2 washington Platt. Or they'd bring back some spedal supply problem of the frontline units and the G-4 Colonel O'Shea would go to work

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on it..

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The day they crossed the Vire River, and the Vire et Taute Canal, the Q:>mbat Liaison was on the job. You came down this long hill to the river, along the road where they'd knocked out the 88, and down at the end of it was where they want'ed to put the bridge. This was the first important XIX Corps operation, and the Engineers wanted to make it good. They did. The 228th Field Artillery Battaljpn hedged off a 2)0 yard bridgehead with HE and smoke, and twenty minutes later that troublesome little river, thirty feet across, was bridged, the vehicles were back in hiding and the annor was pouring over the bridge to clear the way for the 30th. ) There was the little man who was roads and bridges engineer for the French government in the area. He mew the roads, and the river and canal like the back of his harui. The MII Team attached to G-2 had gone out and found him, and brought the first of his information to the mgineers. He and Colonel Hodges of the Engineer Section became great friends. Very soon we were raising and lowering the- water level in that canal to fit all. the needs of the moment: low when we wanted to cross, high to guard our flanks. We raised the river suddenly one night, by six feet, and caught and drowned some Gennan horse-drawn artillery on an underwater bridge they had built at Pont Hebert.) ..,:. 10

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There was t~t crossing at Airel, under fire a good part of the time until we took st. Lo, and no matter when you came there, artillery or no artillery, there was an MP from the S17th directing the traffic. In

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A Corps M P keepstraffic moving atone of thehot spots.

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No~ndy, with the few roads and narrow, it was a juggler's job gettihg the convoys thrcugh. The G-4 did the planning for it, and the MP's had to carry it out. But in the Provost V.arshal, Lt. Col. Teman Smith, the Corps had one of the most experienced traffic regulators in the Army. The conveys went through. When the weather got dry, and the dust rose from passing ve1)icles the Gernans had a fine artillery target. The Corps Chemical Warfare Section under Lt. Col. Cobb, took their JOObile decontaminators , and wet down the dusty roads, and we drew less fire there north of St. Lo. The hedgerows were a great problem tactically, and a lot of people stayed up nights trying to figure out how to beat them. When they did, Ordnance stayed up nights, making the hedgerow cutters thEV mounted on the tanks, and putting them on. Then we foum. the TD's needed turret covers to protect the crew from overhead fire. Ordnance designed and made them. With the line straightened
to VII Co;J:7pS, and having

ti

!. -?
"',..
...

out, t'he western sector. was transferred

to the 29th, III will Corpe probably

<!II,

added the 35th Division The fighting that

followed

......
<,~

t~me4~l~

attention

to St. Lo.

11

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German machine-gun position in a Normandy hedgerow. to observation post. Ladder leads

rank tcn:ever as some of the grimmest and bloodiest fought on the European Continent.

American troops

ever

Wh,enthe 29th had ground its way to

the edge of the old town, a ta.sk ferce of the 29th and of the l13th Cavalry Group, under Brigadier General Norman D. Cota, Assistant Division

ODmDI9J1der of the 29th, went in am took the town, and held :it under a rain
.

of fire

from the Geru8Ils on the ridges oft'the

to the SOltho

To take it

they had to root out and kill

Division, armored fighting from every

bitter-enders

of the 3rd Parachute

off a massive

hole and corner,

and stand

co unt era.t tack.. (Coming down that road into St. 10 the oorning aft'er,

- .got a flat from the shell-splinters

on the road,

and while we stopped on the roadway to fix it, not daring to pull off because there were so many mines, the ambulan ces began careening by at full tilt, oI\e.. >~..
right after the other, and then there came a jeep ~. 12

\b.

't'

...

Typical of St. Lo as XIX Corps troopsfound it.

..,

.I
~

with a couple of cameramen perched on the back, and they stopped to ask if we had a drink for them. We had some Calvados, and the cameraman took a long pull and wiped his lD:)uth, but his eyes were still staring. "It's horr:ible down there", he said, "I hope I never have to see anything as horrible again. There aren't enough ambulances, and they're laying the wounded out along a wall. They hit an ammunition truck down there just now, and just about wiped out a battalion." We fixed the tire and lOOVed on down the road, and sure enough they had the first corner at the bottom of the hill zeroed in with mortars, and it took us an hour of hitting the ditch to get across and down. And the ambulances kept coming by. We saw one get hit at the comer, and that was too horr:ible, as the man had said. They were trom the 546th Ambulance Company, that Corps outfit, some of them. Later on, going back up the road, there were a couple of Aid Stations in the orchards, and the cases ha.d spilled out of the two small tents they had and covered the ground with stretchers, all among the soft green grass and the blossoming trees.
Suddenly the next days the war began to' s.eem endless. Were we going to butt our heads into these hedgerows for months? Wistful questions began coming up from Divisions to the Corps G-2; "How far down does the Bocage country extend? How long before we can break out 1i1ere we can see?") 13

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The capture and the First

of St. Lo made possllile

the next move by GEI1eral Bradley of the hedgerows. After

Army to break out of the stalemte Cobra broke- through,

1st Army's Operation Vire River,

the

XIX Corps ooved west of the

conunanding the 29th, 30th and 28th Infant ry Divis ions and

2nd Armored. (Colonel Charles M. Wells was Adjutant General, and that section everybody thought of as Rear Echelon stuff, but he was up recolU'loit ering for a new cemetery with Col. Louis L~ Ma.rtin, G-l, one day when a Gennan roortar dropped in and got him, and he was evacuated to a hospital. That somehow pointed up the fact that there were a lot of people helping to win the war who had to do ti. by being patient, and sitting in a chair and paying attention to sm11 things. And they knew what St. 10 was costing, when they processed the casualty reports of over a thousand men a day about that time.

One of the 8 inch howitzers of the Corps ArtiIlery prepares to throw its weight in support of the troops ahead

14

. - -- -

-= -

\"'"

:f

Those last days before the breakthrough, the stuff really began to pile up. Not one of those orchards along thos e lit tl e roo <is was empty. You'd have a ba.ttery of 105' s south of the road and just the other side a battery of 8 inch howitzers or 155 guns. The 105's said the big boys were a nuisance, kept 'em awake nights, but they were glad to have than there. The dit ches were a mass of wire and cables now, ani farther back toward the beach there were miles and miles of dumps: rations, ammunit ion, clothing, trucks, jeeps, parts, tanks, tires, and the road from Isigny south was always ja~d with convoys.) The great the breakthrough and drove east attack tore a hole in the German lines on

25th of July,

for Avranches

and Coutan ces.

XIX Corps's the eneII\Y

job was to guard the from sending li6th north Panzer

flank

of the breakthrough east.

and prevent

reinf6rcements tried just this

from the

The German 2nd Panz er and just

l'I&1euver, and met XIX Corps troops These two crack and the outfits

and west of Tessy sur Vireo and forced

were fought in the Gernml Corps

to a standstill lines

to retreat,

gap renained

for the First

and Third

Armies to pour through.

Again the

Knock~d out

hy Corps Artillery fire in one of the Cer-

man armored counterattacks after the July breakthrough. one German tank that will not counterattack again. 15

='

.-

~ . -.

.~ .

fulfilled

a vital pivot

task for

when it the First

took Vire, and Third

which in General in their Arrrry.

Eisenhower's north and

plan ve.s the northwest, taken

swing east, Tessy

to bottle

up the German Seventh 5th the

sur Vire was 18 miles of it on the night

on August 2nd, and by the and was assaulting

Corps had covered took

hedgerows

Vireo

The 29th Division

of August 6th. There was still heavy fighting

pocket, and the Geruans to be done on this over all their sooulder of the

who had brought

armor from the

British drive.
attack stand. helping From the

sector,

made one more thrust

to try to cut off the great

took the brunt it back,

flanking
of that

The 30th Division,

then under VII Corps, and finally in holding drove that

at M:>rtain, and blunted XIX Corps had its to bottle up nearly part

in a magnificent in pocket. then it

".,

attack,

and finally

100,000

Germans in the Falaise-Argentan Corps pushed northeast;

13th to the

17th of August the

shifted

to the east and from the vi~irlity to escape across

to Quellebeuf. beyond;

of Brezolles

drove due north to

cut off the Germans trying

0

the Seine at a narrow shoulder

was XIX Corps who stopped 2Sth followed them.

f the

river

from Elbeuf

It

The 30th took

Evreux and advanced

the

the 2nd Armored

beyond ponches. up to Elbeuf, and two nights, slaughtered

where the everything

powert.ul that tried

2nd Arroore<1 .for two ,days to cross the river. On

August 25th they reached Elbeu! itself, the Canadians to the north.

and the Cor~ made contact

with

That marked the end of the German Seventh Army. "

(These were the days when they were giving France away to us. This was something different from Normandy: the streets black with people, who seemed to do nothing ,twenty-four hours a day but stand there and cheer us and wave, and weep, some of them, and throw us flowers and fruit and vegetables, and stare wide-eyed at the

16

r--

trucks and jeeps and tanks. ?1hat always were the Tank Retrievers. that filled the with red lights blinking, and all armored thing from Mars, and the Long Toms and 8 They loved them!)

got them most whole road, up like someinch Hows.

"!

..

(The XIX Corps Artillery got to be known as the best aggregation in Nornandy. Under Brigadier General George Shea, they were just as tough as he was, and they demanded the best from every man and gun they had. The Divisions early had enough confidence in the Corps Artillery to take chances of counterattacks th~ otherwise wouldn't take, because they knew that Axel, the Fire Direction Center would lay in in a matter of seconds on any threat that appeared. The FDC was bombed pret ty hard for three nights running near Ste. ~rguerite. There were casualties, but they never stopped turning out the fire.)

(There was that CP we had in that dense woods, behird the chateau they were using for a children's home. And the little wizened FrenchIIBn of the FFI who had come down from the group he led to t ell us where they were holding a couple hundred Gernans surrounded, but they couldn't clean them out because they didn't have enough arms, and the ammunition was running low. The G-2 sent him down to the 30th in a jeep to lead a patrol for them out there. And he sat in the jeep shaking his head with a quiet wonder, saying "1 never thought 1'd ever live to see it. All the rest who were with fne when we started have been shot, and 1 really never believed l' d be alive this day1"

.1oJ

An FFI man.

17

..-

~-

- ~~

He was really amazed, and he kept touching his fingers to the back of his other hand as if to verify something he couldn't quite believe. His pocket ;was right in the line of the 30th's attack for the next morning, so they were glad to see him and gave him a gocxi dinner, but he kept shaking his head in that funny way, and saying the same thing over and over.) The bulk of the rest retreat. the Seine, of the Gernan 4rmy in the West was now in full of

The Corps swung east to where rl Corps had made a crossing at Yantes-Gassicourt, where the 79th held a bridgehead, the GernlUls.

passed through and made atter fight in strength

The Gerne.ns might stop and for river cross-

alnk>st anywhere, and they did fight features.

ings and terl'6in

But the drive of the Corps gave them no The Corps crossed the Seine on August 28th,

chance to organjze anywhere.

by SepteDber 1st the Corps advance elements had crossed the Somme, and at
09)0 in the DX>rning of September troops across t;he border. 3rd were into Belgium, the first large the first Allied

Tournai,

town in Belgium was

taken that

same day.

(They sent Colonel Biddle and the l13th to cover the right flank of the CorPS on the north side of Paris. The Engineers of the Corps threw seven bridges over the Seine, and one of them took the place of the roadbridge blown by the Germans at St. Germain. Nowthe Oorps Commandercould cover his right flank there and go hell-for-leather for the Belgian border. For three ot the seven bridges the Engineers had to clear the opposite bank themselves, before they could put them in. That operation of the cavalry was slight4r nuts, said the men ot the l13th Group. When you're ducking SS's and being kissed by beaucoup beautiful girls at the saae time; when the cafes open up, give away all their wine, and you dance in the streets while a burpgun is still l'6ttling away within a block, that's a funny kind of war. But it 'WaSthat way all the way up through those towns, Sartrouville and the rest.)

18

1-

Now the

battle

. became the
pressed weren't

Battle

of Supply.

Trucks

that

should
behind the

have been used to bring

up gasoline

and keep the dumps close

advance were continually pursuit.

,:.

into service

to carry troops and artillery

in the

There just

enough trucks,

ammunition

again became a critical more. For several

item until

the resistance

dropped off even

days the Corps had to mark time unti.J. enough gas

....

was accumulated

to push on.

(Civil Affairs and. the Resistance reported a few caches of German gasoline, but the G-4 vas finally becoming desperate for llr>re supplies. Everybody asked each other about it every moming, and the G-4 was ahlays full of liaison offi cers or visitors from lligher headc:parters explaining why they should get just one can of gas to get home. 1Bjor Marshall, Assistant G-4 finally got a liaison plane and went up to look over the canals in that part of Belgium, looking for tank barges. Then the Q]l sent out and tested the gas in it. We got 30,000 gallons that way. G-4 could always tell to a gallon how much there was in the dumps, and the heads always turned his way at the Staff meetings before any plan was discussed.
By September Bth the 113th Cava.lry had drained across all the other Canal. outfits The

of gas and made their

way all

Belgium to the Albert

2.nd Armored Division the 30th Division

:

could move only one Combat Conmand at a time, and The

had to move half way across Belgium on foot.

up an initial They left took it the defensive fortress 10th. the line

Germans had time t.o set man the Siegfried Line.

on the Meuse and to

of E1>enE)uael undefended,

'.
....

and the 30th Division Although Cavalry assaulted all

on September

the bridges

on the Meuse had been blown, Liege lines to the south

U3th

JI8de an end run through the Canal and river

and the 30th Division bridgeheads

near

Vise to establish

19

. ~ ="

---

south of Maastricht.

The 30th Division became the first

Allied

troops

to

ent er Holland on Sept ember 12th. behind,

On the next day Maastricht

was taken from On the and VII

and the 30th had advanced to Valkenberg by the 14th. drive by nx

17th Heerlen was hl our hands and a coordinated Corps drove to the Siegfried Line just

over the edge of Germany.

The Albert Canal as XIX Corps troopdouml

it. guarded by

members of the Belgian Hesistance, Armee Blanche

(The Engineers of the 1lO4th and some AAwere way out ahead of the hlfantry for that last dash across Belgium to the Albert Canal. They went south to Vise and helped the 30th across the Meuse, and then dashed to"'Ma.astricht; to build a bridge from. the enemy side to ours. The 1115th with a battalion ot intantry and some artillery made their own bridgehead on the other side ot the Albert Canal, and hung their bridge on a barge in the middle of the canal to get it across near Fort Eben Emael. Then the l104th built that great big Bailey atlvilastricht, the largest one in Europe, and we put a picture of it on the Corps Christnae card. The engineers said it was one 19) toot triple triple s~n, two liO foot triple single spans, and one 40 foot single single span. Anyway it was a long bridge.)

20

iii"

\-

XIX Corps Bailey overthe Albert Canal.

~

The long Bailey over the Meuse at Maastricht. ,.

<:

These weeks of AugUst and September scenes, sections.

.~

were a kaleidoscope Corps troops into

of new and staff a running in accomany a region

rushing

action,

and hard w::>rkfor the away fram the of Germans. and again

Any mission some pocket woods,

Corps might turn

fight

with

We found our Command Posts in chateaux. and under It was a real

chateaux,
~

}Sastures,

plishment eventuality. dotted

to keep the Corps together llire than

control, into

ready for

once the CP was pushed

and through

with Gerrra.n pockets. 21

.,~

,".

-~

- -- --

-~

Chateau at Tongres where the Corps set up its C. P.

heror~ moving into HollanJ.

(Everybody argued about it later, even those who hadn't known anything about it until they'd seen the Hq Comdt, Lt. Col. .Forsythe, at the head of that startling column of 150 Germans, marching down the road through theCP, brought up at the rear by Lt. Perez and Capt. Dollahite. It was just at lunch time, and they argued for days whether these Germans knew we were there, or just were too 'bush~' out to come and wipe us out. They ribbed the MPs because the Germans had come to earth on their compass course ma.rch trying to escape, right :in the next field to the MPs, and the medics said they were through being flank guard for the CP; they wanted to move into the middle. Anyway, there were 150 prisoners to chalk up to the credit of the Headquarters Commandant. )
(When you picked up the phones about this time you'd hear a buzzing sound and the operator lNOuld tell you "You're on radio link, guard your conversation." The Signal boys had to lay just as muc}:lwire, but this kept communications in better. It was something new, but it solved an old problem. ~ (One night it was rainy and foggy, and there were more than the usual number of German pockets. The Array said all mvements that weren't absolutely necessary should be cancelled, but the COrp3 Rear didn't hear him, and
22

; ......

t-

I--

""

.,

Work on wire went on summer and winter.

the Adjutant General's Se ction led them on a 162 mile night march from Sourdeval to Aeon.)
(We were really IOOving fast, and no one knew it better than Ordnance who had to pick out spots for J.mmunition Supply Points well in advance. On SeptEmber 2nd they picked one off the map, but by evening it was already 75 miles too far back. M9.jor Heist had a solution. He toid them to get 100 trucks on the road and rolling, and he'd go ahead and have an ASP ready to guide 'them into when they came up. He was the man the Artillery

looked to to keep the Ammo rolling

to their

guns, and

he never let them down. But he ran into a p:>cket, and the SS ambushed him and killed him, with Sergeant Zan Hassin, just southwest of Valenciennes. But the ammunition got to the troops. The marches went by long stretches (already of road, }:artly destroyed littered butchered wagons, with the debris and the meat artillery pieces,

.,.

of a fleeing carried

army: dead horses

off by the thrifty

Belgians),

t rucks and supplies.

23

Corps C. P. at Kastel Nieuborg, Culpen. Holland.

/

"

(Nobody knew.about it when it was going on, but hardly had the Corps moved into Miastricht when the young men of the Dutch Resistance were out in the street looking for the G-2. They had a telephone system, they said, which the Germans didn't know about, and we could call thn>ugh to almost anywhere behind t he German lines: Roermond, Venlo, and tind out what we wanted to know. So they were installsd. in a room at Civil A.ffairs, with th&1r telephone, and a few maps, and when G-2 wanted to know something particularly important, the Dutch boys would just crank their phone and speak quietly for a In Ddnutes, and usually theu'd have the answer. It was quite simple and quite \mbelievable. Finally, however, the Germans blew a bridge the wires ran acn>ss and it was all OVf!!r. They sent- three ot the Resistanc e men up to find out what was on, and they never came back. Nobody knows what happened to them. But they can guess.) ~ (The Ge:rmans had some tricks still in their bag. On Septeiuber 25th they chased out 30,000 people from Kerkrade, just in front of their lines, and drove them on the roads down toward cur lines. They killed 15 of thEIUby artillery tire on the way, and wounded tifty more. The G-5 Se'Ction went to work and by night all these refugees were shelte:red and ted, and the roads were clear for the A.rmy.)

24

=.

\-

CUfJJS Anti-Aircraft

on the Meuse

at Maastricht.

The rest prepared its

of September plans

the

Corps held along to smash through

the border

of Germany, and Line, while

and supplies

the Siegfried

the British
the north

and American Airborne troops

flank of the German line

made their

gallant

attempt
began to barring

to tum

at Arnheim.

The weather that,

wors en, an d we realiz

ed with the beginning waro

of October

miracles,

we were in for a winter from its until flank. Holland this siege of Brest.

The 29th Division

came back to the Corps Line was delayed left

Tae attack for the Siegfried

could

veteran

division

come up and guard the Corps exposed

In the maze of waterways and swampthat and Germany there to the north

nJa-rkedthe borders threat to the north.

of

was a definite their

First

Army, since the British

were turning

attention

?-

(For the big operations, and for the newspapers it was a rest, a pause before the storm, but the 113th Cavalry was holding and attacking alternately up around Sittard, and the 2nd TD Group under the tough, seasoned leadership of Col. George G. Elms, went up to take over and work with the Belgian Bri&.ade on an attack northeast toward Roermend. And the U outfits never rested; they fired their weapons in , ground roles, and they had a 1"I11ethat was unbrea.k25

",,1'=< ~--

~ ~-

--~

_.-I

able: never to fire on a plane unless it was definitely identified as eI1eIl\Y, even if jt, attacked them. The CorFS Signal Officer, Colonel Cerwin was finding underground cables to use for our communications, and soon we didn't have much wire above grouni aI\V IIk>re. All the coal mines in the area had their own telerbone systems. Colonel Platt, G-2, and the Signal Officer conducted a very succe.ssful joint ca. paign for the discovery and use of unsuspected COIDIllunication lines extending into enemy territory.)
~

I'

XIX Corps War Ro~m was the nerve center of operations. Here a Staff Conference for final planning Line. meets

for breaking the Siegfried

Finally

the attack

began on October

2nd,

with

the 30th

Division

racing down a long slope and across the WurmRiver to smash through the Siegfried Line at Palenberg and Rimburg. attacks The 29th Division did its part The 2nd ArnK)red crossed the 30th, and south to then

with diversionary through the line

around Geilenkirchen.

the next day, and took Ubach alongside

turned north to defend the bridgehead. repulsirlg constant counterattacks,

The 30th turned south,

made slow but steady progress

join vd. th VII Corps and close the pocket around Aachen. 26 '""

The Genuans

I~

brought up re:inforcements
this breakthrough, but all

from all along the whole Western Front to hold

the counterattacks of October, that they could throw in were

repulsed close-in t he 30th, the

.,

or made good. fighting an d the against

By the 16th the best

slugging,

heart-bre9.king, brought

the German Army had, wit h it,

116th Infant FJ fighting and Aachen was encircled.

to conta ct ,vi th

1st Division,

"',

InFantry cleans

up Merkstein

on the

drive to the Roer River.

""

(The Corps Surgeon, Colonel Rumpf, knew that the problem would come, and when all the outfits began talking about their Trench Foot cases, he had them make up thousands of little bottles with oil and oil of peppermint mixture, with the label saying "Rub this .on your feet every day and prevent Trench Foot." They say our average number of cases was low compared to other Corps.) 27

..,

-- ~~

.,
..

(It was cold and damp and raw, when it wasn It rain;ing, and a few days of that kind of fighting was enough to dri ve them crazy, the mEll up front. The Corps began to set up Rest Centers. All of Valkenberg was one big Rest Center, run by the 426th Medical Collecting Company. They ran eight hotels, and Civil Affairs helped them to find sheets and linen to -give the guy from the foxhole a taste of civilized living again. And the Red Cross and Special Services made Heerlen, the clean little town where the Corps CP was, into another island of rest for the GI. Corps Artillery took over the hot baths hotel at Aachen and made its own Rest Center, with the best of chow, hot baths, clean sheets, and even a bar. ) All thja bitter time the drizzly cold Fall was closing like in and the

"'.

warmth and light another quarters world.

of the previous We made fast

summer s.ee~d in Holland, clean little

the meroories of Corps Headwhich

friends

and the city

found a second

horae in the

of Heerlen,

made a record of hospitality

could not have been ecpaUed. shortages increased their of food and clothing, danger from shelling

and kindness to the American sol{fier that

They had their of limitations and bombing, problems, on their but they intensified activities, let by by

never

us forget to give

gratitude

for what the men of the American Army were doing

thEm back their

freedom. (Nobody could explain what the stuff was at f:irst, the night it came in. Some said it was a new kind of V weapon, remembering that we had been the first reciprients of the V-2 when we were in Maastricht. But the Artillery said it was a 2SOmm Railroad Gun somewhereto the south, just lining in on the town of Heerlen. Anyway they had a new kind of fuse they guessed, because they seemed to adjust with air bursts, and then bring t-hem down to the grourxl. The first night thE\V made two hits on the hotel where the Red Cross girls stayed, and Colonel Goodwin had just marshalled them all downstairs in their hotel when the fragments peppered ns.ny of the rooms. They took it all like a picnic, and the officers mess at the Grand Hotel the next lOOming was considerably dressed up, with lovely girls in negli28

..

"'\

gees, for breakfast. The next time they began coming in near the station, and started fires in the hot el where the Rear Echelon officers lived. That was a lively place for that night, and the Corps Headquarters ambulance had a job. But it was Dk)re a break in the roonotony that they made than anything else. The Ce:>rpsArtillery had the gun spotted and lIBde it roove several times. And later VII Corps found the wreck of a 28:>DJngun in their sector. We my have hit it, at that.)
''l'

By the middle another hitch

of October courage,

the men of the American Army were taking and facing the grim fact that it was still

in their

a long way to Berlin. village-to-village faced aU us,

~

PrepaI"'ations

went 'on to l1X>ve forward the next natural who had ably

in the inching barrier that Corps to

fighting

to and across General Corlett,

the Roer River. France

led the

across

and Belgium and to the

edge of GerllBny was recalled

the United states

for other duties,

and Major General Raymond S. McLain

arrived. on October lSth from comrns.nd of .the 90th Division to be the

new Corps Co1111IBnder. His was a record

of action has proved.

and leadership

that

augured

well

for the

Corps,

and so it war,

A machine-gun comunder fire in some in

pany COmnBnder in the last of the fiercest Sicily, fighting

he had le~ his troops one. He had aade the

of this

landings as Artillery

at Salerno,

ani Anzio.

He had come to France had taken over the

Co1111IBnder of the 30th Division, mid-campaign

'..

90th Division division. actually the

in Most

and built

it

into

an outstanding

figtt.ing

of his long list his

r3"

of decorations unmistakable fighting

were won under fire, mark has been on all in its thorough

leading

troops,

and his of this

subsequent and prepiraof

operations tion, the its

Corps: in attack

planning its

speed and daring of the

and maneuver, and the

recognition

problems

doughboys and tankers, 29

constant

insistESlce

-~~~-=

- --

- -~

on the

least

}X>ssible cost this

of every operation

in human lives. in the Ameriand XIX Corps

At about

same time the new Ninth Army appeared with its headquarters at Maastricht,

can Order of Battle, became part of it.

The main effort

of the American Army in the Fall

campaign was cen-

.
....

t ered farther

south, but when the jump-off came in the middle of November, for the line of the Roer. they offered The enemy bad had ti8 was bitter. to

XIX Corps attacked

dig in well, and the resistance

But the Divib1m

sions of XIX Corps, w:>rldng under the Corps plan, where he was strongest, parallel
crushing by sheer and the threw

refUsed to ~t

by frontal

attacks

on the line

of low ridge.
with in tanks

to the river.

The 2nd Armored lashed the muddy terrain This attack

out northeast and inferiority

}:Ower, overcoming fighting guts.

drew most of the German arlOOr, Against Grenadier,

Erlem;:rthrew

in the best

he had.

t he

2nd ArJ'Ik:>redhe . but the 2nd Armored

"

the 9th Panzer Corps Artillery As the

and the 15th Panzer

and the tanks.

and Tank Destroyers each ridge,

kn~cked out U8 of their infantry cleaned

arm:>r flanked

the attached

out the Germans from its drove east toward Juelich. l16th

flanks.

At the same time in the cent er the 29th and

where three Higher of the
..
4!

Meanwhile the 3rd Panzer Grenadier

Division smashed. at our right flank

ele..'nEl'lts of the

Panzer

t he 30th Divi3 ion turned divisions headquarters Roer :liver wall

them back.

By the 28th of November all for crossing until were begun. possession

were at the Roer, and the plans

had to hold up any such operations dams was assured. could be sent With these

dams under German control

of water

down the Roer to wash out any cross:ing

30

~ -

operations,
held

and isolate

our bridgeheads
for the

beyori rescue..

So the Corps

at the Roer to wait

dams to betaken.

I!'~

(The 8 inch Howitzers of the Corps Artillery's 793rd Battalion could lay their big projQCtil~s jn on a.dime. When the sports Platz of Juel1ch held out against the 29th Division for over a week, they smashed this pocket day after day, and got a commendation from the 29th for their accuracy and help.) (Part of the Prisoner of War Interrogation team. at Corps had been attached to the 113th Cavalry near Sittard when we were getting ready to hit

....

.
~

1;.

for .the RoeI'. The officer with them was on hi!:! way to his old home, with a good escort of the American Army: Lt. Ernest Kaufman had grown up just on the othel' side of the Roer, in a litt~e town just south of Duren. Just before he had been forced to leave Gerrrany in '38 all the cOWltryside had known about the great new dams that were being built in the wooded area up the RoeI'. He came and talked about it to Colonel:.Wa:shington Platt, the G-2, who sent him to First Army with the urgent advice to list en to him. The Army El1gineer did, and it was news to him. Lt. Kaufnan was among the first into Aachen, and made for where he knew the information 'WOuld be: the offices of the Water Administration. He had to blow a safe to get them, but there they were the complet e Wehrmacht plans for the flooding that 'WOuld follow the destruction of the three great dams, with the delineation of the area to be flooded, the speed of the water, the .duration of the flooding and all. Now the Army was really interested, and we could see the results in the way the plans were laid.) 31

--

'.'~"

---

It was then,

pn the 16th of December, that the Ardennes offensi~e and force:! a postponement of three
south

of von Rundstedt struck, "all our pl.a.ns.

SiOhS formerly with the

months in

The Corps mved under VII Corps:

of Aachen and took over the divithe 78th, and the 8th. There
JI,

the 104th,

a. Cornrmnd Post north shoulder

in an old monastery of the "Bulgetl,

in Kornelimuenster, German patrols, fronts of the

the Corps held and later 78th and 8th West left the to 5th of the 30th, to

rebuffed

pushed

forward

towards

the big dams on the

Divisions. become Chief .February t he 29th, that

Colonel of Staff

Sloan became Corps G-3 when Colonel of the 2nd Arrn9red. again, took It

was not until

we moved t\orth 2nd Armored, operation

over our old divisions, !'he 83rd,

and the into

with a newcomer, and cross the Roer.

and prepared

put our plans

.
.;:

. XIX Corps vehicles parked againstthe walls of the Ilbbey of Komehmunster.

32

!iir'- --

----

I-

"'

A series of drawings of XIX Corps C. P. at Konelimun4

ster. Here is shown the main abbey building from one of the surrounding hills.

rp

II:

T~e late January thaw gave the Corps blem in road maintenance.

Engineer~ a pro4

Here they repair the Main

Supply Route at Kornehmunster.

33

\-

A lighttank guardsthe 13th centry gates of the Corps

C. P. in Kornelimunster.

!.

..,

>:."

>

In the village square at Komehrnunster. 35

.)

I,-

...

Our War room at Kornelimunster

was set up in the

lavish 18th century Hall of the Knights.

J 37

--- ,"-

;;-

(The AA was JOOrenoisy than usual the night the Germans hit down south, and the XIX Corps' 554th AWEn shot down a JU-52 that got mixed up in the lights of 226th Searchlight Battalion. It had a full load of parachutists out for sabotage in our rear areas. They were all killed. And all the neXt day the trucks carrying the 30th south roared down the road through Heerlen, and the Dutch began to look anxious, thinking we were going to pull but. But they felt better when the TOImhawk errblem stayed around those few days. There were reports of p:trachutists in all our rear areas, and one of the AA outfits had quite a job rounding up a few who holed up in some houses. And every time you went anywhere for those weeks, you were stopped by MPs who wanted to know who won the World Series in 1938, or the capital of the Empire state.) (Sometimes, "said the Assistant fight your own army harder than have got to have sleepinf bags weather, and we've got to fight G-4, nyou have to the enemy. These men and shoe pacs for this for' em, day and

;.

,;

The remains of the Junker full ot' parachutists that tried to cross XIX Corps sector early on the first day of the German Ardennes counter"offensive.
39

,,;=-r

'" "'n--

- --

-~

night it seems." He turned to one of his officers. "Better go up to Army again this afternoon and pound on the table. They're doing their best, but they'll do better if we make enough noiseolt) (And suddenly there was snow, and the Germans had camouflage suits of whit'e which made them 'practically invisible. But our men stood out against it, good black targets. G-5 turned to and collected sheets, covers, anything white, from thousands of Germ9.n civilians, although they complained bitterly. Soon our troops too were equipped with camouflage for snow. ) (The Ack-Ack had its biggest day New Year's day when the Luftwaffe made its final effort. From dawn to dark they knocked off 33 German planes of which they actually found the wreckage.) After a delay of almost two weeks, forced by the Germans' crossing blowing

.
it

of the spillway River

of the Schwamrnenauel Dam, the before

of the Roer

was made on the 23rd of February, the floai

the Gerrr.a.ns expected

could be done because

had not yet 40

subsided.

Here the Corps

r--

'- .I-~

""'L

..

The Roer between Julich and Duren. XIX Corps attack had to be mounted across this barrier.

.
At Ju/ich the first treadway bridge was knocked out by enemy artillery fire. Here the Corps Engineers prepare to start a new bridge. This one stayed in.
41

--"'""""

't

Engineers of the 234th Engineer Combat Battalion used these aIIigatorsto carry the assimlt infantry across the Roer, and bring back wounded and prisoners.

Putting down the smoke to hide the bridging operations on the Roer.
43

~..

~~

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'.--

~..

""

'.-

Later the Bailey Bridge is begun.

The completed 30o-foot double-double Bailey. The

<:

Roer is conquered.

45

III"

,'.,'-

~~

-"

~""h "~

Engineer across

units the

did an amazing job. flooded besides river the fire

They built

a total

of fifteen

bridges

racing time, the river sides.

which brought of artillery,

down debris

to smash them and IOOrtars'

time after that

machine guns,

harassed

operation. itself,

1t$iny of the crossings but also over hundreds and rebuilt

had to be made not of feet nine of flooded times. The hundred

only over the area

"\,

on both

One bridge

was built

Corps Artillery tons of shells.

covered

the assault

with a total

of lIDre than four

The crossing by the

was made by the

29th and 30th Divisions,

soon followed

2nd Armored and the 83rd.

.""

I"

(Colonel Miller said th3.t the dams held a hundred million metric tons of water. If they let it all go it could flood the Roer Valley a thousand yards wide for twenty miles down. All those months of fighting got control of the Erfttalsperre, but the lower one was still in German hands. And the Germans blew it. When we started it was still racing and flooded, but Corps Engineer had said they could put in the bridges, so the 29th and 30th went ahead. The l104th Group handled the 29th bridges opposi~e Juelich. Th~ anchors wouldn't hold_at first, and then the cabl~ was shot away three times in a row, and they changed the location once. But they got it across under the eye of the Corps Engineer himself. To the south, where the 1ll5th put the 30th across, it was tougher. There they used alligators at first for the assault across more than 1000 yards of flooded land on each side of the river. And the washed-out roads had to be rebuilt for 1500 yards on eacp. side. The Che.mcal Warfare Section had the Smoke Generators working and they put down a perfect screen. The enemy artillery landed 1000 yards downstream from the bridge site. When they found an unexploded bomb on the far side abutment they were going to use for the bridge, and their anchors were swept away, it seemed often that they'd never get this bridge in. But it worked, and it finished alone with bridging a 60 foot canal on the other side fifteen hours ahead of schedule.

-s

(The Corps Artillery moved up close, and had their targets zeroed in when the jump-off came. There 47

~-~

~ ~--

~....

.-

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111 ~

was some fire for a whileon the bridge sites, but by the time the bridgehead started expanding, the Corps Ba~talions had silene-ed every enemy battery, and the attack was started in full momentum. They showed their 'power when the 30th Division reported a counterattack on the other side of the Hambach Forest. '.Vefired aU the Division Artilleries and the complete Corps Artillery, 20 battalions:, in & serenade. When the smoke cleared & tul.l. German bat talion had been wiped gut, and six to ten tanks.) (The Corps wheeled up the AA to support the attack too. The 459th AT!{ Bn supported the 29th and the 30th with their Bofors guns, and laid streams of fire on strong-points across the river.) XIX Corps' east, reserves throwing attack from their rapidly-acquired p1a.n off balance, bridgehead soon swung their
...,

the German defense

and catching

in rnid-'11B.neuver.

The 29th took Juelich

and push~

on to take

Muenchen-Gladbach on March 1st, while the 30th overran the Bambach Forest,
and guarded alongside. the right flank of the Corps until VII Corps finally came up

The 2nd Armored, committed on the fifth

Muenchen-Gladbach along first and Neuss, with them, to reduce peeled

day of the attack,

Uerdingen, while to the

drove between 83rd, reduce

which had attacked t' eusS and be the

off to the right the

Amer:i:can troops in eventually to Rheinha us en. of Germany for across first the

to reach

lower Rhine. left. bank

The 95th Division

was thrown

and cleaned

up the

of the Rhine from Uerdingen a ttack Artillery

the Ruhr.

This. battle
first the time, steel

drove the
and the plants Corps of'
'"

deep into

the

heart

was able to fire Here, hordes and the too,

the Rhine time,

into

for the

the men of the Corps began to and on had

see the farms, crippled

of slave-workers effects

used by the Germans in factories

of the bonDing with which our Air Forces

German industry.

48

" .;.a....

,1--

The a:ttack was over in ten days, and nx

Oorps had 11,000 prisoners, to its credit. The

lith

353 towns, and over 300 square miles of territory

enemy had rushed more of his best Panzer,
"'"

troops

into

the battle:

9th Panzer,

130th Panzer Lehr, Divisions.

elements

of the 2nd Parachute driven back,

and 15th Panzer and in some

Grenadier cases,

They had been cut up, destroyed.

completely The assault

\'

on the Rhine barrier rart

fell in it.

to the XYl CoIf's to our north,

but XIX Corps had an important Corps Engineer,

Colonel Hubert S. Miller,

and engineer troops

the
for

was in command of all

the naval

the entire
the

operation,

and our Corps Artillery

fires'

moved north to re:inforce

The first crossing

preparation

and supporting

for the attack.

was nade on the night of the 23rd, a~ by March 30th the 2nd Armored
under XIX Corps was across After divisions the time and attacking east. the Corps moved its three most of

the 2nd Arm::>red had cut loose, over one road through from Gerrmn artillery Halt ern, from the

which was under fire pocket to the The S3rd, the

south which the the 30th, the

2nd Armored was helping

to make of the Ruhr.

3th Arm:>red and the 95th Divisions Hammwas by-passed, swung southeast
...

swung in behind up later by the

2nd Armored. The 2nd ArIn:)red

and cleaned

95th.

to Lippstadt

where they made contact the greatest encirclement

with the 3rd Armored of all time.

to close

the Ruhr pocket,

(Both sides of the roads were lined vlith them, day and night. French, Belgian, Polish, Russian, Jugoslav, Dutch, Italian, pulling carts full of their pitiful possessions. And every one of trem another headache for Lt. Co!. Bosch, G-5. The French PW Camp south of So est was just one example of the job for G-l: 8,000 to be evacuated and fed and cared for. And that was only the begiming. 49

.J ~
0 ~.. - -. -. ~.~.~--~

~
~

To clear the roads, G-5 assemhled

the Displaced

Per-

sons as they came iDto towns and villages, housed and fed them. before they were sent to their homes, This group is gathered at Lippstadt.

XIX Corps found this Heinkle jet plane factory in a salt mine 900 fe~t undeTground near Engels. Germany. This

is only one of hundreds of industrial installations overrun by the Corps in the drive to the E!be. 50

'!I""

.,.-0IIII;..

~ -

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--""

.~

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-"~,,-,","-,,,

=_. - .~

J'

~
XIX Corps carried
miles apart, and heading flanked

on for some time now a war on two fronts,

rapidly in opposite directions. 83rd rolled To the toward the

125

northeast the Weser, 95th, and of

the 2nd Armored,

by the 30th and the to the southwest

the Elba and Berlin,

'!'"

while

the 8th Armored, the northern

a combat team of the 17th Airborne the Ruhr pocket. The Germans tried

were reducing to stand

portion

and fight

at the Teutoburger the Weser,

Wald, but the 2nd Armored broke through, with the 83rd Close behind. with them again. orders, On the 9th, east

and in one rush crossed

The 30th cleaned

up Hameln and was soon up on for the the

bank of the Weser th4U held up briefly, of responsibility Cavalry right, screening and the

but on April

XIX Corps was relieved With the left, in the was taken ll3th

Ruhr operations flanks, the 30th

and was off again. Division on the

the 83rd on the center, the

2nd Armored thrusting increasing Halberstadt Goering Steel speed.

powerfully Braunschweig

drive

went on at the 83rd took

by the 30th while a fight

to the sooth. Works south

The armor ran into of Immedorf,

at the Hermann and went on.

but smashed through

j'

Engineers man a ferry with brawn, while bridging operations start. 51

~j

I -f -- - --I('""""'"

I'

On the 11th ot April th~ 2nd Armore.dwent

57 m11GS in one day to reach that had wheels, came up with

the Blb~, and tho S3rd, moving on anything thQR at Barby on tho 12th.

Both th~ divisions

immediateJJ' began bridg-

ing and 'carving ou:t. bridgeheads.

Tho 2nd Armor~t B bridge camo und~r

I;

heavy tire,

so it -s

withdrawn and all O~ strength was put into that south, which went in and stayed.

ot the S3rd tarther

(Sout;h or Halberstadt they twnd it, another one of the Concentration Camps we'd never believed the stories ot in ,the States tor all tl\e years we'd heard about; them. This was called Langenstein, and it was a small one, only 1500 or so, although ten times that number had died. When they first found it, the parade ground was piled high with bodies of the dead. In the huts the dead lay in the same bunks with the living, and they both rotted. This was another job for G-l. And for the Corps Surgeon too, for, with all the length of sector the Corps had, he had to find medical attention for these people. The 20th Field Hospital J1k)vedin, and went to work, but stin they died,. the Dutch, and the French, and the Russians and the Poles, who had had to work twelve hours a day excavating rock by hand, on one bowl ot water soup. Nowthey had truit juices and vitamins and eggs and milk, but for

'"

Some of the lucky ones at Langenstein. They could walk.

...

52

I!\_~

~>-

side

some it was too late. And all that green countrystank from the death th3.t Nazism. had put there.)

(All the time we were liberating thousands of Allied PWs. The French had to be sent back by truck and tr'd.in, and there was another job for the G-l under Colonel Martin. The Americans and British were taken by the thousands to Hildesheim, where the Corps G-l set up shop to evacuate them, at the Luftwaffe barracks there. They had to be fed and cared for, and

';'

)
/ Near Rietburg, this camp holding 10,000 Russian prisoners was liberated by XIX Corps' advance. Only one of many.

"'"::

Long lines of liberated

'l'

prisoners were on the roads.

53

..4

Ir

-- -

-~-

,
~

the Surgeon seot the 426th Medical Collecting Oompiny to help out. The Special Services sent all the Red Cross Clubmobiles and the Red Cross girls. Over 4D,000 prisoners were repitriated from t~here before Ninth A.rrq finally took it over.) (The old problem of supply came up again in this ptlrsuit. For a while, when we reached the Elbe we were hauling supplies of all kinds 500 miles, and the Divisions were having to go 150 miles for them. And counterattacks on the SJrd's bridgehead were using up ammunition. Th, assistant G-4, Lt. Co1. Phillips, had told the 2nd Armored on their way that W'8wanted the railroads left in as good shape as possible, and we wanted the location of rolling stock and engines reported. When they were located and inspected, the G-4 gave the 1lO4th Phgineer Group the job of pushing them through. Capt. Clemens had never seen the inside of an engine before, but on the trial trip he taught the German engineer to jump the engine over gaps. On Apr112Oth, 13th carloads of artillery ATDTDIJI'\1tion and n carloads of gasoline went from Hi1desheim to Oeschers1eben, all the way from the Weser to the Elbe. A.rter awhile, with the 247th Engineer Coni>at Battalion running it the train had over & hundred cars and 8 engines. Going back, G-5 loaded these trains with refugees, and in the time t he Corps ran it we moved more than 25~OOO of them, including thousands of Russians, PW'sand Displaced Persons. This Corps can do anything, and usually does.)
As preparations to bold. were being Dade to push on to Berlin, After the order came up

We were to wait

for the Russians.

two days of cleaning

in Magdeburg, by the 2nd Armored and the 30th, for XII Corps. In this last

the war was almost over ad-

rush we had taken 172,000 prisoners,

Tanced 22> miles across of Hamm,Halberstadt, Boest. didn't fight

the Weser and the .IIbe, and seized the cities Braunschweig, )fagdebur& and day, but theT
~

Hame1n, Hi1desheia,

The Russian armies were rumored close day alter appear. Finally, on the 30th of April, after

a two-day runninc

frOIi Zexvst,

the 125th Cavalry Scp.1&dron of the Corps' 113th C&T-

&11'7Group, made contact. with the men of the XXVII Guard Corps under 54

--"

'-..f
-'~

General Cherakmanov near Wittenberg

junction with the Russians.

on the Elbe, the first

Ninth Army

.",

(We moved to Bad Nauheim, down by Frankfurt, but the work for the Corps Staff wasn't over. The Surgeon's Section had to take over and administer 40 German military hospitals with 45,000 wounded Germans. The Artillery Headcparters had to take over the running of a big area. G-5 still had thousands of DP's on his hands, and the trains carrying the Russians left Wetzlar every day. G-2 had to run down war criminals and Nazis, and set up Document Centers to process the papers We found. G-3 started the :B:ducation Program, and everyone wondered about his points.)

..0

XIX Corps meets the Russians. Co!. \Villiam S. Biddle 1 13 Cavalry Group shakes hands with a Russian Artil-

';:

lery Major at Apollousdorf north of Wittenberg.

55

.=
~

-- ~ -=-

It! fi

UNITS wrm XIX CORPS

Engineers
172nd Engr Combat Bn IlO4th Engr Combat Gp 246th Engr Combat Bn 247th Engr Combat Bn 61lth Engr L E Co 503rd Engr L P Co 62nd Engr Topo Co 1115th Engr Combat Gp 512th Engr L P Co 992nd Engr Tr Brdg Co 1142nd Engr Combat Gp 208th Engr Combat Bn 277th Engr Combat Bn 278th Engr Combat Bn 554 th Engr Hv Pen Bn 208th Engr Combat Bn lOOOth Engr Tr Brdg Co 999th Engr Tr Brdg Co 1254th Engr Combat Bn Co. B, 554th Engr Hv Pon Bn 2894th Engr Tech lnt Team 978th Engr Maint Co 254th Bngr Combat En 86th Engr Hv Pan Co 552nd Engr Hv Pan Bn 989th Engr Tr Brdg Co 178th Engr Combat Bn 582nd Engr Dp Trk Co 82nd Engr Combat Bn 295th Engr Combat Bn 993rd Engr Tr Brdg Co 467th Engr Maint Co

Artillery XIX Corps Artillery 8th FO Bn Hq

~
119th 963rd 203rd 978th 739th FA Gp FA Bn FA Bn FA Bn FA Bn

228th FA Gp 228th FA Bn 967th FA Bn 979th FA Bn 793rd FA Bn 258th FA Gp ~58th FA Bn 959th FA Bn 92nd Chern Mtr Bn 70th FA Bn 696th FA Bn 25th FA Bn 65th Armd FA Bn

576th Army Postal l77th Army Postal 1st Quartermaster

Unit Unit Bn Co

2nd TD Group 113th Cavalry Group 125th Cay Sqdn 113th Cay Gp 11th MRU(Mobile)

24th Special Service 66th AGF Band 90th QMCar Co 4045th 4046th
'

,
'>r

QMSer Co QMSer Co

56
~

~_.".

.-

--

~-~

~~.

0.. -.-

-='" """"

."

,~
"~

Antiaircraft
'C'---.

Artille.ry
Battalions (SP) (Sp) (sp) (SP) (Sp) (SP) (SP)

Signal 2nd Signal Battalion 3252 Signal Service Co l30Bth Signal Pigeon Co, 2nd Plat. 27Bth Signal Pigeon Co l53rd Liaison Sqdn, Flight C 125th Liaison Sqdn, Flight B l65th Signal Photo Co, Det A 3264th Signal Service Co, Jet 51

...

...

37mm Se,lf-Propelled 195th AAA AW Bn 203rd AM AW Bn 3S7th AAA.AW Bn 467th AAA AW En 473rd AM. AYi Bn 486th liA AW Bn 57lst AAA AW Bn

"!: '"

-.

40mm Bofore Battalions 376th AAA AW Bn (M) 430th A.AAAW Bn (M) 440th AAA AW Bn (M) 445th AAA AW Bn (M) 447th AAA AW Bn (M)

Ordnance
48th Ord Bn

448th 449th 453rd 459th 460th 463rd 53lst 547th 552nd 554th 555th 559th 567th 634th

AAAAWBn (M) AAAAWBn (M) AAAAif(Bn (M) AAAAVfBn (M) AAAAWBn (M) AAAAWBn (M) AAAAWBn (M) AAAAW.Bn (M) AAAAWBn (M) Ail AWBn (M) AAAAWBn (M) AM AWBn (M) UA AWBn (M) All AWBn (M)

503rd Ord Co IDvr(Tk) l30th Ord MMCo 6th Ord MYCo 35l3th Ord MAM Co 484th Ord Evac Co 3442nd Ord 1OU{Co 92nd Ord MYCo 257th Ord MMCo lllth Ord MMCo 3522nd Ord MMCo 3468th Ord MU4Co .
18th Ord MMCo 135th Ord MMCo l28th Ord 11M Co 302nd Ord MMCo 553rd Ord AA Co Medi cal 62nd Med Bn, Hq & Hq Det 426th Collecting Co 497th Collecting Co 609th Clearing Co .546th Ambulance Co

90mm Battalions 129th Ail Gun Bn l32nd AAA.Gun Bn .217th AAAGUn Bn 4l3th All Gun Bn 749th AAAGun Bn
th"

Searchlight Battalions 2nd Plat, A Btry, 226t h AAA S/L Bn

0"

;0:

'ik

57

/
Ii--;>O-

~--_.-