Sunday, November 22, 2020

A Look Behind the Scenes

Corg Memorandum dated 26 Apr 1965 Page 49

Every now and then I like to stop, take a deep breath, and give you a look "behind the scenes," as it were. Sometimes it's the history behind what's going on in the book, sometimes it's where I'm going with the story or why I did something a certain way. Often it's just me, the author, needing to take a pause while I figure out where we're going next. But I do like to give you some insight into the background of this whole book endeavor.

The Internet has oodles of information about history, some of it very good, some of it okay but you need to take it with a grain of salt, and, of course, some of it just plain sucks. That is, it's inaccurate, I don't blame the person who wrote it and put it out there, as I grow older I've learned that not everything they taught us in school was accurate. But at least they tried, as anyone who has ever studied (or even just thought about) history knows, often the information floating around is not the whole picture.

The history of a battle, is not unlike the history of a ball. Some individuals may recollect
all the little events of which the great result is the battle won or lost, but no individual
can recollect the order in which, or the exact moment at which, they occurred,
which makes all the difference as to their value or importance.

The Duke was right you know. He said that in response to a question concerning the accuracy of all the books which had been written about the Battle of Waterloo in the years after that event. No one person knows the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth about an historical event. Unless you witness a thing, you can't really be sure what someone else tells you is the unvarnished truth.

Anyhoo.

Having read quite a bit on World War Two in Europe, I think I'm able to discern truth among the many nuggets of information out there. When in doubt I can always check one of the many books I have on the subject. If more than one witness agrees on how a thing happened, then that's a pretty good indicator that that's what happened.


It's probably a fair bet to assume that I once drove by where that jeep is parked in the preceding photo. The town of Hürtgen isn't all that big...

Google Maps

The family and I motored down that way when I was stationed in Germany. My grandmother had asked me if I could go there and get some pictures for her brother, my Great Uncle John, who had fought in the area with the 4th Infantry Division. His war ended in the Hürtgenwald, he survived but having a German bullet go through the top of his helmet was enough to get him sent home.

Oddly enough, a German colleague of mine had a relative whose war ended in the Hürtgenwald as well. His father had been in the German Army and was captured during that battle. Small world.

(Source)

The minutiae of war has long fascinated me, though it's often driven The Missus Herself crazy when I used to make a habit of muttering things like, "They didn't wear those style uniforms at that period in time..." during TV shows and movies. I've learned that those details, while semi-important, aren't as important as the story itself. (One excellent, and woefully mistitled, series I've watched on Amazon, Generation War is an excellent story. But they have shown weapons being used early in the war which weren't introduced until later. Why is it mistitled? The title in the original German is Unsere Mütter, unsere Väter - in English, Our Mothers, Our Fathers. The idea being to show the modern day Germans what their predecessors went through. A much better title I thought.)

Anyhoo.

That graphic above depicts a standard German rifle platoon of the period I'm writing about. I also use this -

(Source)

It's a quick reference for the composition of a German unit from the squad up through an entire company. There is also one for the U.S. Army -

(Source)

Note that the squad's grenadier in that graphic still carries the M1903 Springfield rifle, as the grenade attachment for the M1 Garand wasn't widely available during the time period noted in the graphic (Apr '42 - Jul '43). While the Springfield was a very good rifle, it was bolt action. You couldn't put as many rounds down range as you could with the semi-automatic M1. That's me, the Minutiae King. Which leads me to this...

Sturmgeschütz III Ausführung G
(Source)

Sturmgeschütz IV
(Source)

Jagdpanzer IV
Guderian-Ente¹
(Source)

You may have seen some mention in the comments as to the types of assault guns currently assigned to Kampfgruppe von Lüttwitz and the number of road wheels on the different types. Also Scott mentioned the "Guderian Duck," so I included a picture of one of those as well. (The third vehicle in the series of photos above.) Yup, Kampfgruppe von Lüttwitz has a complement of StuG IIIs, I haven't specified whether or not it's the model with the Saukopf² (first photo), or the one with the more angular gun mantlet (which you can see here).

More minutiae indeed.

I introduced the Nazi version of the Commissar, the NSFO, to bring a little more tension to the story. They were introduced into the Wehrmacht in December of 1943. I guess Hitler and his ilk felt that the Army wasn't political enough. Unlike the Soviet political officers, the NSFOs had no command authority in the units to which they were assigned. No doubt they thought themselves upholders of National Socialism (hack, spit) but (no doubt) were looked upon more as tattletales. I'm not real sure how long the kid will last. You may have noticed that he's a bit of an asshole.

105 mm Howitzer M3 near Carentan, France, 11 July 1944.

Don McCollor brought up an interesting point the other day about the verbiage 1Lt Paddock et al were using to call in fire missions. To be honest, I was using modern day verbiage from the modern US Army Field Manual, FM6-30. I should be using the WWII version for forward observers which is FM6-135. The words used are a lot different. The modern version is, to me, a lot more understandable to the layman, which is why I used it. Now that I have acquired a copy of FM6-135 (like I said, the Internet can be a wondrous thing) I may update how the Americans call in artillery fire.

Maybe, it's all rather technical and the objective here is to tell a story, hopefully it's a good story.

As regards the howitzer in that photo, doesn't look like you expected, does it? Because that particular piece depicted above was issued to airborne units and the regimental cannon companies of U.S. infantry regiments. It was guns like these which slaughtered that German company in The Valley the other day.

I'll get back to the Front on Tuesday (unless Tuna decides he has something to say, Tuesdays are "his" by tradition, like last week).

In the meantime, keep your powder dry and remember, the Associated Press does not determine who wins elections. I hope you are enjoying reading this story as much as I am enjoying writing it. Cheers!





¹ "Guderian's duck" called this by their crews as the vehicle was very nose heavy and difficult to operate in rough terrain.
² Pig's Head, because it looks like one.

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52 comments:

  1. Sarge,
    Good stuff as ever! Perhaps it's because I too have a taste for "details" that I find all of this very interesting. Having spent time in Europe and Germany especially the terrain is very " visible" to me.
    You've brought some interesting detail - I didn't know the horses were organic at Platoon level, just never encountered that bit. Logically or not the injury to animals hits me harder than that of people; could be that like one (or more) of your characters I've found animals to be "nicer" and more worthwhile than many soegennnant "people" - the NSFO comes immediately to mind.
    Being a big fan of the Field Artillery, I would be interested in the contemporary call for fire of the period. I learned the current one as a lad, so it "rang true" for me, even though it might not actually be so.
    I also want to compliment your character development of Lt Paddock and note in those days the second letter was not so frequently capitalized as now. Today's army in particular went to three letters/numbers post-war but contemporary abbreviations were usually longer in my experience/ research; thus Lt Paddock's rank might more usually be abbreviated as "Lieut" in those days in correspondence. Much like today's Navy abbreviated Commander as CDR, in WWII it was usually written "Cdr" or "Comdr". Little things, I know...
    T'any rate, keep up the good work!
    Boat Guy

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    1. My use of abbreviations for the various American ranks is something I've been very sloppy with. Here are the official abbreviations as used from 1942 to 1948:
      Private Pvt.
      Private First Class Pfc.
      Technician Fifth Grade T/5
      Corporal Cpl.
      Technician Fourth Grade T/4
      Sergeant Sgt.
      Technician Third Grade T/3
      Staff Sergeant S/Sgt.
      Technical Sergeant T/Sgt.
      First Sergeant 1st Sgt.
      Master Sergeant M/Sgt.
      Second Lieutenant 2nd Lt.
      First Lieutenant 1st Lt.
      Captain Cpt.
      Major Maj.
      Lieutenant Colonel Lt. Col.
      Colonel Col.
      Brigadier General Brig. Gen.
      Major General Maj. Gen.
      Lieutenant General Lt. Gen.
      General Gen.
      General of the Army GA

      Something else I should fix before publishing! (The Germans have abbreviations for their ranks as well, I haven't used those at all.)

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    2. Sarge,
      Please do NOT use the German abbreviations!
      Boat Guy

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    3. And you know exactly why I have not. German is hard enough as it is!

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  2. USMC squads were loaded for bear!
    https://www.battleorder.org/usmc-rifle-co-1944

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  3. Nice......very nice "behind the scene" look. Huh....bolt-action rifle with five rounds vs semi-auto rifle with eight rounds. Then having 4 MGs in a platoon, well now. But if you shoot faster you need more ammo....uh huh. Some interesting bits today Sarge.

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    1. Those little wagons were used to carry ammo for all those MGs, among other things.

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    2. Which gave the German squad a surprising amount of mobility, vs a squad schlepping all the stuff on their backs.

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    3. It does beat carrying all that stuff.

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  4. Thanks for the background, the attention to detail is telling and it shows in your storytelling. My spending 5 years in Germany and in the forest I get chills everytime I read a story from you because I can see myself in the forest gripping a garand watching for the krauts to ambush us because I did imagine the same thing while I was in the woods and thought what what my fellow soldiers went through going through the forest. The thing about the "STU III's and the STU IV 's that they are built on the modified chassis of the Panzer III and the Panzer IV which was way undergunned by 1943 and pulled out of front line service and sent back to depot and would up getting converted because it was quicker than building a new tank to replace them. Where the STU IV was newer but not as many because the Panzer IV had a much upgraded gun and was still comparable to the allied models and could hold its own against the T34's from the Soviets and was a match and some say was superior to the regular sherman that was issued to the allied armies. They started making STU III's because it was quicker and Germany needed "tanks" and Germany built really good tanks, BUT and here is the but, they were overengineered and complicated and took time and resources whereas the Sherman and T34 were churned out by the thousands.and an assault gun was faster to manufacture with out the turret and turret ring. I have quite a few books on tanks and history of them in my stash and reference the assault guns, LOL Easier to manufacture but not as capable, there was tradeoffs. Another awesome post. I had to delete the earlier post because after it posted, I spotted a technical error and I couldn't correct it so I had to cut and paste and correct and delete, LOL. I hate it when I do that

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    1. I really wish Blogger would give us a comment editor like WordPress used to have. (I don't know if they still have it, I don't comment on many WordPress blogs these days.)

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  5. Replies
    1. I've watched it twice, it really is good.

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    2. I've got it and have "leafed through" some of the scenes. If you say it's good I'll sit down and do the whole thing.
      Boat Guy

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  6. Thought you might like this
    https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/37742/so-long-samurai-japan-bids-farewell-to-its-final-frontline-phantoms

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  7. The minutia matters. It's what makes an early WWII USMC squad not as powerful in firepower as a later USMC squad - Springfields vs Johnsons vs Garands, with numbers of men changing, too.

    And... I hate it when a good author ruins a story by getting a simple fact wrong. Your 'verify by two or more sources' is a good idea, but you have to check who the sources are using as their source, thus all the BS about Shermans being flammable and the crew not being able to escape, which Maj. Nicholas 'The Chieftain' Moran showed was bupkis, and all the later sources all used one source for their source... If you know what I mean.

    Excellent. It's why I almost envision each of your chapters having either a ton of footnotes or chapternotes (please, for the love of God, not endnotes!) The best, of course, would be 'open book, left page has story text, right page has pictures and facts' but that's just silly and expensive waste of space and many people would hate it (I'd love it...)

    And the Forest waits for it's next meal, slumbering in the late fall cold weather...

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    1. I figure there will need to be extensive appendices with lots of data (mostly in pictorial form like above).

      Don't care for end notes either, have to go to the back of the book and check, or read them up front, or after... GAHH! It gets cumbersome. Now the electronic version (if it happens) could have tooltips and links, with an easy way to get back to where you were.

      The logistics on all this could get interesting...

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    2. Hey guys, this is historical fiction, not a definitive technical study. Keep the notes to a minimum (foot or chapter, yes; end-no way!) Adding all this baggage to mollify a few of us geeks is a huge workload which may prevent a great piece of fiction from ever getting finished. A good compromise might be The Book as one project. Then, an on-line only addendum, errata and miscellaneous other cool stuff for those who care enough. You could even have a comment, feedback discussion section there. Don't let a really good book get bogged down with a never ending quest for perfection and expansion.
      John Blackshoe

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    3. Not to worry JB, I'm far too lazy to do all that anyway. But I like the online concept, a lot!

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  8. Sarge, the "minutiae" matters. It is the difference between a tale and a gripping story. Thank for sharing the graphics - helps the folks like me who are visual learners.

    (I appreciate your plight about movies. Me five minutes into The Passion of The Christ: "That is not Classical Latin. That is Medieval Latin..."

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    1. Hahaha! I was wondering how accurate the Aramaic was!

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    2. (Don McCollor)...Kind of like an old (wind ship) sailor looking suspiciously at a beautiful painting of a clipper ship under sail...checking that every piece of sail and rigging was exactly right...

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    3. Or a modern sailor seeing an illustration of a warship, with smoke coming out of the stacks. That is a good way to have the CO, and the ChEng go ballistic.

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    4. Don - I've seen illustrations of sailing ships with the flags streaming aft! Not good, getting the rigging right is something an artist should strive for, but it is hard!

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    5. Scott - Sometimes, of course, the smoke making is intentional. OTOH, ever see a coal-fired warship making flank speed? Pretty smoky!

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    6. Smoke is part of coal firing, when you are using shovels to fuel with, in a rolling deckplate, it's hard to get an optimum fuel/air mix. Even with gas turbine engines, you can get smoke from sudden power changes, from turbo lag. But with mild fired boilers, you want as clean an exhaust as possible, because the incomplete combustion that creates the smoke, also costs the boiler tubes. On water tube boilers, that builds up on the exterior, making it harder to get even heating of the water, and putting thermal stress on the water tubes themselves. In a fire tube bioler, it's even worse, as the spot plugs the fire tubes, and you don't get any steam production. Smoke is evil.

      But yes, you do get smoke from sudden power changes in a steam driven ship, too, the increase in upstart cleans the soot of of the stack interiors. That is why a good fire room crew blows the stacks every night.

      NSFO, being the dregs of the refining process, produces very corrosive smoke. Making smoke for a smoke screen raises all kinds of he'll in the boilers fireboxes. But,so can enemy gunfire, so, sometimes you just have accept that you won't like what you find, in your next boiler availability.

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    7. For upstart, read updraft, for mild read oil fired, please. I even proof read! Stupid Kindle spellcheck!

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    8. Scott #1 - Too much, too much! I yield...

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    9. Scott #2 - I thought that maybe the CHENG was an upstart...

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    10. Scott has some good points there, but I'll quibble a bit. Having been a CHENG, I've had some experience in boiler business, and been chewed out for inappropriate smoke, among other things.

      It's called "blowing tubes" not "blowing stacks."

      NSFO (Navy Standard Fuel Oil), adopted around the time of WW2, is indeed nasty thick inefficient boiler fuel, but it was better than the Bunker C oil used starting circa 1916 when the Navy began building oil burning ships instead of coal burning. Circa 1970 the Navy converted from NSFO to "ND" or Navy Distillate, which was is basically kerosene/JP-5. The ND eliminated the need to heat the fuel in the tanks to make it less gooey and able to be pumped, and made a huge difference in the number of steaming hours on a boiler before it had to be shut down, opened up and have the firesides manually cleaned- a really nasty and foul job.
      About today's jet engine powered ships, I don't know anything, but they seldom seem to smoke at all in photos (or they only publish the smoke free ones.)

      In the early days smoke was not really a concern, although it could be seen way over the horizon, long before masts or hull was visible, By WW2 smoke was considered undesirable, and the more efficient boilers and use of forced draft blowers to adjust the fuel-air ratio made it relatively easy to be mostly smoke free, if the sailors watching the burners and blowers and through a little periscope rig that looked at the combustion gases as they went up the stack, were on the ball. They were less important than sailor making sure to keep the flow of incoming feed water adjusted during speed changes so the boiler tubes did not lack water to prevent them being burned through, or have too much water so it would flood the steam drum, which is supposed to be just steam, and if a slug of water got into the steam fed to the turbines that could cause serious damage.

      [Most?] WW2 ships did not depend on the main propulsion boilers for screening smoke, but had dedicated machinery, often located way aft with the steering gear machinery which would make huge volumes of smoke using a special oil mixture. Post-WW2 most of these were disused or removed as search and fire control radar rendered "hiding in smoke" ineffective.

      Incidentally, the USS Connecticut (BB-18) photo on the masthead shows them on speed trial off the Maine coast in 1906 just after construction, so they would have be shoveling as fast as possible, as they were still coal fired.
      John Blackshoe

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    11. Wow. Interesting indeed.

      You'll note that USS Connecticut (BB-18) has been on the masthead for quite some time. I really, really like that photo!

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  9. Enjoying the story enormously, Sarge. Nice peek behind the curtain, too!
    --Tennessee Budd

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    1. (Don McCollor)...There is a hilarious (fictional) short story 'Un-holy Smoke' in Daniel Gallery's book "Now Hear This" about the ship's incinerator on the carrier flagship (with Admiral aboard) rigged to produce a smoke screen whenever it was lit off...

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  10. (Don McCollor)..."It was in the Year of Our Lord 1944 and there was war all across the world"...Minutia is important, because the war was too big to comprehend without each little nexus that connects to a web of others (often in unexpected ways)...Great job, Sarge! Make it read like you just got their stories right after the war...

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  11. I saw a Lindybeige video on the STUG III, and he crawled inside, and showed that there was at least and inch of open space in either side of the old style mantlet, that was one of the things that the saukopf was meant to correct. Be nice to the STUGers in your story. They are up against artillery, Wolverines, Shermans, P-47s, bazookas, mortars, and maybe even a Jackson, who can tell? Let them have saukopfs, please.

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    1. I think they'll probably have the Saukopf, looks cooler too.

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  12. I didn't know, until the STUG IV photo above, that STUGs has travelling locks! Cool!

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    1. Looks more like a museum thing to hold the barrel up. I looked and didn't see any wartime pictures of the StuG IV with that on it.

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  13. Boy bloggers was really mis behaving today. Kept rejecting me on my desktop three or four times.

    Trying to remember what I kept trying to say this morning 😁

    I do remember on the dialogue a contrast. The worst western I’ve ever seen in my life was on Netflix last night with John Travolta.

    A valley of violence brought a total of $60,000 at the gate when it was in the theaters

    It’s stunk on many levels. Bad acting, bad script, and 20th century dialogue in the old west.

    As a contrast I remember an interview with one of the screen riders for deadwood. I like deadwood although I think it really fictionalize some characters like George Hearst, turning him into a super villain.

    On the pursing the screen writer said we didn’t want to have them curse as they did in the 19th century because people would not understand it. So there’s a fine line on dialogue

    On those Sturmgeschutzen without a movable turet they must’ve been hard to aim. Wonder what any advantage was not giving them a turet.

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    1. The advantage was that they were cheaper and easier to manufacture than a turreted vehicle.

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  14. Trying again with an edit this time:

    Agree like all above that details matter when you know the subject matter details yourself, and also paints a much more robust story even if the reader doesn't know the details are right. Kinda like looking at 'standard' TV vs. HD and/or 4K. What gets me is gun details - like holding someone at gunpoint with a 1911 whose hammer is down, or taking a revolver off safe (yes, I know there are a very few uncommon revolvers with a safety of some sort).

    I think you should name the NSFO "Karen" :-)

    Thanks for the continuing saga, it's a thoroughly engaging story!

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    1. Heh, "Karen."

      'Cept that he's far worse than a "Karen."

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