Tuesday, January 19, 2021

Promotions and Hard Decisions

US Army Photo

The jeep rolled to a stop outside the hut 2nd Platoon was using as a CP. Cpt. Tony Palminteri and 2nd Lt. Herman Jacobsen climbed out, stretched and then stepped into the hut.

"Cap'n, what brings you out here to our palatial estate?" S/Sgt Stephen Hernandez asked as he stood to greet the two officers.

"First of all, Stephen, you need to start wearing lieutenant bars, regiment approved your field commission. As Herm here also got promoted..." Cpt. Palminteri gestured to his Weapons Platoon leader.

"Yup, you can have my bars, Stephen, congratulations." Jacobsen said as he handed over a set of 2nd Lieutenant bars.

"I've got some other promotions for your guys as well. Where's your machine gun team by the way?"

"Follow the track down to your left as you go out the door, Judd and his guys are there. We're not losing them are we?" Hernandez asked with some concern.

"Nah, Judd made sergeant, I wanted to give him the good news myself." Jacobsen said, "So if you'll excuse me?"

"Okay, Herm, see you in a few." Palminteri said.

Turning again to Hernandez, Palminteri handed him a sheet of paper with a list of promotions -

S/Sgt. Jack Wilson
Sgt. Melvin Katz
Cpl. John Myerson
Cpl. Charlie Gammell
Pfc. Chris McWhorter

"Those are all effective immediately. Katz will take over Wilson's old squad, right?"

"Yessir, Pena will be taking over 2nd Squad, he's ready. Any chance on getting him his sergeant stripes any time soon?"

"Yeah, why not? Tell Diego to put those on, I'll clear it with regiment. By the way, how old is Gammell anyway, he turn 18 yet?"

"Yessir, back in November. He's young but he's a damned good soldier. Best shot in the regiment I'd bet."

"I've heard. So, you guys need anything special? Well, other than food, boots, fresh socks, time out of the line, etc., etc.?"

"Heh, a month in Paris would be nice."

"Dream on. Have your men ready to move tomorrow."

Bundesarchiv

They were still a kilometer short of reaching Losheimergraben, so it was into the woods once more as it was starting to get light.

"Herr Major, I think we should push on, it's overcast and I think it's going to snow again." Leutnant Manfred Sauer knew that the men wouldn't be happy spending another day out in the middle of the snowy countryside.

Major Jürgen von Lüttwitz thought about it for a moment, then shook his head. "Into the woods Manfred. I don't want to be out in the open. The enemy Jabos have been active even with the overcast. The ceiling is high enough for them to get under and strafe the roads. The Amis seem anxious to get us out of Belgium."

Sauer sighed, he agreed with his commander, but some of the men were starting to lose faith. Two had actually suggested surrender, but he didn't tell the Major that, von Lüttwitz was determined to keep what was left of his unit together.

So they left the road and headed into the trees. Digging in was out of the question, the ground was frozen solid and their small shovels would be of no use, so they found hollows in the ground to at least get some protection from both the weather and the enemy.


"Sir, we have a problem." In the late afternoon, Unteroffizier Peter Krause, the Sani, had come over to where von Lüttwitz and Sauer had been trying to get some rest.

"What is it Peter?" Major von Lüttwitz asked.

"I've been checking the men, two are having problems with their feet, well, I suppose we all are, but Spiegel and Berger are having severe problems. They have frostbite. Spiegel will probably lose his toes, Berger might lose a foot."

"Damn it, can they walk?" von Lüttwitz asked as he looked at his medic.

"Barely, I'm not sure what to do. Leave them? They will slow us down."

Von Lüttwitz looked off into the distance, it was getting dark, they would be moving soon. He didn't like the idea of leaving men behind, but he may not have a choice. Then Sauer spoke up.

"Sir, we could use the If. 8s¹. We're almost to Losheimergraben, we dump some of the rations and equipment and load Spiegel and Berger on two of the carts."

Von Lüttwitz thought about that for a moment, then said, "Do it. I'll not leave a man behind. It's going to be dark soon, we need to be moving."

The men dumped some of the contents of two of the carts. making room for Spiegel and Berger, both of whom insisted that they could walk on their own.

"Are you kidding mensch?² You move like an old man." Feldwebel Klaus Haasen, Spiegel's squad leader, was only half kidding. They were all moving slowly due to the lack of food and the cold, but Spiegel and Berger could barely put weight on their feet.

"Just hop on, we'll haul your asses back to the Reich. Good thing you've both lost weight!" Grenadier Peter Meyer joked, though he had lost considerable weight himself due to the short rations they had been on since the battle started. He hoped, they all hoped, that they could get a decent meal when they got to Losheimergraben.

No one knew that that town had been flattened by Allied bombing to choke the German supply line. They would learn soon enough.




¹ Infanteriekarren, If. 8 - Infantry carts.
² Man.

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42 comments:

  1. Couple of bleak photos to match the times for both sides but moreso for the Germans. Get chilled just thinking about it, good work Sarge. Eh, down to twelve above at sunrise here.

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    1. The weather here has been relatively mild. 40s-50s during the day, 20s-30s at night. Clear skies for the moment.

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    2. Gonna be eight tonight, here at The Badger's Burrow.

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  2. My 5th grade teacher's brother lost some toes at Bastogne. I never got frostbite, got close at times...

    I can't imagine the feeling of heading to safety to find it's been destroyed. Well, that isn't quite accurate. I'm learning what that feels like....

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    1. Once again our thoughts seem to be in sync, STxAR - it is demoralizing to have defeat being snatched from the jaws of victory, so to speak. The winter of 1944-45 was a trying time for both sides in Western Europe what with weather and enemy action being both advantageous and disadvantageous at times. That feeling of looking forward to a safe haven and finding it not be there has to be demoralizing.

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    2. STxAR - History doesn't really repeat itself, but damn, it often rhymes as has been said by others.

      I've come close to frostbite once or twice, no fun.

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    3. The winter of 1944-45 was vicious.

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    4. Tom, it is amazing how this story seems to dovetail...

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    5. Frostbite becomes progressively easier to get with each exposure. I have circulatory and nerve problems in my feet from repeated incidents, not all due to military service. Winter lobstering and cutting wood caused most of the problem. Old Guns

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    6. I've heard that. I guess once bits of you freeze, or get close to it, the tissue damage remains.

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    7. I frostbite my paws, at age 14, by being too stupid to wear gloves. Now, they ache when it gets really cold.

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    8. You're lucky you still have fingers!

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    9. Winter of 45-46 was no picnic in northern Europe either. The war might have been "over" but times were still hard.
      Been cold here as of late but not northern-Europe cold; stuff goes through your bones.
      Boat Guy

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    10. A lot of the Dutch went hungry that winter.

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  3. I have had the very mild (by comparison) experience of a road trip with a gas station closed when you thought it would be open. I cannot imagine the shock of finding your entire resupply depot completely gone.

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    1. I've had that experience. Driving down the road in Texas, needing fuel, seeing the sign for a gas station just up the road. As I got close, the sign went dark. Fortunately there was a 7-11 not far past that.

      Needing supplies to find the cupboard not just bare but gone, yeah, that would be horrible.

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    2. There used to be a spot on I-10 between Tallahassee and Pensacola where there was nothing, literally nothning available for like a 60 mile stretch except one rathole gas station. And they charged for it. And even worse, most likely you'd get double-charged on your credit card. (Happened twice with us, yes, we disputed and won...)

      So bad that we marked it permanently as a NO-GO on our maps.

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    3. Too bad they couldn't receive a visit from a wandering pack of Vikings...

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    4. I remember as a kid on drives in West Texas with my parents seeing signs saying something to the effect, "Last gas for xx (or xxx) miles - Check your gauge!" or "No gas for XX miles - fill up now". It was wise to heed that advice!

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    5. Between Del Rio and Sanderson there weren't any facilities. 120 miles of Sonoran desert on Hwy 90. The last time I went through Sanderson, the only gas station there closed at 5 or 6 pm. Looks like they have more stations now. You are so far out that AM radio stations were hard to come by.

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    6. Just did a Google Streetview of US-90 between Del Rio and Sanderson, not a place you want to run out of fuel!

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    7. (Don McCollor)...Long ago as a student with a Jeep Wagoneer (spit) with a nonworking gas gauge on my way back to Grand Forks, I estimated I was getting very low, and the expected service station was closed on a bitter winter night. Ended up with the town policeman syphoning a few gallons of gas out of the County road grader for me. I was as jumpy as as a cat ("Are you sure this is legal?")...

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    8. Sounds like you met a good man that night.

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    9. C'mon fellas; most of us are past those times, if you're not filling up at a half-tank these days you're just plain wrong.
      Boat Guy

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    10. I've got to admit, I do that all the time.

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  4. Winter is a bad time to be malnourished. And cold and wet.

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    1. There is no good time for that, but yes, winter is the absolute worst!

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    2. I own R P Hunnicut's 580 page SHERMAN. A book that you get your money's worth of paper, no matter what else. In one of the diagrams, it located the gasoline powered crew heater, in the right front sponson. The parked Sherman the guys are marching past in the top photo, seems to have a small roof over the ball mount. I wonder if that is just something sitting on the glacis, that just looks like a roof, or is it a makeshift roof, to protect the ball mount, so accumulated snow doesn't melt from warm air leaking around the ball mount, and refreshing, locking the ball mount in place?

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    3. It IS a roof, of sorts. Looking closer at the right side headlight guard, you can see that there are sandbags stacked on the glacis, as additional armor, ( see also the shelf, across the transmission cover ). So, it's a roof/shelf, to keep the sandbags off the ball!

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    4. Okay, question asked and answered.

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  5. Hey AFSarge;

    Frostbite, yep I got it on one of my field exercises, I didn't lose any toes but your feet never quite recover from it, cold affects it every time. What a trade, the Kampfgruppe Motors in to Belgium and walks out. but it is better than being dead or in a POW cage. Keep on walking.

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  6. Promotions are better when they come from merit and not attrition, but the money's the same. How did we treat German POWs? Sounds like Von Luttwitz's men could use the rations!

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    1. Allied treatment of POWs in the West depended on a number of things. Manning a machine gun, killed and wounded a bunch of guys, then run out of ammo, bad idea to try and surrender at that point. Numerous instances of the surrendering MG team being gunned down.

      We treated prisoners far better than the Russians and French. Canadians could be rough with POWs, they had good reason to having suffered at the hands of the SS as far back as 1940. Same with the British.

      Surrendering on your own is a dicey proposition.

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