War Years 1941 - 1945 with 327th Field Artillery Bn

War Years 1941 - 1945

with 327th Field Artillery Bn.

I was attending Purdue University in 1941 and I remember coming out from the Sunday noon meal in the residence hall where I was living. On the radio they announced that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor. Right after that Purdue went on a speed-up program of three semesters a year. I was in basic ROTC since all males in the university were required to take two years of ROTC (Purdue is a land grant university). In May of ‘42, at the end of my 2nd year, I elected to take the advanced course since I felt pretty sure we would be going into the service.

In January ‘43 the University requested the advanced ROTC cadets to consider registering, which would credit the city of Lafayette, Indiana with the equivalent number of draftees. Most of my class signed up; there were just three or four who did not.

David in ROTC uniform

We were still not supposed to be subject to the draft, but on 17 February we were advised that we would be taken to Indianapolis and inducted, put in uniform, and returned to Purdue to finish our semester. I would then be one semester short for graduation. The students that did not sign up stayed in school for the next semester and graduated. They were inducted as privates after their graduation and did not get to Officer Candidate School for another three to four months.

In May of ‘43 we were sent to OCS, Class 77, at Fort Sill, Oklahoma for our thirteen-week course. Most of the class consisted of Purdue students but there were a few candidates from the other services. Some were from the Air Force and had never seen an artillery piece. The Air Force personnel had a tough time for most of the thirteen weeks since most of the instruction moved pretty fast. The Purdue students had already had three years of instruction on 75 mm and 155 mm artillery pieces.

The first few days at OCS were trying. We lined up for the mess hall and on signal entered and started down the food line. When we sat down at the table it seemed like only a couple of minutes and the whistle blew for us to leave. It went on like that for every meal. After a few days I was getting pretty hungry. I decided to start eating as I was going down the line so that I was partly finished when I got to the table. I have never changed my eating habits to this day. I still eat fast. When I was first out of the service and married to Rosemary, she would not sit across the table from me because I was always close to being finished before she had eaten half of her meal.

We received our commissions in August of 1943. My first assignment was to the Replacement Training Center at Fort Bragg, North Carolina as a platoon leader on 155 mm guns. I had a platoon of fifty men and they were a group of rejects that the Army was giving one last chance to qualify for service. Most of them wanted to stay in the service. One of my men was called to appear before a board to determine if he should be given a Section 8 Discharge. I was called as a witness and I said he should be allowed to stay in the service. He was very willing to do KP and we didn’t have a lot of men who liked that job. I also said if they discharged this man that most of the men in my platoon were candidates for discharge. The man got a Section 8.

I stayed at Bragg for three months, then went to Tennessee, and then to Fort Polk in Louisiana. From Camp Polk I received orders, in February of 1944, to the 84th Division, which was at Camp Claiborne in Louisiana. I was assigned to Battery “C” of the 32nd Field Artillery Battalion. We had a number of extra officers in the battery and I was one of the extras and assigned as an Assistant Executive Officer. I believe we had a total of 6 or 7 officers at that time and the normal is only four. I was one of the extras.

During the stay at Claiborne we had field training exercises in the surrounding countryside. Our field exercises usually lasted about a week and then we came back to base for showers and rest.

Dan Daley, my friend from Purdue, was teaching flying in Texas and came up to see me one weekend. He came in an Air Force plane and took me for a plane ride. I had been confined to base at the time he made his visit because of some infraction, which I cannot recall, but I went for the plane ride anyway.

Just before we were due to go overseas there were a lot of officers being moved around. The extra officers had been moved out and I was Ex Officer of “C” Battery and Lt. Chrisman was battery commander. In August of ‘44 Captain Proctor was given command of “C” Battery and Lt. Chrisman moved to Ex officer. I was transferred to “A” Battery as Ex Officer. Captain Dillon was “A” Battery Commander. Lt. Walter Jarrett was Recon Officer and Lt. Noble Katter was Motor Officer. We were all 2nd lieutenants.

In August of 1944 we went by train from Claiborne to Camp Kilmer in N.J. to prepare for shipment to England. With a weekend pass I went to New York to see my sister, who was working at Macy’s, and to see Rosemary, who I had met on a previous trip to New York. Rosemary was also working at Macy’s in the men’s department.

We loaded aboard a British ship by the name of Sterling Castle. This was the sister ship of the Morro Castle that had burned off the coast of New Jersey in the 30’s. I remembered that many people lost their lives in that accident and I was apprehensive about being aboard the Sterling Castle. I have since learned that Robert Garner was one of those casualties (Jean Kregg’s brother).

We sailed in a heavy fog, with the rest of our division on two other vessels. While we were receiving instructions from the ship’s captain on the procedures for the ship we felt a very hard impact. A member of the crew rushed in and spoke to the captain. The captain started reeling off the lifeboat assignments and told us to get our men on deck immediately. Our ship had collided with another vessel and we had a large hole in the bow.

When we got on deck we could see that the vessel we had collided with was on fire and disappearing in the fog. It was announced that our ship would return to New York where we unloaded and returned to Camp Kilmer. A week later we went through the loading procedure again back on the same ship. They had patched the bow and we sailed in another convoy. The officers took a four-hour watch in the compartment where our battery was billeted. We also led calisthenics on deck each day. We sent a few to get the food each day and they returned with large pots to serve the men in the compartment. The men had hammocks to sleep in and they were taken down during the day so that we had a big room for meals. Since there were about five thousand troops on board we had to take turns going on deck. The ship was pretty dirty when we got on board and we had to clean it up.

When the officers were not on watch we played pinochle in our stateroom. I was in a small stateroom with five other officers. Three of us from “A” Battery were together with the rest from “B” Battery. We arrived one week after the rest of our division at Liverpool and went by train to southern England.

We stayed at a Camp Lopcombe near Winchester, just east of Salisbury, for about three weeks to prepare our equipment for combat. The camp accommodations were Quonset Huts.

In France they had a quartermaster outfit that moved supplies from the coast to the front line troops. We were required to furnish a group of officers and men to temporarily operate one of the companies. Captain Dillon was selected for this assignment and Lt. Jarrett and Lt. Katter from our battery went with him along with others from the battalion and about half of “A” Battery personnel. I was left in charge of the battery in England to get the equipment ready. We had some leaves during our stay in England and I did get into Salisbury and went to see the cathedral. It was my first time in England and we got to do a little sight seeing. I did get to make one trip to London.

We moved out of camp on October 31st and loaded aboard an LCT in Southampton. We then moved out into the harbor to wait for the rest of the division to load. The LCT could only carry two 155 mm howitzers along with their prime movers. There was some additional room on the sides of the guns and they loaded some unmanned three-quarter ton vehicles to travel with us. While on board we ate “C” rations and “K” rations. We landed on Omaha Beach November 2nd. Captain Dillon was there to meet us and we drove to Forest de Cerisy where we stayed for a few days.

Our howitzers were tractor drawn (a light tank with the top cut off, seats provided for the crew, and a rack for a small amount of 155 mm shells). The tractors had no provision for personal gear of the men. The original prime mover was a 3 ½ ton truck which had a large storage capacity. The tractors had very little space so we were always short of storage for personal gear. Our captain recognized this so when he turned in the trucks that he was assigned for the RED BALL EXPRESS he decided to appropriate a few 2 ½ ton trucks and a few ½ ton weapon carriers. As they checked off the vehicles he was responsible for he sent them out the back gate of the camp then drove around to the front gate and checked in again.

The brass was on to this scam, so they set up check points along our line of march and counted our vehicles. We then had to turn in the excess vehicles that they counted. When we found out what they were doing we started to mix our vehicles in with other units. Eventually they got all of the appropriated trucks back from us.

On November 6th we left Forest de Cerisy and drove through St. Lo. That town had been destroyed. The first stop for the battalion was at Dreaux, France. We started with two columns in the movement. One was a wheeled vehicle column and the other was a tractor column. I rode at the rear of the tractor column to repair broken down tractors which occurred about every ten miles. They were not designed for long distance and would destroy the rubber on the bogeys when they got too hot. Constant driving did that and we covered about 151 miles that first day.

Bogeys are the small wheels inside the track.

We ran out of spare parts very early in the trip across France and had to improvise. There were four bogeys on each side of the tractor, each with two rollers with rubber treads. The constant running wore the rubber tread off the roller and the track would bind. We would tie up a roller in the bogey that lost its tread and that would cause the other roller to take twice the load. That roller would then lose its rubber. We went to various supply companies along the way to scrounge spare bogeys.

The truck convoy would stop at night for a meal and rest and than move out at daybreak. My crew would usually make it to the assembly point when the truck convoy was leaving as we had worked all night doing repairs. When we fixed a tractor and got it on the way we would go about 10 miles and find another tractor broken down. We did this all the way across France and were worn out when we got to the Palemberg and Urbach area in Germany at the Siegfried Line.

Engagement on the Siegfried Line

Our first action was on November 15, 1944. We fired twenty four hours a day in support of the infantry and found the first problem in our training. The gun crews consisted of 10 men. Each had an assigned job. The first few days we operated as the army had set us up. One of the things they did not consider was that we were operating 24 hours a day. We were not going back to camp after a few days for rest and rehabilitation. I was the Ex Officer in charge of the four artillery pieces and their crews. We had three other officers in the battery -- a captain, a recon officer, and a motor pool officer. The motor pool officer didn’t have a lot to do once we were in position and the vehicles had been serviced. I requested that the captain assign the motor pool officer to me so that I could cut back to a 12 hour shift. Captain Dillon agreed to this arrangement and Lt. Katter stayed with me whenever maintenance was not being performed.

The crews were in bad shape at the end of the first few days since they were not getting proper rest. We decided that each crew would divide into two and each group would take a 12 hour shift. Each man therefore had to cover two jobs. We operated this way for the rest of the war. The crew that was not on duty did not respond when we had a fire mission and everyone got their rest. Instead of having three men to load a 95 pound shell into the howitzer, one man had to pick it up in his arms and throw it into the breech. Another man would ram it home and place the powder charge. It worked out very well. We were lucky we had men who were big and strong and capable of handling heavy jobs.

In running two shifts for the gun crews we needed eight men who could add and subtract quickly in their heads. There was no time for using a pencil and paper. We also needed four men who could do math for the survey crew under direction from the recon officer. When we moved to a new location the advance party would very often survey the location of our number two gun from the base point established by the battalion. We were, however, limited in the number of men who were capable of handling these jobs. Before we shipped overseas the division was under strength. At that time we had many ASTP (ARMY SPECIAL TRAINING PROGRAM) students assigned to the division and we were hoping we would get our fair share. We did get some but most went to the infantry. We probably could have used them to better advantage.

Since no one had the opportunity for a shower since we left England it was decided that some arrangements should be made to get this done. Someone found that we were near some German coal mines and they had excellent shower facilities. The rooms were all tiled and they had baskets that hung from the ceiling for your clothes. We ran trucks back to the mines, in shifts, so that everyone got a chance for a shower sometime during the day. You would take off your clothes, put them in the basket, hoist it to the ceiling, and tie it off. The facilities were excellent.

Each man did his own laundry by washing it in his helmet. Sometimes the long johns we were wearing didn’t get washed very often. Because of this we often thought we could sleep standing up.

A 155 howitzer has a different loading pattern than a 105. We had a separate 95 pound shell which was first rammed into the barrel and then a powder charge was placed behind the shell. The powder charge consisted of seven bags, which were tied together for the maximum range of the howitzer. We rarely fired at maximum range and therefore had to remove powder bags for our normal engagements.

155 mm Howitzer

Once a fire mission started and the first commands were received from Battalion Fire Direction we knew the following rounds would have the same powder charge. We could then start making up successive charges in advance. Depending on the fuse in that first round we could also make up successive rounds so these could be fired faster than the first round. An impact fuse could be set in advance, but, If we were firing a timed shell for an aerial burst, we had to wait for the commands to set the timing. After the shell and powder are placed in the breech it is closed and a primer is placed in the breechblock. The primer sets off the powder and the unit fires. Sometimes the primer did not set off the powder charge and this resulted in a misfire. The basic rules call for waiting five minutes before removing the primer and inserting another primer. The reason for the delay is because sometimes the powder charge starts to burn but not fast enough to set it off immediately. This is known as a hang fire since they sometimes do go off after a bit of a delay. We never felt we had the time to wait the full five minutes but were careful not to stand behind the barrel when removing the primer. This proved to be fatal during the Battle of the Bulge when Leon Bradford did not follow that procedure.

The 105mm howitzer has a casing, with powder bags in it, that fits on the back end of each shell. To prepare to fire you remove bags from the casing and place the shell back on the casing and the unit is pushed into the barrel. No ramming is necessary and no primer is used. It fires the same as a cartridge in a rifle. Consequently you can fire it much faster than a 155 mm howitzer. The shell is also much lighter and therefore does not require the physical effort of a 155 mm unit. The breech of the 155 is much higher off the ground than a 105 and this adds to the strain of firing the larger shell with half the crew. The sound of the 105 is very sharp whereas the 155 has a deeper roar. At that time we were not furnished with any ear protection so a lot of artillery personnel have hearing problems.

105 mm (4.1 in) Howitzer

We were the left flank of the Ninth Army. The British 43rd Division was on our left and the 2nd Armored Division on our right. A major engagement came on November 18, 1944. We opened up with a five-minute barrage to prepare the way for the tanks and infantry. The first objective was Brell, Germany. The town of Prummern fell that day and also Geilenkirchen. This entire area was part of the Seigfried Line and had many concrete pillboxes that had to be taken individually.

In one position near Geilenkirchen we had our command post in a basement. The guns were in a field across the road. One night there was a very large explosion that rained a lot of dirt on us. The next morning we found that an artillery shell had landed about 20 yards from our position and there was a big crater where it had landed. We were very lucky that night since some of our off-duty men were sleeping in the remains of the house above our basement. The shrapnel went through the building but over the top of them since they were sleeping on the floor. No one was hurt.

The field in which the guns were located was a big mud hole. One of our tractor prime movers got stuck getting the gun into position. The tracks dug into the mud until the under pan was on the ground and the vehicle had no traction. We had to get one of the trucks with a forward winch to pull the tractor out of the mud.

A major from battalion came to inspect us one day and we walked out into the field toward a gun position. We heard a few enemy artillery shells passing overhead and when we looked around the major was face down in the mud. All of the men were looking at him and they were all standing. We knew that if you could hear the shell you didn’t have to worry. It was those that you couldnot hear that you had to be concerned with. The major discontinued his inspection and returned to battalion headquarters. That major was relieved from duty and sent back to the States with a bad case of the shakes.

We did have one enemy shell land in a stack of our shells at one of our guns. The shells were kept separate from the fuses and the explosion merely blew the shells out of the stack. We picked them up and put them back. We also had one enemy dud land in our battery area. We tied a rope on it and pulled it to a trench and dropped it in. We then covered it with dirt so that if it went off it could do no damage.

Food was always in short supply at the end of each month and sometimes we would revert to our emergency supplies. We had some “C” rations which were very poplar, and also some “K” rations. The “K” rations were for the three meals. Breakfast had a little can of scrambled eggs, lunch had a can of cheese, and dinner had a can of Spam. We always ate all of the breakfast and dinner meals first so when we were real short we only had lunch meals left. To top it off the lunch meal usually had a packet of lemonade mix for a drink. You can imagine pulling out a packet of lemonade mix in the cold damp weather. When you ate the cheese it felt like a rock in your stomach. We also got some hard biscuits in the “C” rations that you would not consider eating at the beginning of the month, but they tasted pretty good at the end of the month with the jam that came in the same packet. We did get powdered milk from the battery cooks and we would have a succession of men beat it all day long and then it tasted pretty good. To start the month we would have coffee, milk and sugar. First we would run out of milk, a few days later we would run out of sugar, and then we would run out of coffee. That’s when we drank the lemonade.

One day one of our gun sergeants came into the command center eating something. We asked him what he had and if he was going to share. He said he was eating a turnip. We asked him where he got it. He said the field where the guns were located was a big turnip patch and you could dig as many as you wanted. Needless to say in a very short time we were all eating raw turnips. We were also able to dig some potatoes and obtained some grease from the battery cook. Using a can we boiled the grease and had French fried potatoes all day. Any kind of food was welcome fare.

Battalion advised us that a lot of cases of trench foot were appearing at all of the aid stations. The problem was that the men never took their shoes and socks off. We then received orders that the officers had to inspect the feet of the men in their command every day. Since the men would be embarrassed to have dirty feet when inspected, they took off their shoes and socks before inspection and washed them. Every day we went through the same drill. Each man would come into the command post, take off his shoes and socks, and we would check that there was no trench foot. It was very effective but not pleasant duty.

The 155’s were used for harassing fire at night. We didn’t know who was being harassed, the enemy or us. The first night we were assigned harassing fire, battalion fire control told us we had twenty-four shells to fire between midnight and 6 am. At midnight we fired twenty-four shells. The next morning battalion called and said that they heard us fire twenty-four shells at midnight and wanted to know why. We said we were just following the orders they gave us. The response was that we were supposed to fire them throughout the night. The next night they told us we had the same twenty-four rounds but were not to fire more than four rounds per hour. That night on the hour we fired four rounds. The next morning they said they did not want us firing all the rounds at one time and that night we could not fire more than one round every fifteen minutes. This we thought was to serve as maximum harassing of us rather than the enemy. Since we had to stay up all night we decided to play “tic-tack-toe” with our shots. We drew lines on the map of the town we were firing on and we each took a turn as to where we would put the next shell. Those on the receiving end must have had a hard time figuring out our strategy.

The Battalion Fire Direction Center used to think we worked all day figuring out how to make their lives miserable. In the artillery the order of command is very precise. If the commands are not in the proper sequence they cancel the previous commands. Battalion staff members were not that well trained in this respect so when the commands were not in the proper order and they asked if we had fired we would say no, and tell them why. We would actually fire but would always tell them we hadn’t. One day I was called and told to report to Battalion Fire Control. When I got there the major in charge told me that my battery were firing too slowly. To prove it he wanted me to sit alongside his man giving the fire orders and time how long it took to get the first round off. I started my timing when the command came in from the forward observer. I saw the calculations made and the command issued to the battery. In general we could get the first round off in twenty to twenty-five seconds. When the major asked me if I thought they were too slow I responded with a question asking if he thought we should get at least a bit longer than it took his man to calculate the commands. He said that he thought that was reasonable. I told him that we were already taking less time than that. I suggested that if he wanted to speed up that first round he should do some training with his staff before he criticized the gun crews. I never got called to the Fire Direction Center again.

When I returned to my battery I told the gun crews what had happened and said that we should try to pick up our response time. I told them that at the beginning of a fire mission I would give them a command to load. We did need to know the type of shell and fuse in order to do that, and then give them the data for direction and elevation. This would save time and we were able to get that first round off in fifteen seconds. The only danger in this is that a fire mission could be stopped any time up until the normal load sequence is given. One time they did stop the mission and we already had a round loaded. I had to report that my guns had a round in the barrel and I was berated for proceeding as I did. We didn’t get another fire mission and we had to ram the shell out of the barrel.

One day when I was out observing one of the gun crews I made some comments that they were getting sloppy and slow in getting a round off. I told them I could bring out the cooks and ammunition supply men and get a round off faster. They all laughed so I made a bet with them. I went to the cooks that were off duty and told them what I had done. They were all willing to join me if I thought we had a chance of beating the gun crew. I said I would be the gunner and I showed them which jobs each of them had to perform. We received a fire mission shortly after I finished giving them instructions on their jobs. We did beat the gun crew and they were a lot more attentive after that. They didn’t want me to bring out my pick-up gun crew again. This was when the ROTC training really paid off since I had performed all the duties of each man in the gun crew while at Purdue.

We were strafed by a German jet fighter while we were in the Geilenkirchen area. He made one pass at us and then was gone. We had 50 caliber machine guns on a few of our trucks but they never got into action. The plane was in and out before we knew what was going on.

I was promoted to 1st Lt on 16 November 1944

The division was in Lindern on November 29. The first German counter attack came on the morning of November 30. The Ninth Army (consisting of three divisions, 2nd Armored, 84tth, and 102nd) had drilled a hole through the Seigfried Line in 17 days, November 16 – December 2. It was a major achievement. We had arrived at the Roer River. There was a threat that the Germans would blow the dams upstream if we were to try to cross. If they did blow the dam it would make crossing impossible until the water receded.

While our division was planning for the crossing of the Roer the Germans made their first counter attacks at the same time that they made their offensive moves in the Ardennes -- December 16. During our drive to the Roer we had bypassed the towns of Wurm and Mullendorf. On December 18 the division turned its attack on Wurm and took the town by 10:45 am. Attention was then directed at Mullendorf from the rear. Mullendorf was captured before noon. This completed our operation on the Seigfried Line.

The Battle of the Bulge

The 84th Division had orders to move to the Ardennes on Dec 19th. The move was 75 miles and we had one day to get there. We had received more 155 mm ammunition then we could transport so we had to leave some behind. I regretted that for the next month because Battalion Fire Direction wanted me to account for all of the shells we had received.

The first night of the move was in a fog and our convoy was stopped at a checkpoint near Marche-en-Famenne, Belgium. We put our guns in position on the roadway not knowing if the German Army was coming in our direction. The next day we moved into position at Baillonville near Marche-en-Famenne.

In our first position we moved to a hillside near a forested area. We tried to dig in but the ground was frozen. We dug about 12 inches in an hour. It was getting late and we were all tired. We decide if they shot at us that night it would be too bad. We put down a tarp in the hole we dug, got into our sleeping bags and pulled a tarp over us. It was very cold but we made it through the night. We wore all of the clothes that we had. I had on long underwear, my GI uniform, a sweater, a field jacket, and a long overcoat. We also wore two pairs of gloves. We heard explosions nearby during that night. We didn’t know what was going on but were not interested in finding out at that time; we had enough problems.

The next morning I found that an antiaircraft unit had been attached to us. They had their foxholes dug and I asked how they were able to get through the frozen ground. The officer said they carried a supply of TNT in quarter pound sticks. They drilled a small hole, put in the TNT and set it off. They were then able to shovel out the fractured earth. I got a supply of TNT from them and thereafter carried a half pound with me at all times.

A favorite breakfast was pancakes. The first morning the cooks set up their Coleman stoves out in the open and started breakfast. The problem they had was that the pancakes were freezing on the stove. I didn’t mention that the snow was about two feet deep and the temperature was just above zero. We had to put an enclosure around the stoves to solve the problem.

That day we cut some trees and built a log hut that we used for our command post. We had 12 inch logs for the roof and felt that this would give us ample protection if we were shelled. We kept a fire going in the hut at all times. The fire was made in a five gallon can that our dehydrated potatoes came in.

A major from battalion came to inspect our position and told me to put up our camouflage nets to conceal the guns. I told him he would have to give that order to Captain Dillon. I did not think that putting up green camouflage nets in the snow would help to conceal our position. The major was pretty upset and stormed off. A short time later Captain Dillon appeared and told me to put up the nets. He said he had no choice since battalion gave the order. I must admit that after a few days the frost had accumulated on the netting and it did help to hide the guns. We had to move to another location before it was really effective, however.

Since our guns were tractor drawn and the roads were covered with ice we had difficulty getting up hills and kept sliding off the roads. We put a 2 & I/2 ton truck at the top of the hills and ran the cable from the winch to the tractors and pulled them up. This made moving to new locations very slow. The engineers arrived and welded studs on to our steel treads. We then could go anywhere. Of course when the snow ran out we ground up the roads until we could wear off or burn off the studs.

We moved a number of times and finally came to a stable position at a point that was to become the tip of the bulge. We were on a Belgium farm with our guns in one of their fields. Our command post operated from the barn. The men in the gun crews dug large dugouts at each gun position that could house the full gun crew.

While we were in this position we received our first supplies of a new fuse (Proximity) that we could set for an aerial burst at any height that was desired. Previously we had to set the time of travel and could never make an accurate setting. We used this fuse to get a burst above a forest area where German troops assembled. This produced a rain of shrapnel on the soldiers below. It was very effective.

Whenever we went into a new position our command post was always within sight of all of the guns but we required and installed telephones from the command post to each gun. The guns were usually spaced about thirty yards apart, depending on the terrain. Battalion would also install telephone service from the Fire Direction Center to each battery command post.

One night we had a lot of noise and movement near our position. The next morning when we could see what was going on we found the 105 mm units were in back of us. They had all pulled back during the night and our 155 mm guns were in the forward position. Not like what the book says should be the case. A day or two later the 105’s moved back to the front. That event was the turning point of the Bulge. We had looked at new positions we could pull back to, but were never given those orders.

The weather was still cold and the roads were all ice covered. The tanks had a tough time moving and would slide off the roads. A British unit came by and ran a couple of tanks directly in front of our guns. We stopped others that were trying to do the same by running a bazooka team in front of them and threatening to fire on them if they tried to block our guns. We stopped the remaining tanks from getting in front of our guns. I saw a British officer in one of the tanks that was already in front of one of our guns and told him we intended to fire if we got a fire mission. I said if we do he had better button up because he would be getting a good muzzle blast. We bore sighted our guns to clear the tanks so that we knew our minimum elevation. We didn’t get a fire mission and the tanks finally moved off. The trouble we had with tanks in our area was that when they ran off the roads they usually cut our telephone lines which were just laid along the side of the roads. This would then cause a traffic jam as all of the units with telephone lines would converge to find the breaks in their lines. When we were in Geilenkirchen we must have had 20 outfits trying to find their lines when British tanks ran through our position. At times it seemed to us that the British were trying to sabotage our efforts.

We were at the farm over Christmas and New Year’s. We had a turkey dinner for Christmas. For New Year’s the Belgian farmer’s wife made Belgian waffles for the entire battery. She started cooking early on New Year’s Eve and cooked all night and into the next morning feeding all of the men. When I looked at the waffles I thought I could eat a couple of them, but they were so filling I could only eat one. They were thankful that we were there and we had a good relationship with the residents. I went back to see them in 2003 and was able to find “The Waffle Lady” who met with us on that visit.

When we moved out of our positions the British moved in and occupied our dugouts. We later learned that the barn we had occupied burned down.

We left our positions on the tip of the Bulge and moved around to the north side in order to assist with the pincer movement that would eventually trap the Germans in the Bulge. The Third Army came up from the south and together we had the Germans cut off.

During one of our engagements in the bulge we had a hang fire on one of our howitzers. The man responsible for firing the weapon did not wait the required five minutes to remove the primer. He stepped in back of the breech and reached up to remove the primer and at that time the gun fired. Our man, Leon Bradford, was hit by the recoil and thrown against the trail. By the time I got out to the gun the man had turned completely purple. We had called the battalion aid station and the doctor came immediately, but Leon died before aid could get to him. It was the first casualty we had in the battery. The second casualty occurred when one of the men walked forward of the gun muzzle and received the muzzle blast when the gun was fired. This was not a fatal accident but the man was sent back for hospital care.

One day during the Battle of the Bulge I had a terrible case of diarrhea and I didn’t care if I lived or died. I slept for about 24 hours and when I got up I felt much better and ready to go back to duty. Lt. Katter was glad to see me back since he had to assume my responsibilities for the entire period.

We had a temporary lighting hookup for our command post. We had some spare headlights for our vehicles and had a long extension cord, which we connected to the vehicle battery. We burned out quite a few headlights that were 6 volt when we connected them to 12 volt batteries.

The junction between the north and south pincer was finally achieved on January 16, 1945. We went east and took the towns of Beho and Gouvy. By the night of January 23rrd our share of the Battle of the Bulge was over.

Our division was taken out of action and sent to a small town for rest and rehabilitation. We were there for one week and then started the return trip back to the Geilenkirchen area where we had come from in December of 1944. While we were in the rest area I spoke to Captain Dillon about switching jobs with the Recon Officer. I felt I was not seeing enough of the action. I was tired of contending with battalion inspections every time we were in position for more then a few days. All was agreed and I left with the division’s forward party for our move north.

My jeep driver did not keep up with the main column and we were soon lost. We had to go through a few road blocks and give the password of the day in order to keep moving north. We caught up to the rest of the forward party in time to get our assignment as to where we were to billet our battery which was a few hours behind us. We scouted the houses that were available and then waited at the side of the road for our outfit to appear. We guided the battery to their parking spots and assigned the housing. It was pitch black when they arrived and we would have had a terrible time getting located if we didn’t have an advance party. We were in the town of Aachen, Germany overnight and moved out the next day, February 3, 1945.

Our sector around Geilenkirchen, Germany was almost the same as when we left it. We were still on the west bank of the Roer River. The road to the Roer crossing at Linnich ran along the top of the hill line that could be observed from the west side of the Roer where the Germans were dug in. When you ventured on to the road in the daytime you attracted artillery fire from the other side. I took my forward party up the road one night and we walked down the slope toward the river where we could get a good view of the other side. We dug a large hole and covered it over with branches and dirt. The next night we went up again and ran a telephone line in so that we could transmit our information back to battalion. Two of us occupied the observation post that night since we knew we couldn’t reach it during the daytime without being observed.

The Germans must have seen something and they fired on our position. They fired a few rounds of 88’s at us but they landed over our position so they did not cause us concern. We knew they were short of ammunition and if they didn’t get you in the first few rounds they stopped firing. The area was shrouded with fog a lot of the time and observation was quite variable. For a short time you could see the other side clearly and then it would fade out. An observation plane flew over our position and they took photographs of the other side which we received a day later.

German 88 mm gun

I was able to pick out a crossroad on the map and tie it to the photograph. On February 9th I got the opportunity to take advantage of our position. We were getting ready to make a crossing of the Roer and had a lot of support artillery attached to the Ninth Army to soften up the other side. The only problem was that they were not able to get registered on a target point because they didn’t have forward observers where they could see a check point on the east side of the Roer. Apparently I was the only one in that kind of a position. I registered my own battalion. I then had a call from the Battalion Fire Direction Center asking if I could register some additional battalions. In all I registered seven before the fog closed in and cut off my view.

For my efforts that day I received the following from our division artillery commander.

Commendation Letter from Col. Barrette

Field Artillery Commander

Feb.10, 1945

1. On 9 February 1945 you completed in superior fashion a mission of observation on the division front. Your reports were accurate and complete, and contained much valuable information. In addition you completed registration for several battalions of field artillery of or attached to this division.

2. Precise and detailed reports of observation are essential to proper evaluation of intelligence. Your performance on 9th February 1945 may serve as the standard in such matters to be expected of the eyes of the artillery.

A Bronze Star was awarded to me on the 30th of March 1945 for this action.

The RAILSPLITTER, a division newspaper, carried the following in the March 21st edition:

SOME DEBUT: On his first day as forward observer, Lt. David H. Kregg of the 327th Field Artillery gave directions that enabled seven artillery battalions to score hits on their targets.

We were originally scheduled to cross the Roer on the 10th of February but the Germans destroyed the upper dams and flooded the river basin. We had to wait two weeks for the water to subside. During this time the division made detailed plans for the attack.

The artillery had three successive nights of shelling. The first night we fired at the actual crossing site with a five minute preparation at 2 am. The next night we fired for five minutes at another crossing site at 5 am. On the final night we fired for forty- five minutes with time on target control. This meant that you calculated the time of flight from your artillery location to the target so that all rounds landed from all units at the same time. The concussion that this causes can break your eardrums. The artillery preparation for the actual crossing started at 2:45 am.

For the crossing they brought up all the available tanks and lined them up on the ridge line directly behind our observation point. The tanks were firing directly over us and they were mostly equipped with 75 mm guns. The noise was pretty bad and we could not maintain our position and end up with any hearing. There was a short lull in the firing and we evacuated our position and returned to our weapons carrier which was parked back over the ridge line. The tanks continued to fire for about 15 hours.

Since I was no longer able to assist in fire direction I decided to drive to the crossing point and try to get to the other side of the river. We were able to drive close to the bridgehead where we parked the truck and two of us went across the foot bridge with the infantry. I followed an engineering officer who was sweeping for mines. I still couldn’t get to a spot that gave me any observation of the forward unit. My only means of communication was a walkie-talkie radio that I was carrying and it did not have enough range for me to make contact. I finally decided that my venture was unproductive and we headed back to the bridgehead to return to our unit.

Foot bridge over the Roer River

After we had crossed the river we started back up the road that was the supply line for the troops which were crossing. Traffic was very heavy and we finally had to leave the main road and use a secondary one. Everywhere there was a sea of mud and we got stuck in it with a host of other vehicles. We couldn’t move. It was late and I didn’t see any way of getting back to our unit. I knew my captain would be getting pretty anxious since we had not been in contact for about 12 hours. When I was about to give up hope of getting out of the mud one of our tractor prime movers appeared to clear up the traffic jam and I got him to pull us out first. When we got back to the battery the captain wanted to know where we had been. When I told him we crossed with the infantry he was very upset that I did it without orders.

From The Roer to The Rhine

The race to the Rhine started on the morning of the 21st of February and we arrived on the Rhine on the 4th of March. Most of the towns we went through were pretty shot up and one looked like the next. Our direction of drive was generally north and northeast rather than directly east. We went into a final position at Heide on the Rhine where we stayed until April 1st.

While we were in position on the west bank of the Rhine we lived in houses and herded all of the residents together into a few homes and required them to stay put. On one of the first days we were in position I went out to one of the gun sections. As I walked into their dugout I saw an electric light hanging from the center of the roof. I asked how they accomplished that task. They said they had one of their men climb a power pole and he found the wires were hot. So they tapped into the supply and ran a line to their dugout.

We then checked all of the houses that we were occupying and where the wires were down we reconnected them. The one thing we had to watch closely was the voltage we were receiving. We used the local radios to listen to get the news. The radios were equipped with a fuse so that you could change them to operate on different voltage. In the early evening the voltage would be high because usage was down. As it started to get dark the voltage would drop and the radio didn’t perform so you had to change the fuse position. As it got later and the lights started to go off the voltage would start to increase. If no one watched the dial it would blow the radio and we would have to find a new one. We went through a lot of radios in our travels.

While we were on the Rhine we were ordered to build dummy gun positions. We set up camouflage nets and put the outline of an artillery piece underneath. If the enemy had any aerial observation they would think we had a lot more artillery then we actually had. And when we moved up they would still think a unit was still in position.

Since I was a forward observer with division artillery I had the right to go anywhere on the division front to support any of the division infantry. I found an eight story building that was right on the Rhine River. We went to the eighth floor to set up our observation post. We had a good view of the other side of the Rhine and I used the end of a bridge on the other side as a registration point. On registration we knocked the top off the turret on the end of the bridge.

The Germans apparently thought we were in the building and they would fire an 88 at us. When we were first there we ran for the stairs and the basement. After we were there for a while we found that the shells were going through the building and bursting on the other side. After that we just ignored the shelling. They were short of ammo and didn’t fire many shells at us at any one time.

One day a battalion officer brought some Red Cross workers up to our observation post to show them what the front lines were like. We tried to make it clear to them that they had to stay back from the window area. They brought us doughnuts and coffee. However, they walked about a fair bit and when they left we took a heavy shelling and had to take cover at a lower level in the building. Most of the shells were still going through the building before they went off.

I could spot the smoke from a train moving on a track that I could pick up on my map. It would go a short way and stop. The train was out of sight and the movement erratic. I directed fire onto it a few times but never knew if it had been hit. There was no further smoke that I could see. In general, you had to over describe your target, otherwise battalion would not allow you to fire. One day I saw a large concentration of people as though a shift change had occurred. We fired on them and again did not know if any were killed or wounded but there were no more concentrations after that.

From The Rhine to Hanover

When the time came to cross the Rhine they sent the first troops in by glider to secure a position on the east side of the Rhine for a bridgehead. Then the engineers built a pontoon bridge that would carry all of the equipment and troops of the division. When we got to the east side we saw the damaged gliders. It was hard to believe that enough troops survived the landings to hold the position until the bridge was installed.

After we crossed the Rhine my memories all seem to run together since we were moving pretty fast. We normally went into position in the afternoons and fired into the night and moved up the next day. This went on each day. As recon officer I moved out behind the infantry and then was assigned an area by battalion to locate my battery when they moved up. I normally ran the survey for the Number 2 gun and staked the position for the other three. We would then guide each gun to its position as it arrived.

On April 9th we started out on the same routine. However, it was not to be the same for me. As we followed the infantry we were told that they had gone up the side road and cleaned out the enemy and they had then pulled back to the main road to continue to Hanover.

We were advised to proceed up the side road to a small village and find new positions for our guns to fire on Hanover. As we approached we came under rifle fire. The village was only a few houses on a cross road that had an underpass below an elevated railroad track. There was also a cemetery adjacent to the railroad embankment. We took cover behind the headstones. Whenever we stuck our heads out, they fired at us. We could not determine where the shots were coming from and knew we had to take some action since the battery was not that far behind us. I said I would go through the underpass and up the other side of the railroad embankment to see if I could locate the sniper. There was a communications enlisted man from battalion who was with us and he said he would go with me. There was a railroad control tower about 300 yards further up the tracks and I thought the firing might be coming from that position.

The railroad was electrified so there were overhead wires and therefore poles to support the wires every fifty or one hundred feet. So we had some cover going along the right-of-way. We checked out the tower and there was no one there so we continued along the embankment walking on the tracks. We went another couple of hundred yards and there still was no firing. I thought that the sniper must have pulled out and decided that we should get back so that the location of the battery could be taken care of. The shortest way back was across an open field. We got out in the field about one hundred yards and they opened up on us with a machine gun. I didn’t know that there was another underpass a couple of hundred yards further on and there was a German squad and halftrack in it.

Halftrack

I hit the ground and started to return fire with my carbine. This was the first field that I had seen in Germany that did not have any shell holes. When I hit the ground my steel helmet came off my helmet liner and rolled out of reach. T hey were firing tracers at me so I could see the line of bullets coming at me. A lot of the shells were landing short and I could see the impact in the dirt. I felt a burning in my left hip. I had been hit with a tracer and my pants were smoldering. I hit at it with my hand to try to put it out, then felt my right shoulder jerk back but didn’t think further about it. I was then hit in the right leg. All the bullets went through. I finished firing my clip and changed clips. I must have passed out then and came to a short time later. When I looked up I saw three Germans coming toward me with my companion ahead of them. I couldn’t remember if I had pulled the bolt back when I changed clips. I thought if I pulled the trigger and nothing happened I was surely dead. I decided not to try. They got me up and we started back toward the railroad embankment. As we reached the embankment rifle fire from our side started. They got me up the embankment and I rolled down the other side. The two of us were put in a half-track and we started back for the next village.

My right leg was an open wound from my knee to my ankle and I was bleeding so I took one of my first aid packets and tried to cover some of the wound. One of the young German boys started to help me but there were two SS soldiers in command who stopped him. When we reached the next village they got me out of the half track and laid me on the sidewalk. Apparently a hospital had been at that location but most of it had been destroyed. An old doctor came out and they took my pants off so that they could see the wound. He apparently told the soldiers that I could not be moved any further so they got back into the half-track and took off. A few nuns came out and they helped me down into the basement. They put some paper bandages on my leg and gave me something to eat and drink.

I was rescued April 10th, the next day, by the 292nd Engineer Combat Battalion. The engineers took me out of the bunker on a stretcher and back to a battalion aid station. The doctor examined me and bandaged my leg, foot, and hip. He then asked if I had any other wounds and I said I didn’t think so. I did not have my pants on so the lower wounds were all visible. I still had my field jacket on and he had an orderly help me sit up. He walked around in back of me and said I had a big blood stain on the back of my field jacket. When they took my field jacket off he saw the large wound on my back where the bullet came out. He then asked where the bullet entered. I said I did remember my shoulder jerking back when I was on the ground firing toward the source of the incoming tracers. He saw the hole where the bullet had hit me in the right shoulder. It went through without hitting any bones or my lung. I was very lucky. After treatment at the aid station I was transported to the clearing company in Bruckeburg, Germany. It was a MASH unit.

They operated on me at the clearing company to clean up my wounds. I was given penicillin every four hours for a couple of days and I was then able to sit up. When the orderly came around at night with the penicillin shot he didn’t always wake the patient. One night when he stuck the needle into one of the wounded, the patient awoke and hit him. After that they always woke you up before they gave you your shot. I have been allergic to penicillin ever since.

When I was feeling good enough to sit up I realized that I had not written home in a fair bit of time and thought the folks might be worried about not hearing from me. So I wrote a letter as though nothing had happened out of the ordinary, the date on my letter was about April 16th. I found out when I got home that my parents had received a telegram from the War Department saying that I had been wounded in action. It arrived on the same day that they received my letter. They were confused as to what was going on since the telegram dated April 25 read as follows:

THE SECRETARY OF WAR DESIRES ME TO EXPRESS HIS DEEP REGRET THAT YOUR SON 1LT KREGG DAVID H. WAS SERIOUSLY WOUNDED IN GERMANY 09 APR 45 HOSPITAL SENDING YOU NEW ADDRESS AND FURTHER INFORMATION PERIOD UNLESS SUCH NEW ADDRESS HAS BEEN RECEIVED ADDRESS MAIL FPR HIM QUOTE RANK AND SERIAL NUMBER (HOSPITALIZED) CENTRAL POSTAL DIRECTORY APO 640 C/O POSTMASTER NEW YORK NEW YORK UNQUOTE= J.A.ULIO THE ADJUTANT GENERAL

The letter from me did not mention being wounded.

I was transferred from the clearing company to a large hospital in Paris and when I arrived I asked the nurse when I was getting out and going back to my unit. She told me that I was not going back since I would be out of action for some time. She also said anyone who was not to be sent back to their unit would be transferred to England for further care. A few days later some orderlies came in and put me in a cast from my waist down my right leg. My big toe on my right leg was the only thing showing. They put me on a stretcher and transported me from the hospital to an airfield near Paris on April 21st.

Along with other wounded I was loaded aboard a C-47 and flown to England. From the English airport we went by train to a small town and then were taken by ambulance to an army hospital. They separated all of the wounded who had been prisoners from the other wounded. Since I had been a prisoner for one day I was classified as a war prisoner. Most of the others had been prisoners for a long period. Many were British soldiers that were under-nourished and had lost considerable weight.

The reason for the separation became obvious after a few hours. The first thing they did was delouse us. Even though I had not been in a POW camp I got the same treatment as the rest of the patients. They also decided that everyone would have to be weighed to determine the amount that they were underweight. I had lost a fair bit between the time I was shot and my return to England but nothing compared to the rest of the patients.

Even though I had a large cast it was decided that I would have to be weighed. I gave them a hard time about it but they said it was required. They brought in a small bathroom type scale and two orderlies picked me up and set me on the scale. Going from horizontal to vertical caused a fair bit of blood to start coming out of the cast at my big toe. The nurse was pretty upset since I made some comments about the stupid action. They didn’t know what was wrong and decided to put me in a private room and called the doctor to come and determine their next action. They decided the cast had to come off and when they opened it the doctor said I was in the wrong hospital. He said the work I needed was not done there and I should be transferred to another hospital about 40 miles away.

An ambulance took me that same evening to the next hospital and I arrived late on the night of April 21st. There had been a lot of wounded received and there were no spare beds so I was placed in a hallway, still on the stretcher. Many wounded on stretchers were in most of the hallways. They took my temperature and said I would be looked at the next morning. The next day a nurse took my temperature again and it was higher than the night before. I was still in the hallway that afternoon when they took my temperature again and this time it was at 104.

The nurse decided that they had better get me to a bed and find out what was going on. They moved another fellow to a tent and put me in the bed. When they took off the bandages they discovered that my leg wound had become infected and that was causing my high temperature. They used wet bandages to clean up the infection. It felt like I was lying in a sea of water. I thought that I was in pretty bad shape at that time but when I looked over at the fellow in the next bed to me I saw a big leg wound that was a lot worse than mine. I also saw one fellow who had been hit in the face with a bullet and most of his face was gone. I came to the very quick conclusion that I was pretty lucky to get by with the comparatively little damage that I had.

After a few days my temperature came down and they decided that I should be operated on. They took a piece of skin from my right thigh and grafted it over part of my leg wound and sewed up the rest. They also grafted a piece of skin to the wound on my left hip. The wounds in my right shoulder, back, and right foot were sewn.

The next morning, which was a Sunday, the hospital commander was making rounds with the surgeon who had performed the operation on me. I was still under sedation but I could hear and understand what was going on around me. The commander asked the surgeon what was wrong with me and the surgeon responded by saying that he had to do some skin grafts. He also said that he had done a number of other skin grafts and had never had a successful one. He said if this one was not successful he would not do another one regardless of what the commander said. It made me feel real good. I later found out that the doctor who operated on me was a pediatrician in civilian life before entering the army.

The operation was successful and the skin graft took. A few days later the doctor thought that they should get me out of bed. They had me swing my legs over the side and sit up. The first time I did this I got dizzy. After a few tries I was able to sit on the side of the bed. The next step was to have me stand up. When I did this my leg started to swell and the stitches in my leg broke. I then had an open wound about four inches long that took until October of ‘45 to heal.

While I was in the hospital I received my Purple Heart and Bronze Star-Oak leaf Cluster.

I stayed at the hospital in England until the first week in June and then received orders to be transported back to the States. I sailed on the George Washington. This ship had been captured from the Germans in World War I. Its interior was of wood construction and it was a real fire trap. (A few years later it burnt up in Baltimore Harbor). It took about a week to get back to the States. We unloaded at Staten Island and were taken to Hallorn Hospital.

I called home when I arrived at Hallorn. Dad and Rosemary came to see me the next day.

After a few days they transferred me to the hospital at Fort Dix in southern New Jersey. I still had an open leg wound that would not scab over. I requested a thirty day leave and it was granted. When I got home Dad took me to our family doctor and he used some salves on my leg that finally got a scab to grow. When my thirty days were up I had to return to Ft. Dix to receive another pass. I took leave like this a couple of times since I was making better progress at home and the army was glad to have one less patient.

When I arrived home I weighed about 150 pounds and my mother was quite shocked at my appearance. She started feeding me with everything I liked and I went from 150 to 190 in a matter of four months.

As soon as my leg wound healed I was discharged from the hospital at Fort Dix and put on active duty. I had a thirty day leave at that time and went home and Rosemary and I were married on 14 October 1945.

I then had orders to Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas where I was to have rehabilitation from having been a prisoner of war and wounded. They wanted to make sure you had the proper attitude to return to civilization. After two weeks I was assigned back to Fort Bragg in N.C. for duty. I arranged another 14 day leave in route. I went home for Christmas and reported to Bragg after the first of the year.

When I got to Bragg they said they had a job in the discharge center at Fort Knox, KY and asked if I would go. It didn’t make any difference to me so I received orders for Fort Knox. I worked in the discharge center for about a month and then had enough points for discharge. I got orders back to Fort Dix and was discharged on Feb 8, 1946 with 36 days of terminal leave.

One good thing came out of my hospital stay and that was I received back all of my GI insurance premiums because I was confined to the hospital for a six month period.

Lt David H. KREGG

327th Field Artillery

Battalion

84th Infantry Division

Campaigns

Battle of the Bulge,

Belgium