New Year's Eve in Tillet

New Year's Eve in Tillet

I was a member of the First Squad (Second Rifle Squad) of the First Platoon of "A" Company of the 55th Armored Infantry Battalion of the 11th Armored Division of General Patton's Third U.S. Army ("Patton's Thunderbolts").

I remember that around 10:00 AM on December 31, 1944, Lieutenant Eugeen Been, the commanding officer of the First Platoon of "A" Company, 55th Armored Infantry Battalion, ordered my platoon to move northwest on the road leading out of Magerotte (the Magerotte-Tillet road) through the Bois des Haies de Magery Woods, in order to locate the positions of the Germans on the Battalion's left flank (the rest of the Battalion was ordered to near-by Acul, where they engaged elements of Colonel Otto Remer's Fuhrer Begleit Brigade that day).

I remember that we left Magerotte, that we moved northwest on the road through the woods, that we stopped on the road at one point, and that Lieutenant Been ordered us to patrol the road for several hours. At around 3:00 PM, Lieutenant Been ordered us to resume our movement northwest up the road. But when we heard the distant rumbling of tanks shortly thereafter, Lieutenant Been ordered us to halt. Lieutenant Been then sent a patrol of four men -- which included myself -- up the road to the end of the tree line of the woods, to locate where the noise was coming from.

We were at this position at the end of the tree line for about fifteen minutes, when members of one of the platoons of "C" Company of the 56th Armored Engineer Battalion came up the road behind us sweeping for mines. When they saw us, they went back down the road toward Magerotte. Five minutes later, Lieutenant Been sent a runner up to our position at the end of the tree line to tell us to return to the platoon's position. We returned to the platoon with the runner and reported to Lieutenant Been that we had not seen any tanks at the end of the tree line. Lieutenant Been then ordered the platoon to hold its position for the remainder of the afternoon.

At around 7:00 PM, Lieutenant Been ordered the platoon to continue its advance northwest up the road, in order to locate the German positions. We came upon the town of Tillet -- which was identified by a road sign at the outskirts of the town. We entered Tillet, passed through it, and then headed to the western outskirts of the town -- where we came across high ground which was occupied by elements of the Remer Brigade. We attacked the Germans at around 8:00 or 9:00 PM, and they threw up a series of flares as we attacked. The Germans then retreated into the woods west of Tillet (the Haies de Tillet Woods), and we dug in for the night between them and the town.

Around midnight, a single German plane dropped bundles of German propaganda newspapers at our position. The Germans must have thought that their troops were still in control of the area, and that the papers would be a good morale-booster for their comrades. Since one of the soldiers in my platoon was fluent in German -- Carmine DiGiambattista, of the Headquarters Squad (First Rifle Squad) -- he read us the contents of the propaganda newspapers, which urged the German troops on to victory in the New Year.

The next day -- January 1, 1945 -- we remained in our defensive positions on the western outskirts of Tillet, and the Germans remained in the woods west of Tillet. There was a barn about 100 yards to the left of our foxholes, and we were concerned that German snipers might have come out of the woods and hidden themselves in the barn during the night. We told Lieutenant Been about the possibility of the Germans infiltrating the barn, and he called up for a tank from the 11th Armored Division on his radio. The tank came up near our positions, fired upon the barn -- which leveled the building -- and withdrew.

On January 2, 1945, my platoon -- one squad at a time, in sequence -- was ordered by Lieutenant Been to move back into Tillet to be served a hot meal by the cooks of "A" Company of the 55th Armored Infantry Battalion, and to then return to its positions on the front line on the Western outskirts of Tillet. I remember that when my squad headed back into Tillet at around 10:00 AM on that day, we saw a downed American fighter plane in one of the fields on our left. We also passed a cemetery on our left. On some of the headstones in the cemetery were cameo photographs of the deceased -- something that I had never seen before in the United States, and which made a deep impression in my mind.

Our cooks had come up in a truck from Magerotte, and had set up thermal food cans in the middle of the road in Tillet. The cooks had just started to serve breakfast (scrambled eggs) to the men of my squad, when the Germans began to shell the road that we were on. Our cooks dumped the food from the cans onto the snow, threw the cans into the trucks, and hurriedly retreated down the road to Magerotte. As the men of my squad dodged incoming shells, we scooped up what was left of our breakfast and scrambled back to our positions on the western outskirts of Tillet.

On January 3, 1945, my platoon was relieved by elements of the 17th Airborne Division, who passed through our positions and on toward the Germans in the woods west of Tillet. We then headed back down the Tillet-Magerotte road to Magerotte -- where we joined the rest of "A" Company, and the rest of the 55th Armored Infantry Battalion.

On May 29, 2000 (Memorial Day), representatives of the Belgian Government, The United States Government, the Commune of Sainte-Ode, CRIBA and the Circle of History of Sainte-Ode gathered in Tillet to unveil a plaque in honor of the men of the 55th Armored Infantry Battalion who died in the fighting at Tillet and Acul on December 31, 1944, and at Bois de Nom de Falize (east of the Longchamps/Bertogne road) on January 14, 1945. May the men of the 55th AIB -- and the work that they did to restore democracy in Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge -- always be remembered.

Patrick J. KEARNEY

"A" Company

55th Armored Infantry Battalion

11th Armored Division

Campaigns

Battle of the Bulge,

Belgium