Battered Bastards of Bastogne

by George Koskimaki

  Suffering from an acute case of trench foot, Cpl. Bernard Stevens had this remembrance of the sensitivity of the affected members of one’s body that had suffered from prolonged exposure to frost bite. He wrote:

  When we were being evacuated out of Bastogne, a rather funny incident happened. As all who had trench foot know, you cannot have even the slightest thing touch them. As a result, all of us on stretchers, with trench foot, had our bare feet uncovered. The German prisoners were used as bearers. When the trooper next to me was going to be moved, the Germans bent over to pick up his stretcher. The one at his foot end, as a sign of compassion, pulled the blanket over his feet. The trooper was in such pain that he struck straight up at the poor German at his head end, knocking him over backward. There was a great deal of laughter, swearing and confusion before the medics were able to explain to the prisoners what happened.

  At first, Stevens was to lose his left leg but the operation was delayed and when the doctors saw the condition had improved, there was no need to amputate it. Stevens returned to his unit several months later.

  As the day ended, a total of 652 wounded were moved back to Army hospitals in the XII Corps area. The evacuations were carried out by the 64th Medical Group. The last stretcher case from those accumulated during the siege was transported to the rear on the 28th. By this time, the number had reached a thousand.

  Escorting Prisoners

  A very elated F/O Case Rafter had been driven to Division Headquarters before his glider had been completely unloaded. He had met his friend Tom Longo and other glider pilots and tow plane personnel who had been assembled, ready for evacuation. Rafter provides a brief description of the move to the rear: “When the airborne decided to evacuate us, they loaded us onto trucks and all the German prisoners on other trucks and we escorted them to the rear areas through the opened corridor.”

  Flight officer Charles F. Sutton had served as co-pilot on one of the eleven gliders flown into Bastogne on December 26. He remembered that the glider had been loaded with fifty-five 5-gallon cans of gasoline for the hard pressed troops.

  Sutton has a vivid recollection of his trip out of Bastogne when the glider pilots were evacuated along with the 700 enemy soldiers who had been captured. He wrote:

  After the highway to the rear was opened, we were to escort German POW’s to the rear. Blessing, Hammargren and I were assigned to the last truck carrying about 25 POW’s. Blessing and I were sitting on the tailgate; Captain Hammargren was in the cab. The driver got too close to the edge of the road and the truck slid down an em bankment and tipped on its side. The POW’s were returned to the holding area and we three glider pilots were placed in an uncovered truck which rejoined the convoy. On the way, we passed a group of Belgian farmers who had been throwing rocks at the POW’s as the trucks passed. A rock was thrown at our truck and immediately the thrower saw that we were all Americans in the truck and his actions indicated he was sorry. The rock hit me on the left eyebrow, cutting it and blood ran down my cheek, making me look like a casualty. I was patched up at the aid station when we arrived at the village where we turned the POW’s over to the MP’s. The medics wanted my name, rank and serial number—they said I was due a Purple Heart. I wouldn’t give them the information—not when others gave their lives.

  Aerial Observers

  An unheralded group of pilots arrived from England with their Piper Cub L-4 planes on the day the Division departed for Bastogne. These were the flyers whose job it was to fly above the front lines looking for enemy gun positions and concealed armored vehicles. They had a dangerous assignment. Two of their planes had been shot down in Holland with two occupants in one plane dying when their craft burned on crashing.

  The pilot of the second downed plane, ILL Bill McRae, had been shot down between Veghel and St Oedenrode while observing enemy traffic and was rescued the next day from captivity by men of the 506th Parachute Regiment

  He had flown into Mourmelon on the day the Division departed for the Ardennes. He remembered the pilots who made the flight to Bastogne a few days later: “Major Shannon Powers, 1Lt. George Schoeneck and I are the only people of the 101st who went into Bastogne airborne. We flew in with our Piper Cubs.”

  As an aerial observer with Headquarters of the 463rd Parachute Field Artillery Battalion, 1Lt. Ben F. Wright remembered that the L-4’s didn’t accompany the division as it moved out on December 19. He wrote:

  When we got to Mourmelon with our L-4’s, the Division had just departed for Belgium. I was an observer, not a pilot, and flew in over the Krauts with 1Lt. George Schoeneck, who was killed later over Bastogne.

  When the movement orders were given to proceed to Bastogne, most of the L-4 pilots and crew members were in Paris on 48-hour pass. 1Lt. Jack Washishek describes how most of his small segment of the artillery wing made their way to the fighting front:

  A number of the pilots as well as crew members were on leave when the call came for Bastogne. These were mostly in Paris. The troops were all back in time for the move to Bastogne. It was decided, since we knew nothing of the area (didn’t know yet that it was Bastogne), to send a pilot and all the crews to Bastogne with the Division. The pilots and planes would follow once the air snip was established.

  The Division had been in Bastogne for several days and in the midst of heavy fighting when the three small planes were flown into Bastogne. The arrival is described by 1Lt Bill McRae:

  They shot at us as we approached the town and as we circled looking for a place to land. The flak was extremely heavy against our three little planes. Lt. George Schoeneck was later killed in the air.

  Apparently in the observer’s seat of one of those planes, 1Lt. Jack Washishek didn’t sense the ack-ack coming up at them was that serious even though there were lots of holes in the planes. He provides more detail of the landing strip and its previous occupants:

  Surprisingly, the ground fire was not as intense as we expected. Most of the planes were hit but none seriously. Holes through the fuselage or wings by small arms was not too serious—just scared the hell out of us. As we neared Bastogne, we saw the panels indicating our landing strip. We landed and found we were on the strip just abandoned by the previous air section. I’m not sure who we replaced but, due to the fog, they could not fly out and burned their planes on the strip. We were about a mile east of Bastogne.

  For the first several days that the L-4’s were in the air to provide eyes for the artillery, the information obtained by the observers provided more frustration than satisfaction. Lt. Jack Washishek continues his story:

  Since we had very little artillery ammo, our principle job was recon. We tried to keep everyone alert to troop and tank movement We could have directed the killing of a good many of the enemy if we had all the ammo needed. There were targets everywhere.

  The failure of relieving forces to reach Bastogne on Christmas Day was a big disappointment to General McAuliffe. His frustration may have shown when aerial observer lLt. Ben Wright came in to report on his information obtained while flying over the western perimeter during the major attack on Christmas Day. Wright wrote:

  I was sent up once with 1Lt. George Schoeneck and thought that my mission was to mark a map and report to General McAuliffe. I went to his headquarters in Bastogne and started a long dissertation on every position. The General said, ‘Hell, I know that! I want to know where the 4th Armored is!’

  To have a ringside seat to an aerial dogfight is one thing; to have that same seat at eyeball level was something else. Lt. Ben Wright describes the action which occurred over the battle areas the following day:

  Another time, it was like an air show or chapter out of WINGS, when the P-47’s took on the Kraut planes which were shooting up our resupply C-47’s and gliders. We watched it all from an L-4 right in the middle. They all flew right past us like we weren’t there. One liaison pilot described a similar situation as a ‘Box seat over Hell’.

  As the temperatures dropped dramatically at the end of December,
the cold weather had an adverse effect on the engines of the small observer planes. Like a family car on a particularly cold frosty morning, it was very important to get that engine going early in the morning. Lt. Washishek relates:

  The pilots stayed in a small house at the southern edge of the airstrip while the crew stayed in town. Since it was so cold, the job of starting and keeping the planes going was a helluva job. Plugs had to be pulled in the morning and heated before they would start. The engines had to be kept warm so the crews came up with all kinds of great ways to keep them warm. Almost as soon as you took off, you were within range of small arms fire. Surprisingly, we were not hit often. Perhaps because so many other targets were available.

  Mentioned previously by fellow L-4 pilots and observers, 1Lt. George Schoeneck was shot down with his observer (2LL Jack S. Terry) while watching enemy tank and infantry movements during the battle in which the troops of First Army moved south and the 101st and other divisions moved north, closing the gap and finally sealing off the Bulge on January 16. According to former officers of the 463rd Artillery Battalion, the L-4 and its occupants were hit by a 105mm shell fired by friendly forces when the plane flew into the path of the shell.

  CHAPTER 13

  CALM BEFORE A STORM

  December 28

  It was a misty day. Our fighter-bombers failed to show up but enemy observation planes made runs over the Bastogne sector. There were two small probing attacks in the 401st Glider Infantry area which were quickly repulsed.

  Convoys continued to arrive from Mourmelon with ammunition and gasoline. The first mail arrived for the troops. This included a huge amount of Christmas packages which, for the most part, were shared by the troops with their buddies.

  Additional anti-aircraft gunnery units arrived and were put under the command of LTC. X. B. Cox of the 81st AA and AT Battalion of the 101st. These guns would keep the enemy bombers at greater heights decreasing their accuracy.

  With the arrival of the commanding general, Maxwell D. Taylor, from his abbreviated trip to Army Headquarters in Washington, the 101st commander was quickly appraised of the dangers in Bastogne with the continued shelling and the regular appearance of enemy bombers during the night. For this reason, the Division Headquarters became three segments. A forward element remained at the cellar headquarters in Bastogne; a rear echelon was moved to Sibret about two miles southwest of Bastogne, and a third group moved to the chateau at Ile-le- Hesse to establish a night-time command post. This was done to decrease the possibility of an enemy shell or bomb wiping out a major portion of the command elements of the 101st Airborne Division.

  In his diary entry for December 28, T/4 Gerald Zimmerman of the 101st Airborne Signal Company describes a move of his high-powered radio transmitter truck to Sibret It was his final entry into a diary he kept during the Bastogne fighting. He also offered praise for the units which fought side by side as part of the defensive team at Bastogne. Zimmerman wrote:

  December 28,1944—No air support today but we got plenty of shells. Today I moved with the rear CP a thousand yards from the front lines where it was safe. The forward CP took a beating after that. This ends the so-called story of Bastogne … take it from the Battered Bastards of Bastogne, the boys of CCB, 10th Armored and the 705th TD Battalion are tops. It would have been a lot worse without these gallant men.

  As a member of the radio platoon of Signal Company, T/3 George Koskimaki was sent with his team to provide night-time radio communication for the Division command post at Ile-le-Hesse.

  Chateau Ile-le-Hesse

  This large manor home is located a mile west of Bastogne at the juncture of the Bastogne-Marche highway and a lesser road which led to Senonchamps. The property was the estate of Baron and Baroness Greindl. During the German occupation, the Baron had received the temporary appointment as governor of Luxembourg Province of which Bastogne was a part. When the Allies began their march across western Europe, Baron Greindl had been dismissed. As American soldiers neared Bastogne in September of 1944, he was seized after the German SS learned he had been working with underground forces. He was sent to Germany as a political prisoner at Buchenwald. He was executed on February 20, 1945 leaving the Baroness to rear their twelve children.

  The first troops to occupy the chateau were the artillerymen of the 420th Armored Field Artillery of Combat Command “B” of the 10th Armored Division. These groups were followed by 1st Battalion of the 327th Glider Infantry with Captain Walter L. Miller and “C” Company using the garage as their command post after withdrawing from Senonchamps.

  Captain Walter Miller’s “C” Company was given the assignment of providing security for that division command post. Miller was able to keep General Taylor posted on the up-to-the-minute actions going on around the division perimeter. Miller added to his account:

  As an ex-communications officer, I had tied into the artillery line and pretty well knew what was going on around the perimeter of Bastogne and briefed General Taylor who had moved the Division CP to the chateau at that time. We remained in the vicinity of Ile-le-Hesse until the evening of January 3rd.

  Baroness Rene Greindl was sheltering her large family, some young boys, their teacher and a group of civilian refugees in the cellar of the home while the military occupied the upper floors. The communications personnel occupied the furnace room along with its coal storage area. Baroness Rene Greindl describes how life was lived in the cellar during this time period in December 1944:

  Here is an idea of what the cellar was like: a flight of eight steps led to the landing, where stood our sentry; near the staircase was a cellar 22 by 25 feet. Next came a vault 6 by 6 feet. Then a sort of larder of 6 by 9 feet The children christened the vault ‘Vincent Dormitory’ because a refugee couple from Bastogne came there to sleep every night, while the larder was ‘St. Thomas Dormitory’ because they said it was impossible for eight people to sleep there, which nevertheless they did, over a long period of time. On the other side of the passage was a vault coming downward in an arch, provided with an opening to the outside air. I took up my abode, with the two babies, to one side of the opening and my corner was called ‘Spiros Dormitory’. On the other side, the Abbe made himself overseer of all this improvised sleeping space and nipped in the bud any tendency to indiscipline amongst all these children. Our passage was out diagonally by another (way) which, in turn, came on to the central heating cellar which, in spite of being encumbered by a large furnace, was the American combat post during the battle of Bastogne.162

  (Author’s note: Although my family and I had been guests at Ile-le-Hesse in 1967 on my first research trip, and revisited again in 1984, it was not until 1989 that I got to enter the cellar where I had spent about ten days providing communication for 101st Airborne Division Headquarters. A change I noted was the coal furnace had been replaced by a smaller and more efficient oil heating unit. I pointed out to my wife where we had placed the 9-foot long radio antenna so it protruded for most of its length outside a small basement window. When Christmas packages arrived from home once the highway was reopened, I shared many of the goodies with Baroness Greindl’s young children.)

  An “Upstanding” Company Commander

  PFC. John “Wilkie” Wielkopolan remembered that “G” Company had received a replacement company commander fresh from the states. As an old timer, Wielkopolan was not anxious to expose himself to enemy fire while serving as runner for his gung-ho commander. He wrote:

  His name was Captain Shay and he was from New York. My platoon leader, Lt. (Jesus) Cortez had sent me to be his runner. That didn’t go over too well with me because I had all I could to take care of myself.This captain did not believe in hugging the ground like I did. He was always standing up everywhere we went. It seems that he was always looking for something. It was about the 28th of December and we were out front checking our outpost positions. He was standing up in the middle of the road. That was when a sniper opened up. I was on the side of the road, standing in a ditch. I didn�
��t know just where the sniper was located at the time. I looked over at the captain. When I glanced at him, he was still standing in the middle of the road—the sniper was still firing at him. I could see the bullets hitting the road. I guess the captain didn’t know where to go so that was when I rushed out and pushed him off the highway. We both landed in the ditch. That was when I noticed that he had been hit in the neck. After we took care of the sniper, I led the captain back to the aid station. The doctor found it was only a flesh wound.

  Widening the Corridor

  Still on line along the ridge northwest of Marvie, after one road had been opened to Bastogne by tanks of the 4th Armored Division, PFC. Charles Kocourek remembers the approach of tanks up the same road along which the German parliamentaries had approached on December 22nd. He recalled:

  A couple days later we saw four or five tanks coming down the same road along which the four German soldiers had approached with their surrender ultimatum. These tanks were off the road about 20 yards traveling parallel with the roadway. There was a building about 250 yards in front of us. I said, ‘Oh, oh! those are German tanks!’ The tanks that had supported us earlier were not with us now. One of the approaching tanks shot at the building and put a hole in the roof and hit it with at least three more shells. Then I saw them throw or shoot a red flare into the woods. Then the American planes came in and strafed those woods. We knew then that the tanks were American. That was the first time I had seen airplanes work closely in support of infantry. It sure was beautiful to watch.

  The tanks finally came up to our position and we were one happy bunch, shaking hands with those guys and pounding each other on the back.