The Victors: Eisenhower and His Boys

by Stephen E. Ambrose

  On January 18, Gen. Bernard Law Montgomery, commander of the 21st Army Group to which the 101st was attached, came to Chilton Foliat for an inspection. He reviewed the regiment, then told the men to break ranks and rally ’round his jeep. Climbing onto the “bonnet,” he told them how good they were. “After seeing the 506th,” he said, “I pity the Germans.”

  • • •

  As the days slowly began to lengthen, meaning decent fighting weather was approaching, tension increased. Inevitably the young men thought of death. Few made their thoughts articulate, but Webster dealt with his directly. He wrote his mother, instructing her to “stop worrying about me. I joined the parachutists to fight. I intend to fight. If necessary, I shall die fighting, but don’t worry about this because no war can be won without young men dying. Those things which are precious are saved only by sacrifice.”

  • • •

  In February, training became more big unit–oriented as the 101st, and indeed the entire invasion force of more than seven divisions, began rehearsals for the attack on Normandy.

  On March 23, the 2d and 3d Battalions of the 506th made a combined jump, by far the largest of the war to date for the regiment. The occasion was an inspection visit by Prime Minister Winston Churchill, Supreme Allied Commander Dwight D. Eisenhower, U.S. First Army commander Omar Bradley, Gen. Maxwell Taylor, commander of the 101st (General Lee had a heart attack in February and was forced to return to the States), and numerous other big shots.

  The jump was a huge success. The C-47s came roaring through the sky in a perfect V of Vs. Churchill and the generals were watching from a specially constructed grandstand. The troopers began leaping out of their planes, stick after stick, more than 1,000 men and parachutes filling the sky in a seemingly unending deluge. The instant they hit the ground the troopers were twisting out of their chutes and heading for the assembly area on a dead run, putting their weapons together without slackening speed. The visitors were amazed at the rapidity of the movement; as the regimental scrapbook put it, “the Boys from Currahee” had made a grand impression.

  Later, the regiment assembled in front of the reviewing stand. Taylor invited Churchill and Eisenhower to inspect the ranks. They did, stopping occasionally to ask a question or two of one of the men.

  Eisenhower stopped in front of Malarkey. “Soldier, where are you from?” (Eisenhower talked to thousands of enlisted men on such inspections before D-Day; invariably his first question was “Where are you from?”)

  “Astoria, Oregon,” Malarkey answered.

  “What did you do before the war?” Malarkey said he was a student at the University of Oregon. Ike wanted to know who won last fall’s Oregon–Oregon State football game, and whether Malarkey intended to return to college after the war. Then he turned to Churchill and suggested that the Prime Minister might have a question.

  “Well, son, how do you like England?” Malarkey assured him that he liked it very much, as he had always enjoyed English literature and history. Churchill promised to get him back to the States as soon as possible. “It was,” said Malarkey, “a very memorable occasion.”

  Even larger maneuvers were held immediately after the Churchill jump, with the purpose of dovetailing the paratroopers, gliderborne units, and ground forces with the air forces and naval elements. Exercises were held throughout southwest England, with mass air drops and amphibious operations.

  On one maneuver, Guarnere told Pvts. Warren Muck and Malarkey to drop a mortar shell on a 6-foot-square white target situated on a dune about 600 yards to their front. Malarkey fired once, too long. A second time, too short.

  At that moment, some staff officers came up, accompanied by General Taylor. One of the staff officers told Guarnere to have his mortar squad fire at the target as a demonstration for the general.

  Guarnere told Malarkey and Muck to fire three rounds. In rapid succession, they dropped three rounds down the barrel. Boom, the first hit the target dead center. Boom, boom, the other two came down on top of the destroyed target.

  “Sergeant, is your squad always that accurate?” Taylor asked.

  “Yes, sir,” Guarnere replied, “my boys never miss.”

  The 101st took trains back to barracks in Wiltshire and Berkshire. General Taylor and his staff were well aware that there were many kinks to work out. The Boys from Currahee had learned their lessons about small unit tactics well; now it was up to the generals to fit them properly into the larger whole.

  4

  “Look Out, Hitler! Here We Come!”

  SLAPTON SANDS, UPPOTTERY

  April 1–June 5, 1944

  THE 101ST AIRBORNE, the 82d Airborne, and the 4th Infantry Division made up the VII Corps. The VII Corps and V Corps (1st Infantry and 29th Infantry Divisions) made up the U.S. First Army, Gen. Omar Bradley commanding. Eisenhower had given Bradley the task of establishing a beachhead on each side of the mouth of the Douve River, where the French coast makes a right angle; running to the east is the Calvados coast, running to the north is the base of the Cotentin Peninsula. The V Corps was to take the Calvados coast (code name for the target area, “Omaha Beach”), while the VII Corps was to take the base of the Cotentin (code name, “Utah Beach”). The VII Corps at Utah would be on the extreme right flank of the invasion area, which stretched from the mouth of the Orne River on the left (east) some 65 to 70 kilometers to the Cotentin.

  Eisenhower needed to provide sufficient width to the invasion to bring in enough infantry divisions in the first wave to overpower the enemy, dug in behind Hitler’s “Atlantic Wall.”1 In one way, Utah was the easiest of the five assault beaches. At the British and Canadian beaches (“Sword,” “Juno,” and “Gold,” east of Omaha) the numerous vacation homes, small shops, and hotels and casinos that lined the coast provided the Germans with excellent protection for machine-gun nests, while at Omaha a bluff rising from the beach to a height of 200–300 feet gave the German defenders, dug into a trench system on a World War I scale, the ability to shoot down on troops coming out of the landing craft. But Utah had neither bluff nor houses. There were some fixed defenses, made of reinforced concrete, containing artillery and machine-guns. The biggest was at La Madeleine, in the middle of Utah (the fortification took its name from a nearby religious shrine that dated back to Viking days). But the gradual slope and low sand dunes at Utah meant that getting across and beyond the beach was not going to be as difficult as at Omaha.

  The problem at Utah was what lay inland. Behind the sand dunes was low ground, used by the Norman farmers for grazing cattle. Four narrow, unimproved roads ran inland from the beach; these roads were raised a meter or so above the ground. Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, the German commander, had flooded the fields, with the idea of forcing any troops and armor coming inland to use the roads (“causeways,” Eisenhower’s planners called them). Rommel had most of his artillery in camouflaged positions or reinforced casements and bunkers back from the flooded area, where it could bombard the roads; Rommel had his infantry prepared to take up defensive positions along the western end of the roads, where it could repel any troops moving up them.

  The task Eisenhower gave the 101st was to seize these causeway exits. The method to be used was a night drop. The aim was to disrupt the Germans, create surprise and havoc, and get control of those exits and destroy the big guns before the Germans could react.

  It would be an intricate, tricky, and risky operation. To have any chance of success, it would be necessary to practice. For the practice to be realistic, it would be necessary to find a piece of the English coastline similar to Utah Beach.

  Slapton Sands, in Devonshire, in southwestern England, was similar to Utah. A long narrow stretch of beach was separated from dry ground by a shallow lake and adjoining swamp. Two bridges crossed from the shoreline to high ground. And so it was that the VII Corps carried out its rehearsals for the part it was to play on D-Day at Slapton Sands.

  At the end of April, the entire VII Corps participated in Exercise Tiger. Easy Comp
any rode in trucks to a resort hotel on the seashore at Torquay, where it spent a comfortable night. The next day, April 26, it was back into the trucks for a ride to an area back from Slapton Sands from which all civilians had been evacuated. The company slept in the field until midnight, when trucks brought the men forward to a simulated drop zone. After assembly, the company marched overland through a mist to an elevated point a mile back from the beach and set up a defensive position, guarding the bridge.

  At dawn, Webster wrote, “We could see a vast fleet of amphibious craft moving slowly in to land. I’ve never seen so many ships together at one time; an invasion fleet is the most impressive sight in the world.” What he had not seen was the disaster of the previous evening. German torpedo boats had slipped in among the LSTs and other big assault craft carrying the 4th Infantry. The Germans sank two LSTs and damaged others; more than 900 men drowned. The incident was covered up by the Allies for fear that it would hurt morale among the troops scheduled to go to France in LSTs (it remained covered up for more than forty years, evidently out of embarrassment).

  Webster, watching the men of the 4th Infantry come up from the beach and pass through E Company’s positions, noted that they were “sweating, cursing, panting.” He also recorded that the officers informed the men that “we cannot write about our Torquay excursion.” In the afternoon, the company made a 25-mile march, then bivouacked in a woods for the night. In the morning of April 28, it rode in trucks back to Aldbourne.

  • • •

  That weekend Malarkey, Chuck Grant, Skip Muck, and Joe Toye got passes to London, with Muck’s best friend from Tonawanda, New York, Fritz Niland of the 501st PIR. There they met Niland’s brother Bob, who was a squad leader in the 82d Airborne and who had seen action in North Africa and Sicily. They spent the evening in a pub listening to Bob Niland talk about combat. He made a remark that Malarkey never forgot: “If you want to be a hero, the Germans will make one out of you real quick—dead!” On the train going back to Aldbourne, Malarkey told Muck that it sounded to him like Bob Niland had lost his effectiveness.

  • • •

  Back in Aldbourne in the first week of May, E Company went through more problems, attacking gun positions, bridges, causeways, and other objectives, once attacking after a real jump, other times simulating the air flight and “jumping” out of trucks.

  From May 9 to 12, the 101st held its dress rehearsal for D-Day, code name “Operation Eagle.” The entire division participated. Easy used the same airfield it would use on D-Day, Uppottery. Personnel and equipment were loaded onto the same aircraft the company would use on the real thing; the takeoff, drop, and assembly followed the plan as close to the letter as possible, including spending the same amount of time in flight.2

  Climbing aboard the C-47s was difficult, because of all the gear each man carried. Individuals were overloaded, following the age-old tendency of soldiers going into combat to attempt to be ready for every conceivable emergency. The vest and long drawers issued each man were impregnated, to ward off a possible chemical attack; it made them cumbersome, they stank, they itched, they kept in body heat and caused torrents of sweat. The combat jacket and trousers were also treated. The men carried a pocket knife in the lapel of their blouses, to be used to cut themselves out of their harness if they landed in a tree. In their baggy trousers’ pockets they had a spoon, razor, socks, cleaning patches, flashlight, maps, three-day supply of K-rations, an emergency ration package (four chocolate bars, a pack of Charms, powdered coffee, sugar, and matches), ammunition, a compass, two fragmentation grenades, an antitank mine, a smoke grenade, a Gammon bomb (a two-pound plastic explosive for use against tanks), and cigarettes, two cartons per man. The soldier topped his uniform with a webbing belt and braces, a .45 pistol (standard for noncoms and officers; privates had to get their own, and most did), water canteen, shovel, first aid kit, and bayonet. Over this went his parachute harness, his main parachute in its backpack, and reserve parachute hooked on in front. A gas mask was strapped to his left leg and a jump-knife/bayonet to his right. Across his chest the soldier slung his musette bag with his spare underwear and ammunition, and in some cases TNT sticks, along with his broken-down rifle or machine-gun or mortar diagonally up-and-down across his front under his reserve chute pack, leaving both hands free to handle the risers. Over everything he wore his Mae West life jacket. Finally, he put on his helmet.

  Some men added a third knife. Others found a place for extra ammunition. Gordon, carrying his machine-gun, figured he weighed twice his normal weight. Nearly every man had to be helped into the C-47. Once aboard, the men were so wedged in they could not move.

  General Taylor had moved heaven and earth to get enough C-47s for Operation Eagle. The planes were in constant demand for logistical support throughout ETO, and Troop Carrier Command came last on the list. It was cheated on equipment. The fuel tanks did not have armor protection from flak.

  Easy got its briefing for Eagle on May 10–11. The objective was a gun battery covering the beach. At dusk on May 11, Easy took off. The planes made “legs” over England, flying for about two and a half hours. Shortly after midnight, the company jumped. For Easy, the exercise went smoothly; for other companies, there were troubles. Second Battalion headquarters company was with a group that ran into a German air raid over London. Flak was coming up; the formation broke up; the pilots could not locate the DZ. Eight of the nine planes carrying Company H of the 502d dropped their men on the village of Ramsbury, nine miles from the DZ. Twenty-eight planes returned to their airfields with the paratroopers still aboard. Others jumped willy-nilly, leading to many accidents. Nearly 500 men suffered broken bones, sprains, or other injuries.

  The only consolation the airborne commanders could find in this mess was that by tradition a bad dress rehearsal leads to a great opening night.

  • • •

  On the last day of May, the company marched down to trucks lined up on the Hungerford Road. Half the people of Aldbourne, and nearly all the unmarried girls, were there to wave good-bye. There were many tears. The baggage left behind gave some hope that the boys would be back.

  Training had come to an end. There had been twenty-two months of it, more or less continuous. The men were as hardened physically as it was possible for human beings to be. Not even professional boxers or football players were in better shape. They were disciplined, prepared to carry out orders instantly and unquestioningly. They were experts in the use of their own weapon, knowledgeable in the use of other weapons, familiar with and capable of operating German weapons. They could operate radios, knew a variety of hand signals, could recognize various smoke signals. They were skilled in tactics, whether the problem was attacking a battery or a blockhouse or a trench system or a hill defended by machine-guns. Each man knew the duties and responsibilities of a squad or platoon leader and was prepared to assume those duties if necessary. They knew how to blow bridges, how to render artillery pieces inoperative. They could set up a defensive position in an instant. They could live in the field, sleep in a foxhole, march all day and through the night. They knew and trusted each other. Within Easy Company they had made the best friends they had ever had, or would ever have. They were prepared to die for each other; more important, they were prepared to kill for each other.

  They were ready. But, of course, going into combat for the first time is an ultimate experience for which one can never be fully ready. It is anticipated for years in advance; it is a test that produces anxiety, eagerness, tension, fear of failure, anticipation. There is a mystery about the thing, heightened by the fact that those who have done it cannot put into words what it is like, how it feels, except that getting shot at and shooting to kill produce extraordinary emotional reactions. No matter how hard you train, nor however realistic the training, no one can ever be fully prepared for the intensity of the real thing.

  And so the men of Easy Company left Aldbourne full of self-confidence and full of trepidation.

  • • • />
  Easy’s marshaling area in southwestern England, about 10 miles from the coast, was an open field beside the airstrip at Uppottery. The company lived in pyramidal tents. “Our standard of living went up considerably,” Webster wrote. “We stuffed ourselves at the hospitable mess hall [a wall tent] (‘Want some more, boys? Just help yourselves—take all you want.’) on such luxuries as fried chicken, fruit cocktail, white bread with lots of butter. The realization that we were being fattened for the slaughter didn’t stop us from going back for seconds.”

  Troops wearing German uniforms and carrying German weapons roamed constantly through the marshaling area, to familiarize the men with what the enemy looked like and what weapons they carried.

  On June 2, the company officers got their briefings from former E Company officers, 1st Lieutenant Nixon (now 2d Battalion S-2) and Captain Hester (S-3). On sand tables that showed terrain features, houses, roads, dunes, and the rest, and on maps, Nixon and Hester explained that Easy would be dropping near Ste. Marie-du-Mont, about 10 kilometers south of Ste. Mère-Eglise, with the objective of killing the German garrison in the village and seizing the exit at causeway No. 2, the road coming up from the coast just north of the village of Pouppeville. The 3d platoon was given the task of blowing up a communications line leading inland from La Madeleine.

  The detailed information given out by Nixon and Hester, and by other intelligence officers briefing other companies, was truly amazing. They passed around aerial photographs of the DZ that showed not only roads, buildings, and the like, but even foxholes. One member of the 506th recalled that his company was told that the German commandant at its objective, St. Côme-du-Mont, owned a white horse and was going with a French schoolteacher who lived on a side street just two buildings away from a German gun emplacement that was zeroed in on causeway No. 1. He took his dog for a walk every evening at 2000.3