by Alan David
Niehaus began firing rapidly. Kurt saw enemy troops leaping forward over the bank, throwing grenades. The machine-gun cut them down, but several grenades came spinning towards them. Kurt ducked and slammed the hatch, for a grenade dropping in among them would shatter the Panzer. There was a series of loud explosions as the hand bombs blasted, but none caused serious damage, and Kurt straightened to take stock of the situation. They had to keep moving forward or get the hell out of it. There should have been supporting infantry up with them but there were no signs of the Grenadiers.
Niehaus, seated in the front seat beside the driver, hadn’t the slightest idea what was going on half the time. He fired his machine-gun whenever he saw targets, and was cold inside but not frightened. He seemed to be filled with elation, exhilaration, and whenever panic tried to fight its way into his mind he listened to Kurt’s calm voice giving orders, controlling the vehicle, realizing that his fate lay in their commander’s hands. But the noise of battle was terrific, seemed to be trapped inside their steel walls. He had a restricted view of the battlefield and could only hope that they were winning.
Then the voice of Leutnant Reinhalt came over the radio, ordering them to withdraw. Using the intercom, Niehaus passed on the order to Kurt then sat tensely, using his machine-gun on the milling enemy infantry on the other side of the hedge, who were crouching behind the bank still trying to throw grenades at them. But the Panzer was just out of grenade range. Schultze, getting fresh orders, took them out fast, and they raced back across the field they had battled over while shells and mortar bombs crashed down all around them.
Time had lost its meaning. The Grenadiers failed to break through the enemy line and, after over-running the forward positions, had met stiff opposition. They failed to get through and the Panzers could not advance because of the accuracy of enemy artillery and the activities of Allied aircraft. Kurt looked around grimly as they crashed over another hedge. He counted ten Panzers burning or shattered, and realized that most of them were from his Battalion. He saw Reinhalt’s vehicle and was relieved that his superior had been luckier today.
They moved back from the forward area, returning through the Grenadiers, who were lying in the cover of a hedgerow, and reached the comparative quiet of a back area. They hurriedly camouflaged their vehicles, and had barely finished when a wave of fighter-bombers appeared and began to shoot up the entire area. Minutes passed while they lay crouching under their vehicles, hoping their efforts at camouflage had been good. The aircraft finally moved away and they sighed with relief and emerged into the sunlight.
Niehaus was pale and tense, his hands shaking, but when he spoke, although his voice was slightly squeaky, he seemed in complete control of himself.
‘How are you feeling, Niehaus?’ Kurt demanded wearily, yawning in an effort to unblock his singing ears.
‘It was some experience,’ came the slow reply. ‘What about our wounded? We crushed some of them. I could feel the tank lurching over them.’
‘You couldn’t. That was imagination,’ Kurt retorted. ‘It’s something we all have to get used to. It’s one of the nastier sides of our kind of war. There’s nothing we can do about anyone falling directly in front of us. Just don’t think about it. You’ll soon get used to it. But you did very well with the machine-gun. I thought we were going to get some grenades in the turret when we got too close to that hedge. It was your accurate fire that saved us.’
Niehaus smiled tautly, bolstered by the praise, but he was badly shocked. However there was little time for conversation. They threw out the spent shell cases and waited for the soft trucks to come up with supplies. They all helped to hand in the fresh shells, and then the petrol truck arrived and they refuelled. Kurt went to look for Leutnant Reinhalt, who was beside his Panzer one hundred yards away.
‘Why the recall, sir?’ Kurt asked.
‘The Regiment lost forty tanks,’ came the bitter reply. ‘We couldn’t keep up the pressure with those losses. Their air attacks are tearing us to pieces. At the rate we’re going, we won’t have a Panzer left in a few days. Apart from that, the Grenadiers ran into trouble. The British and Canadians are not trying to advance. They’re on the defensive on this front and we can’t get through. I don’t know what we’ll try next, but I hope it’ll be something more constructive. Did you see all the knocked-out Panzers as we withdrew?’
‘I saw them,’ Kurt nodded slowly. ‘We’re not going to do any good here until we get all our reserves up and into action. Attacking piecemeal is only throwing away equipment and Panzers. I think we’re going to pay dearly for that.’
‘I’ll go and have a word with Major Zimmermann.’ Reinhalt spoke wearily. ‘Stay by your tank and be ready to move out if we are ordered forward again.’
Kurt saluted then walked back to his vehicle. He listened to the heavy sounds of war. They trundled back and forth across ground that was raked by enemy fire, and each time some of their number fell by the wayside. Yet they managed to survive, and he guessed that each crew and vehicle had just so many chances. When they were used up then the end came.
He joined his crew in the hedge and they lay motionless and silent, breathing the warm, clean air deeply. All the hatches of the Panzer were open to permit fumes to escape. None of them looked forward to getting back inside the vehicle. Kurt lay watching Reinhalt’s tank, and when he saw the Troop Commander returning some minutes later he ordered Niehaus to get into the turret and listen to the radio. But no orders came through and they remained motionless, listening to the sounds of the battle, which seemed to increase as time passed. Kurt closed his eyes. He had a headache and his ears would not stop ringing. All the explosions he had ever heard seemed to be repeating themselves endlessly inside his tormented skull.
Later they were ordered to go forward into the hedgerow being held by the Grenadiers and to give fire support to their infantry, who were being pressurized by the British. It seemed that the Allies were trying to straighten out their line, and the pressure they were exerting was causing problems for the Germans. Kurt was not too happy about playing a static role, but they surmounted the hedge behind which they were hiding and trundled forward until they reached the line being held by their Grenadier comrades. He was pleased to see that the infantry had dug declines for them to get into the hedge, and they manoeuvred the heavy vehicles into hull-down positions then began to cut away the foliage to increase their fields of fire. They had to camouflage the vehicles for enemy aircraft were constantly passing over.
They used high explosive shells to strike at the enemy positions and their machine-guns rattled whenever they spotted enemy movement. But the British called upon their artillery and the entire area was shelled heavily. Kurt closed his hatch and they sat motionless in their cramped quarters. But he felt sorry for the Grenadiers, who were in open trenches. They had little or no chance against the many air bursts that erupted about them.
Kurt fancied that their presence in the line merely added to the problems of their infantry. Artillery-fire increased, and he saw trenches being destroyed, their occupants torn asunder by the terrific explosions. But they maintained their own fire, shooting any targets presenting themselves across the fields.
When the British started an attack during the afternoon the whole front blazed up, and Kurt compressed his lips when he saw the ominous shapes nosing forward. They engaged them immediately with armour-piercing and soon dealt with the enemy armour. Being in hull-down positions, they were well able to handle the situation, and the enemy attack disintegrated. When it was over there were seven Shermans blazing furiously in the area and not one of the Panzers had been damaged.
‘We’re getting short of ammo, sir,’ Hohner reported when Kurt crouched in the fume-laden turret to congratulate them.
‘Call the Troop Commander and report the situation to him,’ Kurt ordered Niehaus, and the youngster complied. Kurt did not think they would be moved back to replenish their supplies, and he was right. Niehaus reported that the soft tru
cks would come forward to them.
Enemy shelling was heavy, and mortar bombs were dropping all over the area. Their own artillery was in action, and the Nebelwerfers they were using filled the air with horrifying screeches as they pounded the British.
When their supply trucks arrived they had to run a gauntlet of enemy fire, and Kurt realized that their positions were under observation. He complained over the radio to Leutnant Reinhalt, but was told that they could not move back to receive supplies. They crouched around their vehicle,. watching the trucks coming in while enemy shelling increased.
A petrol truck was hit and exploded in a great gout of black smoke and a broiling fireball. Blast pushed at them and the roaring flames devoured everything around. The driver disappeared with his vehicle, and they sat cursing and shaking their heads while waiting for a second vehicle to approach. But Kurt was more concerned about the ammunition trucks, and when they arrived the shelling increased, so much so that Kurt once again complained to Leutnant Reinhalt.
‘The only alternative is for the trucks to halt at the hedge behind you and your crews to manhandle the shells across the open field,’ Reinhalt said wearily. ‘If you want to try that then go ahead.’
‘It’s impossible for us to do that,’ Kurt replied. ‘The shelling is too heavy. We can’t afford to lose crews now.’
‘Then let the trucks take their chances and come up,’ Reinhalt snapped unsympathetically.
‘I’m thinking of the Panzers, sir,’ Kurt retorted. ‘If one of those trucks is hit while it’s beside a tank then that will be the end of everything.’
‘It’s a chance we’ve got to take.’ Reinhalt cut off and Kurt shook his head as he left the tank and crouched in the hedge. He peered forward, spotting British troops moving in the open, and ordered his machine-guns to open fire. Weilen used the last of their high explosive, and they sat in their places waiting and watching. The British were going to attack again, and now they were practically out of ammunition. Then Niehaus opened fire with his machine-gun, fired a few rounds and stopped.
‘That’s the last of my ammunition, sir,’ he reported.
The Grenadiers in positions all around them were beginning to open up a full defensive fire, and Kurt peered out of the turret. He could see Reinhalt’s tank on the left, and its two machine-guns were hammering rapidly. Evidently Reinhalt had managed to get some supplies.
‘What are we going to do?’ Weilen demanded. ‘We can’t throw stones at them.’
Kurt peered towards the rear. He could see a soft truck in the field beyond the one they occupied, but it was making no attempt to come through the curtain of shell-fire that was pouring from the British guns.
‘Niehaus, you and Hohner had better try and get some boxes of machine-gun ammunition over here,’ Kurt decided. ‘Take it easy crossing the field.’
‘I need some HE shells,’ Weilen protested.
‘We’re not going to attempt to carry those,’ Kurt rapped. ‘They’ll get the supplies up to us as soon as they can. It will be enough for us to get machine-gun ammo.’
Hohner and Niehaus left the vehicle and started running back across the field. It was only about one hundred yards long, with a thick hedge on the other side.
‘Start throwing out the empties,’ Kurt ordered Weilen and Schultze. ‘I’ll put it to Leutnant Reinhalt that some of the reserves should bring the shells across to us.’
‘Those stubble-hoppers won’t want anything to do with that,’ Weilen retorted.
Kurt used the radio, raising Reinhalt, and the Leutnant agreed to his suggestion. Watching his rear, Kurt saw sudden activity among the infantry there, and minutes later some of them appeared, coming forward carrying armour-piercing and high explosive shells for the 75mm. Relief filled Kurt, and when they were fully reloaded they began to operate again, hitting the massing British, smashing their attack and shooting hell out of them. The battle raged unceasingly, and it seemed to Kurt that the British were content to draw as much fire and attention upon themselves as was possible. He did not know that it was British strategy to attract most of the German armour on to their front in order to give the Americans an opportunity to break out in their sector, and hell continued to explode throughout the long hours of daylight.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
SS Division Vaterland moved into the front line to the west of Caen. They were subjected to terrifying air attacks all the way to the front, and Max Eckhardt was appalled by the extent of air activity against them. All this was in addition to the heavy pounding the big industrial cities in the north of Germany were taking. It brought home to him the extent of Allied air power. They hardly saw the Luftwaffe during the day, although their bombers were out over the Allied beach-head during the night.
But as soon as they reached the front and went into defensive positions Colonel Dantine wanted to put in an attack to test the mettle of the British. They were entrenched in front of a village and there was a large wood on their right. The fields were open, some of them ploughed, and they had good arcs of fire. Shelling was heavy and they remained under cover, the platoon commanders checking their areas and reporting to the Company Commanders. Captain Eckhardt had his command post in a cellar of a cottage which was ruined and smoking, and he quickly settled in, gaining a complete picture of his Company area.
Sergeant-Major Leun went around the four platoons and came back to report that they were all well stocked with ammunition. Eckhardt was receiving orders from Dantine, and the Colonel was stressing the importance of hitting the British hard and maintaining fire initiative.
Eckhardt listened to the heavy shelling and realized that warships lying off the coast were supplementing the Allied artillery. Heavy calibre shells were bursting all around the area. The Germans had nothing to match them, but their own artillery pounded away at the more important targets.
The British came forward in an attack before Colonel Dantine could organize an attack of their own. They lay in their trenches in the cover of the hedges and cut loose with everything they had, succeeding in driving the British into cover. But Dantine was not satisfied with a stalemate and ordered his Battalion to get up and counter attack. Eckhardt’s Company was to lead the attack, and he went forward to keep an eye on his platoons. He watched them going forward against British machine-gun fire, and reported to Dantine that they were not going to reach their objective minutes before negative reports began coming in to him from the platoon commanders.
‘Go forward and take personal command of your Company,’ Dantine rapped. ‘I want to show Brigade that we can succeed against these British. Everyone seems to think we’ve already lost Normandy. Well that might have been the situation before SS Vaterland arrived. Now we’re here we’ll change the minds of those defeatists.’
Eckhardt led his HQ group forward and they sheltered in an orchard. Most of the trees had been stripped of their foliage and budding fruit by shell-fire. Panzers appeared, careering across the fields, blundering into and out of ditches and crashing over the big hedges. All hell broke loose when Allied fighter-bombers appeared, and everyone dived into cover. The air attack was over as quickly as it had begun, and the men got up to continue their advance, pushing against enemy fire, gaining inches here and yards there, throwing grenades at enemy machine-gun posts and infiltrating, encircling, outflanking the main positions, drawing ever closer to the trenches where the British waited. Small arms fire rattled unceasingly, and figures dropped from the ranks. The sun shone brightly through the drifting smoke and they sweated, from tension and nerves and the heat of the June afternoon.
German snipers were in action, having moved out before daylight, and the sudden crack of a single rifle-shot was usually answered by a falling body of some unsuspecting British infantryman who died without knowing the cause. The British sent out small patrols to get at the snipers, and fierce fights broke out when one of them was cornered.
Eckhardt watched his platoons moving in to attack a fortified farm. They came under artillery an
d mortar fire before they were close enough to charge, and men fell from their ranks as shell splinters caught them. Leutnant Reinfeld, leading the advance platoon, radioed to report that he was pinned down in a ditch and could not move. There were three light machine-guns firing at his sections. He had sustained casualties, and requested fire support from the reserve platoon. When he moved forward to observe the situation, Eckhardt saw the farm was protected by machine-gun posts, and immediately sent two of the platoons on a left-flanking movement, but they came under fire from more machine-gun nests sited to cover one another. In a matter of minutes the platoons were bogged down, crouching under heavy, accurate fire, and Eckhardt clenched his teeth as he sneaked forward to take a closer look.
He ducked as bullets screeched off a low wall and flew in all directions. Some of them were tracers, and he could see them whirring at a tangent. The rattle of weapons was heavy and endless. Echoes resounded. But he ignored the shooting, although taking care not to reveal himself. He saw a narrow road winding away across their front from left to right, sunk between two massive hedges, and there was the sound of enemy armour in the distance. Thick trees lay just ahead and he motioned for his HQ group to move forward into their cover. They crawled and bellied forward until they were crouching in a ditch, and Eckhardt eased back his steel helmet and wiped sweat from his forehead. Calls were coming in over the radio from all four platoons, reporting casualties and trouble. Eckhardt ordered them to stay put.
He called Battalion and Dantine spoke to him personally, his tone sharp, filled with impatience.
