|
Posted on 03/22/2005 10:07:21 PM PST by SAMWolf
|
|
 are acknowledged, affirmed and commemorated.
|
| Our Mission: The FReeper Foxhole is dedicated to Veterans of our Nation's military forces and to others who are affected in their relationships with Veterans. In the FReeper Foxhole, Veterans or their family members should feel free to address their specific circumstances or whatever issues concern them in an atmosphere of peace, understanding, brotherhood and support. The FReeper Foxhole hopes to share with it's readers an open forum where we can learn about and discuss military history, military news and other topics of concern or interest to our readers be they Veteran's, Current Duty or anyone interested in what we have to offer. If the Foxhole makes someone appreciate, even a little, what others have sacrificed for us, then it has accomplished one of it's missions. We hope the Foxhole in some small way helps us to remember and honor those who came before us.
|
|
Control of a village near the Hürtgen Forest meant control of the Roer River dams. Without the dams, the American push to the Rhine might be thwarted.  Lieutenant General Courtney H. Hodges, commander of the First U.S. Army, was upset as well. Reports from his liaison officer at Parker's headquarters indicated a "confused situation and lack of knowledge" among Parker's senior leaders. Hodges was worried the new division would "get itself smacked by the Boche," and he bluntly told Maj. Gen. L.T. Gerow, the V Corps commander, to "get the thing straightened out." Unfortunately for the First Army, it would be some time before things were straightened out. The village of Kesternich and its resolute defenders swallowed up two battalions of infantry and made a third pay a high price for its capture six weeks later. What happened? What was so important about Kesternich, and why is it virtually unknown now? The Roer River was the last major natural obstacle between the 12th U.S. Army Group and the Rhine River. The First Army had been trying since September 1944 to secure Roer crossing sites by attacking through the Hürtgen Forest. Weeks of very brutal fighting in the gloomy woods had brought little more than several thousand casualties, and in December the First Army was still on the west bank of the Roer.  Pfc Thomas W. Gilmore from Company A, 121st Infantry, photographed near Hürtgen on December 7, 1944. The winter of 1944-45 was a long one for First Army troops trying to drive to the Rhine. Kesternich was important because of its location. It was perched on a high ridge above the Roer Valley and its two largest flood-control dams, the Schwammenauel and the Urft. The dams were under German control. The issue was simple: Control the dams and you control the level of the Roer. The Americans would be foolish to put a single soldier across the river unless they had the dams. Unfortunately, they had not been a stated target of the First Army. Air attacks in early December had failed to breach the dams, and the First Army had no choice but to have V Corps take them by a ground attack through the so-called Monschau Corridor. This was rolling farmland studded with villages such as Kesternich, as well as a thick band of West Wall (Siegfried Line) bunkers and anti-tank obstacles called "dragon's teeth." The area was far better for maneuvers than the adjacent Hürtgen Forest, but it was also known as a "fine practice range for German artillerymen." The 78th Division would attack the Schwammenauel Dam, while the 2nd Infantry Division attacked the Urft Dam. No senior officer in V Corps had any illusion that the battle would be easy; however, most of the officers were surprised at how difficult the task turned out to be.  Parker's staff developed a three-phased plan to clear the Monschau Corridor and hit the Schwammenauel Dam from the northwest. Kesternich and nearby Simmerath would fall in phase 1. In phase 2, the division would take Konzen, Eicherscheid and Imgenbroich to protect its vulnerable right flank. The towns of Schmidt, Steckenborn and Strauch were targets of the third phase. The ground assault on the Schwammenauel Dam would come last, but only after all the villages were in American hands.  Bone-chilling cold and a dense ground fog marked the dawn of December 13. The 2nd Battalion, 309th Infantry, moved on Kesternich from the northwest and hit trouble minutes after it jumped off. Company F, for example, ran into a thick belt of wood-cased anti-personnel mines. The flashes of the explosions were a signal for the German mortar crews to open fire on the survivors. Shells poured in, hammering the ground and simply erasing some soldiers. The men of Company E, meanwhile, were riding tanks of the 709th Tank Battalion, attached to the 2nd Battalion. These men soon found themselves in a pasture covered by deep snowdrifts. German anti-tank gunners fired on the struggling tanks. The infantry dismounted amid plumes of muddy earth and continued on foot without tank support. Those who lived called it "a fight between Company E and the German army." The men who made it through the mines, mortars, anti-tank and automatic-weapons fire to the first buildings in Kesternich were cut off from reinforcement. They had no radios with which to call for fire, and most of the tanks were still outside the town. The battalion commander, Lt. Col. Wilson L. Burley, Jr., had started the battle riding on a tank, but had ended up in a shell crater near the main road leading into town from the west. Contact with his company commanders was intermittent, and he knew only as much about the battle as he could see from the crater. He was not sure of the location and strength of the German defenses, and he had no idea where most of his men were. His command post had no idea where he was. He finally reached the commanders of the two lead companies by radio and had them withdraw their men a few hundred yards to the west. There was no more progress that day. Burley was last heard from early on the 14th, after he had gone into Kesternich to assess the situation. His body was later found in the town. The executive officer was presumed dead, though his body was never recovered. The commander of Company H, Captain Douglas P. Frazier, took command. The day had gone generally well elsewhere, but there was nothing good for Parker to tell Gerow about Kesternich. They decided to reinforce Burley's battalion. Time was critical. As one participant later said, "There was no hope here, just death lurking in every shadow, every hollow, every house."  Parker ordered Lt. Col. Byron W. Ladd's 2nd Battalion, 310th Infantry, to attack at 6 a.m. on December 14. Ladd was ordered to clear and hold Kesternich and block the roads leading into the town from the east. The battalion had spent December 13 moving forward but out of contact, and Ladd's staff had not used the time it had to prepare plans for commitment. The battalion also did not conduct a thorough reconnaissance, a shortcoming the unit later paid for dearly. Much damage was inflicted on the battalion by a machine gun firing from a large, undetected, concrete bunker that covered the western approaches to Kesternich. Reportedly, in the days leading up to the attack, the battalion intelligence officer had not prepared a terrain analysis of the area, though the battalion had excellent, specially produced maps. Finally, Ladd knew only that a battalion of the 309th badly needed help. Like Burley, he knew little about the German defenses.  Companies E and F of the 310th made the main effort on the 14th. Company F had an attached platoon of tank destroyers, and Ladd held the attached tanks in battalion reserve. The German machine gunners reacted quickly to the figures wading through the snow-covered fields. When members of Company E tried to escape the fire, they touched off anti-personnel mines. This was the cue for the German artillery observers to call in a rain of shells. Company G, in reserve, was so close behind the attacking companies that it also suffered several casualties from the same fire that hit Company E. Division artillery refused Ladd's call for supporting artillery fire because of concerns about injuring soldiers from the 2nd Battalion, 309th Infantry, who might still be in town. But it mattered little in the end because no one could locate the forward observer.
|
LOL...thank you, my FRiend...I luv all you FReepers...MUD
Morning stand watie.
Free Dixie!
I read "A Dark and Bloody Ground", I'll have to look into "Follow Me and Die"
Cool!
FReegards...MUD
Thanks for telling a little of your dad's story. They really were the greatest.
Yep...I grew up politically watching what Reagan accomplished, and he's been my inspiration fer years. Limbaugh's also very optimistic, and I get a lot of input from him as well.
"...but he had a lot less to be optimistic about when he rolled up his sleeves and went to work in 1980."
Nobody's saying it's gonna be easy or that there will not be major roadblocks, pitfalls, and setbacks on the Road to Liberty...still, I believe more and more enslaved folks will demand their rights as human beings, and the Tyrants will be steadily vanquished!!
Regards...MUD
DemonRATS...the Party of Death...MUD
The Pie-shaped ones are interesting.
Cool, I've not seen a wedge shape coin before.
Afternoon Ms_68.
People forget a lot of smaller countries stood up to the Communists when they first came to power, to bad the Western Democracies for the most part didn't help much and stop it before it became the force it did.
free dixie,sw
Afternoon Victoria.
LOL!
:-D
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
