The FReeper Foxhole Remembers the Battle for Kesternich (12/1944 - 01/1945) - Mar. 23rd, 2005

World War II Magazine | November 1996 | Edward G. Miller

[SAMWolf]

Lord,

Keep our Troops forever in Your care

Give them victory over the enemy...

Grant them a safe and swift return...

Bless those who mourn the lost.
.

FReepers from the Foxhole join in prayer
for all those serving their country at this time.

.................................................................. .................... ...........................................

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Desperate Hours at Kesternich

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.

Major General Edwin P. Parker, Jr., commander of the new 78th "Lightning" Infantry Division, was worried. His battalion attacking Kesternich was in trouble. The fight for the little farming village, about 15 miles southeast of Aachen, Germany, had started before daylight on Wednesday, December 13, 1944. Now it was evening, and Parker was one of many officers who had no idea what the situation was. The battalion commander whose men were locked in combat had no idea either. He was in a shell crater just outside the town, out of contact with his own command post and company commanders.

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.

[SAMWolf]

Then they stabbed Poland in the back in 1939.

[w_over_w]

Evening Grace Folks~

Incredible read. This is the third post I've read here regarding the battles within the Hürtgen Forest and they clearly are the most devasting conditions of combat that gained so little advantage.

The reports following the nights of Dec. 15th & 16th are simply numbing. In four words . . .

"dog-eat-dog fight."

[tomball]

The children of today have no idea what it was like to have grown up with the "Greatest Generation." May God always be with you and your family.

[SAMWolf]

Thanks for the link ms_68

[tomball]

Hello Foxhole -

Incredible thread today.

[SAMWolf]

Evening w_over_w.

Some of the worst terrain and weather conditions in Western Europe were in the Hurtgen.

[SAMWolf]

Evening tomball.

[w_over_w]

Hey Counselor~

I too would like to echo the sentiments expressed today for your father's service to our country and for you sharing his great life. With every "greatest generation" member that departs our lives we loose a rare gem. My father was able to slip into the final 6mos. of the South Pacific campaign of WWII (he lied about his age) as a Navy E-1. After his return home he obtained a 1st Lt. commission and his AF wings whereupon he flew 150 missions during the Korean War and 200 missions over North Hanoi. His final battle was with cancer which took him from us 15yrs. ago.

God bless . . .

[Valin]

Raining in Oregon? I find that hard to believe.

[Iris7]

I figure those missions into North Viet Nam took guts.

I would not like to be captured by those people, not one bit. Don't think I have the guts to do what Lance Sijan did. In God all things are possible, however.

[Iris7]

I don't believe I would have been interested in surrendering to the Soviets of 1939 - 45. No point in it, may as well make them pay instead.

Lots of stuff, here and there, about 1920. No point in letting yourself get captured then, either. Very vulgar abuse of prisoners done by the Reds, may they rot in Hell.

[Iris7]

Wright-Pat is one of the important places on my to do list, my itinerary. Truly important museum there. Thinking of driving down maybe this year, can't be more than ten hours or so.

To repeat, a truly important museum there. Hope you got a chance to go.

[Iris7]

Excellent maps.

If the Soviets had hooked up with the German Reds, the Spartacist - Luxemberg outfits, well, the details are hazy, but the Soviet Union including Italy, Germany, and France was likely. Spain and Portugal, I think, too. 1920 was the emotional high point of the Red movement.

Marshal Pilsudski and his gallant people did what needed doing in those days.

Sometimes guys talk about Patton finishing the job after the surrender of Germany. Me, I like to point out that the Manhattan Project was getting into the mass production of nuclear weapons when Japan surrendered. (Good old Truman canceled the program.) The plan was for ONE A DAY in December 1945.

The new B-50s had a range of 4,650 statute miles, and from Turkey could cover way east of the Urals, Western Europe, and well into the Arctic Ocean and return to base. Advance Edward Teller's project a few years, and where there were kilotons before there would be megatons.

Fly from northwest China and cover the rest of the Soviet Union. A little mid air refueling, etc.

Patton attacks, and the enemy must mass men, armor, and artillery, making nice nuclear targets. Other nice targets are industrial, oil, etc. I am not a big fan of city busting, women and children should not be targeted, and would rather leaflet the whole town before nuking it. The first few towns would not believe it, but the rest sure would.

Ah, lost opportunities. Had a lot of Reds over here in those days, project was not politically possible.

[SAMWolf]

Someone once said "politicians always leave another war to fight", based on history it sure seems to be true.y

[snippy_about_it]

I agree with you w.

Every story I've read about the Hürtgen is emotionally upsetting. They gave everything they had.

[snippy_about_it]

Hi tomball.

[snippy_about_it]

Raining in Oregon?

LOL. It's really just a myth we perpetuate to keep folks away. ;-)