Free Republic

General McAuliffe issued a memorable Christmas message to his troops:Headquarters 101st Airborne Division Office of the Division Commander24 December 1944What’s Merry about all this, you ask? We’re fighting – it’s cold – we aren’t home. All true but what has the proud Eagle Division accomplished with its worthy comrades of the 10th Armored Division, the 705th Tank Destroyer Battalion and all the rest? just this: We have stopped cold everything that has been thrown at us from the North, East, South and West. We have identifications from four German Panzer Divisions, two German Infantry Divisions and one German Parachute Division....

I often wonder what he was thinking that morning as he crossed that swollen river into Germany. Perched up on the half track, I’m sure the vast majority of his concerns that morning were for the young kids at his feet, buck privates piled into the back of the clattering machine that was half tank and half truck. But I’ll bet one corner of his mind that November morning in 1944 was thinking about going home. Home was Lewiston, Maine. A small town in Maine dominated by old brick textile mills and a smelly river flowing by it. His father...