"Veterans of the Battle of the Bulge" Topic

Of possible interest?

"In December 1944, I departed for Le Havre, France, and entered combat on December 24, 1944.

During our combat period, we were strafed by planes and attacked by the German 88's. We did not remain in a position for more than one or two days, as there was a great need for our guns.

During one of our firing positions, the 88's zeroed in on our gun position. One shell hit the cooks' tent, which was just to the rear of our gun, causing a death and injuries to our cooks. As the shells were zooming in, a fellow crewman by the name of Private Friel suggested we dash out to our howitzer and return the unfired shells into a nearby dugout. Hurriedly, the two of us moved the shells under cover. The 88 shells were dropping around our guns. Fortunately, [there were] no further hits on us. Orders came through to pack up and move to another position…"
More here
link

Amicalement
Armand

Not many vets of ww2 left, now.

From my family, the 3 vets we had are gone.

My uncle Mike, went from North Africa then "up the boot" in Italy. He passed in 2000.

My uncle Hank went ashore in the very first wave at Utah beach. He was an engineer. He died in 1988.

My beloved uncle Bob was a Marine and fought in quite a few of the "big name" battles in the Pacific. He was set to go ashore in the first wave at Iwo Jima, but cought some kind of stomach bug, and stayed on ship until D+4. He swore to his dying day, that that "bug" saved his life, as his rifle company sustained very high casulties on the first day.

He died june of 2004.

They are all missed.

An excellent find. A treasure chest of first hand accounts.

I really love reading primary sources on WW2 history. I have collected many (some books, some typed original battle reports, some electronic battle reports).

My own father was in the tank destroyer command in WW2. He was too old to enlist when the war started (more than 30 years old in 1941), but was young enough to be drafted two years later. As he was an experienced businessman they made him a supply clerk and gave him an extra stripe (think corporal Radar O'Reilly from M*A*S*H, except older and not as funny).

But as a member of the TDs, supply clerk or not he was trained to kill tanks. The M1 carbine was his primary weapon, but he was trained on the bazooka and trained on the various US TD vehicles. He was also trained in armor recognition. He wasn't very good at any of it.

My obsession with tank models as a boy led to several interesting comments from him. For example when he saw my Rocco Minitank model of a US M110 SPH, he told me that was his favorite among the vehicles he was trained on in the war (??). I knew from reading all the stuff that came with my M110 (I always red EVERYTHING that came with a model), that it was a post-war vehicle, and an artillery gun rather than an anti-tank gun. And so, in my early adolescent my-parents-don't-know-anything-about-the-real-world point of view he sank about 2 more notches on the credibility totem pole. When he told me about how they didn't put any armor on the turrets so they'd be faster, and how they used to be able to go 50 – 55mph in them, I just dismissed it as dad's ramblings.

I have spent so much of my hobby time on US TDs since I became an adult. The M18 Hellcat has been my favorite WW2 vehicle ever since I first learned about it. Wish I had known about it when I was making models as a kid.

I learned, from this experience and several others, a little bit about how to read first-hand accounts. Be careful not to put full faith in the details. Some detail which which may be all-important to a hobbyist, may have been entirely lost on the participant. And most certainly the validation from both sides' accounts was entirely missing.

So when my dad saw an M110, he didn't know it wasn't an M18. In his day artillery was mostly towed, and those that were self-propelled didn't have turrets. And he probably didn't care one lick, at that time, for the difference between an artillery gun and an anti-tank gun. A gun, in an open turret, on a tracked chassis … it was a TD. Dismissing his account was foolish on my part, as I later learned. But that doesn't mean the M110 was in fact a tank destroyer. It just means that there was truth in his comment even if he was wrong on some of the facts.

Similarly in the first quoted account from the linked page, I don't believe, not even for 1 minute, that the artilleryman was in fact under fire by German 88s. The Germans didn't use 88s for counter-battery fire. Clearly he was under fire by artillery guns, not anti-aircraft-come-anti-tank guns. So he is wrong. Yet it is a mistake to dismiss what he has written, because there is truth in his comments, even if he is wrong on this one fact.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

Glad ou enjoyed it my friend!. (smile)

Interesting histories…

Amicalement
Armand

Very valid points Mark 1. I've just been going through 11 Armoured's divisional history after picking it up last year and am reminded how subjective the history is, even at that short distance.

I have had the same experiences with the WWII/Korea/Vietnam era mis-memories of the war vets and my own smart-alec kid reaction back in the day. Now that I am over the hill and 10 years past my war, I catch myself mis-remembering small details. Maybe one of the blessings of time is to extend the fog of war to blur our memories a bit. OBTW, keeping to the original post, my 2nd Cousin was part of the US forces engaged in the Bulge and managed to survive despite being run over by a German tank. Although I never heard the story in person, I suspect he would have said it was a "tiger".

IIRC by the Bulge the Germans were putting 75mm and 88mm AT guns on artillery carriages and assigning them to the artillery regiments, so it is possible it was an 88. At the same American soldiers tended to call every cannon an 88 and every tank a Tiger, so it isn't that likely.

IIRC by the Bulge the Germans were putting 75mm and 88mm AT guns on artillery carriages and assigning them to the artillery regiments…

OK, that's a new one for me.

Anyone got any more on that? In all my readings I have never heard of 88s assigned to artillery regiments. Certainly the later 88s were put onto anti-tank gun carriages (PaK43 and 43/41), but I have not heard of them being placed on artillery carriages (optimized for high-angle indirect fire).

I have also read of 88s being used for bombardments. Generally this was ad hoc fire of HE rounds at front-line targets, though. And usually it was done over open sites by AA batteries. To my understanding the 88 didn't have the sighting equipment for indirect fire, a key factor for being attached/assigned to artillery regiments.

But just because I haven't read of it doesn't mean it didn't happen. So … anyone got more on this?

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

Yes they put Pak 40 barrels on the LeFH 18/40 carriage to produce the FK 7M85. I'm pretty sure some of the Volks artillery had them.
I think that surviving Pak 43/41's were transferred to artillery units too. It was an artillery carriage and had decent elevation and was too cumbersome and heavy as a Pak. It was accurate with a decent range so would be a good choice for a counter battery mission.

Mark

The Luftwaffe 88 where the bane of the Americans and British during the period after D day.

These units used a grid system and could bring in fire at 3 min from call not the normal 20+ it took reg Divisional or Corp artillery.

If they did not have an AA mission going they would answer artillery calls.

So it could have been 88's or may the enemy's divisional k 100 guns (no clue how they sound but assume that a gun shell and a Howitzer shell income sound different.

My wife's uncle was at Arnhem bridge (3 Para Mortar Platoon, that in itself is a tale) and his recollections are vague at best, he mentioned about dropping a Grenade into an open topped tank, it wasn't until much later i knew about the SP's that were attached to KG Knaust.

88's did do direct artillery missions using airburst shells with the fuses set to burst over the target!

I got the impression originally from Nafziger's order of battle for the Battle of the Bulge. I did a little follow up to find more info but couldn't tell you where I found it now. I don't have any problem being proven wrong though.