After The Battle 167 - The Battle at Camp Bowmanville

S ER MB ME RE IN ITA BR

NUMBER 167 © Copyright After the Battle 2015 Editor: Karel Margry Editor-in-Chief: Winston G. Ramsey Published by Battle of Britain International Ltd., The Mews, Hobbs Cross House, Hobbs Cross, Old Harlow, Essex CM17 0NN, England Telephone: 01279 41 8833 Fax: 01279 41 9386 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.afterthebattle.com Printed in Great Britain by Warners Group Publications PLC, Bourne, Lincolnshire PE10 9PH. After the Battle is published on the 15th of February, May, August and November. LONDON STOCKIST for the After the Battle range: Foyles Limited, 107 Charing Cross Road, London WC2H 0DT. Telephone: 020 7437 5660. Fax: 020 7434 1574. E-mail: [email protected]. Web site: www.foyles.co.uk United Kingdom Newsagent Distribution: Warners Group Publications PLC, Bourne, Lincolnshire PE10 9PH Australian Subscriptions and Back Issues: Renniks Publications Pty Limited Unit 3, 37-39 Green Street, Banksmeadow NSW 2019 Telephone: 61 2 9695 7055. Fax: 61 2 9695 7355 E-mail: [email protected]. Website: www.renniks.com Canadian Distribution and Subscriptions: Vanwell Publishing Ltd., 622 Welland Avenue, St. Catharines, Ontario Telephone: (905) 937 3100. Fax: (905) 937 1760 Toll Free: 1-800-661-6136 E-mail: [email protected] New Zealand Distribution: Dal McGuirk’s “MILITARY ARCHIVE”, PO Box 24486, Royal Oak, Auckland 1345, New Zealand Telephone: 021 627 870. Fax: 9-6252817 E-mail: [email protected] United States Distribution and Subscriptions: RZM Imports Inc, 184 North Ave., Stamford, CT 06901 Telephone: 1-203-324-5100. Fax: 1-203-324-5106 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.rzm.com Italian Distribution: Milistoria s.r.l. Via Sofia, 12-Interporto, 1-43010 Fontevivo (PR), Italy Telephone: ++390521 651910. Fax: ++390521 619204 Dutch Language Edition: SI Publicaties/Quo Vadis, Postbus 188, 6860 AD Oosterbeek Telephone: 026-4462834. E-mail: [email protected]

The 4-star Dixcart Hotel on the island of Sark in the Channel Islands was the unlikely setting for an event that was destined to have worldwide repurcussions. It was on October 3, 1942 that Major Geoffrey Appleyard led a 12-man party from the Small Scale Raiding Force and No. 12 Commando on Operation ‘Basalt’ to capture prisoners and gain information on the German defences on the island. The Germans had made the hotel their headquarters and soldiers were billeted in an adjoining annexe.

CONTENTS

Front Cover: In 2014, this stunning display was created in the dry moat of the Tower of London using hand-made ceramic poppies to commemorate the loss of over 800,000 men from Britain and its Empire during the First World War. (Gail Ramsey) Back Cover: Above: Kampfgruppe Müller of 12. SS-Panzer-Division suffered painful losses in trying to break the American positions at Krinkelt on December 17, 1944. Two Panthers from the 3. Kompanie ‘318’ in front, were knocked out in the centre of the village, the charred body of one of the crewmen lying across the engine deck (see page 98 of The Battle of the Bulge Then and Now). Below: The main street in Krinkelt in the winter of 2014. (Jean Paul Pallud) Acknowledgements: Mary Churchill’s Anti-Aircraft Battery from A Daughter’s Tale by Mary Soames, published by Transworld, reprinted by permission of The Random House Group Limited. The Battle of Singling is principally based on the account by Gordon A. Harrison in Battalion & Small Unit Study No. 8 (1944) and Small Unit Actions (Washington 1946). For help with the story, the Editor would like to thank Matthew E. Hermes and Phillip Bradley. Photo Credit Abbreviations: USNA — US National Archives.

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THE BATTLE AT CAMP BOWMANVILLE 2 UNITED KINGDOM Mary Churchill’s Anti-Aircraft Battery 14 BELGIUM Return to the Battle of the Bulge 24 FRANCE The Battle of Singling 39 WORLD WAR I Britain Remembers: 1914-2014 52 The annexe has unfortunately been been demolished but this is the building pictured in 1979. Bombardier Redborn describes what happened: ‘It was difficult to open the door and we made a great deal of noise before we rushed inside. We were very surprised not to find anyone in the first room — a kind of hallway — and we carefully approached the door on the far side. We found it led to a passageway with about six doors on each side. The Major gave orders that each man should take a room and all go in at the same time. I rushed into the room allotted to me and heard snoring. I switched on the light and saw a bed with a German asleep. The first thing I did was to draw the curtains and tear the bedclothes off him. Half asleep he pulled them back again. I got the blankets off a second time and when he saw my blackened face he got a shock. I hit him under the chin with a knuckleduster and tied him up. Then I looked round the room for papers or cameras. I got him to his feet still half-senseless and out into the corridor where the others already stood; there were five prisoners all told. I covered them while the others searched the rooms once more and when this was done we took the prisoners outside. Until then, everything had gone fine but as soon as we were out in the moonlight they began to scream and shout, probably because they saw how few we were. All five of them had their hands tied behind their backs but they were not gagged. As soon as they started hollering we set about them with cuts and blows. Major Appleyard shouted, “Shut the prisoners up!” and this began a regular fight. I was not exactly clear over what happened next as I had so much trouble with my prisoner — he had got his hands free and we were fighting. He was just on the point of getting away so I gave him a rugger tackle and we both fell to the ground. He got free again as he was much bigger than me but I grabbed at him and we rolled about in a cabbage patch. One of the officers shouted above the noise: “If they try to get away, shoot them.”

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THE BATTLE AT CAMP BOWMANVILLE

THE POW ‘SHACKLING CRISIS’ The treatment of prisoners during the Second World War, in principle, should have followed international law. States present at the 1907 Hague Convention agreed that prisoners of war ‘must be humanely treated’, an outcome that most subsequently ratified in the 1929 Geneva Convention, which decreed in detail the expectations of captor states. Several incidents concerning Britain’s maltreatment of German prisoners during the Second World War — including the unsatisfactory POW conditions at Fort Henry, Ontario, Canada; the imprisonment of German civilians in Iran; the ill-treatment of prisoners at Latrun Camp, Palestine (August 1942-May 1943), and the victimisation of officers aboard

HMT Pasteur en route from Port Said to Durban in March 1942 — infuriated Berlin and precipitated reprisals.

By David Mitchelhill-Green

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Although there were several hundred POW camps in Britain, the majority of German prisoners of war were despatched to the Dominions – Canada and Australia – and, after the United States entered the war, to America. One particular camp in the Canadian town of Bowmanville held several hundred enemy officers and other ranks in accommodation that was closer to a country club than a POW camp. The tedium of incarcerated life and a yearning to return home nevertheless prompted several ingenious escape attempts, including one containing a carefully orchestrated rendezvous with a U-Boat. The most notorious incident, however, was triggered by Winston Churchill’s order to shackle German prisoners in response to Berlin’s decision to fetter British prisoners after the aborted Dieppe raid and commando raid on the Channel island of Sark. The reprisal precipitated a three-day riot at Camp 30 — remembered as the ‘Battle of Bowmanville’. The only skirmish on Canadian soil during the war, it had the potential to have worsened an already tense international situation over the accepted treatment of prisoners of war.

Both Bruce Ogden Smith (above) and his brother Colin participated in Operation ‘Basalt’. When we spoke to Bruce in his London flat in February 1981 surrounded by relics and mementoes (he took the ashtray from the annexe for his collection), he still had a clear recollection of what took place: ‘We had taken a grey-coloured cord with us specificially to tie the Germans up as the purpose of the raid was to bring back prisoners. We were all armed with .45 Colts. In the fight my prisoner got away and when the Germans started pouring from the hotel we ran like hell to the boat — it was every man for himself. The prisoner held us up; he was still in his pyjamas. Afterwards we never thought any more about the significance of what we had done until the Press took it up. I believe Major Appleyard reported direct to the Prime MInister himself who was not in the least worried.’ 3

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Bruce was interviewed by Channel Television on the actual spot where the fight that resulted in two Gemans being shot had taken place in October 1942. (Major Appleyard was posted missing on an SAS operation to Sicily in July 1943 and Bruce’s brother Colin was killed fighting with the Maquis in Brittany in July 1944.)

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ever, felt that the shackling of prisoners ran counter to the spirit of Bushido, disingenuously claiming that its treatment of prisoners ‘has so far corresponded to generous and unbounded humanity’! Lukewarm Japanese support was received on October 24 while all approaches to Rome fell on deaf ears, Italy holding significantly fewer British prisoners than its Axis partners. Meanwhile, the Canadian press voiced its concern over a local breach of the Geneva Convention should the shackling of POWs occur on home soil, while Canada’s Department of External Affairs saw the reprisal as an opportunity for Germany ‘to play off one part of the Commonwealth against another’. Besides, as Ottawa cabled London, weren’t there already sufficient German POWs in Britain? Did Canada even have to participate in the illegal activity?

RICHARD HEAUME, MBE

By far the worst crisis in Anglo-German POW affairs erupted after a copy of the operational plan for the Allied raid on the French channel town of Dieppe -— Operation ‘Jubilee’ on August 19, 1942 (see After the Battle No. 5) fell into German hands as contained within were instructions that enemy prisoners were to be bound to prevent them from destroying secret papers. Then, following the British commando raid on the island of Sark on the night of October 3/4, two German soldiers were found dead with their hands tied with cord, a flagrant breach of Article 3 of the Geneva Convention which specified the humane treatment of prisoners at all times. (The two men had been captured while asleep in their quarters at the Dixcart Hotel, and their hands had been secured merely to get them to the boat. However, once outside the hotel, they started shouting to raise the alarm so one was shot and another knifed. (See Operation ‘Basalt’ recounted in The War in the Channel Islands Then and Now.)) This provoked Berlin to issue a communiqué stating that the men had been illegitimately bound when they were shot. Despite the British response of ‘never [having] countenanced any general order for the tying up of prisoners on the field of battle’, Germany followed with a declaration that 107 officers and 1,268 NCOs, mainly Canadian, captured at Dieppe were to be fettered in retaliation for the binding of captured German soldiers. On October 10, Churchill announced that Britain would match Germany’s reprisal. Berlin’s immediate response was to immediately up the ante with a three-fold increase in the number of prisoners shackled. Hitler clearly believed, because of the disproportionate number of prisoners Germany held, that he held the upper hand. Churchill, though, stood his ground and within days some 3,000 men on both sides were in manacles. As the crisis deepened with Britain’s refusal to back down, Hitler’s Foreign Minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop, instructed the German ambassador in Tokyo, General Eugene Ott, to seek Japanese support and, possibly, introduce similar reprisals against British POWs held by Japan. Tokyo, how-

However, the Dominion’s Office saw matters differently. Canada would actively partake in the reprisal by chaining up to 2,000 prisoners held by them. Following Germany’s lead in handcuffing more than 4,100 prisoners, the Canadian government was requested to approve the handcuffing of 3,888 prisoners on October 10. A note from Winston Churchill to the Canadian Prime Minister, Mackenzie King, called for him to ‘stand by us in this anxious business’. Both Canada’s High Commissioner in London, Vincent Massey, and Minister of National Defence, James L. Ralston, voiced their concerns after Clement Attlee, the Dominions Secretary, informed them of the contentious decision. Ralston felt that Germany should be allowed to back down without losing face; Massey suggested that Switzerland, as the protecting power, should intervene to defuse the situation. Canada’s Cabinet War Committee, also opposed to the chaining, approved lodging a protest with Switzerland over this breach of the Geneva Convention. King, however, had additional reason for proceeding cautiously. Earlier, on September 4, Ross Munro, a Canadian Press reporter, had delivered Berlin a propaganda windfall. In recounting heroic details of the Dieppe raid to a packed rally in Montreal, Munro spoke openly of German soldiers who were shot, if not murdered, after being captured at a coastal defence battery. Munro’s provocative speech made frontpage headlines the following day while Canadian military intelligence moved to quickly quash the antagonistic claim. Rather than openly challenge Churchill over the matter, King acquiesced, though with minimal enthusiasm. ‘We feel that we have been committed without proper consultation to a course of doubtful wisdom.’ The assessment that Germany would always win such a vexed contest was expressed in telegram, concluding that Canadian compliance in the handcuffing of German prisoners was ‘decided with regret in order to avert a major difference with Britain’. Four Canadian camps were nominated to implement the shackling request: No. 20 Gravenhurst, No. 21 Espanola, No. 23 Monteith and No. 30 Bowmanville. Opposition to the cuffing varied from passive resistance at the Monteith and Espanola camps, to outright defiance at Gravenhurst where the prisoners threw their ‘shackles into the stoves, rendering them useless’, to an outright riot at Bowmanville.

When the two men were found dead with their hands tied behind their backs, Hitler perceived their deaths as an execution which triggered an escalating tit-for-tat backlash. The Germans shackled Allied prisoners, mostly Canadians taken at Dieppe, while Britain similarly retaliated, instructing Canada to handcuff German prisoners in their custody. Then Hitler went one stage further by personally issuing his ‘Commando Order’ which provided that in future all Allied servicemen who took part in commando raids and were captured would be put to death. The two Germans were buried in the German War Cemetery at Fort George, Guernsey. They were Gefreiter Heinrich Esslinger and Unteroffizier August Bleyer.

Until the mid-20th century, it was a long-standing convention among the officer class of all armies that capture was related to dishonour, but with the advent of the fast-moving battles, particularly in the air, the chances of capture had increased and corresponding disgrace diminished. Left: Generalmajor Georg Friemel was captured at Ypenburg airfield in the Netherlands during the German airborne invasion on May 10, 1940. Until then an Oberst BOWMANVILLE: THE ‘MOST LUXURIOUS’ CAMP IN THE WORLD Canada declared war against Germany on September 10, 1939. Shortly thereafter the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, responsible for the country’s intelligence and security service, began incarcerating Canadian civilians of German descent deemed to have dubious loyalty, as a precaution against espionage and the emergence of a ‘Fifth Column’. The number of internees grew considerably following Winston Churchill’s request in June 1940 for Canada to receive German POWs. Existing facilities were hurriedly pressed into service while new purpose-built POW camps were constructed to house the 35,046 German prisoners and internees eventually held during the course of the war. One of the smallest was Camp 30 located in a former school for wayward boys in the small town of Bowmanville, some 50 miles east of Toronto. The first entry inscribed in the camp war diary on October 15, 1941 records the arrival of the commandant, Lieutenant Colonel Charles J. Whebell. Several hundred civilian workers were still on site transforming the former correctional facility into a camp with guard huts, nine perimeter towers and double-apron fencing, 12 feet high, enclosing an area of approximately 14 acres. Mindful of possible escape attempts, a meeting was held with the local Chief of Police to formulate plans for recapturing absconded prisoners. Meanwhile orders were received on November 17 to begin transferring prisoners to Bowmanville, the first inmate being Great Britain’s highest-ranking prisoner at the time, Generalmajor Georg Friemel, and his adjutant, both relocated from a camp at Kingston in eastern Ontario ahead of the first wave of prisoners. Two officers and 71 other ranks of the Veterans’ Guard of Canada (VGC), a new corps of mostly First World War veterans, arrived from Fort Henry on November 19 ready to escort the first wave of POWs: a non-commissioned officer and ten other ranks transferred from Camp 21 at Espanola. A further 403 German officers and 115 other ranks followed this lead group. Generals were allocated their own room; officers, between two to eight men, were accommodated in a single room, while other ranks were housed in groups of 60 men to a single barrack.

in command of Infanterie-Regiment 65 of the 22. Luftlande-Division, Friemel was subsequently promoted while in captivity, remaining the highest-ranking POW held by the British until Generalmajor (later Generalleutnant) Johann von Ravenstein was captured by New Zealand troops in North Africa on November 29, 1941. Sent to Canada, he was the first prisoner to occupy Camp 30 at Bowmanville, Ontario (right).

Another 33 prisoners captured in Europe and North Africa, ’all young and vigorous’, arrived at the camp on September 20, 1942. Much to their delight, as the camp diary recorded, they were ‘very pleased at themselves for drawing such a comfortable billet’. Indeed, a Canadian newspaper editorial described the camp as the ‘most luxurious’ in the world, complete with swimming pool, library, gymnasium and playing field. A small-scale zoo was even built in mid-1942. It was little wonder, then, that the Canadian War Office deemed the standard of comfort as ‘unique’. Time, especially for the large cohort of POW officers for whom work was forbidden under the Geneva Convention, was passed by a variety of sports, elaborately staged theatrical productions and orchestral performances. Further education was provided by the University of Toronto under YMCA supervision.

Writing home to his mother in the autumn of 1942, one prisoner described his daily camp routine: ‘I take an English and Spanish lesson for an hour each, then read until dinner at eleven-thirty; from one to one-thirty I often swim, and until our second roll-call at three, we read or walk. Occasionally we have a coffee party in the dining room, and after we have talked ourselves out there, we go back to our rooms to work for an hour. By that time it is nearly a quarter to six and time for supper. In the evenings we read or write letters. Sometimes we play Doppelkopf in the old German fashion with a great deal of talking, or sometimes we drink a glass or more of beer [freely available from the wet canteen, provided the patrons remained “orderly and sober”]. The daily routine includes sports, concerts and lectures. Since we manage the whole camp ourselves, we have similar food to what we had at home.’ BOWMANVILLE

CANADA

UNITED STATES

The location of Bowmanville, 50 miles east of Toronto, near the shore of Lake Ontario, was a godsend to German prisoners seeking to escape to the United States as the frontier bisected the lake. 5

Camp 30 was formerly a boys’ home built on the grounds of a 300-acre farm donated to the Ontario government by local businessman John H. H. Jury for ‘unadjusted boys’ who were not considered ‘inherently delinquent’. The Boys’ Welfare Home and School, later the Ontario Training School for Boys, opened in 1925. Formal regulations stipulated a range of punishments for the boys that were in excess of those the later POWs would receive including solitary confinement for up to 12 hours with a bread and water diet (though an apology could EARLY ESCAPE ATTEMPTS The first recorded break from Bowmanville was an opportunistic flight by three officers from a train en route to the camp on November 23, 1941 but all were soon recaptured. To their astonishment, the first wave of prisoners discovered that the camp was still under construction and without ‘towers and machine guns’. Leutnants Jürgen von Krause and Ulrich Steinhilper seized the opportunity to escape the next day (November 24), followed by a Leutnant Schmidt who was caught crawling under the perimeter wire on November 25. Steinhilper escaped again on December 17 only to be recaptured in Montreal the next day and returned to the camp where he was given 28 days’ detention. These early escape attempts led to the daily roll-calls increased from two to three, at 0700, 1500 and 2215 hours, as well as ‘unexpected’ counts. The first tunnel was discovered in No. 2 Dormitory on February 9, 1941 originating from a new bathroom in the building’s basement. Already 61 feet in length, the tunnel measured 22 inches wide and 27 inches high and ran some 13 feet beneath the road to near the No. 4 guard tower. Leutnants Schmidt and Lüderitz received 21 days in detention for their abortive escape effort, officially described as ‘not very successful . . . filled with water’. Engineers subsequently destroyed the tunnel with explosives on February 19. Oberleutnant Hans Peter Krug and Leutnant Erich Boehle brazenly escaped from the camp in broad daylight on April 16, 1942 dressed as civilian workers using clothing supplied by the camp’s theatrical troupe. With a crowd of prisoners enthusiastically cheering at a football match which distracted the guards in the nearby towers, Krug and Boehle, armed with two ladders, paint and brushes, proceeded to nonchalantly mend the perimeter barbed-wire fence, painting the posts. A ladder was hoisted up and over to the outside to enable them to paint the 6

mitigate this detention); up to ten strokes by a strap as well as expulsion. Boys with an IQ of more than 80 between the ages of ten and 15 were accepted for a maximum period of two years before being placed back into the community at 16. Later in the 1930s the age range was broadened from eight to 18. Despite local protests against the closure of the school and the likely depreciation of local farm prices, a delegation comprising the Department of National Defence, the Swiss Consul and the Red Cross approved the use of the facility as a POW camp.

outer side of the posts. After working on several posts, the men calmly descended to freedom. ‘We were both scared as we walked away’, Krug recounted later, ’but the hardest part then was to keep from running. We knew that if we were too eager, it would be all over. We would be shot.’ The pair carried forged documents to support their new identities: Boehle was now a pilot from No. 5 Squadron, Free Norwegian Air Force, on leave in Toronto; Krug was a Frenchman from the liner SS Normandie which had capsized in New York harbour only weeks earlier. Back in the camp, an elaborate ruse was underway to assist the escape. Two dummies, basically Luftwaffe uniforms packed with newspaper and straw with papier-mâché heads and officer’s hats, were successfully paraded at two roll-calls before

the ploy was discovered. In the meantime, the two escapees had hitched a ride on a freight train before they separated at Toronto’s busy Union Station. Boehle boarded a train for the United States only to be recaptured the next morning in Niagara Falls. Krug’s good fortune, however, continued to hold. Convincing several people, including a military policeman, of his supposed plight, Krug was in turn directed to a Catholic priest who provided him with the money needed for a bus ticket to Windsor on the US-Canadian border. Hiding in bushes until nightfall, Krug made a paddle for a rowboat that he stole before crossing the Detroit river, which marks the border between Canada and America, to Belle Isle, an island park in the middle of the river, before walking across the bridge to the city on the far side. Left: Encircling an area of around 14 acres, the perimeter was formed by a double apron of wire 12 feet high with nine guard towers. Three men were assigned to each tower with one of the three on duty at any one time. Camp guards were initially regular army or local militia units until the establishment of the Veterans Guard of Canada (VGC), a new corps of mostly First World War veterans formed on May 24, 1940. Although the maximum age was 50, many men merely lied about their true age; the veterans of the South African campaigns were barred from wearing their ribbons which would be a tell-tale sign of their advancing years. It was reported in mid-June 1942 that since the opening of the camp, seven months earlier, 18 POW officers had already been involved in 12 attempts to escape. This prompted orders to be issued for guards to be ‘vigilant and alert always, and suspicious of anything that happens outside of the normal routine’. Guards who thwarted an escape attempt would be rewarded with six days leave.

During the escape attempt by Oberleutnant Peter Krug (left) and Leutnant Erich Boehle, a ‘dummy’ was used during rollcall as a substitute prisoner, as demonstrated (right) by two Canadian guards. A report by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police on April 21, 1942 found that the ‘two prisoners had been aided in their escape by means of two dummies. These had been constructed of paper-mache. They were made life-size and were dressed in German airforce officer’s uniform. The face and features were almost perfect, while hair had been used for eyebrows and the lips appeared to have been coloured with regular lipstick. The frames had been built by means of stuffing paper into a suit of underwear so tightly that the dummy would stand without bending. The dummies were complete from boots to officer’s peak cap.’ Boehle was quickly captured trying to cross to the States at Niagara Falls but Krug managed to reach San Antonio in Texas before he was apprehended. (The only German POW to successfully escape from Canada was Oberleutnant Franz von Werra — see After the Battle No. 2.) cer’ was dismissed by the District Attorney, John C. Lehr, as fanciful. His testament against Stephan, however, was inexplicably damning. Having failed to breach ‘his duty of allegiance’ to the US as a naturalised citizen, Stephan was ultimately found guilty by the jury of high treason as proscribed in Article III, Section 3, of the US Constitution, and on August 6 Judge Arthur J. Tuttle sentenced him to death. Although the state of Michigan had long since abolished the death penalty, this was a federal crime and only the second time in US history that a defendant had been given a death sentence for treason. (The first was during the 1790s Whiskey Rebellion although the two convicted men were subsequently pardoned by President George Washington.) Appeals, however, delayed the execution until July 1943. Judge Tuttle received hundreds of letters supporting his decision, but also some requesting leniency. The Michigan Governor [and US Supreme Court justice] Frank Murphy and US Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Billings Learned Hand and

Solicitor General Charles H. Fahy all wrote to President Franklin D. Roosevelt requesting clemency and just seven hours before he was due to be hanged, the President commuted Stephan’s sentence to life imprisonment. Newspapers reported how the ‘pudgy restaurateur’ stood sullenly in court, a far cry from the former First World War corporal who, on sentencing, had warned his jailers that ‘a victorious Germany will not leave Stephan in jail . . . I will never be hanged . . . Germany will win’. It remains a mystery why Krug chose to testify. Was it a way to escape from the boredom of a POW camp or simply the vain attraction of assisting the FBI? In May 1943 Krug was again brought to Detroit to testify in Theodore Donay’s trial. Once again, he was no friend to the defendant, who was convicted of assisting in the act of treason and given a jail sentence of seven-and-a-half years. Bertelmann, a resident alien, was sent to an internment camp for the remainder of the war. Krug was returned to Canada to the camp at Gravenhurst from which he also escaped before being re-captured.

WSU VIRTUAL MOTOR CITY COLLECTION (DETROIT NEWS)

Krug had memorised four addresses in the German community in south-east Detroit from parcels sent to the prisoners by German-American groups such as the ‘Red Cross Ladies’. This apparently innocuous activity remained legal even after the US declaration of war in December 1941. However, the parcels would sometimes contain contraband items such as ink and paper which the POWs would use to forge identification documents for use during escapes. Consequently, the US Government requested that all parcels were to carry a return address. It was in this way that Krug was able to make contact with a German immigrant, Margareta Bertelmann; Max Stephan, a German-born restaurant proprietor and member of the pro-Nazi GermanAmerican Bund, and Theodore Donay, another Nazi-sympathiser and owner of the Europe (previously the German-American) Import Company. Krug’s new associates outfitted him with new clothes and sufficient money to get him a Greyhound bus ticket to an address in Philadelphia via Chicago. However, in the meantime at least one informant, possibly Dietrich Rintelin, Donay’s assistant, had reported Krug’s presence to the Detroit office of the FBI. The restaurant was raided and Stephan arrested together with his wife Agnes. Bertelmann and Donay were also arrested though the FBI lost track of Krug’s whereabouts. From Philadelphia he travelled north to New York City in the hope of stowing away on a neutral Swedish ship. After this option proved impracticable, he journeyed through Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Nashville and Dallas before arriving in San Antonio, Texas, with plans to cross into neutral Mexico. There Krug hoped to receive assistance from the German embassy. His plan, however, was thwarted after a suspicious hotel owner called the FBI. Arrested shortly afterwards, the fugitive airman was returned to Canada. Back in Detroit, Stephan was initially charged with harbouring an illegal alien before the US Attorney General, Nicholas Biddle, proclaimed that he would be indicted for treason. Krug, the prosecution’s key witness, also recently promoted to Oberleutnant, was brought back to the US as a volunteer witness for the trial that began on June 29, 1942. The case caused a sensation. Resplendent in his blue Luftwaffe dress uniform, Krug entered the court, clicking his heels and saluting an ‘astonished bailiff’. His explanation that he had escaped in order to ‘return to duty and to inform the German government of conditions in the camp and of the shooting and murder of a comrade offi-

A German restaurant owner, Max Stephan, had been arrested by the FBI for assisting an illegal alien, a charge later increased to treason. In June 1942 Krug, resplendent in his Luftwaffe uniform, was returned to the US to appear as a witness in Stephan’s trial. 7

The cafeteria — Haus I to the Germans — had been the very first building constructed on the site back in 1924. Even though the Boys’ Training School began with only 16 youngsters, the cafeteria was provided to serve 300 at one sitting in anticipation of the school’s future role as Ontario’s largest boys’ training institute. However, during its tenure as a prisoner of war camp, it was the

Meanwhile, word of the shackling directive had spread and POWs began barricading themselves inside barracks, armed with broom handles and hockey sticks. Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine personnel discussed switching uniforms so no individual would be shamed wearing their own uniform should the order be carried out. Roll-call that afternoon at 1500 hours was boycotted by the prisoners in a direct challenge to the Canadians. With tension mounting, Taylor sent for reinforcements but the VGC guards trying to dislodge the barricaded prisoners were met with a fusillade of tableware, glass and clubs as they attempted to rush the barracks. Breaking a hole in the roof, guards trained a fire-hose onto the rioters below. A contingent then stormed the kitchen, armed with unloaded rifles with fixed bayonets. A fierce ‘battle’ ensued before the guards retreated, unable to

enter the building as the doors and windows had been barricaded with mattresses. ‘We were determined’, Oberleutnant Horst Elfe, the former commander of U-93, recalled, ‘but a little frightened too. We thought the Canadians would come in with machine guns and tear gas and grenades, because that is what would have happened in Europe. So we were shattered when we looked from our windows and saw the Canadians marching in with no guns, no gas, just baseball bats on their shoulders.’ Former artillery officer and survivor from the battleship Bismarck, Kapitänleutnant Burkard von Müllenheim-Rechberg, recounted what happened next. ‘We observed through the fence a company of younger, front-line soldiers. They formed up outside where they were required to turn in live ammunition and were armed instead

DAVID MITCHELHILL-GREEN

THE BATTLE OF BOWMANVILLE: DAY ONE Despite the weather at Bowmanville on October 10 being recorded as ‘mild and bright’, a storm was brewing inside the camp. A letter marked ‘Most Secret’ was delivered on the morning of October 10 to the current commandant, Lieutenant Colonel James M. Taylor, informing him of the shackling directive. The highest-ranking German officer, Generalmajor Georg Friemel, and his adjutant, were then directed to provide prisoners for fettering. Friemel flatly refused, replying by letter that no further communication would occur until the order was rescinded. The senior army officer, Generalleutnant Johann von Ravenstein, senior Luftwaffe officer Oberstleutnant Hans Hefele and senior Kriegsmarine officer Korvettenkapitän Otto Kretschmer also refused to cooperate.

only dining hall on the grounds, which became a problem when Camp 30 reached a peak population of 800. Consequently, a meal rota had to be introduced that included two sittings for each meal throughout the day. It was at this building that the ‘battle of Bowmanville’ began subsequent to the measure of the shackling of prisoners in October 1942.

David Green visited Camp 30 with Charles Taws in 2014: they were disappointed to find the cafeteria had been boarded-up. 8

DAVID MITCHELHILL-GREEN

the alcohol had got out of control, greeted them with blows, shoves and kicks, readying a regular gauntlet for the [surrendering] Germans to run, with the aim of avenging the injuries their comrades had received during the conquest of the cook-house; it was not a very sporting conclusion to the capitulation of House V. The Canadian camp technical [engineering] officer, Captain [in fact Lieutenant G. E] Brent, especially aroused the Germans’ anger. In an absurd victor’s pose, he let his swagger stick dance indiscriminately on the heads of the German officers as they came up.’ The Canadians separated out the German army officers from House V and handcuffed them. The first day’s fighting had concluded, though the battle had not yet been won. Taylor, in the meantime, had contacted Military District No. 3 in Kingston; the camp war diary noted the arrival of three officers and 50 other ranks from the Royal Canadian Ordnance Corps (RCOC) at about 1945 hours. A second convoy arrived from Ordnance Training School at 2210 hours to bolster Taylor’s force.

Anxious to find any traces of the riot that October, Charles inspects the building to see if it had been struck by a bullet. floor. And there were so many things to discover: beer, cigarettes, Germans medals, rank badges, cockades, valuable objects of every sort. Stimulated by beer, they took these “souvenirs” home in their pockets.’ ‘In the meanwhile, the water had nearly filled the cellar and done its job; the German officers climbed out, dripping wet, with “hands up”, the way the Canadian had shouted at them to do. Their captors, whom

DAVID MITCHELHILL-GREEN

with billy clubs, baseball bats, and the like. The Canadians’ first objective was the cookhouse which stood nearest to the camp gate and also contained the big dining hall. In this stone structure [in reality, brick and stucco] our enlisted men, whose wooden barracks would have been too flimsy for the approaching “operations”, had barricaded themselves. They had placed up-ended tables against the windows and posted themselves behind, armed with hockey sticks, chair legs and soup ladles; as projectiles they had readied crockery, cutlery and marmalade jars. And then the Canadians attacked. They broke the window mullions with battering rams and stuck their heads cautiously into the cook-house but the defenders’ blows on their steel helmets checked their initial élan. Then one of them made a daring leap into the house. The superior force inside quickly put him out of action and was delighted to have his helmet as booty. But soon fighting broke out at every window, blows landed on heads and shoulders, marmalade jars and other projectiles flew, soon there were injuries on both sides, bloody and in part marmalade-smeared faces, which were easy to confuse. The fight swayed back and forth, but in the end the Canadians, with their superior numbers, succeeded in making a decisive breakthrough into the cook-house and overwhelming its occupants, the “conquest” of their operational objective. ‘Among the occupants of the cook-house were the army enlisted men whom the Canadians sought to handcuff, but they had not yet found a single officer. The army officers would still have to be hauled out of the other houses, one house after the other to be stormed. The next operational objective that presented itself was House VI, which was right beside the cook-house. As it served as the hospital, however, it was spared from the “prosecution” of war.’ In his memoirs, Müllenheim-Rechberg described how the Canadians next ‘attacked House V, an officers’ quarters beside House VI. Its occupants had withdrawn into the cellar and barricaded themselves there. The Canadians thereupon decided upon a different tactic. From outside, they used fire-hoses to flood the cellar. And as only a few Canadians were needed for this operation, many of them had the unexpected, welcome opportunity to look through the rooms on the ground

DAY TWO During a transfer of prisoners to neighbouring Darch House at approximately 0520 hours, it was discovered that two officers had escaped. Just over an hour later a shot was heard from a guard firing at the escapees who had refused to stop when challenged. Both men were subsequently recaptured and returned to camp. In the morning, Taylor proposed a deal whereby if the selected army officers voluntarily reported to be fettered, then some of the captured officers from House V being held as security would be allowed to return to their quarters but the overture was refused. Moreover Brent’s actions the previous day had generated considerable acrimony within the prisoners’ ranks.

Bowmanville is the only wartime POW camp still standing in Canada and is increasingly falling prey to vandals. Despite local efforts to have the site preserved, it is becoming more and more derelict. This is again the dining hall. 9

Kretschmer (the former commander of U-99) advised that it would be unwise for the despised Canadian officer to enter the compound. Müllenheim-Rechberg explained that the ‘situation remained at this stalemate, even after the visit of a representative of the Swiss protecting power, who had rushed to the scene from Ottawa. The latter’s attempts at mediation also failed for by now passions were running high.’ Brent, a marked man, entered the compound in the morning, accompanied by a VGC guard. Word of his presence quickly spread within the camp. Kretschmer, in the company of Luftwaffe pilots Oberleutnant Erwin Moll and Oberst Artur von Casimir (CO of KG 100) confronted him in front of House IV, a position out of sight from the perimeter guard towers. Oberfähnrich Volkmar König (deck-gun officer from U-99) afterwards told how Brent’s ‘Good morning, commander’ was met with a ‘fist into Brent’s face while Leutnant Moll knocked the guard to the ground. Captain Brent was dragged into House IV. He was bleeding from his nose and mouth. And he was reviled by us. I was standing beside Captain Brent and was ordered: “Quick, shackle this man! We will parade him through the camp!” I tied his hands behind his back and pushed him ahead of me towards one of the exits at the rear of our house along which the perimeter wire fence stretched. I was accompanied by a “patrol” of House IV inmates. As we exited into the open, Captain Brent and I first, we were challenged from the opposite guard This is Haus IV, the Generals’ House, as it appears today. Burkard von Müllenheim-Rechberg described his arrival at the camp: ‘The first glimpse was highly agreeable. We saw pleasant, low houses and one or other higher utilitarian structures, all built of solid stones, with pretty grounds planted in between with the trees and shrubs. As a senior Kapitänleutnant — together with a Luftwaffe major — I enjoyed the advantage of being able to take possession of a double room in a long building. Besides a bed, we each had a table and, for the two of us, a separate bathroom with tub and sink, all centrally heated, and with hot water out of the tap. I knew right away that I now found myself in a camp, which later and quite justifiably became know as “unquestionably the finest on this or that side of the ocean”.’ 10

tower: “Back into the building!” Simultaneously rifles were pointed at us from the tower. Captain Brent threw himself immediately on the ground. We jumped back into the building, I was the last one. As I was in the doorway a number of shots rang out. One went into the left door-frame at a height of six feet, another at about 32 inches hit the masonry wall left of the door. This bullet disintegrated and I was wounded in my left side by a number of bullet fragments and masonry pieces. As I was diving head first through the doorway another shot rang out. I received a gunshot that penetrated clean through my left thigh.’ The subsequent war diary entry, however, states that ‘POW 84882 Ensign Koenig received a GSW [gunshot] wound in leg, having been shot by Sentry Corporal J. E. Morrison, also seized and beaten and then left alone and returned himself to Scout Centre’. This is at odds with the German accounts specifying that the rifle shots originated from a guard tower. DAY THREE Day three of the rebellion — October 12 — began with the arrival of No. 4 Detachment, RCOC, at 0545 hours under the command of Major D. F. Adams. No morning roll-call was held. A delegation including members of the Swiss Consul conferred with Friemel at 1100 hours informing him that the attitude of the prisoners was wrong and could lead to further trouble. Forty-five minutes later, Taylor directed

the 400 Canadian troops, hungry for action and armed with clubs and unloaded rifles with fixed bayonets, to storm Houses I to V in what became a bloody six-hour mêlée. As the war diary recorded, ‘operations continued until about 1730, when all POWs were on parade ground, in detention, or in hospital . . . four POWs in hospital, 80 in camp hospital and 55 balance held for handcuffing’. Revenge was exacted by the captors. According to one of the Canadian troops, Bill Kennedy: ‘We tried to herd the prisoners out of each building. As we did this, we were told not to touch or hurt them in any way. But by this time some of the fellows from Kingston were pretty worked up. One of them, who had been punched in the eye by a prisoner, was clubbing the inmates over the head as they came out the door. Then an officer ordered him to not to hit anyone whose hands were up. “Okay, Sir”, this chap answered. But when the next German came out with his hands up, the same man yelled: “Put your gaddamned hands down!” The POW did so and was slugged on the back of the head with a tent peg. There was a lot of that sort of thing.’ As submariner Siegfried Bruse (U-35) added, ‘we had no choice because we were unarmed. Then the Canadians made sort of a barrier away from the front door. There were two lines of guards there and we had to walk down the centre. As we did so, they hit us on the head with clubs. It wasn’t fair, but they were mad because it had taken three days to end the whole thing.’

DAVID MITCHELHILL-GREEN

FORBES WILSON

Victoria Hall — known as Haus IV — was home to the generals and it was here, outside the building, that the confrontation took place between Oberst Artur von Casimir (left) and Lieutenant Brent on the second day of the riot. The second largest of the camp’s barrack buildings, it also contained a 16-bed hospital and a fullyequipped dental clinic. Located close to the camp perimeter, it was from this building that two tunnels were dug, the spoil hidden within the building’s attic. At one point, part of the ceiling collapsed under the weight though the prisoners were able to patch up the hole before the next routine inspection.

L-R: Oberleutnants Karl Heschl, Krange-Toskau, Linné, Groothus and Oberfähnrich-zur-See Volkmar König.

casualties on both sides took place. It should be realised, that while in some instances the prisoners in one or two rooms would surrender, fighting continued in other parts of the same buildings, adding to the confusion, in so far as the troops were concerned.’ The camp diary recorded that prisoners were afterwards busily engaged in cleaning up the debris from the riot while 22 officers and 33 other ranks were taken to nearby White House and Darch House, respectively, where they were handcuffed without opposition. Three officers and 183 other ranks from the RCOC returned to Kingston with two troops remaining behind in hospital. The Germans defiantly presented the Canadians with a bill for $12,000 for their plundered wardrobes, destroyed uniforms and liberated medals and wrist watches. The Canadians countered with a $12,000 charge to cover the damage to camp property. The three-day riot shocked Prime Minister King who was incensed by a disingenuous article on the insurrection that appeared in America’s Time magazine on October 26, 1942. According to the article, ‘the Canadians came with the manacles, the big blond Nazi boys at Camp Bowmanville put up an awful fight. In the mêlée one was bayoneted (severely), another shot (not seriously); 400 barricaded themselves in the camp’s main hall.’ Especially worrying was a description how guards -— in the Brent incident -— had fired ‘a couple of tentative machine-gun blasts and the prisoners ducked back. After 35 minutes of high-pressure water and tear gas, the Nazis marched out smartly in military fashion.’ The Canadian legation in Washington made official representations to US authori-

ties through fear of the incident having ‘drastic repercussions on the lives of Canadian prisoners of war in Germany’. King noted in his diary that it ‘gives Hitler just the kind of ammunition he wants. All goes to show the folly of shackling prisoners at the outset and the wisdom of our decision not to attempt it on more than the present scale.’ While the publisher of Time defended the story’s accuracy, Ralston downplayed both the incident and the errors in the article, stating that ‘no machine-gun fire was used nor was there tear gas or any other form of gas resorted to throughout the trouble’. Berlin, though, had received all details of the ‘battle’ including the beating of prisoners and the theft of their medals courtesy of the Swiss consul. For some reason, perhaps not to escalate the situation and jeopardise ongoing negotiations in Switzerland, Germany chose not to use the incident for propaganda purposes. Kretschmer escaped punishment while Casimir was mistakenly charged on November 9 with having assaulted Lieutenant Brent. London eventually declared an end to the shackling a month later on December 8 and Berlin briefly reciprocated by unfettering prisoners over the Christmas and New Year period. After shackling at Bowmanville ceased on December 11, 1942, a number of the ringleaders were removed to a camp at Farnham, and from there to Grand Ligne, north-east of Montreal, in an attempt to avert future trouble. The shackling crisis finally ended in November 1943 when Germany finally began unfettering British and Canadian prisoners.

DAVID MITCHELHILL-GREEN

AFTERMATH Generalmajor Friemel wasted no time writing to the Swiss Consul General about the incident. ‘Forty-six prisoners of war suffered casualties up until the time the resistance was stopped’, he protested. ‘I do not fail to recognise that the authorities have tried to avoid bloodshed. However, I must confirm that only after resistance ended not less than 107 prisoners of war (officers and men), while a great part put up their hands, were beaten with sticks and rifles or were injured with bayonets. Among these defenceless were found a doctor distinguishable by a Red Cross armband and a lieutenant wounded before and lying on a stretcher. One officer suffered a head wound with concussion of the brain and probably a fractured shoulder blade. Another an injury of the lungs through a stab with a bayonet. It must be pointed out that some Canadian officers and soldiers, especially those of the present staff, tried to protect the defenceless prisoners of war against mistreatment. I petition you to make complaints to the Canadian Government with regard to the treatment of German soldiers after the cessation of the fight.’ Responding to Friemel’s protest, Lieutenant-Colonel Taylor’s moderated response described the ‘considerable confusion and excitement’ during the riot. ‘Most of the fighting was at close quarters, and because of the nature of the buildings the space, available for action in most cases, was rather limited, and it was during the mêlée that went on in each of the buildings in turn, and before the prisoners surrendered and agreed to come out voluntarily, that most of the

L-R: Oberfähnrich-zur-See Sarolowsky, König (again), Günter Rubahn, Scheider and Stührenberg.

The group photos appear to have been taken outside this building. 11

DAVID MITCHELHILL-GREEN

Korvettenkapitän Otto Kretschmer (left) had been captured on March 17, 1941 when U-99 was brought to the surface. He first spent time at No. 1 POW Camp at Grizedale Hall in Cumberland — known as the ‘U-Boat Hotel’ — but later in Canada in 1943 an OPERATION ‘KIEBITZ’ An elaborate escape plan was hatched in 1943 to liberate some of Germany’s top submariners from Bowmanville including Otto Kretschmer, Kapitänleutnant Hans Ey (U-433), Kapitänleutnant Horst Elfe (U-93), Kapitänleutnant Wolfgang Heyda (U-434) and Joachim von Knebel-Döberritz, Kretschmer’s executive officer and former adjutant to Grossadmiral Karl Dönitz, the commander-in-chief of the Kriegsmarine. If successful, ‘Kiebitz’ would be a strategic and propaganda windfall for Berlin at a time when the tide of the war had swung heavily in the Allies’ favour. Senior naval officers at Bowmanville were in regular contact with Dönitz via a cunningly simple written cipher, known as Code Irland. Seemingly invisible to the censors examining the mail passing through Red Cross channels, coded messages could be easily encrypted using words beginning with the appropriate first letter. A simple transposition of particular letters of the alphabet into Morse code meant the letters A to I represented a dot; J to R a dash and S to Z a space. In this way, an innocent letter written by a prisoner to his family could convey vital information. Although the code was soon exposed by the Canadian Naval Intelligence Division responsible for the interrogation of POWs, the exchange of POW mail was still permitted. One particular decoded letter alerted Canadian authorities to a planned break-out from Bowmanville coupled with a rendezvous with a U-Boat at an isolated spot on the New Brunswick coast. A similar plan, code-named ‘Elster’, involving two U-Boats (U-376 and U-262) in early May 1943 to rescue escaped prisoners from Camp 70 on Prince Edward Island in the Gulf of St Lawrence had already failed but the senior officers at Bowmanville had received confirmation from Dönitz regarding the new rendezvous. Kapitänleutnant Rolf Schauenburg, commanding officer of U-536, received orders to carry out the rescue attempt on September 12, although the UBoat initially assigned to the operation (U669) had been attacked, either by the RCAF’s No. 407 Squadron on September 7 or by No. 612 Squadron of the RAF, five days earlier. 12

elaborate attempt was planned to rescue him along with other valuable U-Boat captains held at Bowmanville. Right: Two tunnels were dug from Haus IV to the perimeter in the foreground, the second one begun specifically for Kretschmer’s U-Boat break-out.

Canadian Naval Intelligence pieced together the ambitious escape plan following a fortuitous discovery by Staff Sergeant Stephen Lett of the Crime Detection Laboratory at Regina. Carefully examining the binding of an Arnold Ulitz novel (Die Braut des Berühmten) posted from Germany, Lett discovered a number of escape documents including a map of the eastern Canadian coastline revealing the rendezvous point, a forged National Registration card and Canadian and US currency secreted inside the book’s cover. A 300-foot tunnel — ‘a masterpiece of engineering’ — had already been discovered at the camp after an RCMP team had probed the Bowmanville compound at night after hearing digging sounds. Lett’s chance discovery spurred Admiral Leonard W. Murray, Commander-in-Chief Canadian Northwest Atlantic, to form a party comprising himself, Lieutenant Leslie ‘Rocky’ Hill, Captain William L. Puxley and Lieutenant-Commander Desmond Piers to board and capture the waiting U-Boat. A late inclusion was Lieutenant-Commander Ansten Anstensen, a fluent German speaker who would impersonate a senior army officer, of superior rank to the U-Boat’s captain, and ‘assume some kind of control’. Two mobile radar units would be used to detect the submarine. Once the prisoners had been apprehended as they emerged from a tunnel exit beyond the perimeter fence, a news item would be broadcast to deceive Schauenburg that the escape was successful. Then seven volunteers, impersonating the escapees, would meet the U-Boat at the rendezvous point. Once aboard the submarine, Murray’s men were to capture it by heaving a heavy chain down the conning tower hatch to prevent it closing and attacking the crew with an assortment of weapons comprising smoke grenades, hand-grenades, revolvers and daggers. However, the proposal was cancelled as the British Admiralty asked the Canadian Navy to sink the submarine. Back inside Camp 30, once Kretschmer learned of the rendezvous he requested use of a tunnel already in progress, only to have his appeal vetoed. This led to the digging of a second tunnel, also originating from under Hut IV, with friendly rivalry developing between the two tunnelling gangs with the

sharing of information, tools and manpower. Plans, however, went awry after the discovery of soil in the attic of the hut on August 30, 1943 just as the first tunnel was nearing completion. To keep the project alive, Kretschmer allowed ‘his’ shaft to be discovered on the same morning so that the original one could continue. However, the guards quickly realised that the volume of secreted spoil must indicate that there was a second passage, and this ‘missing’ tunnel was located the next morning during a comprehensive search. HEYDA’S ESCAPE With the tunnelling project effectively terminated, Kapitänleutnant Heyda convinced Kretschmer to allow him to escape via a plan he had developed independently. Donning a badly-fitting Canadian Army sergeant’s uniform, Heyda cleared the perimeter wire by jury-rigging a bosun’s chair to run along the telegraph wires. As Horst Elfe recalled after the war, there was a ‘painful moment’ on the night of September 24/25 when ‘Heyda’s legs were dangling in a searchlight beam’. With a man missing, the prisoners were held on the parade ground until 0500 hours the following morning (September 25), and although an identification parade was held, it proved impossible to tell who the missing prisoner was. The local police were notified but a second identification parade held that afternoon had to be halted after it became apparent that prisoners were switching uniforms. The POWs were duly informed that they would remain on the parade ground until ‘their nonsense’ stopped. Finally, at 1800 hours the prisoners agreed to cooperate and, reassembled at 1930 hours, Heyda’s absence was confirmed and a description passed on to the police. In the intervening period, Heyda had travelled by train to Montreal and then on by foot to Point de Maisonette. It appears that he either carried a forged document authorising him to conduct a geological survey on the Point for the Royal Canadian Navy or papers showing that he had been discharged from the Royal Canadian Engineers in order to join the Northern Electric Company to make anti-submarine equipment.

MAISONETTE POINT

The plan was to rendezvous with a U-Boat on the coast and after the war, Kretschner (who rejoined the German navy in 1955) explained his thinking behind his choice of a rendezvous point: ‘I had an atlas that I got in England; it was a nice school atlas that we could use to study the Canadian Atlantic shoreline. At the point where the St Lawrence empties into the sea, along the shores of its wide mouth, we located a large number of bays. One of them, called Chaleur Bay, attracted our attention because of a cape that protruded into it and which would

23 onward. Oberleutnant Wolfgang von Bartenwerfer and another crewman were to proceed to the rendezvous in a motorboat. Having arrived in Chaleur Bay, from 200 yards off the beach Schauenburg scanned the shoreline through his periscope but he was concerned as his chart showed a solitary building where now there were several. He also had a feeling of being trapped when a signal in German — komm, komm — was flashed from the shore. Convinced that the plan had been compromised, Schauenburg lay submerged on the seabed throughout September 27. As he knew the enemy warships could not use depth-charges in shallow water without risk of damage to themselves, he thought they would try to force him into deeper waters before attacking. Remaining stationary in shallow water until the night of September 27/28, U-536 crept out of Chaleur Bay at a depth of 65 feet. In water just deep

enough to cover the U-Boat’s conning tower and periscope, the submarine became briefly snared in a fishing trawler’s net as it made for open sea. Upon reaching the Cabot Straits, Schauenburg sighted a destroyer and, it is believed, fired three torpedoes at it but all missed their target. Six weeks later, on November 20, U-536 was sunk by the frigate HMS Nene and the Canadian corvettes HMCS Calgary and Snowberry. Schauenburg, together with 16 other survivors from his crew of 55, was captured and, ironically, sent to a POW camp in Canada. Over the next two years there were further smaller-scale escape attempts at Bowmanville before it closed in April 1945. Although the prisoners were repatriated to Britain, and then onwards to Germany, in later years a number chose to return to Canada.

DAVID MITCHELHILL-GREEN

Waiting at the lighthouse, LieutenantCommander Piers and his party, with an anti-submarine task force waiting offshore, were now aware that although the group break-out had failed, a single prisoner had successfully escaped and was most probably making his way to the rendezvous point. Heyda was finally apprehended on the evening of September 28 just half a mile from the coast. According to a later interrogation of the survivors from U-536 after it was sunk on November 20, 1943, Schauenburg had provided only a brief outline of the mission to his crew. Proceeding to Canada, he told them that they were to pick up three escaped U-Boat prisoners, one of whom the crew assumed to be the ace captain Kretschmer. The submarine arrived in the Gulf of St Lawrence around September 16 with orders to be alert for the escapees from September

favour an escape. We could easily reach Pointe Maisonette in three or four days and once there, it would be possible to board a submarine’. In the event, it was Kapitänleutnant Wolfgang Heyda (right) who took the escape forward after the tunnels were discovered. His idea was to swing over the wire using telegraph wires to run a bosun’s chair to freedom. Heyda successfully got to within a few hundred yards of the coast before being captured. Six weeks later the U-Boat sent to pick them up was sent to the bottom.

Jim Thompson, who was serving as a former staff member at the boys’ training school on the outbreak of war, recalled the haste in which the transformation of Bowmanville into a POW camp had to take place. Jim says that ‘we were given exactly 24 hours from the time word came down from Ottawa to the time when we had to have all of the boys out of the place. It was not easy to do. There was one hell of a lot of scrambling.

Then, as soon as possible after the war ended and the POWs were out, our boys were brought back.’ Camp 30 subsequently reverted to provincial government control and operated as an educational centre under various guises until it was closed in 2008. Today the former camp buildings lie abandoned while local activists endeavour to preserve this unique piece of Canadian wartime history. 13

MARY SOAMES

MARY SOAMES

Mary Spencer-Churchill, born in September 1922, was the youngest of Winston and Clementine Churchill’s five children. She married Christopher Soames in 1947, becoming The Hon. Lady Soames on his elevation to the baroncy in 1978. Left: Here, Mary is pictured at the home of her cousin Judy Montagu

in Breccles, Norfolk, in the summer of 1940. Judy was the daughter of Clementine’s cousin Venetia and was Mary’s close friend. Right: The following year they both decided to join the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS), the women’s branch of the British Army.

MARY CHURCHILL’S ANTI-AIRCRAFT BATTERY

14

I arrived at Chequers in time to install myself for my 18th birthday on Sunday, September 15. There were also gripping distractions: during these days air battles of varying intensity were taking place, and on this Sunday my father (who always liked to see things for himself) drove from Chequers with my mother to the headquarters of No. 11 Group at Uxbridge, where over a period of a few hours they witnessed the directing of ‘one of the decisive battles of the war’.

By Lady Mary Soames I started my work with the WVS at once, driving over to Aylesbury every day (my mother having left her car for me, as she now had the use of an official car). People were pouring out of London as a result of the heavy bombing, and Aylesbury was deemed a safe area: during my first weeks, therefore, I was assigned to the team of billeting officers,

MARY SOAMES

On September 1, with war a virtual certainty, Mr Neville Chamberlain had asked my father to join the small War Cabinet he was forming. Two days later, after the Prime Minister’s broadcast, the House of Commons met briefly; afterwards he invited Winston to become First Lord of the Admiralty. It was the appointment he most desired, and he did not delay, reporting to the Admiralty that very evening. During these early days of the war I divided my energies between helping with the major task of sewing black-out curtains and doing four-hour shifts as telephonist at the Ambulance Headquarters at Westerham, to-ing and fro-ing on my bicycle. July 10 was the day the Battle of Britain began when the Germans launched air attacks on our convoys in the Channel and on our airfields. For the rest of that summer the German and British air forces would be joined in daily conflict. My second and last term at Queen’s College had just ended, and inasmuch as it was possible to make plans in such uncertain times, it was decided that when the ‘holiday’ months were over I should do a full-time war job, working from home (which was now No. 10 Downing Street). To this end I was interviewed by the very splendid (and, to me, awe-inspiring) Stella, Lady Reading, head of the WVS (Women’s Voluntary Service), who said she would take me on at their headquarters in Westminster, working at first in the Registry. With this settled, I spent the rest of this most fateful — but also most beautiful, weather-wise — of summers between London, Chartwell, Chequers and Breccles in Norfolk (my cousin Judy Montagu’s home).

Mary with her parents in January 1940. Churchill became Prime Minister that May.

BELL ARCHIVE

BELL ARCHIVE

Left: General Sir Frederick Pile was the commander of AntiAircraft Command and in June 1941 he was invited to Chequers, the Prime Minister’s official country retreat near Ellesborough in Buckinghamshire. Women had only recently been introduced into mixed batteries and Mary and Judy were present when the General discussed the progress of

We subsequently discussed this idea quite seriously between ourselves, and of course with my parents who approved and understood how we felt. But although I was much taken with the idea of joining up, I did have some serious heart-searchings as to where my duty lay. I knew my mother relied a great deal on me, that I was of real help with all the entertaining, and that she also found my presence at home at the weekends as a companion and confidante a real solace: for the demands of security meant she could not talk freely even to old friends. For my own part, I realised of course that I would miss my parents, and the intense interest and excitements that life with them brought me; this consideration weighed far more with me than the thought of any discomforts life in the army

might entail. But I genuinely felt passionately about the war — and recently working in a hospital library had come to seem rather inadequate set alongside the challenges and sacrifices confronting so many people. After many heart-to-heart talks, Judy and I finally made up our minds and acquired the necessary information and application forms — and in the last week of July I resigned from the WVS. Meanwhile, Judy and I reported to the ATS recruiting office in Grosvenor Gardens near Victoria Station to go through the procedures involved in joining up. We had an interview, and a medical examination — which both of us passed, as I noted proudly in my diary: ‘Grade 1! “Fit for anything”’ — and after which we were told to go home and await further instructions.

MARY SOAMES

whose job it was to accommodate the refugees locally. It was a difficult and ungrateful task, especially trying to keep families together, and relying on persuasion rather than invoking the powers that existed to compel people to take in these unfortunate folk, all of whom had terrible tales to tell of the bombing of their neighbourhoods. At night, even from 40 miles away, we could see the flashing from the anti-aircraft guns and hear the distant rumble. At the end of September I was transferred by the WVS from the dramas of billeting to work in the library organised by the Red Cross for patients in the very large hospital at Stoke Mandeville on the outskirts of Aylesbury. The library team was made up of mainly married women with families, working part-time. In the middle of June 1941, I went to Norfolk for a weekend with Judy. She was a few months younger than me and had stayed on at Queen’s College, and was now in her last term there, trying to decide — as was I — what to do next. After my visit to Breccles she came to stay at Chequers, and it was there that one day we listened to a conversation between my father and General Sir Frederick Pile, the Commander-in-Chief of Anti-Aircraft Command. The talk concerned the formidable manpower requirements of the heavy anti-aircraft batteries which were the principal defence of our cities and ports — a matter which was of great concern to my father. General Pile, who had long been fully aware of this problem, was able to tell him that a project in which he had taken a close personal involvement had just recently, in May, come into operation. This was the forming of the first heavy mixed (that is, employing both men and women) anti-aircraft batteries, where members of the ATS (Auxiliary Territorial Service) were integrated with Royal Artillery personnel on gun sites, under the command of male officers, to perform all duties and technical operations (including radar) other than actually forming the gun teams, where the physical strength required to operate the 3.7-inch guns and to handle and load the shells was quite beyond the capacity of women. Judy and I were much excited by all this, and intervened to say that we would both like to become ‘gunner girls’!

the arrangements with Churchill. Right: An early inspection of a mixed 3.7-inch battery by Churchill in October 1941. Only three gun positions in London had the Mk6 model — this is S12 which was situated on Elgood Playing Fields at Beckenham. All has since been demolished for the construction of Kelsey Park School (since re-named Harris Academy).

Mary and Judy joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service in September 1941. 15

ALDERMASTON PARISH COUNCIL

After the war the Grade II* manor house and immediate grounds were returned to Associated Electrical Industries who used it as a research laboratory, opening Britain’s first commercial scientific reactor in 1959. After a period as a school, the house was restored and opened as the Aldermaston Manor Hotel but this went into administration in 2012. The estate faced an uncertain future when we visited it in 2014.

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ALDERMASTON PARISH COUNCIL

By that time Judy and I had received our instructions to report to No. 15 ATS Training Centre at Aldermaston in Berkshire on Friday, September 5, and set about enjoying our last few weeks of civilian life, doing the rounds of our friends and going to many ‘farewell’ parties. I see from my diary that during this time I had considerable misgivings, and that I was full of trepidation at the step I was about to take. I had never even been to boarding school, and the imminent prospect of leaving home for such a totally unknown new world was suddenly very alarming: I wondered how I would cope with its challenges. But I don’t remember telling anyone about these ignoble qualms. In any event, both Judy and I were genuinely excited, and buoyed up by our friends’ enthusiasm — even admiration — for the decision we had made. Almost without exception our girlfriends were doing war work — nursing, as air-raid wardens, or driving with the Motor Transport Corps. Relatively few, however, at this stage of the war were in the women’s services, and of these the ATS was the Cinderella, largely on account of the truly unattractive khaki uniform. However, any doubts or anxieties we may have had disappeared the minute we actually took the plunge — and, looking back, I have always known it was one of the best decisions I ever took in my life.

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Their first posting was No. 15 ATS Training Centre at Aldermaston where the army had requisitoned Aldermaston Court. Later the estate south of the manor house was hived off to build an aerodrome for the RAF which in post-war years became the Atomic Weapons Establishment.

On Friday, September 5, 1941, I wrote in my diary: ‘Caught 11.20 from Paddington. Terrific farewell scene. Rosemary S[cott] E[llis], Fiona [Forbes], Ronnie [Buckland, a Coldstreamer friend], Nana, Mummie, Cousin Venetia & Cousin Sylvia to see us off. Judy & I bore up — & went away saying firmly “No regrets” . . . Army vans to meet us at Aldermaston.’ So started our great adventure. That night about 20 of us girls — mostly between 18 and 25 and from every walk of life — found ourselves in our wooden barrack room. My first letter home, written that first evening just before ‘lights out’ at 10 p.m., was laboriously headed: Private M. Churchill, A Company, 3 Platoon, Clive Hut, 15 ATS Training Centre & Reception Depot. There were about 500 of us in the camp, in two successive intakes, and we would be there for nearly a month, being transformed from mere civilians into something like soldiers in both appearance and mindset, the latter being more difficult than the first. I wrote nearly every day to my mother, recounting our daily programme of drills and lectures, the acquiring of our uniform, the endless cleaning and scrubbing. The same day I arrived, I was sent for by the Camp Commandant, whom I described in a letter home as ‘very charming middle aged & distinguished looking. She saw me alone & said that if I agreed she thought I

Left: ‘Right Dress!’ Mary wrote that their pay was 1s 8d per day — a little over 5p today — although its purchasing power was 16

then much more when an average weekly wage was around £3 per week. Right: ‘Sit and Stay!’ Oliver awaits his reward.

Mary was hoping to remain incognito but on September 29 the press descended on the training centre at Aldermaston, much to Mary’s embarrassment.

The next day I did not enjoy at all: ‘Sat. 27th September. This was quite one of the BLOODIEST days of my life. From dawn till dusk I was pounced at by photographers. Pte. Churchill — Parading [with my platoon],

I couldn’t have felt more mortified, embarrassed or miserable, the other girls were absolutely charming & understanding about it.’ Two days later our course ended; and on Wednesday, October 1, we marched to the station bound for anti-aircraft training at Park Hall Camp in Shropshire. It was a very large army establishment about 2½ miles out of Oswestry. Several heavy anti-aircraft regiments and ATS ‘specialist’ personnel (which included us) underwent training courses there. We were to be at Park Hall Camp for over two months — and long, physically hard and action-packed they would prove to be. We all lived in ‘spiders’ — complexes of barrack rooms (mostly double-bunked, sleeping from 20 to over 30 girls) which gave off the central ablutions block. The ATS had their own rest rooms and dining halls, but shared with the men the huge Naafi and the other amenities of this bewildering hutted garrison township, with its church hut, cinema, theatre and hospital. All our operational AA training was conducted by male instructors, and apart from lectures many cold hours would be spent by us novice ‘gunners’ on the vast windswept barrack square either drilling or learning our roles on the various instruments: Judy and I were predictor operators. In view of the wintry cold, the issuing to us of battledress (like the men’s) was most opportune, as very necessary layers of warmth could be put on under our ‘battle blouses’.

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should remain entirely incognito. I am pleased about this — & would you please if you do write me send plain envelopes without the Downing Street address? And would you please address me Private M. Churchill!!’ Despite this intention and precautions, my identity became known within just a few days, and in my diary for September 9 I wrote: ‘I’m afraid the cat’s out of the bag’. Luckily for both Judy and me, in those first days we had established our credentials as genuine ‘floor scrubbers’ and non-shirkers. The girls were all very jolly and friendly and this new life, after all, was equally strange to all of us. Later, while we were mulling over the day’s events, I was sent for to be told that the War Office had announced that I had joined the ATS, and that the press were coming down the next day to interview me. I was genuinely upset, as I confided to my diary: ‘Oh how I had hoped it might not happen. That I really could be a person & not a name — that I might be a perfectly ordinary Private. I just said “Very well Ma’am” and went miserably to my hut where I shed some bitter tears.’

Drinking Tea, Eating Bread, Sitting on bed, Making bed, Writing letters, Polishing boots & buttons, Scrubbing floors & doorsteps, Emptying dustbins, Saluting. Oh God, taking a bath was about the only portion of my day omitted.

After the first photo call, Mary explained that ‘two days later I was set upon once again by the press — this time it was the newsreel companies: Drill competition made doubly hysterical by the presence of cameramen shooting from all angles. It was impressed on me by various officers who tried to reconcile me to what I regarded

as persecution that the resulting publicity, which was considerable, would be good for recruiting and many years later I was really gratified to see in a magazine article about the women’s services that a distinct little upward “blip” on a table showing recruitment figures was labelled “Mary Churchill joins the ATS”!’ 17

W5 BURNT FARM

ORDNANCE SURVEY, 1945

In the middle of October Judy and I, with others deemed suitable, were elevated to the inspiring rank of local, unpaid, lance bombardier; we proudly sewed one stripe on our uniforms and started on an NCOs (NonCommissioned Officers) course. This was a step up, making life more interesting — and even harder work. Finally our incarceration, and our time at Park Hall Camp, came to an end. We all received news of our postings: Judy and I were to join 469 Heavy (Mixed) Anti-Aircraft Battery at Enfield, on the northern outskirts of London. Before reporting to our units, we were granted a spell of leave; but when I arrived home at the Annexe it was to find luggage stacked in the corridor and much to-ing and fro-ing. My father was off that very evening, December 12, to the north by train to board the ship that would take him to visit President Roosevelt. I was much cast down to realise I would hardly glimpse him and my disappointment must have shown in my face, for he said: ‘Come with me on the train — at least we can dine together!’ So I did just that. At the end of our leave Judy and I, excited and distinctly nervous, reported for duty to 469 H(M)AA Battery at Chaseside, Enfield. Before I left home I wrote to my father, who was still on the high seas: ‘My own darling Papa, ‘Just a little letter to tell you I love you, and that I hope you are well and have enjoyed the journey. I so much enjoyed my trip with you to Scotland although it made me sad and anxious to leave you. Today Judy and I join our battery, which is situated near Enfield; I am so much thrilled by the thought of being in action. And the fact that I shall be so near home makes me very happy indeed. Please take care of yourself, and come back soon.’

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After training, Mary and Judy were posted to No. 469 Heavy (Mixed) Battery at Enfield in Middlesex which occupied two sites in the same area, each with four guns. A heavy mixed anti-aircraft battery was composed of eight 3.7-inch guns, with about 600 personnel of which about one-third were women, commanded by a Royal Artillery Major and several RA officers. The senior ATS officer was a junior commander (equivalent in rank to a captain), with about six ATS subalterns.

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Battery W4 (above) was located on Hog Hill, just off Slades Hill, Chaseside, with Battery W5 three miles north at Burnt Farm. Right: Unfortunately the majority of the W4 site has been buried under spoil on which brambles have run riot but the long concrete approach road still exists. 18

SLADES HILL

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Mary: ‘This is an artist’s impression of the command post at my battery during an air raid when my father paid us a visit. General Pile is standing behind him. I am the plotting officer marking the position of our target on an illuminated glass table-top.’

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My mother, in a letter to my father the following day, wrote: ‘Yesterday Mary’s leave came to an end; I took her & Judy in your car & deposited them as night was falling at their new camp near Enfield. In the gathering darkness it looked like a German concentration camp. It is a big piece of waste ground surrounded by suburban villas in the distance. It has a high iron fence all round with barbed wire & locked gates.’ Although first appearances were so dismal on a dreary December evening, the gun site was in a pleasant open situation, and the living conditions were a marked improvement on our Park Hall accommodation, as I told my mother, to whom I wrote the day after our arrival: ‘We sleep in single beds & 25 per room. The rooms & passages are much more cheerful being painted white & green. Each AT has a box & shelf & hooks. The floors are ordinary boards which just need sweeping & occasionally scrubbing. Hooray! Attached to the spider is a lovely rest room – with comfy chairs & a stove. Thank God — the curse of NAAFI is not upon us. There is a small — but nice YMCA (delicious cream buns!) We shall only be able to get out twice a week from 4 to 11 & we don’t know which days. The girls here seem very charming & I really think it will be thrilling, interesting & fun here.’

The base of the guard post still exists alongside the approach road to the battery site.

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One of the wartime buildings survives as a scout hut although it has been moved from its original location.

We visited the site before the brambles had reclaimed it! This is the only building remaining. 19

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On the other hand, W5 at Burnt Farm remained largely intact and was described as one of the most complete AA gun sites left in

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the UK but unfortunately the hutments (below) were swept away to build a residential complex on the south side of Silver Street.

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Many of the additional buildings which appear on the post-war plan (below) were added as a result of the Burnt Mill battery

being retained and expanded for the perceived nuclear threat in the 1950s.

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When the new estate was built on the camp site, the entrance was moved eastwards to cater for the newly built gated complex . . .

ourselves and the camp. All this caused a bit of grumbling, but these visitations kept us on our toes, as we always gave our guests a demonstration ‘Stand to’ and ‘Action stations’, and a dummy run on an imaginary target. The first of our VIPs were my parents, who came in early April. I, of course, was beset by anxiety — but in fact my comrades really seemed quite pleased to show off our skills. In the event it wasn’t only our skills that were shown off: there were some build-

ing works in progress on the site, and — to my embarrassment but everyone else’s delight — my father stopped, seized a trowel, and laid a line of bricks! Some time later he made a return visit, bringing with him my ‘favourite American’, Harry Hopkins. I think the officers and senior NCOs quite enjoyed these visits, and they certainly caused less general anxiety than descents upon us by ‘top brass’ such as when General Pile inspected us, accompanied by sharp-eyed colleagues.

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The next day I managed to get home briefly, and wrote to my father about battery life: ‘10 Downing Street, Whitehall. ‘My darling Papa, I am at the Annexe for a few hours “off duty” and I find there is an opportunity of writing to you. I was on duty at the gun site from 1 o’clock today. The “manning team” sleep in a little concrete warren — ready (fully dressed in battle regalia!) to rush to the instruments. Twice during the night Judy and I took our turn to do an hour’s stretch at “spotting” — and watching for anyone suspicious on the gun site.’ Meanwhile, across the world, my father had Christmassed at the White House, and on December 26 he had addressed both Houses of Congress. When he returned home on January 17 we were all so much relieved — it had been a long absence. Judy and I would be with 469 Battery at Chaseside for nearly ten months. It was, on the whole, a happy time and certainly a busy one. From the local underground station (about a quarter of an hour’s walk away) we could be in central London in just over an hour, and usually had evening leave two or three times a week. Unless we had a special late pass, however, we had to be back in camp at 11 o’clock, which somewhat restricted our nightlife, entailing much anxious checking of the time and frantic rushing for the station. In fact one’s spirits revived quickly after a spell of leave, once one was back in the hustle and bustle of camp life. During the spring and early summer the battery received several visits from VIPs which always involved a great deal of dashing around smartening up

. . . but the battery site itself in the field beyond remains virtually intact . . . minus of course the guns! 22

The heavy anti-aircraft gun site at Burnt Farm Camp is an exceptional survival of its type and provides a significant, visible reminder of the nature of home defence during the war. It is one of only ten HAA gun sites to have survived in good condition. The importance of the site lies in the complexity and range of surviving gun emplacements and ancillary buildings: octagonal and square gun emplacements; a well preserved command post; generator block; radar vehicle and equipment enclosures and on-site magazine, all linked by contemporary trackways. As such it provides an exceptional insight into the development of anti-aircraft measures in the region. During the period of use Burnt Farm Camp was divided into two parts. The domestic area to the north (alongsided Silver Street) contained the accommodation and general administration buildings [since demolished — Ed]. The operational site is approached along a short concrete access road leading from the accommodation site. In 1940 the emplacements were armed with 3-inch mobile guns; these were replaced during the latter part of the war with a mixture of 3.7-inch and 4.5-inch guns. The gun site is dominated by an array of six gun emplacements arranged around a loop at the end of the access track, which also encircles the central command post. The gun emplacements are of two types: four octagonal emplacements of the ‘March 1938 pattern’ form an arc to the north of the command post, whilst two later square-plan additions sit at either end of the array. The octagonal emplacements each have six internal rendered brick ammunition lockers (some retaining original wooden racking) built against the 1.5-metre-high concrete walls which surrounded the guns. Concrete ‘holdfasts’ retaining patterns of metal fixtures mark the positions of the guns, which were manoeuvred into place via a single access gateway in each emplacement linked to the inner access road by a short area of hardstanding. Some of these gateways retain their original steel-clad gates. The octagonal emplacements are also equipped with six external ammunition/equipment stores, as well as a larger external crew shelter positioned on the opposite side to the gateway. Many of these lockers and shelters retain original wooden racking and steel doors.

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During the war, the number of people serving in Anti-Aircraft Command reached a peak of 274,900 men, additional to the women soldiers of the ATS who served on gun sites from summer 1941, and the Home Guard who manned many sites later in the war. Gun sites were of three main types: those for heavy guns (HAA), light guns (LAA) and batteries for firing primitive unguided rockets (socalled ZAA sites). Following the end of the Second World War, 192 HAA sites were selected for post-war use until closed down in 1955. These sites contained big guns with the function of engaging high-flying strategic bombers, hence their location around the south and east coasts, and close to large cities and industrial and military targets. Of all the gun sites, these were the most substantially built. There were three main types: those for static guns (mostly 4.5 and 3.7-inch); those for 3.7-inch mobile guns; and sites accommodating 5.25inch weapons. Nearly 1,000 gun sites were built during the war but English Heritage reported in 2003 that ‘less than 200 of these have some remains surviving, and that at only around 60 sites are the remains thought sufficient to provide an understanding of their original form and function. This includes 30 of the 192 sites that continued in use until 1955. Surviving examples are therefore sufficiently rare to suggest that all 60 wellpreserved examples are of national importance.’

The square emplacements for the 4.5-inch guns are similarly enclosed by concrete block walls with a single gateway at the corner linked to the inner access road. External crew shelters are attached to the outside of both emplacements, positioned to the right of the gateways. Internal ammunition lockers are built against the centre of each wall, except along the southern wall of the western emplacement which is fitted with an unusual feature — a full-length magazine with concrete shelves and dividing walls providing 20 alcoves for shells. The command post, situated in the centre of the semicircle of gun emplacements, is unusually large and contains a number of rooms including the Plotting Room, telephonists’ quarters, offices, rest rooms and stores. Built into the top are three protected positions where the Predictor, Heightfinder and Spotting equipment would have been located. To the south of the emplacements and command post are a number of associated structures. The Generator Block or Engine Room, located some 50m south of the gun array and connected by a concrete track, is of a standard design and would have held the diesel engines for powering the site. Standing in two similar pairs west and east of the Generator Block are four structures. The larger structure (14m by 9m) in each pair is a concrete blast shelter, open at each end. The smaller of each pair is a roofed concrete shelter, open at the front and flanked by blast walls. These buildings would have housed vehicles and equipment serving the emplacements, including the mobile radar systems. A further small concrete shelter some 15m to the east of the Generator Block would also have been for storage. The final associated structure stands alone, a further 35m east, and is connected to the accommodation site by a separate concrete track. This is a large ‘Nissen’-type hut, built of double-skinned corrugated iron sheeting with brick-built end walls, which most probably functioned as the on-site magazine. Only a small section of concrete roadway connecting this building to the acccommodation huts to the north survives above ground, although the course of this trackway can be traced as a slight depression and is included in the scheduling. Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979 English Heritage Listing, July 2003

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CWGC

It was while Mary was stationed at Enfield that her mother wrote to her to tell her about the death of Private Nora Caveney, the first member of the ATS killed in action during a German attack in April 1942. ‘My first agonising thought’, wrote Clementine, ‘was that it might have been Mary. My second thought was satisfaction and pride that the other girls on duty continued their work smoothly without a hitch like seasoned soldiers. And then private pride that you, my beloved one, have chosen this difficult, monotonous, dangerous and most necessary work. I think of you so much my darling. I know you never regret your choice. Give Judy my love.’

Nora, 18 (left), was working the Predictor at 505 Battery of No. 148 (M)HAA Regiment at Southampton on the night of Friday April 17/18 when the area suffered a major attack. She was struck by a splinter from a bomb that landed close by, blasting the sandbags surrounding the Predictors. The commanding officer of the battery carried her to a shelter while Private Gladys Keel stepped forward to take her place. It was reported that ‘the other girls coolly carried on — there was not a moment’s delay in passing directions for the guns’. Right: Nora’s grave (No. 2210) lies in Netley Military Cemetery in Southampton.

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In July 1942, Mary and Judy were interviewed as potential candidates for an Officer Cadet Training Unit, later attending No. 2 ATS OCTU at the Imperial Service College at Windsor followed by a ten-week course with No. 205 H(M)AA Battery at Arborfield near Reading. This was at the time when there were serious concerns about the health of Mary’s father. ‘It appears that he might get a coronary thrombosis. This knowledge of course, made the few of us “in the know” even more anxious whenever my father had to fly. From this time on, he travelled as much as possible by sea but it was by air that he went on January 12 to North Africa to meet President Roosevelt for the Casablanca Conference. Ten days later he went on to Turkey to meet President Inönü, and from there he went on to visit the Eighth Army in Tripoli before flying home. The news of his journeyings was not made public until January 27. The strain and fatigue of his travels contributed to my father becoming ill. 24

On February 18, my mother told me he had a feverish cold; this developed into pneumonia, and the next day saw the first of a series of doctors’ bulletins. I went home two days later, a Sunday, and on the way up, in the train reading the official bulletin about Papa I got into a sudden panic. Might this be the beginning of the end?’ The two girls now parted to join separate units. Initially Mary went to No. 643 H(M)AA Battery at Whitby, Yorkshire, before the battery moved to South Wales to defend Cardiff, although she had already been advised that because of her father’s health, she would be transferred to a London battery — No. 481 in Hyde Park. Her posting came through on April 10, 1943. Left: Four of the guns were positioned opposite the Dorchester Hotel in Park Lane, the other half of the battery being located at Burnt Oak in north-west London. Right: Preparations for an outdoor concert in June 2010.

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‘Tim’ Pile, although diminutive in stature, was a great character; on this occasion he called Judy and myself forward and asked us how we were getting on, remembering that it was his visit to Chequers which had inspired us to volunteer as AA gunners. When we arrived at 469 Battery, Judy and I both kept the rank of lance corporal we had acquired at Oswestry. However, quite soon I was made up to a corporal: this caused me embarrassment vis-a-vis Judy, for up to now we had kept pace with each other. In this smaller unit, however, promotion was governed not only by merit, but by the appearance of vacancies (each unit having its set ‘establishment’ of NCOs). Judy did mind my being promoted ahead of her — as did I — but she accepted it with generosity; it did not ruffle our friendship, and quite soon she too put up her second stripe. Then, two months later, to my great astonishment, I was promoted to sergeant — which meant not only a third stripe, but my having to live in the sergeants’ separate quarters and mess, and taking on a quite distinct role with different responsibilities. However, by and large these months at Enfield were happy — certainly busy. It would indeed have intrigued me and been the cause of much merriment among my family and friends if I had known that about this time I had been momentarily part of Adolf Hitler’s thinking. Over 60 years later I would learn this from an extract from Hitler’s Secret Conversations: ‘By far the most interesting problem of the moment is, what is Britain going to do now? At the moment, the British are trying to wriggle out of their difficulties by spreading the most varied and contradictory of rumours. To find out what she really intends to do is the task of the Wilhelmstrasse [foreign ministry]. The best way of accomplishing it would be by means of a little flirtation with Churchill’s daughter. But our Foreign Office, and particularly its gentlemanly diplomats, consider such methods beneath their dignity, and they are not prepared to make this agreeable sacrifice, even though success might well save the lives of numberless German officers and men.’

smartness and deportment at all times, but also for the general appearance of the gun site. Stones forming the edging to flower beds at the camp entrance had to be whitewashed, and roads and pathways kept swept. On the eve of any special visitation potted plants (according to season) were hastily planted in among the regular shrubs and plants by “volunteers”, and there was a good deal of grumbling about eyewash. Our most important (and most popular) visitor that summer was Queen Elizabeth.’

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Mary: ‘While life for all ranks in the Hyde Park battery had great advantages from the point of view of access in off-duty hours to entertainment, shops and general contact with civilian life, our location also placed particular pressures on us: we really had to be on our toes as a “showpiece” for the relatively new phenomenon of mixed anti-aircraft batteries, which were of interest both to our own military pundits and to overseas official visitors. This made site life quite demanding: Major Stan King was a great stickler, not only for our personal

‘Among daytime visitors there were marked contrasts. Visiting military groups were sent by the War Office, as were a few gaggles of women officers. The latter were quite often a little “prickly”, as some thought mixed batteries got too much attention — a view well illustrated by the fictionalised account of an officer from an anti-aircraft battery at Dover telling an American what he thought of London’s defences. “They’re so busy planting rhododendrons around the emplacements and shining the barrels so they’ll look pretty when Miss Churchill happens to pass by that there’s b— all gunnery.” I see from my military record that from 29 July to 20 September 1943 I was officially “Attached to the Personal Staff of the Minister of Defence”. This meant that on July 29 I left my battery without explanation: in fact I knew that I was to go with my parents on a voyage to North America, and that I would act officially as an ADC to my father. Although I was of course much excited by the prospect of this journey, I was genuinely concerned about the “rightness” of this arrangement; however, over the next weeks I would feel that I was able to make myself useful, as well as having a most thrilling and interesting time. The variety of VIPs was striking, from Field Marshal Smuts to Mr Irving Berlin (above in raincoat) of Alexander’s Ragtime Band and I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas fame, who brought a group and performed extracts for the whole battery from his latest show, This is the Army, Mr Jones, in December 1943.’ (Lady Mary Soames died on May 31, 2014.) 25

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RETURN TO THE BATTLE OF THE BULGE Jean Paul Pallud In 1974 Winston Ramsey visited the Ardennes for a feature on the Battle of the Bulge published in After the Battle No. 4. Ten years later ATB published my ground-breaking Battle of the Bulge Then and Now in which I sought out many of the classic locations depicted in the photographs taken during the fighting. Now, to mark the 70th anniversary in 2014, Winston asked me to go back and illustrate some of the many changes that have taken place since then.

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The Battle of the Bulge . . . 70 years on! In December 1944 the objective of Operation ‘Wacht am Rhein’, the major counter-offensive in the West conceived by Hitler, was to split the Allied armies with a thrust through the Ardennes to reach the port of Antwerp. Four armies were tasked for the operation. On the right, the 6. Panzerarmee was entrusted with taking the city; in the centre, the 5. Panzerarmee was to push through the Brussels area and reach the coast west of Antwerp, while the 7. Armee was to protect the south and south-western flank. Just to the north, on the right flank of the attack, the 15. Armee was initially to hold American forces in place and then was to launch attacks ‘as soon as the least opportunity arises’. Top: The attack began in the early hours of December 16. As this cine still illustrates, German newsreels featured the powerful Tiger IIs belonging to schwere SS-PanzerAbteilung 501. This particular tank was on its way to join Kampfgruppe Peiper, the spearhead battle group of the 6. Panzerarmee (see Battle of the Bulge Then and Now, pages 74-76).

Left: Jean Paul was the first historian to track down where this film sequence had been shot. It turned out to be at Tondorf, ten kilometres east of Blankenheim. Right: Hubert Stembert was on 26

hand to take the comparison when Jean Paul returned for this feature in 2014. Remarkably, the ‘Gasthaus zum Weissen Ross’ is still in business after all these years.

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Time marches on in Honsfeld. When Winston took this comparison in 1974, the drinking trough of 1944 was still there (see After the Battle No. 4, page 13).

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Pushing on ruthlessly to extricate themselves from a massive log-jam of traffic east of Losheim, the leaders of Kampfgruppe Peiper advanced to Lanzerath in the early hours of the 17th. To avoid giving the game away the battle group proceeded under black-out conditions with men holding white handkerchiefs walking beside each vehicle to guide the drivers. The leaders reached Honsfeld just before daybreak, quietly driving into the village and even joining the stream of American traffic passing through it. The units concerned — elements of the 99th Infantry Division and men of the 14th Cavalry Group — were taken by surprise and most were captured in their attempt to escape from the trap. Above: In Honsfeld, a German war photographer took this iconic shot of men from the 3. Fallschirmjäger-Division removing the boots from American dead to replace their own footwear. Right: On the other side of the road junction, the PK cameraman then pictured men rummaging through abandoned American vehicles for war booty. Winston visited Honsfeld in 1974 when touring the Ardennes for the feature in After the Battle and Jean Paul Pallud returned in 1980 (see Battle of the Bulge Then and Now, pages 138 and 139).

Left: Since then a memorial has been erected just alongside the restored drinking trough ‘in honour and memory of all soldiers who fought here, December 17, 1944’. Dedicated to ‘the 612th and 801st Tank Destroyer Battalions and attached units of the

99th Division’, it is adorned with the checkerboard emblem of the latter. Right: On the far side of the junction, the house remains remarkably unchanged, even after seven decades, and provides a marvellous comparison. 27

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Signal Corps detachment attached to Colonel Francis Boos’s 38th Regimental Combat Team defending both villages. By the morning of December 17, they were sleeping at Boos’s rear command post in Krinkelt when they heard tank gun-fire just to the south. Rushing forward with their cameras, hoping to get some good action shots, they came upon a knocked-out Panther still in flames. Cook directed Clancy to get some pictures of the tank and three others in the destroyed column while he walked up the road to look at an unusual stretch of water. Reaching the spot he surprised a German tanker dressed in SS Panzer black and took him prisoner. He marched him up the road where Clancy took this photo of them (also reproduced on page 91 in my book). Bernard Cook explained that their exposed films were carefully labelled and identified as to the US units concerned and immediately sent back for processing. After development, the images were submitted to the censor who either passed them for publication or withheld them for various reasons. In either case, the prints were never returned to the photographers in the field and, as Sergeant Cook regretted, they rarely saw the fruits of their labour.’

The incident took place here, on the road between Krinkelt and Büllingen, about one kilometre west of the village church. Jean Paul was there in 1979 (left) and again in 2014 (right). Trying to document all aspects of Bernard Cook’s story, Jean Paul searched in vain for the pond that was supposed to be in this

area, the one in which Cook had said the German tanker had been trying to hide. A pond does exist today a small distance to the south but local villagers say that it was only created in the 1970s. They went on to say that they knew of no pool of water at or near this location in December 1944.

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On the right wing of the 6. Panzerarmee, two infantry divisions first tried to breach the American lines so that the panzer divisions could push through westwards. However, this proved not that easy as elements of the 2nd and 99th Infantry Divisions held on to their positions on the Elsenborn ridge. By nightfall on December 16, the breakthrough had still not been achieved causing the I. SS-Panzerkorps to commit more forces from the panzer divisions. The leaders of Kampfgruppe Müller (12. SS-Panzer-Division) fought hard to smash through the Americans in Rocherath and Krinkelt, suffering painful losses in the twin villages. Above: Finally, Panther ‘126’ broke through and advanced westwards until it was finally knocked out by three rounds into its thinner rear armour from an M10 of the 644th Tank Destroyer Battalion. Jean Paul: ‘The story behind this particular photo was related to my friend Paul R. Stevenson, himself a former lieutenant and platoon leader in the 644th TD Battalion, by former Sergeant Bernard Cook who was a photographer with the 165th Signal Corps Company. Paul went to interview him at his home in La Canada, California. With his assistant, Pfc James F. Clancy, Cook formed the

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During his research back in the 1970s, Jean Paul discovered that Tiger ‘222’ — the mount of SS-Oberscharführer Kurt Sowa and his crew — had been pictured at four different locations by the German war reporters in the early days of the offensive, almost as if they were following the progress of this one tank . . . which they probably were! Tondorf was the first place (see page 26), the Tiger later being photographed with the party of Fallschirmjägers still riding on board at Deidenberg (above), Kaiserbaracke and Ligneuville. Because of this photo coverage, Tiger ‘222’ is probably the best known of the Tiger IIs taking part in the attack. It finally met its end on December 19 at the southern end of the bridge over the Amblève river at Stavelot.

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When I first visited the Ardennes battlefields in 1979 it was 35 years after the battle. Then, many places appeared almost exactly the same as in 1944 and taking comparisons of American photos using the original wartime captions was generally not a problem. However it was a different story with the German photographs as none of their captions survived the war yet I still managed to track down many locations depicted in both still and cine film. So I was looking forward to returning in 2014 to tour the Bulge salient, retracing my own footsteps. I suppose in hindsight I should not have been surprised that the last 35 years have brought huge changes in this rural sector of Belgium, so much so that in some cases, without the old comparison to hand, I would never have been able to find the same spot today. Many of the farms of 1944 were still farming in 1980s but agriculture has changed greatly since then and I found that most of the old farms have since been modernised, some even rebuilt as second residences for people from cities in Belgium, the Netherlands or Germany. In several cases, my comparison of the early 1980s is the only link between what was there in 1944 and what can be seen today. A good example is at Deidenberg. My original shot shows that the house passed by a Tiger II still looked the same as it did in 1944 with the same large farm building in background, but today the farm is no more and the house completely rebuilt. Only the church, built after the war, in the far left background of my photo of 1981, confirms the location.

Since then it has been completely rebuilt, losing the clear link with the past, and the large farm building seen in the background has disappeared altogether.

Photos taken at Kaiserbaracke appear in every book on the Battle of the Bulge, either the sequence showing ‘222’ and its paratroopers negotiating the road junction, or the shot of the Schwimmwagen parked up for the SS-Unterscharführer to check his map (see Battle of the Bulge Then and Now, pages 157-158).

Left: This SdKfz 251 armoured personnel carrier is turning left towards Recht. Right: Now completely transformed, the historic T-junction has since been bypassed leaving the old road as backwater in a nondescript industrial area while the new road bears off 100 metres or so to the south.

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Back in 1981, this house in the centre of Deidenberg, which lies ten kilometres north of Saint-Vith, was the clue which led Jean Paul to trace the spot.

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divisions and battle groups of the 6. Panzerarmee. When interrogated at the end of the war, Skorzeny said that ‘of the 44 men sent through our lines, all but eight returned’. Left: The eight men captured by the Americans, being dressed in US uniforms, were promptly executed as spies. Here Oberfähnrich Günther Billing, Gefreiter Wilhelm Schmidt and Unteroffizier Manfred Pernass are being marched to the firing-squad at an army barracks on the Chaussée de Liège at Henri-Chapelle in Belgium (see Battle of the Bulge Then and Now, pages 110111). Right: Now the complex is the logistical base of a transport company. Although the wall at the rear of the premises, used as a back-stop, still stands, it is rather difficult to access.

Equipped with tanks and vehicles bearing American markings, one battle group was tasked with capturing the bridges over the Meuse before they could be destroyed. As few American tanks and vehicles could be gathered together in the short time available, five Panthers and five Sturmgeschütze were allocated to this Panzerbrigade 150, as well as six armoured cars and six armoured personnel carriers. All were given American markings and Allied white stars. However the plan had to be aborted as the brigade got caught up in traffic jams so instead it was redirected to take Malmédy (see Battle of the Bulge Then and Now, pages 119-124). Above: That attack launched on December 21 also failed although this Panther/M10 managed to cross the Warche river only to be stopped a few metres from the bridge. Above right: In 1980, Jean Paul found the house already in poor shape although faint traces of the prewar Chevrolet advert could still be seen. Right: Time passes by and this is another corner of the battlefield lost forever. 30

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J. DEBLAU

Special operations were organised to support the advance of the leaders of the 6. Panzerarmee. Operation ‘Stösser’ involved a night-time paratroop drop behind the Allied lines aimed at capturing road junctions in the forested areas on the right wing. Then Operation ‘Greif’ comprised commando units of English-speaking German soldiers dressed in American uniforms. These teams were to infiltrate American lines, changing signposts and misdirecting traffic, while others were to aim for the bridges across the River Meuse and capture them intact. According to SS-Obersturmbannführer Otto Skorzeny who led ‘Greif’, six commando teams were sent into action in the first days of the offensive, plus six ‘lead commandos’ attached to

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By December 22, the Germans had halted their attack on Malmédy and pulled back some distance to the south although it was incorrectly assumed that the town was still in German hands. Consequently, a raid by B-26s of the US Ninth Air Force went in on December 23. This first attack was ‘not very accurate’ according to Sergeant Arthur P. Wiley, 120th Infantry, who witnessed the bombing, but this was not the case with the follow-on raid next day. This time carried out by B-24s from the 458th Bombardment Group, they believed they were dropping their bombs on Schonecken, their target in Germany, some 45 kilometres away. This time the ‘accuracy was deadly’, said Wiley. ‘It was beyond our belief that our own planes could bomb us two days in a row.’ Actually, American aircraft attacked Malmédy yet a third time later that day, though doing little damage, and again on Christmas Day. As a result, the entire centre of Malmédy was wiped out with 37 GIs and over 200 civilians being killed. Above left: Troops of the 30th Division in Malmédy main square, sometime about December 20 or 21, before the first American aerial bombardment hit the town. Above right: Desolation in Malmédy in March 1945.

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R. CROUQUET

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Few American photographers were able to take pictures in the hectic first days of the German offensive but at least one man from the 165th Signal Photo Company was at Malmédy to picture troops of the 30th Division arriving on the 18th. Alerted on the 17th, the first elements were rushed south from the Aachen area to reinforce the sector at Amblève. Left: He photographed men of the 120th Infantry exiting the town to the south-east. Right: Remarkably, the houses lining Avenue Monbijou all survived, enabling this perfect comparison.

The ruined houses lining Place Albert 1er have all been nicely rebuilt in character. Surprisingly, the late 18th-century fountain with its tall obelisk survived the war intact and is still in working order. 31

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On the morning of December 18, the leaders of Kampfgruppe Peiper reached Stavelot, crossed the Amblève river and pressed on towards the west. However, as they did not leave a force behind to hold the town, by evening it was back in American hands. Only German dead remained as evidence of their brief tenure.

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In the past four decades, many new memorials and commemorative plaques have been erected, and there are several new museums. The Baugnez 44 Historical Centre opened at Baugnez, beside the field where troops of Kampfgruppe Peiper shot American prisoners on December 17, 1944, and at La Gleize, the new December 44 Museum, enlarged and modernised, was inaugurated in 2013. We featured the one at Poteau in issue 142 and the La Roche museum takes pride in being the only museum having a sizeable British section. A flurry of new museums have opened in the Bastogne area. The large Bastogne Historical Centre at the Mardasson Memorial closed in 2011 and a new Bastogne War Museum took over from early in 2014. The Bastogne Barracks Museum has now been established in General McAuliffe’s headquarters in the army barracks on the Route de La Roche, and another museum dedicated to the 101st Airborne Museum can be found in the Avenue de la Gare. And there is the Bastogne Ardennes 44 Museum by the side of the N84 at Bras, just before reaching the border with Luxembourg. A memorial plaque at the junction of Rue de la Gare and Rue de Cielle in La Roche en Ardennes to commemorate the meeting of the 51st Highland Division with the US 84th Infantry Division, has been erected at the spot where pictures of the actual meeting were taken on January 11, 1945.

Right: Time marches on and inevitably things change; also a new modern building has since been erected on the opposite corner.

Meanwhile, Kampfgruppe Peiper pushed on west and took Stoumont on December 19. Left: In this photograph, PK photographer SS-Unterscharführer Max Büschel featured SS-Sturmbannführer Josef Diefenthal looking on as men from the 119th Infantry Regiment, 30th Division, were assembled in Stoumont. Remarkably, though the film taken at Kaiserbaracke (see page 29) and Poteau on the 18th was captured by the Americans, that shot by the same team at Stoumont on the 19th successfully made it back to Germany. Right: Stoumont

would be the most westerly point reached by Kampfgruppe Peiper. Lacking fuel and supplies, the battle group entrenched around the town and La Gleize, waiting for follow-up units and supplies to arrive. However no reinforcements reached them so, with their supplies exhausted, on the night of December 24/25 the men were ordered to try to escape through Allied lines on foot. They had to abandon all their vehicles and equipment and release the prisoners they had taken (see Battle of the Bulge Then and Now, pages 164-169).

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Stavelot . . . then and now. Left: In 1979 this corner of Place Saint-Remacle still looked remarkably the same as it did in 1944 with the same curb stones, pavement and gutter drain.

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In the centre of the German attack, the 5. Panzerarmee crossed the Our river and continued westwards across Luxembourg. Striving to organise some defence, the VIII Corps commander, General Troy H. Middleton, directed two armoured combat commands — CCR of the 9th Armored Division from his reserve and CCB of the 10th Armored about to reach him — to set up roadblocks on the roads east of Bastogne. Positioned on the Allerborn—Bastogne road, the forces of CCR were cut to pieces by the Germans during the night of the 18th. Meanwhile, CCB formed three battle groups, Team O’Hara going east to Wardin, Team Desobry going north to Noville and Team Cherry going northeast to Longvilly. On the 19th, elements of Team Cherry were caught up in the fight with leaders of the 2. Panzer-Division east of Mageret, the Germans losing all their vehicles forcing the main body to pull back. Right: Wrecks of Team Cherry’s tanks and vehicles disabled on December 19 were still lying along the road when this photo was taken in January 1945.

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The road between Mageret (to the rear of the photographer) and Longvilly: 1980 (left) and 2014 (right).

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When it received orders to advance to Bastogne with all haste, the 101st Airborne Division was in reserve in the Reims area of France, some 150 kilometres away, but nevertheless its leading vehicles reached the town late on December 18. However, judging that the division ‘had done well but received too much credit’, General George S. Patton, the commander of the US Third Army, later wrote that it was his conviction that the true architect of the Bastogne triumph was General Middleton. In a letter to the corps commander he stated that in his view ‘your decision to hold Bastogne was a stroke of genius’. Right: On December 20, Signal Corps photographer Tech/5 Wesley B. Carolan pictured men of the 1st Battalion of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment moving out of Bastogne to reinforce Team Desobry at Noville. Below: This is the Chaussée de Houffalize at the northern entrance of Bastogne . . . pictured in 1980 (left) and then again in 2014 (right). The signpost on the corner now directs travellers to the German War Cemetery at Recogne, six kilometres to the north which contains 6,800 dead.

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This picture, another still from a German newsreel, was taken in Rochefort on December 24 when the Panzer-Lehr-Division captured the town, sweeping aside a battalion of the 335th Infantry Regiment of the 84th Division. On Christmas Day the division tried, although with no measurable result, to join up with the 2. Panzer-Division that was stranded through lack of fuel near Foy-Notre-Dame, just ten kilometres from the Meuse.

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In travelling the area, I experienced an extraordinary coincidence in La Roche. I was standing in the middle of the bridge, somewhat frustrated to see road works lining the whole of the main street and so ruining my planned comparisons, when I was approached by a chap with a rusted German helmet in hands. He turned out to be Philippe Bouillon from the Battle of the Bulge museum in the town, and the helmet had just been uncovered by one of the workmen! Another memorable spot where elements of the 84th Infantry Division of the US First Army, met with leaders of the 11th Armored Division of the Third Army at 9.45 a.m. on January 16, 1945 is now commemorated by plaques affixed on the rock at the Moulin de Rensiwez, on the bank of the Ourthe river seven kilometres west of Houffalize, At Hasselpath, just north-east of Rocherath, another important memorial to at event in the Battle of the Bulge was dedicated in 2000 in the presence of American and German veterans, as well as officials of the Belgian, American and German governments. Occupied by the ‘battle babies’ of the US 99th Infantry Division, the positions saw fierce combats on December 16 when the Germans tried to break through and reach the roads leading to Elsenborn and Liège. The positions were held until all troops from Hasselpath and Wahlerscheid were withdrawn to the new defensive line along the Elsenborn ridge. The Germans then occupied the Rocherath forest and the

their Panthers. Left: Corporal James R. Gordon and Private L. C. Rainwater posed with one of them lying abandoned in Grandménil. Right: Though it is not the same one seen in 1944, one of the Panthers was preserved and placed at the same junction. Left for decades in a coat of pink anti-corrosion paint, it now appears with a more authentic camouflage scheme and bearing the insignia of the 2. SS-Panzer-Division.

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On the left wing of the 6. Panzerarmee, the 2. SS-Panzer-Division swept through the important crossroads at Manhay on Christmas Day, routing elements of CCA of the 7th Armored Division. They took Grandménil, just to the west, but this turned out to be the furthest point that the grenadiers would reach. Bombed and strafed on the 26th by fighter-bombers, they pulled back during the night, leaving behind a dozen of

The junction of Avenue de Forest and Rue Jacquet in the centre of Rochefort looking north — 1980 and 2014. 34

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By now the German offensive had ground to a halt so the Allied command turned to erase the deep salient which had been driven into its front line. The German ‘bulge’ was soon attacked from three sides: in the north by the US First Army; in the west by the British XXX Corps against the tip in the Marche area, while in the south, the US Third Army struck northwards from the Bastogne sector with three corps. The First Army opened its offensive on January 3 with the VII Corps attacking between the Ourthe river and Marche, supported by the XVIII Airborne Corps on its left and the British XXX Corps on its right. Right: On January 5, Tech/5 William E. Williams of the 167th Signal Photo Company pictured men of Company I, 333rd Infantry Regiment, 84th Division, ‘moving cautiously through the snowy streets of the recently captured town of Forge à l’Aplé’. However, far from a town, Forge à l’Aplé was then — and still is — just a small hamlet at the T-junction formed by the north-south road from Erezée to Dochamps and a smaller road coming from Grandménil.

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A moment of reflection for Jean Paul at Forge à l’Aplé in 2014, recalling the day 40 years earlier when he was there with his sons.

through the shell-torn village of Beffe. Right: This was the comparison that appeared in After the Battle No. 4 in 1974.

Left: Jean Paul updated it in 2014 . . . and proved that the original caption of the photo of 1944 is wrong for the troops are not marching towards La Roche but are leaving the town! Right: The genuine Sherman tank recovered near Beffe (see front

cover of After the Battle No. 4) now stands just to the left of the spot where the photographer was standing in 1944. When Jean Paul took this photo, its plinth was being refurbished for the 70th anniversary commemorations.

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Left: The 75th Division advanced in a southerly direction towards La Roche. These men of the 290th Infantry were pictured moving

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On the left wing of the First Army attack, the 83rd Infantry Division teamed up with the 3rd Armored to continue the advance. On January 11, Signal Corps photographer Loehwing pictured

most western advance of the German attack, but I had to point out that one of the markers had been placed at the wrong spot (see pages 494-495): stone No. 5, which had been erected near Géronstère, just south of Spa, where locals claimed to have seen a German tank. However it was pretty certain that it was a Sherman and undoubtedly an American tank. From that point on, efforts were made by local historians to try to have this marker repositioned at the correct spot but, whatever

the historical reasons, the city of Spa refused to let ‘its’ marker be taken away. In the end an independent decision was taken to erect a new marker where a recce party sent from La Gleize by Kampfgruppe Peiper — ten vehicles — came against an American roadblock on December 19. This was protecting a huge fuel dump – some three million gallons — in jerrycans piled by the side of the road, one pile every 50 yards. On December 18 and 19 a convoy of US trucks hastily removed the whole dump in 48 hours.

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I. Bataillon, Grenadier-Regiment 989, 277. Volksgrenadier-Division, took over the Hasselpath sector. The grenadiers launched repeated assaults towards Elsenborn ridge, all failing. Countless wounded were treated in the field hospital set in the woods, German soldiers and American prisoners as well, before being evacuated, and many died here. In my book published back in 1984 I detailed the ring of commemorative stones erected in the late 1940s to delineate the

their forces in Bihain but the Field Press Censor went as far as erasing the marking on the Sherman while a newspaper editor has cropped the photo.

Left: This comparison with its superb winter setting was taken in December 1974 and included in After the Battle No. 4. Right: Remarkably this corner of Bihain still remains the same after four more decades, but unfortunately Jean Paul’s plan to have a 36

real winter scene for his return to the Bulge turned out a complete failure. There was no trace of snow, and the weather was beautiful day after day, so ‘far from achieving winter photos, those I took all give the feeling of a sunny summer day!’

HUGUES MERTENS

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including the combat jacket of Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Cathcart, commander of the 7th Black Watch, that he wore during the battle. Unfortunately road works completely blocked the street during Jean Paul’s visit so Hugues Mertens took this match for us after the work had been completed.

Left: Some days later, Signal Corps photographer Carmen A. Corrado pictured a patrol from the 507th Parachute Infantry, 17th Airborne Division, Third Army, meeting men of the 24th Cavalry Squadron, VII Corps, First Army. Centre: The Ourthe

river bridge in 2014, with the ruins of the 11th-century castle in the background. Right: By a remarkable twist of fate, Jean Paul was there just as Jean Luc Hardy uncovered a rusted German helmet while digging up the street!

Left: At Moulin de Rensiwez, seven kilometres west of Houffalize, a plaque now commemorates the junction between the 84th Infantry Division, First Army, and the 11th Armored Division, Third Army, at 9.45 a.m. on January 16, 1945 — the official meeting of the First and Third Armies (see The Defeat of

Germany Then and Now, page 320). Right: Having worn several different colour schemes since we first saw it back in 1980 (see Battle of the Bulge Then and Now, pages 489 and 530), the Panther in Houffalize still displays the number ‘401’ and the emblem of the 116. Panzer-Division.

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Left: On January 11, patrols from the 84th Division made their way down to La Roche from the north as the 1st Black Watch of the 51st Highland Division arrived from the other side of the Ourthe river. Right: The Musée de la Bataille des Ardennes opened in the town in 1990 with a sizeable British section

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Left: After photographs had been taken of the three generals together (see Battle of the Bulge Then and Now, page 392), the photographer took one of a pensive Supreme Commander 38

standing alone. Eisenhower was in the Rue du Sablon, the main street in Bastogne, which Jean Paul pictured in 1980 (centre) and 2014 (right), with the Rue de la Halle branching off to the left.

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The Battle of the Bulge is over. On February 5, General Eisenhower summoned Generals Bradley and Patton to Bastogne. On the left is Stars and Stripes reporter Sergeant Jules Grad.

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Studying after action reports and local witnesses, historian Gérard Grégoire was finally able to precisely pinpoint the exact spot where the leading German vehicle was halted, some 200 metres in front of the American road-block. And it was here that a commemorative marker was erected in 2012 saying that “Here on December 19, 1944, the German army was halted by D Battery, 110th AAA Battalion supported by elements of the 639th AAA Battalion. This force was in place some 200 metres upstream”. All those tanks that were on display in the early 1980s at Bastogne, Ettelbruck, Clervaux, Houffalize, Grandménil, Beffe — many of them genuine veterans from the battle — have since been repainted and their plinths restored and often enlarged. Other armour which has appeared since then in the Ardennes area are not genuine relics from the 1944 battles, like the Sherman in La Roche on the Quai de l’Ourthe. Also in the town is a British Achilles tank destroyer opposite the Hôtel du Chalet which recalls the liberation of La Roche by the British on January 11, 1945. The Achilles was inaugurated on the 55th anniversary of the event. At Vielsalm, at the junction of Rue du Général Jacques and Rue Hermanmont, another Sherman shows the markings of the 7th Armored Division that defended the town in the early days of the German offensive in December 1944.

Looking in a southerly direction from the junction of Zum Walkerstal and Zum Grossen Feld in Bütgenbach today.

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Superb winter setting in Bütgenbach for this picture of German prisoners being marched to a prisoner of war compound.

On December 12, six days after the action, Sergeant Harrison visited Singling with a photographer to study the terrain and document the sites of battle. Here he stands in front of the village church. The material thus assembled then became the basis of a detailed account written by Harrison and titled Battalion and Small Unit Study No. 8. This narrative, originally merely available in typescript form for internal Army use only, was subsequently published in book form in Small Unit Actions, a volume published by the War Department Historical Division in April 1946 as part of their ‘American Forces in Action’ series. (Harrison would later join the Office of the Chief of Military History and write Cross-Channel Attack, a volume of the official history of the US Army in World War II, published in 1951.)

THE BATTLE OF SINGLING Sarre, CCA at Domfessel and CCB at Voellerdingen. That afternoon, the 37th Tank Battalion passed through the bridgehead to begin a dash towards the village of Bining under orders from General Gaffey to go as far as possible, but with a limiting objective set at Rimling. Although Bining itself was not important, the village controlled the entrance to Rohrbach-lès-Bitche, an important communications centre and barracks area. Through Rohrbach passed a railway and main highway

By Karel Margry east out of Sarreguemines, the corps’ principal objective. The 4th Armored Division was to seize and block this escape route while the 35th Infantry Division attacked Sarreguemines. Rohrbach was also important for the neighbouring XV Corps of Seventh Army because through it ran the German lines of retreat out of the large Fôret de Montbronn then under attack by the corps units.

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In the first week of December 1944, the US 4th Armored Division was advancing through the Lorraine region in north-eastern France and approaching the German frontier. Operating on the right flank of the XII Corps of Lieutenant General George S. Patton’s US Third Army, the division was also on the eastern boundary of the entire US 12th Army Group, its right-hand neighbour being the 44th Infantry Division of the XV Corps of the Seventh Army of the 6th Army Group. Having started on November 10 from assembly areas just east of Nancy, the division had been engaged in a slow, difficult drive for nearly a month. Casualties in men and materiel had been very heavy, largely because mud and mines had restricted manoeuvrability and confined the tanks to the roads, and because incessant rains had prevented air cover. By early December the division was on its last legs: vehicles were worn out, the men were tired, many units were far below strength, and many key leaders had been lost. On December 3, even the divisional commander, Major General John S. Wood, had been relieved and sent home for rest. Wood, a brave and energetic commander, who had led the 4th Armored in the successful drive across France and during the difficult autumn campaign, had been affected by the strain of battle and General Patton and Major General Manton S. Eddy, the commander of XII Corps, reluctantly concluded that he would have to go back to the US for recuperation. As his replacement, Patton sent his own Chief-of-Staff, Major General Hugh J. Gaffey, an armoured expert who had earlier commanded the 2nd Armored Division. When Gaffey took over, the 4th Armored had just completed an eastern envelopment of the city of Sarre-Union, a move that enabled the 26th Infantry Division to penetrate and begin clearing the city. The 4th Armored was earmarked for rest and rehabilitation but, before that happened, it was to partake in one last corps drive, the objective of which was the city of Sarreguemines on the German border. On December 4 the division jumped off, attacking with Combat Command A (Brigadier General Herbert L. Earnest) on the right and Combat Command B (Brigadier General Holmes E. Dager) on the left. By the morning of the 5th, both combat commands had established bridgeheads across the Eichel river, a tributary of the

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On December 6, 1944, a small tank/ infantry force of the US 4th Armored Division attacked the tiny village of Singling in north-western France. They found themselves confronted by an unexpectedly strong German presence and after a sharp engagement lasting a few hours the Americans had to withdraw from the village, having suffered five tanks knocked out, six men killed and 16 wounded. The battle of Singling was nothing exceptional and would never have gained any fame if it had not been for the fact that two US Army combat historians, Captain Dello G. Dayton and Master Sergeant Gordon A. Harrison of the 3rd Information and Historical Service attached to the US Third Army, decided to make it the subject of a special study. The 4th Armored was pulled out of the line for rest and rehabilitation one day after the battle and this enabled Dayton and Harrison to conduct group interviews with the men while their memory of the action was still fresh. The interviews with the members of the 37th Tank Battalion were held in their rest area at Mittersheim on December 10-12 and those with members of the 51st Armored Infantry Battalion at Gelucourt on December 16.

Time has virtually stood still in Singling and the village church remains exactly as in 1944. 39

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The original plan for December 6 was for Task Force Abrams of Combat Command A to advance past Singling and attack and occupy the village of Bining, while taking Singling was assigned to Combat Command B. However, CCB was slow in moving up from Voellerdingen and, finding his left flank exposed to heavy fire coming from Singling, Colonel Creighton Abrams made an impromptu decision to send part of his force into the hamlet. The 37th Tank Battalion, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Creighton W. Abrams, was relatively fresh, having been in reserve since November 19. Because the ground was too soft to allow movement across country, and because the main road to Bining and Rohrbach proved covered by massed German artillery, Colonel Abrams turned to a secondary road, two miles further west, with the intention of wheeling near the little hamlet of Singling and outflanking Bining from the west. Although this alternative route seemed to offer a safer approach, actually the Singling area was as dangerous to tanks as the main road. Singling itself is just a small agricultural village of some 50 squat stone houses, strung out along half a mile of a main road leading east to Rohrbach. However, it lay right in the Maginot Line, the belt of defensive fortifications built by France in the 1930s (see After the Battle No. 60). Concrete bunkers and pillboxes — part of the line’s secondary system of forts — dotted the hills and slopes to the north and south and guarded both entrances to the village. Singling’s position along a low ridge gave it good observation to the south. The hamlet also lay right under the guns of 40

German batteries emplaced on the higher hills to the north. All this made it ideal for the Germans as a fortified outpost of their main defensive line. The German force defending the Singling sector was the I. Bataillon of Panzergrenadier-Regiment 111 (Oberst Johann Adolf Graf Kielmannsegg), a unit of the 11. Panzer-Division (Generalleutnant Wend von Wietersheim). Depleted by earlier battles, the battalion only mustered 150-200 men but they were relatively well armed, having one towed 7.5cm anti-tank gun, at least five 8cm mortars, eight to ten light machine guns, one heavy machine gun, three 2cm Flak guns, and a schwere Wurfgerät 40, a rocket launcher of steel-supported wooden frames capable of firing two 28cm high-explosive projectiles at a time. The battalion was supported by several tanks and self-propelled guns (probably remnants from Oberst Meinrad von Lauchert’s Panzer-Regiment 15 and Major Arnold Kessler’s PanzerjägerAbteilung 61 respectively); by a 10.5cm howitzer battery of Panzer-Artillerie-Abteilung 119 (Oberstleutnant Erich Hammon) — all units organic to the 11. Panzer-Division — and by elements of Volks-Artillerie-Korps

208 with guns of miscellaneous calibre from 7.5cm to 21cm. Unaware of what it was up against, the 37th Tank Battalion moved out of Schmittviller at noon on the 5th. However, the advance carried less than two miles before it ran into trouble. As they topped a ridge 1,000 yards south of Singling, five tanks of the leading company were hit almost simultaneously by direct fire; nine others bogged in the sticky ground and were destroyed by artillery or temporarily disabled. Having now lost 14 tanks, unable to advance further without infantry, and with dusk approaching, Colonel Abrams broke off the fight and withdrew his battalion out of range of the German guns. That night Division HQ issued new instructions. During the day, CCB had put its armoured infantry on tanks and driven as far north as Schmittviller, about a mile south of where Abrams was laagering. General Gaffey now instructed CCB to take over the task of securing Singling, enabling CCA to concentrate on taking Bining and Rohrbach. For the latter mission, CCA now formed Task Force Abrams, consisting of the 37th Tank Battalion (Abrams’ own unit), the 51st

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51st Armored Infantry Battalion. This map shows the movements and positions of its tanks and infantry platoons, and also the position of the German armour in and around the village.

Singling lay right in the French Maginot Line and the Germans made good use of the many bunkers and pillboxes that dotted the area. Even though the French fortifications had been built to defend against Germany, and their gun casemates were thus facing north-eastward (i.e. the wrong way to defend against an attack from the south), this did not apply to bunker

types designed as personnel shelter, command post, observation post, etc. These could still be used to great effect. Left: An observation copula on the slope to the south of Singling. Right: This large bunker on the crest of the ridge to the north of Singling would serve the Germans well during the action. At least one panzer was lurking in its shadow during the battle.

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Singling consisted of some 50 buildings strung out along a main road. The force detached to assault the village comprised Company B of the 37th Tank Battalion and Company B of the

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PHILLIP BRADLEY

Singling as seen from the south. This is the slope across which Company B of the 37th Tank Battalion charged with 13 tanks in line abreast, firing as they went. The 2nd Platoon moved to the

left, while the 3rd and 1st Platoons, with the 57 riflemen of Company B of the 51st Armoured Infantry dispersed over its tanks, went for the centre and right half of the village. before. At 0830, the M7 Priest 105mm selfpropelled howitzers of the 94th Armored Field Artillery Battalion began firing smoke concentrations north and east of Singling. The smoke drifted perfectly across the village but enemy fire continued heavy nonetheless, and for the next hour the column made no attempt to advance. The Company A tanks fired into the smoke-clad

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Right: Unknown to the Americans, a pocket of German strength — comprising at least one self-propelled gun, three Panther tanks, a 7.5cm anti-tank gun and a machine gun — lay in ambush position at the western end of the village. The panzers benefited from the protection of this Maginot Line pillbox, which gave excellent concealment but still allowed them to command the length of the village street. From here they could also cover the slope on the right. Any enemy armour coming over the crest would find itself exposed to the panzers’ powerful guns.

IMPROMPTU ATTACK ON SINGLING December 6 dawned overcast and grey. At 0700, the 51st Armored Infantry Battalion left bivouac near Schmittviller to meet up with the tanks of the 37th Tank Battalion at the assembly area, two miles from Singling. As was usual practice in task forces, likelettered infantry and tank companies were paired off, forming Teams A, B and C respectively. The original plan had been to advance in column of alternating tanks and infantry half-tracks up to the outskirts of Bining. However, the rain-soaked ground proved too muddy even for the half-tracks so they were left behind while the riflemen rode the rear decks of the tanks. The attack jumped off at 0800, Team A leading. As they got within range of Singling, they were stopped by direct and indirect fire from the village as heavy as that of the day 42

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Armored Infantry Battalion (under Major Dan C. Alanis), the 94th Field Artillery Battalion (Lieutenant Colonel Robert M. Parker, Jr.) and Company B of the 704th Tank Destroyer Battalion (less one platoon). Colonel Abrams had misgivings about the new plan. He feared that CCB would not be able to come up in time to jump off abreast with him. Impressed with the risk of having to make a right turn in front of Singling while it was still enemy-held, he requested permission to himself attack the village before continuing on to Bining. He also asked for the support of at least six battalions of artillery. However, he heard nothing back from CCA, so he and the other unit commanders in his task force spent the night planning for the attack on Bining, as ordered.

This is exactly what happened to the tanks of Lieutenant Jim Farese’s 2nd Platoon. As soon as Farese’s Sherman, Brooklyn Boy, topped the crest of the ridge, it was hit by three armour-piercing shells in quick succession, killing Farese and his loader, Pfc Bill Bradley, and wounding the gunner, Corporal Hulmer Miller. The other crew-members, driver Tech/4 Alvin H. Moe and bow-gunner Private Robert G. Shafer, escaped unhurt. The platoon’s remaining tanks quickly withdrew behind the crest but, later in the day, a round fired by one of the panzers ricocheted off the ground and, by a freak of luck, hit the right-hand side of Sergeant Joe Hauptman’s tank, dislodging the turret and killing the loader, Pfc Bill McVicker. Hauptman and the rest of his crew — Tech/4 Don N. Davenport (driver), Corporal Leo J. Gnatowski (gunner) and Private Bernard Tuchinsky (bow-gunner) — got out unhurt. This is Hauptman’s tank, pictured by the combat historian’s team six days after the battle. Most of the damage was done by the Germans when they set fire to the tank during the evening. Farese’s tank can be seen in the far right background, just left of the tree.

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village, although targets were seldom visible, and those of Company B engaged targets of opportunity at extreme range and without observed effect. However, they spotted two enemy tanks in the orchards west and east of Singling and a self-propelled gun firing from the centre of the village. Convinced that the enemy guns in Singling could not be neutralised by a firefight, Colonel Abrams decided on his own initiative to attack the village and attempt to hold it with one tank company and infantry, while the remainder of his force turned east into Bining. He assigned the mission to Team B (Company B of his 37th Tank Battalion and Company B of the 51st Armored Infantry Battalion). There was no time to make detailed plans. Abrams radioed his order to Captain James H. Leach, the tank company commander; Leach informed 1st Lieutenant Daniel M. Belden, the infantry company commander, who was riding as passenger on his tank. However, Belden’s men were already mounted, so he could not pass word of the changed plan even to his platoon leaders. (Few men of Team B realised there had been a change in plan. In fact, most tankers and infantry fought the subsequent action thinking they were in Bining.) Both companies were far below strength: Leach’s company had only 14 tanks (out of a normal complement of 17), one of which was a 105mm assault gun attached from Company Headquarters; Belden’s three rifle platoons counted only 57 infantrymen (out of a normal strength of 168). There was one additional tank, that of 1st Lieutenant Donald E. Guild, the forward artillery observer attached to co-ordinate support fire from the 94th Armored Field Artillery Battalion. Captain Leach deployed his tanks. He put the 1st Platoon, commanded by 1st Lieutenant William F. Goble, on the right; the 2nd Platoon, under 2nd Lieutenant James N. Farese, on the left; and the 3rd Platoon,

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Right: As the leading infantry, having alighted and now on foot, approached the village square near house No. 6 (the large farmhouse on the left) they were faced with a German SP gun, which opened fire on them with its machine gun before turning its tail and rattling off down the village street. This picture was taken from directly in front of the church — the position of the SP gun — and its escape route is off to the right. Captain Jim Leach, the tank company commander, later parked his command Sherman in the opening between No. 6 (left) and No. 7 (right). (The vehicles in these pictures belong to the US 12th Armored Division, which captured Singling the day following the 4th Armored’s action.)

Our comparison shows a little more on the left in order to bring into view the street along which the riflemen and Leach’s tank approached the square. Houses Nos. 6 and 7 have changed little since 1944. under 1st Lieutenant Robert M. Cook, in support. He moved his own command tank between the 1st and 2nd Platoons, in front of the 3rd. As the four tanks of 2nd Platoon carried no infantry, the three infantry platoons were mounted on the remaining 11 tanks (five of the 1st Platoon, four of the 3rd,

Leach’s own tank, and the artillery observer’s). Before the attack, the 94th Field Artillery Battalion put 107 rounds of high-explosive on Singling. The assault guns of the 37th Tank Battalion took up the smoke mission and continued to fire north of the village.

MATTHEW E. HERMES

Right: In September 2009, Jimmie Leach, by now a Colonel (retired) and 87 years old, returned to France, Luxembourg and Belgium to visit the sites where he had fought in World War II. After visiting Chancenay, Lunéville, Valhey and Arracourt, he visited Singling. Here he stands in the forecourt of No. 6 explaining what happened on that December morning. Leach had dismounted from his tank and walked ahead to get a look at the German SP. Together with other men, he was firing his automatic weapon at it. Then, as the SP turned to drive off, he yelled back at his tank to fire at it. However, his gunner, Corporal John Yaremchuk, did not shoot because Leach was standing in the line of fire and the muzzle blast from the shell would have blown his head off. The SP escaped and Leach turned around, berating Yaremchuk for his refusal to fire. Unruffled by the difference in rank, Corporal Yaremchuk yelled back at the captain that he had been in the way and the round, had he fired it, would have killed him. (Leach led Company B, 37th Tanks, throughout the 1944-45 campaign. He was wounded five times and received the DSC for his heroism at Bigonville on December 24, 1944, during the 4th Armored’s drive to relieve Bastogne. Twenty-five years later, in 1969, he took command of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment in Vietnam, being awarded three Silver Stars. He died on December 17, 2009). 43

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Then a deadly stretch of road, today a place of rural tranquillity.

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BATTALION & SMALL UNIT STUDY No. 8

At 1015, immediately after the artillery preparation, the Company B tanks advanced rapidly toward Singling, firing as they moved. But the formation was soon broken. Sergeant Joseph Hauptman’s tank (2nd Platoon) developed engine trouble, ran only in first gear, and so lagged behind; Staff Sergeant Max V. Morphew’s (3rd Platoon) radio failed and he did not bring his tank up at all. As the company approached the village, the 1st and 2nd Platoons swung east and west respectively, and the 3rd Platoon moved in through the gap to come up on a line. Thirteen tanks were now advancing in line abreast on Singling. Up on the left, Lieutenant Farese’s Sherman was notably in advance. Leading the tanks of Staff Sergeant Bernard K. Sowers and Sergeant John H. Parks by about 50 yards, Farese moved up the hillside and turned left into an orchard. As his tank topped the crest just south of a stone farmyard wall, it was hit three times by armourpiercing shells and burst into flames — the team’s first tank loss of the day. Farese and his loader, Pfc William J. Bradley, were killed; the gunner, Corporal Hulmer C. Miller, was slightly wounded, the rest of the crew got out. Sowers and Parks backed their tanks in defilade behind the rise and radioed Hauptman not to come up. The shells that hit Farese’s tank had come from the western end of the village. Here, on the south side of the main road through the village, just behind the last stone building and 75 yards from the thickly settled part of the village, stood two Maginot Line pillboxes: a larger one up on the embankment, and a smaller one directly alongside the road. In this area, shielded from view, there lurked a strong German presence: three Panther tanks, two self-propelled guns, one towed 7.5cm anti-tank gun and a machine gun.

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Right: Turning his camera to the right, the photographer captured the slightly curving village street along which the German SP gun barrelled off. As the Americans were soon to find out, there were now five enemy panzers — two SP guns and three Panthers — located at the far end of the village, which could command the whole length of the street with deadly fire. The Sherman tanks of Lieutenant Bob Cook’s 3rd Platoon were by then in position in the walled garden seen just behind the second house on the left.

Left: Having entered the walled garden from the right rear, the three tanks of Cook’s platoon (the fourth had stayed behind because of radio failure) were initially unaware of the danger lurking to their left. It was only when Lieutenant Bill Cowgill of the infantry walked in and warned them that they realised the risk they would have run had they attempted to cross the street. Sergeant Grimm, commander of the platoon’s M4 44

assault gun, then chopped down the corner of the garden wall with his 105mm howitzer to get a bead on the enemy tanks. Cowgill’s men later fired bazookas at the panzers from the attic of the farmhouse on the left (No. 12) through the gaps in the roof tiles. The house across the road is No. 23. Right: The wall closing off the garden from the street has been completely cleared away but Nos. 12 and 23 have been repaired.

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Left: Before Sergeant Grimm could open up on the enemy armour, they beat him to it, opening the duel with very accurate tank fire. Lieutenant Cook was able to back his Sherman into the passage between buildings Nos. 9 and 10 (where the 12th Armored’s truck is parked in this photo), but the tanks of

THE INFANTRY ATTACK When the two other tank platoons reached a hedge just south of Singling, they slowed up to let the foot soldiers dismount. Only now was Lieutenant Belden able to instruct his platoon leaders. He ordered 2nd Lieutenant William P. Cowgill of 3rd Platoon, the first to alight, to take the left side of the village; 2nd Lieutenant Theodore R. Price of 1st Platoon to take the right side, and 1st Lieutenant Norman C. Padgett of 2nd Platoon to ‘follow up after Cowgill’. Cowgill with his runner, Pfc John T. Stanton, entered the village ahead of his platoon. Close behind followed Padgett with two of his men. They were approaching the small village square when they spotted an enemy SP gun parked beside house No. 44, just 15 yards away. The building, burning from shell-fire, clouded the small square with thick smoke. Cowgill shouted back to the tanks not to come up. At this warning, Captain Leach dismounted and advanced along the street ahead of his tank. Up to this point, the SP had not seen them, though the commander’s head was out of the turret. Leach, Cowgill, Padgett and the two enlisted men started firing to make him button up. Upon this, the SP started to move, backing across the square towards the church. By now more infantry had come up from the south, crowding the street. Lieutenant Belden, coming up from behind and realising

the danger, shouted at the men to clear off and fan out into the houses. Just then, the SP let off a burst of machine-gun fire. Cowgill’s 1st Squad, under Corporal Ralph R. Harrington, ducked into houses on the west side of the street. The 2nd Squad, under Sergeant John McPhail, retreated hastily into No. 45 on the east. Belden, who himself had not seen the SP, asked a soldier what was holding them up. ‘Machine gun’, said the soldier. ‘If it is a machine-gun nest’, said Belden, ‘we’ll bring up a tank.’ His order was passed back to Sergeant Kenneth L. Sandrock of the 1st Tank Platoon, who set out thinking he was to clean out ‘an enemy machine-gun nest’. Moving west from his platoon, which had by then driven into an orchard at the eastern of the village, he fired pot shots at the church steeple, went on up the street leading into the village from the south, but found no machine-gun nest. Then, meeting Captain Leach, Sandrock drove his tank in behind

house No. 6, where he would remain separated from his platoon for the rest of the day. In the meantime the German SP at the square had started heading west along the main street. Leach continued to fire his Thompson sub-machine gun at it but in so doing blocked the line of fire of his own tank behind him, and the SP escaped. By now, Leach had received the report about a tank that had knocked out Lieutenant Farese of 2nd Platoon, and decided that it would be wiser to attempt to get the escaping SP from the flank by moving the 3rd Platoon tanks through the west end of the village. He therefore had his own tank back between buildings Nos. 6 and 7, where he was covered from the west and could command the square, and called Lieutenant Cook. Cook’s three tanks — his own, the one commanded by Sergeant Giles W. Hayward, and the 105mm assault gun commanded by Sergeant Robert G. Grimm — had advanced on the village to the left of the road that

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Because of the slope of the hill, anyone approaching this spot from the south could only observe it by topping the rise and exposing himself first. And because the main road makes a broad S-curve, the position could not be seen from the centre of the village either. On the other hand, the pillbox beside the road and the sturdy farm buildings next to it, provided good cover and concealment for the German anti-tank gun and panzers, yet still permitted them to command the full length of the street to the main square. It was a perfect defensive position and the Germans would use it to the fullest for the rest of the day, successfully blocking every attempt at direct assault or envelopment, and firing at will at all movements across or along the main street. For some time, however, Sergeants Parks and Sowers were the only ones who suspected the strength of this enemy position. They reported the destruction of Farese’s tank to Captain Leach, but the latter was momentarily pre-occupied by another moreurgent problem, an enemy SP gun directly in front of him.

Grimm and Sergeant Giles Hayward stayed in the open yard. Right: A nice little villa has been built in the garden, partly masking this side of No. 10, so Karel had to take his comparison from a little more to the right. House No. 9 has been considerably altered since the war.

Shortly after, a Panther tank on the ridge to the north of Singling hit Hayward’s tank with a round in the right-hand sprocket wheel, which immobilised the vehicle. Four more rounds then hit the Sherman in quick succession, setting it ablaze and killing the gunner, Corporal Angelo Ginoli, and the bow-gunner, Private John Furlow. Sergeant Hayward and his loader, Pfc Vern Thomas, were wounded. Only the driver, Tech/4 Russell K. Holland, escaped unhurt. The destroyed tank was photographed six days later by the Combat Historical Team. The building behind is No. 11. 45

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Left: Just before Hayward was hit, Lieutenant Cook had moved his tank deeper into the alley between Nos. 9 and 10, hoping to find a spot from where he could better observe the enemy armour on the ridge to the north. He thus emerged into the small courtyard formed by these two houses and No. 8, park-

(Corporal Harrington and Private Grover C. Alexander) moved along the south side of the street. Making their way to No. 10, they could see two German SPs parked on either side of the street 200 yards to the west. It was then that Cowgill, coming into the garden beside No. 10, found Cook and warned him of the enemy armour. Cook thought that he could see one of the tanks, so he had his Sherman and Grimm’s assault gun chop down the corner of the wall in front of them. This fire probably provoked the enemy, because a round of 75mm struck the northwest corner of No. 10 close to where Cowgill was standing. Cook dismounted and with Cowgill walked around to the east side of the building. In the meantime Cowgill’s 2nd Squad under Sergeant McPhail had moved on from No. 45, into which the SP had driven them. Crossing the square, the seven men entered No. 28, a stone house set back from the street, where they discovered 12 civilians sheltering in the cellar. Having searched them, the squad then wanted to continue the sweep of the north side of the street. Emerging through the front door, McPhail and Tech/4 Ben A. Todd made a dash to the next building, the village schoolhouse, but when a third man tried to follow machine-gun bullets spattered in the front yard. For the rest of the day, No. 28 was under direct enemy

fire from the tanks on the west. McPhail and Todd reached the school; the rest of the squad stayed in No. 28. Lieutenant Cowgill, standing on the other side of the street, shouted across to ask McPhail whether he could see the enemy SPs. He could, so Cowgill ordered him to fire. Lieutenant Cook, having now seen the true location of the SPs, returned to his tank and backed it into an alley between Nos. 9 and 10, just wide enough to let him through. He told Grimm and Hayward about the German SPs, and then called Captain Leach to ask whether tanks could be sent around to hit the enemy guns from the south-west. Leach radioed orders to Sergeant Sowers of the 2nd Tank Platoon, who was still in defilade position in the orchard close to the German strong point, to attempt to go through the burning barn (No. 11) and attack the SPs. Sowers tried, but it proved impossible. As soon as his Sherman exposed its nose through the gate to the west, it was shot at. Sowers gave up and returned to the orchard. Realising more information was needed on the enemy position and strength, Lieutenant Cowgill and his two men decided to undertake a reconnaissance through the houses to the west. Sergeant Grimm started them on their way by blasting open the door of No. 12 with a burst of .50-calibre. The three men climbed to the attic and, peering

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entered it from the south. In front of them a large farm building (No. 11) was on fire and clouds of smoke reduced visibility to the north to a few feet. Cook led his tanks to the right of the burning farm with the idea of cutting across the main street in pursuit of the enemy SP. Moments before, Cook’s loader, Private Charles R. McCreer, had seen Farese get hit in the orchard to their left but Cook himself did not absorb this information and made his next moves unaware of the enemy armour on his left. He drove his tank between the burning barn and the house just north of it (No. 9). Grimm and Hayward followed him. The three tanks now found themselves in a garden that was enclosed on the north and west by a high stone wall. Nonetheless, they felt as exposed as if on a skyline, because the sloping ground continued northwards beyond the village for several hundred yards, which completely nullified the wall as a screen. Cook was about to cross the road, thus exposing himself to fire from the tanks to the west, when Lieutenant Cowgill appeared and, just in time, shouted a warning: ‘There’s Kraut tank behind the third building down to the west!’ Immediately after the SP had left the square, Cowgill’s platoon had set out to move into the western part of the village. Cowgill and two men from his 1st Squad

ing his tank right on top of the manure heap, and this is where he remained for the rest of the action. Right: The farmhouse seen in the background of the wartime picture is No. 7. Because of a fence and tree growth in the garden of No. 9, our comparison is taken from a little more to the left.

Left: Meanwhile the infantry was busy engaging the Germans in the valley to the north. Sergeant John McPhail and Tech/4 Ben Todd of the 2nd Squad of Cowgill’s 3rd Platoon were isolated in this little schoolhouse on the north side of the village street. The building was next-door to the infantry company CP in house No. 28 (just off the picture to the right) but both lay under fire from the German tanks at the western end of the vil46

lage (note the bullet hits around the first-floor windows). However, looking out the rear, McPhail and Todd spotted enemy infantry in the valley below and opened up on them with their rifles. Not long after, two Germans came up the slope and surrendered to them. Right: The old schoolhouse is now in use as a dwelling. The small road seen to the right of it leads down to Welschoff Farm.

ACTION ON THE NORTH SIDE OF THE VILLAGE Meanwhile, as all this was happening, the infantrymen on the north side of the village street had not been idle. McPhail and Todd of Cowgill’s 2nd Squad, still in the schoolhouse, had spotted enemy infantry in the valley to the north. These Germans were also occupying the attention of two other groups of men in the village. The four men of Cowgill’s 1st Squad who had stayed at the square when their squad leader, Harrington, accompanied Cowgill westwards, had spotted 15-18 Germans near a pillbox in the valley. They crossed the street, took up positions in the yard of No. 28, and opened fire on the Germans, hitting two and dispersing the rest. They continued to fire until an officer across the street by the church shouted at them to stop. This officer was Lieutenant Price of the 1st Platoon, whose men had come last into the village because they had stopped at two small pillboxes south of Singling to take and disarm 11 unresisting Germans. Although Price had been ordered to occupy the east end of town, when he arrived at the square he could see Lieutenant Padgett’s 2nd Platoon already moving along the houses there. Cowgill’s men were on the west, so Price decided to go north. While Tech/Sergeant Lovell P. Mitchell with four men cleaned out the houses on the south-east corner of the square (Nos. 43, 44 and 45), Staff Sergeant John Sayers and six men took over No. 35 on the north side of the street. Price himself with the remainder of his platoon crossed the

BATTALION & SMALL UNIT STUDY No. 8

through gaps in the roof, could see the two SPs but not see beyond. They continued their journey but the next three houses had no access to the roof and the last (No. 17) had no openings in the west wall, so they backtracked through the courtyard between Nos. 15 and 16 and walked round the rear into a walled garden-orchard. Crawling to a gap in the wall they found themselves within spitting distance of the two SPs. Beyond, they saw three more enemy tanks. Returning at once to Lieutenant Cook’s position, Cowgill first sent word to Lieutenant Belden that there were ‘five enemy tanks on the west’, then took Cook back to the gap in the wall so that he could have a look himself. Cook was impressed with both the strength of the German position and the difficulty of dislodging them. This was clearly more a target for artillery than for tanks, so Cook went to look for Lieutenant Guild, the artillery observer. He found him at the infantry company CP at No. 28 with Lieutenant Belden and Captain Leach. The four officers discussed the problem. Guild felt that artillery could not be brought down without endangering friendly troops. Mortar fire would be fine, but the infantry had brought no mortars because they had too few men to operate them and carry ammunition. The mortar squad, down to three men, were armed with just a bazooka. Cook suggested that the street might be smoked with grenades, so that the tanks might cross the street and attack the enemy from the northeast, but Captain Leach preferred to try the infantry bazookas, and the job was given to Lieutenant Cowgill. Belden sent Pfc Kenneth L. Bangert and Private Frank LeDuc down to Cowgill with the headquarters bazooka, and sent his runner, Pfc Melvin P. Flynn, over to No. 7, which was occupied by seven men of the machinegun and mortar squads, to get some riflemen to protect the bazooka team. His message was slightly misinterpreted for, instead of sending riflemen, Staff Sergeant John W. Herring of the mortar squad and Staff Sergeant Patrick H. Dennis of the machinegun squad went down to No. 12 taking with them the two men who carried the company’s second bazooka.

Lieutenant Theo Price and four men of his 1st Platoon had made their way to the north-west corner of the church. From there, they could see Germans near a pillbox in the valley and hear an automatic weapon firing from further up. The steep drop of the ground enabled Price and his men to return fire over the roofs of the houses behind No. 28, and, shortly, white cloths were seen waving from the pillbox and 12 Germans came walking up the hill towards them to surrender. Later, four men of the 3rd Platoon went down to the same pillbox to see if there were any other Germans there but they only drew German machine-gun fire, which pinned them in place for several hours. This photo, taken by the Combat Historical Team from the tower of the church, has the pillbox arrowed. street and ducked into the alleyway between the church and No. 35. Posting two men at the north-east corner of the church to watch in that direction, Price and four men followed the alley around the north side of the church. At the corner they could see the Germans at the pillbox in the valley who had already been spotted by the men of 3rd Platoon. An automatic weapon was firing from somewhere to the north-west. The steep drop of the Singling ridge to the north enabled Price’s men to return fire over the roofs of the houses behind No. 28. Meanwhile, Lieutenant Cook’s tanks had also begun engaging the Germans to the north with machine-gun and high-explosive fire. Sergeant Grimm saw six Germans jump up and run into the valley pillbox and, in his own words, ‘closed the door for them with HE’. All three tanks also fired HE at the ridge to the north. The large volume of fire must have demoralised the Germans in the valley for shortly Lieutenant Price saw white cloths wave from the pillbox. It was then that he ordered his men, and those of 3rd Platoon across the street, to cease fire. Twelve Germans walked up the hill and surrendered to Price. One who spoke some English said there were five more who were willing to surrender but afraid to come out. After all the Germans had been disarmed, Price sent one of them back down the hill to bring in his comrades. At that moment, however, a volley of enemy mortar and artillery struck the square, wounding Sergeant Elmer White in No. 34 and three other men of the 1st Platoon — Staff Sergeant Sayers, Corporal Frank B. McElwee and Private Randall S. Brownrigg — at No. 43. Price and his men ducked back from the alley, and began occupying houses on the square where they were to remain all day. No more was seen of the German sent back to corral his comrades but two more Germans came up the hill and surrendered to McPhail and Todd at the schoolhouse. McPhail took them to join the other prisoners and the 13 disarmed Germans were sent down the road south without escort. The four men of the 1st Squad (3rd Platoon) then decided to go down to the pillbox to get whatever Germans might still be in it. They found none but did draw machine-gun fire from the direction of Welschoff Farm, a large farmstead located in the valley about 1,000 yards north of the village. Pfc L. W.

Battles was wounded in the leg and the squad was pinned in place for several hours. More to the right, Lieutenant Padgett of the 2nd Platoon had also seen the enemy infantry in the valley. On reaching the village, Padgett had gone east with his 1st Squad. They had found the first three houses (Nos. 36, 37 and 38) occupied by scared civilians, who were rounded up, and they were now in No. 39, a sturdy farmhouse on the north side of the street near the end of the village. As they arrived there, the four Sherman tanks of Lieutenant Goble’s 1st Platoon pulled into position in the orchard across the street opposite No. 39 — a reassuring sight. From where he was, Padgett could see the enemy infantry in the valley, but he had seen two other things that worried him far more — a rocket launcher (Wurfgerät), firing from about 800 yards west of Welschoff Farm, and seven enemy tanks on a ridge to the northeast. He was still without his 2nd Squad, so he sent out his runner to give a situation report to Lieutenant Belden and also to find the missing squad. When the runner failed to return in what seemed to Padgett a reasonable time, he sent out another man, Private Lonnie G. Blevins, on the same mission. The 2nd Squad, under Pfc Phillip E. Scharz, had by then already gained one of the most-notable successes of the day. Investigating the southernmost house of the village (No. 1), which the rest of the infantry had bypassed, they found a Frenchman and asked whether there were any Germans inside. He shook his head, but Scharz’s men were suspicious, for they noticed a radio antenna thrusting out of a cellar window. Four of them surrounded the house, and Scharz and Pfc Lewis R. Dennis went in. In the cellar they found 30 Germans — two officers and 28 other ranks — who surrendered without resistance. A search of the house then revealed large stores of small arms and ammunition. When the squad emerged, they met on the road the 13 prisoners sent back by Price and McPhail, which they searched before sending them on. It was because of all this that they arrived late at the square where Blevins found them and told them to join the rest of the platoon at the eastern end of the village. By this time enemy artillery and mortar fire was falling around the church. Not long after, a round of 75mm hit the company CP 47

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Lieutenant Don Guild, the forward artillery observer attached to the tank/infantry force from the 94th Armored Field Artillery Battalion, had taken up position on the roof of house No. 33,

STALEMATE Meanwhile, a series of incidents occurred to suggest that enemy armour might be forming on the north for a counter-attack on Singling. First, Sergeant Grimm in the enclosed garden spotted three to five German tanks moving on the north. As his own gun was trained through the gap in the wall against the SP threat from the west, he left the new menace to Sergeant Hayward. Lieutenant Cook moved his tank into the courtyard of the cluster of buildings (Nos. 8-10) from where he could observe north. Next, a white signal flare shot upward, immediately followed by a short, intense artillery concentration on Singling. For five minutes, a mixture of artillery, rocket and mortar fire rocked the village, at times as many as 20 shells hitting in the same instant. The shelling prompted the 2nd Platoon tanks, still in the orchard on the west, to back a few yards to a cabbage patch beside the orchard trail. A few minutes later, one of the nearby German tanks fired off an armourpiercing shell. It hit the crest of the rise in front of the American tanks — about where they had been parked just before —, ricocheted off the ground, and ploughed into the right-hand side of Sergeant Hauptman’s turret, killing the loader, Pfc William J. McVicker. Hauptman reported his loss to Lieutenant Cook who ordered the remaining two tanks of the platoon, those of Sowers and Parks, to get into shelter. Both drove up behind the 3rd Platoon in the lee of No. 11. Just then Sergeant Grimm casually turned his binoculars to a pillbox on the ridge 1,200 yards north, where he had seen a few enemy infantry minutes previously. He focussed just in time to see a German tank near the bunker fire a round directly at him. It missed, hitting a wall nearby. In a split second, Grimm decided it would take his 105mm, without power traverse, too long to be laid and fire back, so he threw his tank in gear and backed out of the garden. He had just started when a second round hit Sergeant Hayward’s tank on the sprocket, immobilising it. In quick succession another four rounds slammed into the 48

Sherman, setting it on fire. Gunner Corporal Angelo Ginoli and the bow-gunner, Private John H. Furlow, were killed; Hayward and his loader, Pfc Vern L. Thomas, were wounded. Grimm made good his escape through the opening between Nos. 9 and 11. Outside, the tank bogged down in the heavy mud, and the crew evacuated while Grimm got Sowers to pull him out. The 2nd and 3rd Platoons, Sergeant Sandrock of the 1st Platoon, the command and the artillery observer’s tanks (i.e. seven of the 11 surviving tanks) were now all bunched together in the area south-west of the square which, protected on three sides by buildings, was about the only safe spot in town for tanks. It was becoming increasingly clear to the Americans that, with the small forces at their disposal and against an enemy who had at least equal strength and every terrain advantage, they could not hope to secure their position in the village by attack. They had, instead, to sit out the stalemate until reinforcements could be brought up. Colonel Abrams had already radioed Captain Leach that relieving companies from Combat Command B were on the way. In the meantime there was no point in incurring needless casualties. Lieutenants Price and Padgett gave strict orders to their platoons to stay inside unless the Germans counter-attacked.

SERGEANT FITZGERALD DESTROYS TWO PANTHERS Meanwhile, something had to be done about the enemy tanks on the north that still threatened to attack. Lieutenant Padgett of 2nd Platoon sent his runner, Blevins, across the street to warn the four tanks of Lieutenant Goble’s 1st Platoon in the orchard. However, Goble’s vision was obstructed by a six-foot-high hedge and by houses and brush on the north side of the road, so he could not see any of the enemy armour. Meanwhile, Padgett himself set out to find Lieutenant Guild, the artillery observer, to see whether a concentration could not be put on the enemy. Braving the machine-gun bullets that hit the street he sprinted down to the company CP, where he reported to Lieutenant Belden, but he could not find Guild, so he returned to his platoon in No. 39. However, Guild had already spotted the enemy tanks himself from the roof of his OP at No. 33, and had informed Captain Leach about their position. Leach took the warning personally to Lieutenant Goble, who thereupon instructed Sergeant Robert G. Fitzgerald on the right to move his tank down the hill to within 15 yards of the road, where he could observe better to the north-east. Fitzgerald kept his gunsight at 1,400 yards, the range to the ridge where the enemy had been reported. However, the first tank to

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in No. 28. Pfc John E. Tsinetakes was scratched by dislodged plaster but there were no other casualties. Judging that the fire had come from one of the enemy SPs at the western end of the village, Company 1st Sergeant Dellas B. Cannon, who had just arrived at the CP, and Sergeant McPhail, who had just come over from the school, decided to go west and ‘get a closer look’. The two set out, taking almost exactly the route that Lieutenant Cowgill, unknown to them, had already followed twice.

seen here in the left foreground. From there he observed enemy tanks assembling on the ridge to the north and others approaching from the north-east.

With no access to the church, this is the best-possible comparison Karel could take. The road curving up the hill is again that leading to Welschoff Farm.

BAZOOKA ACTION Meanwhile, on the other side of the village, Lieutenant Cowgill’s bazookas in the attic of No. 12 were getting ready to fire at one of the enemy SPs. (The other SP had withdrawn by this time.) Down below in the basement, preparing to cover the bazookamen with rifles through the windows, were four sergeants: Staff Sergeant Harold A. Hollands, Staff Sergeant Dennis from the mortar squad, Sergeant McPhail from the 2nd Squad and Company 1st Sergeant Cannon (the latter two had come up from the company CP on their independent reconnaissance). One of the two bazookas (with old-type firing mechanism) failed to go off. From the other, the three men in the attic launched five rounds at the SP. The last one hit but it merely chipped a fragment off the turret. However, this prompted the crew to jump out, two of whom were shot by the

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One of the Panthers came very close to the houses at the eastern end of the village before it was knocked out by fire from Sergeant Bob Fitzgerald’s Sherman of the 1st Platoon, which was in an apple orchard along the south side of the village street. This photo was taken from Fitzgerald’s position, looking north across the street and between houses No. 37 (left) and No. 38 (right). The destroyed Panther can be seen in the field beyond.

The view between Nos. 37-38 is today blocked by trees so we took our comparison from between Nos. 36 and 37.

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appear, a Panther, drew up in the sloping field between Nos. 37 and 38, less than 150 yards away, heading toward the church. Both saw each other at about the same time. The Panther started to traverse its turret, but Fitzgerald got his gun laid first and — at point-blank range — put the first round into his opponent, setting it on fire. One man jumped out and ran behind one of the houses. Fitzgerald fired two more rounds into the burning tank. Later, warned by Padgett’s men that more tanks were approaching from the north-east, he drove his Sherman through the hedge and east along the road almost to the bend, where observation north and east was clear. He saw an enemy tank but, before he could take aim, it fired smoke and, shielded by this, escaped. Rockets then began to fall close to Fitzgerald’s tank, so he retired to the concealment of the hedge. Leaving his tank, he and Goble then crossed to Padgett’s CP and, from there, spotted a Panther in the valley north-east, whose gun was facing east, away from them. Fitzgerald went back to try a shot at it. Once more he moved his Sherman east, until he sighted the enemy between two trees. The second round was a hit; the third set the tank on fire. Fitzgerald had knocked out his second Panther. He then spotted and opened fire at yet another Panther facing him about 800 yards away. Sergeant Emil Del Vecchio’s tank, on the hill behind him, was also firing at it. However, all shells from both Shermans just bounced off the Panther’s front armour plate. Fitzgerald drove back to his hedge and, again walking over to No. 39, saw an enemy SP moving east in the vicinity of Welschoff Farm. Rather than risk exposing his tank again by moving it out to the east, he decided to wait until the enemy came around behind the farm and emerged into his field of fire. But the SP did not show itself. Shortly after, seemingly out of nowhere, two armour-piercing rounds hit Lieutenant Goble’s tank in quick succession. The first one set it on fire and wounded Goble and his gunner, Corporal Therman E. Hale. The second penetrated the turret, ricocheted inside, and finally landed in the lap of the driver, Tech/5 John J. Nelsen. Scared but unhurt, Nelsen dropped the hot shell, scrambled out, and with the loader, Private Joseph P. Cocchiara, ran from the burning tank — the fourth Sherman lost by the company. They eventually came upon Sergeant Sowers’ tank of the 2nd Platoon and got inside. As soon as Goble was hit, Staff Sergeant John J. Fitzpatrick took command of the platoon and ordered them to back over the ridge behind them into defilade from the enemy. As they backed, a round of HE exploded in front of Del Vecchio’s tank, splattering it with fragments. The enemy continued to fire at Goble’s tank, but the other three Shermans reached cover without loss.

Fitzgerald’s three rounds set the Panther on fire and killed four of the crew. Only one man got out. The Panther belonged to Panzer-Regiment 15 of the 11. Panzer-Division. First committed in Lorraine on September 25 (see After the Battle No. 83), the division had suffered serious losses and by November 15 could only muster five PzKpfw IV, 18 Panthers, four Tigers and 26 assault guns. By the time of the Singling battle this had been further reduced to some 20 tanks and assault guns. 49

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Left: However, the Germans soon had their revenge on the Americans for, shortly after, they hit Bottle Baby, the Sherman of Fitzgerald’s platoon leader, Lieutenant Bill Goble. The first round set it on fire and wounded Goble and his gunner, Corporal Therman Hale. The second penetrated the turret, ricocheted inside, and finally landed in the lap of the driver, Tech/5 John sergeants in the cellar. Hardly had this happened when a Panther drew up alongside the SP and sent a round crashing into No. 12. Another shell from the north struck the building at its foundations, showering the men in the cellar with plaster. It was a narrow escape on both scores, but no one was hurt. Cowgill moved his men sideways to No. 13, which turned out to be another of Singling’s thick-walled fortress-farms. Here the 3rd Platoon sat out the second of the enemy’s short, sharp artillery concentrations, which scored three hits on the building but did little damage. RELIEF OF TEAM B It was now getting late in the afternoon, and still the relief scheduled to take place an hour or more earlier had not been accomplished. Shortly past noon Colonel Abrams had been ordered by Brigadier General Earnest, the CCA commander, to turn over Singling to CCB and get ready to move on his own objective, Bining and Rohrbach. Basing himself on information that his tank/infantry team was in the village, Abrams had told Major Albin F. Irzyk, commanding the 8th Tank Battalion, that he was ‘ready to turn over to them their objective — and without a fight’. Although fire was still coming from Singling, the relieving units therefore acted on the assumption that the village was clear. Major Irzyk decided to send Company C of his battalion, under 1st Lieutenant William J. Marshall, in with Company B of the 10th Armored Infantry Battalion, led by 1st Lieutenant Robert F. Lange. At 1400 hours, Marshall set off with the 35-40 men of Lange’s company mounted on his tanks. His orders were to go into Singling, contact the commanding officer of the tank company there, and take over the outposting with infantry and tanks. At the south edge of the village the leading 1st Tank Platoon (2nd Lieutenant George Gray) turned north-west, following the same route as that taken by Lieutenant Farese earlier in the day. He soon came across Farese’s two knocked-out tanks but, although their hatches were open and there was no sign of the crew, he failed to detect that they were both out of action. Approaching the end of the wall at No. 14, Gray saw ahead of him, near the road, a tank which he assumed to be American. He had just radioed Marshall that he was doing well when his Sherman was hit by two rounds of AP. His gunner, Corporal Tauno H. Aro, was killed. Gray himself, 50

Nelsen. Terrified but otherwise OK, Nelsen dropped the hot shell, scrambled out, and with the loader, Private Joe Cocchiara, ran from the burning tank. The driver, Private Jacob Kirchenblatt, also got out safe. Right: The spot where Goble’s was knocked out on the edge of the apple orchard beside house No. 41.

seriously wounded, was evacuated to Cowgill’s CP at No. 13. The infantrymen riding the deck of his tank scrambled off and fell back, assembling near No. 49. As soon as Gray was hit, Lieutenant Marshall ordered his 2nd Platoon (Staff Sergeant Edwin J. De Rosia) to move east and try to circle behind the panzer that had knocked out Gray. De Rosia, however, had only moved a short distance when he reported enemy direct fire from north and east which he could not locate. Marshall thereupon ordered all tanks to withdraw to the reverse slope of the ridge south of the village. The infantry remained on the decks of the tanks when they retired. Lieutenant Lange, the infantry company commander, went into Singling on foot to make contact with his counterpart, Lieutenant Belden. He found Captain Leach in a tank outside of the village and together they went to No. 28 to talk with Belden. The three commanders decided to relieve Padgett’s and Cowgill’s platoons in place; Price’s platoon would be withdrawn first and without relief. Lange had organised his few men into two platoons: about 15 men in one, 18 in the other. He sent an NCO to meet his platoon leaders, inform them of the decision, and guide them into the village. Meanwhile Captain Leach went to look for Lieutenant Marshall and arrange for the relief of his tanks. Just then, worried that the afternoon was wearing on, Colonel Abrams called Captain Leach to find out how the relief was progressing. In Leach’s absence Lieutenant Cook took the call but his report was not very reassuring. There were five enemy tanks west of the village and three to five more moving down the ridge to their front. The 1st Platoon on the right had knocked out one enemy tank. All three tank platoons were receiving heavy enemy shelling and the enemy was laying a smoke screen on the north. The 51st Infantry was still outposting the village and the 10th Infantry was in process of relieving them. Cook said he was not in contact with the infantry’s commanding officer (Belden) and had not yet heard from Leach who was conferring with Lieutenant Marshall. Not prepared to wait any longer, Abrams called back a little later and told Cook to organise the company tanks, pick up the 51st Infantry, and move out immediately, irrespective of whether he found Captain Leach or not. Cook complied albeit that the actual withdrawal was delayed about 30 minutes to allow the relieving infantry to consolidate

their positions. Lieutenant Lange made few changes in Lieutenant Belden’s dispositions, except to place most of his men outside the buildings to guard against enemy infiltration during the night. He set up his CP at No. 45 to get away from the direct fire that had been harassing No. 28 all day. WITHDRAWAL Meanwhile, Captain Leach had arrived at the tanks of Company C, 8th Tank Battalion. Lieutenant Marshall had just left to confer with Major Irzyk, but Leach was able to speak with him over Sergeant De Rosia’s radio. Leach reported the situation in the village, then asked Marshall how long it would be before his tanks relieved him but Marshall, who had just been ordered by Major Irzyk to stay put, replied he would not come into town ‘until my orders are changed’. This alteration of plan was not known to the infantry in Singling, who were completing the relief as scheduled. Most of the 11 wounded had already been evacuated earlier on Sergeant Morphew’s tank of 3rd Platoon (which due to radio failure had not been in action but was brought up specifically for this task) but some casualties remained to be evacuated by the withdrawing infantry. Price, who did not have to wait for relief, moved his men out first and met the tanks outside the village beside the two pillboxes that had been cleaned out by Padgett’s men that morning. Here they picked up the last prisoner of the day, a sleepy German who had to be prodded into surrender. Cowgill and Padgett led their platoons south to a rendezvous with the tanks near No. 3. It was already getting dark when Cook moved his 11 tanks out. They collected the infantry as arranged, and found Captain Leach with Lieutenant Marshall about 400 yards south of the village. As the 2nd and 3rd Platoon tanks moved out together and the 1st Platoon on the right headed back to join them further south, another heavy enemy artillery concentration fell among them, which by a miracle caused only one light casualty, Private Genar W. Ferguson, 2nd Infantry Platoon, who was hit in the leg. To cover the withdrawal, all tanks swivelled their guns north and fired back into Singling. The enemy tanks replied and armour-piercing tracers streaked through the gathering darkness. Two rounds landed within a few feet of Sergeant Del Vecchio’s tank before the firefight was taken up by Marshall’s tanks and the enemy shifted his attention to them.

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After Leach’s tanks had pulled out, Lange’s infantry company in Singling remained without armour support for over three hours. During this time the Germans crept up to the two destroyed Shermans of Farese’s platoon and started the battery chargers, probably hoping to drive the tanks away. When the infantry outposts at No. 14 heard the engines, they believed them to be relieving tanks, so their platoon commander, 2nd Lieutenant Robert J. Victor, went out with one of his squad leaders to meet them. They had approached to within 25 feet of one of the Shermans, when they noticed that the three figures on top of it wore long overcoats and sharply-beaked helmets — these were no American tankers but German infantry! Victor and his sergeant had only one carbine, so they quickly moved back to the CP to pick up more weapons and another man. Approaching the tank a second time, they were fired on by an automatic weapon, which they answered with rifle fire and grenades. The Germans retreated but, later in the night, returned to set fire to the tanks. Meanwhile, Lieutenant Lange, worried about his thinly manned positions in the village, had gone out to see Lieutenant Marshall, hoping to persuade him to move the tanks in. As Marshall was absent (the lieutenant, who three months earlier had won a DSC for bravery, had broken under the strain of combat and Major Irzyk had called him back to Battalion HQ), Lange found Sergeant De Rosia temporarily in command. Irzyk himself and Captain Abraham J. Baum, the S-3 (Operations Officer) of the 10th Armored Infantry, were also in the company area. Together the three officers discussed the question of whether to attempt to hold in the village for the night or withdraw. Irzyk’s initial plan was to send one platoon of tanks in to support the infantry, but he reversed his decision after talking to Lange. He already doubted whether there was any good reason for holding the village and Lange reported that, with less than 50 men at his disposal, his outposts were very thin and the enemy could easily infiltrate through him during the night. Irzyk was also impressed by an incident which Lange related: an hour or so earlier (it was now about 2000) the east platoon, under 2nd Lieutenant James W. Leach, had shot up and captured a German kitchen truck at the village square. It carried hot soup, enough to feed at least a company. This settled the matter for Irzyk. Figuring that the presence of

Today there are two memorials in Singling to the action fought there in December 1944. Left: ‘To the officers and men of the 4th Armored Division’. Right: The plaque mounted on the church wall, dedicated in 1994, commemorates the killed tank crewmembers of the 37th and 8th Tank Battalions. Compared to the six fatalities named in the Small Units Action study, one name has been added: Tech/5 Patrick J. McEvey of the 37th Tank Battalion. His date of death is recorded as December 13, 1944, so he probably died of wounds incurred in the Singling action. own troops in the village would only obstruct the use of artillery against the Germans, he gave the order to withdraw from Singling. To cover the withdrawal, De Rosia jockeyed his tanks back and forth on the reverse slope to make the Germans believe that they were entering the village. The infantry assembled in about an hour near No. 47 and moved back to the tank positions 400 yards to the south, where they dug in and guarded the tanks for the night. During the few hours they had been in Singling they had suffered five light casualties from enemy mortar fire. Within five minutes of the infantry report that Singling was clear of friendly troops, corps field guns put a heavy TOT (time on target) artillery concentration on the village. The battle at Singling was over. American losses, for all units involved, added up to 22 casualties (six men killed, 16 men wounded) and five medium tanks destroyed. Known German losses were two Panther tanks destroyed and 56 men taken prisoner. The attack on Singling, though itself not successful, did however achieve tactical success for CCA. With the main German forces

heavily engaged there throughout the afternoon, other elements of CCA — the 1st Battalion, 328th Infantry (detached from the 26th Division), and the light tanks of Company D of the 37th Tank Battalion — were able to pass the village and reach and take the primary objective, Bining. Singling had been the 4th Armored Division’s last action in the drive through Lorraine and towards the Siegfried Line. The next morning, December 7, the CCB tanks and infantry moved forward again to just short of the crest of the Singling ridge, but then received orders to hold in place as the whole division would shortly be relieved by units of the 12th Armored Division, part of XV Corps of the Seventh Army. Relief took place that night and by December 8 most of the 4th Armored was out of the line and en route across the Sarre to rest areas near Cutting and Loudrefing. Singling was finally taken by Task Force Wells (Lieutenant Colonel Clayton W. Wells) of CCA of the 12th Armored on December 9. Rohrbach, the further objective, was not entered until the 10th.

2nd Lt Pfc Pfc Cpl Pvt

Killed James N. Farese William J. Bradley William J. McVicker Angelo Ginoli John H. Furlow

2nd 2nd 2nd 3rd 3rd

Platoon, Co B, 37th Tank Bn Platoon, Co B, 37th Tank Bn Platoon, Co B, 37th Tank Bn Platoon, Co B, 37th Tank Bn Platoon, Co B, 37th Tank Bn

Cpl

Tauno H. Aro

1st

Platoon, Co C, 8th Tank Bn

1st Lt Cpl Sgt Pfc

Wounded William F. Goble Therman E. Hale Giles W. Hayward Vern L. Thomas

1st 1st 3rd 3rd

Platoon, Co B, 37th Tank Bn Platoon, Co B, 37th Tank Bn Platoon, Co B, 37th Tank Bn Platoon, Co B, 37th Tank Bn

Sgt S/Sgt Pvt Cpl Pt Pfc

Elmer White John Sayers Randall S. Brownrigg Frank B. McElwee Genar W. Ferguson L. W. Battles

1st 1st 1st 1st 2nd 3rd

Platoon, Co B, 51st Arm Inf Bn Platoon, Co B, 51st Arm Inf Bn Platoon, Co B, 51st Arm Inf Bn Platoon, Co B, 51st Arm Inf Bn Platoon, Co B, 51st Arm Inf Bn Platoon, Co B, 51st Arm Inf Bn

1st

Platoon, Co C, 8th Tank Bn

2nd Lt George Gray

five men of Company B, 10th Armored Infantry Battalion

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AMERICAN CASUALTIES AT SINGLING (DECEMBER 6, 1944)

Lieutenant Farese was repatriated after the war and today lies buried at Long Island National Cemetery at Farmingdale, New York. Of the other six men killed, Bradley, Aro and McEvey rest in the Lorraine American Cemetery at Saint-Avold; Ginoli and Furlow in the Luxembourg American Cemetery, and McVicker was brought back to the US. 51

Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae of the Canadian Army Medical Corps was killed on January 28, 1918 during the second battle of Ypres, yet his poem In Flanders Fields, which he had

written three years earlier, lives on as a memorial to the fighting men of the Great War. His grave lies in the Communal Cemetery at Wimereux (Plot IV, Grave H3).

BRITAIN REMEMBERS: 1914-2014 The terrible destruction meted out to huge swathes of the landscape of northern France and Belgium during the First World War led to the proliferation of bright red Flanders poppies across the battlefield, a sight which inspired a Canadian doctor, LieutenantColonel John McCrae, to compose his poem In Flanders Fields. This led Moina Michael in the United States to fabricate silk poppies and when the British Legion (later Royal) was formed in 1921, it officially adopted the poppy as a sign of remembrance. Nine million of the American poppies were ordered for the Legion’s welfare work that year raising £106,000 — a huge sum at the time. The following year Major George Howson set up a factory off the Old Kent Road in London where five disabled ex-Servicemen began making poppies; three years later the Poppy Factory moved to its current site in Richmond. In 1922 a second factory was established in Scotland to make a four-petal version although without the leaf. (The correct way to wear the poppy is with the leaf pointing in the eleven o’clock position.) Today 40 million poppies, five million petals, 750,000 crosses, and over 100,000 poppy wreaths and sprays are manufactured and sold by the Legion each year. In August 1914 the moat of the Tower of London served as a convenient parade ground for volunteers responding to the call, like these recruits for the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers. 52

PAUL CUMMINGS CERAMICS

PAUL CUMMINGS CERAMICS

Paul Cummins thought up the idea of a ceramic poppy memorial and approached the Tower as an ideal setting with its strong military links. Unfortunately during the manufacturing process, Paul crushed his right hand and lost a finger and the use of another which prevented him from making any more poppies.

As a leading theatrical designer, Tom Piper joined Paul to lend his expertise, and for their outstanding work on the project. Both were awarded MBEs in 2015.

With the approach of the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the war, Paul Cummins, a ceramic artist with a studio in Pride Park, Derby, was inspired by a reference in the Will of a local Serviceman who had joined up in the earliest days of the war and had been killed in Flanders. The soldier had written about ‘the Blood Swept lands and Seas of Red, where angels fear to tread’, and it was these words that led Paul to conceive the idea of a memorial ‘sea of poppies’ in the dry moat surrounding the Tower of London. He was delighted when the idea found favour, the Constable of the Tower, General Lord Dannatt, stating that ‘the First World War was a pivotal moment in our history, claiming the lives of over 16 million people across the globe, and its consequences have shaped our modern society. We wanted the Tower of London’s commemorations to serve as a fitting tribute to those who lost their lives during the First World War, while encouraging others to reflect on our past.’

The project was announced to the public in May 2014, the planting the poppies on two-foot metal stems to begin on August 5 marking the anniversary of Britain’s entry into the conflict. Using volunteers working in shifts, including many students from the University of Derby, the whole display was to be completed by Armistice Day in November. It was explained that the poppies would progressively fill the moat during the summer months and ‘will encircle the iconic landmark, creating not only a spectacular display visible from all round the Tower but also a location for personal reflection’. These particular volunteer soldiers — who always referred to themselves as ‘Ditchers’ since the day that they joined up in the Tower Ditch — may have faded away but one hundred years after they marched off to war, their memory begins to take shape on the green turf of the moat in the summer of 2014.

© HISTORIC ROYAL PALACES

Theatre designer Tom Piper was brought on board to develop the theme which was to be titled ‘Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red’. The scale of the project was huge as Paul proposed to make over 800,000 ceramic poppies by hand by the same methods that potters would have used during the First World War. A grant of £450,000 from the Derby Enterprise Growth Fund allowed Paul to move into an 8,000 sq ft production unit in Pride Park, most of the companies on the estate helping out in various ways. The lead time was 12 months but even so it was a huge task as each poppy took three days to mould, fire and paint. The total number of British and Commonwealth casualties was determined as 888,246, with one poppy to be planted to mark each death. These were to be offered for sale for £25 and in this way it was hoped to raise £11.2 million (the Government stating that they would waive the sale from Value Added Tax), to be shared between six charities.

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PAUL CUMMINGS CERAMICS

PAUL CUMMINGS CERAMICS

Every poppy was hand-crafted making each one unique. Clay was sliced by hand and rolled into large flat sheets when a metal ‘biscuit-cutter’ was used to cut out the petals. These were then

Swept Lands and Seas of Red memorial astounded its creator who modestly admitted that ‘it has provoked a massive amount of emotion from people. It is such a good feeling that everyone from across the world has taken this on board, especially the 20,000 volunteers who have dedicated their time to planting the poppies. They placed as they wished to do so and this makes it truly their work. It has become a worldwide community project.’ News items on the Tower were broadcast around the world, it even being

photographed from on board the Mir space station, and it received more that five billion hits on the internet. It had also been planned that each evening in the moat at sunset the names of 180 Commonwealth troops killed during the war were to be read out as part of a Roll of Honour. Members of the public were asked to nominate a name on a weekly ‘first come, first served’ basis, to be read out the following week, followed by the playing of the Last Post.

GAIL RAMSEY

The moat at the Tower was drained in 1843, after which engineers dumped large quantities of soil to level the surface, although initially it was planned to avoid one area where the ancient foundations were close beneath the surface. This was the site of the North Bastion, demolished by a German bomb on October 5, 1940. As tens of thousands of visitors, many from overseas, began gathering daily along the edges of the moat to watch the display grow, the huge popularity of the Blood

paired together to form six overlapping petals. Each flower was then individually shaped and then fired in a kiln. Bright red glaze was added before they were returned for a second, final firing.

A beautiful feature was the ‘Weeping Willow’ cascading from a window of the Legge Mount Tower. As one of the yeoman 54

warders aptly put it: ‘The English language does not have the words to describe something as powerful as this’.

MPS HELICOPTERS

EDDIE MULHOLLAND

On the morning of November 11, Harry Hayes, a 13-year-old CCF army cadet — whose great-great-great uncle was killed in action in 1918 — planted the last poppy. Harry was the same age as the youngest British soldier on the Somme.

What had taken 118 days to assemble was now to be dismantled by 11,000 volunteers in two weeks. We made a final visit to picture the break-down on November 14 at which point the work was well underway. With hundreds still looking down on the muddy moat, suddenly we heard a lady who had just joined the crowd: ‘What a pity we are too late to see it. We must come earlier next year as it is bound to be better!’ By November, General Lord Dannatt said he had been delighted with the great public response to the memorial as it was estimated that more than five million had visited the unique memorial. ‘We have been astounded by the overwhelming public support. In this significant year of the centenary, it has been heartening to see so many people engaging with the project; either by volunteering their time, buying a poppy and helping to raise millions of pounds for service charities, or by visiting the poppies and remembering all of those who died in the First World War.’ It was explained that the very last poppy would be planted just before 11 a.m. on November 11, after which the memorial display would be dismantled so that the poppies could be cleaned and sent to the 600,000 people who had subscribed for them. Although there were protests and an on-line petition began to attempt to retain the display indefinitely, Paul explained that ‘I never intended the poppies to be anything other that transient. Like the real flower, they were planted for a season and then are gone . . . like the frailty of the soldier’s lives.’

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As we all know, the Tower of London is no stranger to death as so many have been executed within its grim walls, but we must not forget Yeoman Warder Sam Reeves killed when the North Bastion was bombed in 1940 (it was never rebuilt after the war). And back in the First World War, two Dutchmen found guilty of spying for Germany met their fate in the moat in front of a Scots Guards’ firingsquad. Shortly before 6 a.m. on July 30, 1915, Haicke Janssen was marched from his cell in The Casemates to where a chair had been placed in the moat. The Assistant Provost-Marshal of the London District issued the order to fire, death being instantaneous. After his body had been removed, ten minutes later Willem Roos was brought forward. We are told that he eyed the fatal chair, from which the bleeding body of his accomplice had just been removed, with an air of indifference, requesting permission to finish the cigarette he had requested as a last favour. That done, he threw the butt on the ground in a gesture of contempt before a blindfold was fastened around his face. 55

No. 167

£5.00