Beyond Band of Brothers (28 page)

In mid-May SHAEF lifted its restrictions and its censorship of military mail. Most of us took the opportunity to write home in a futile attempt to put into words what we had gone through since D-Day. Writing to DeEtta Almon, I summarized the war from my personal perspective, but I found it impossible to convey my innermost thoughts to someone who had not experienced combat. I had grown frigid mentally and couldn't think of anything to write. Instead I outlined my plan to volunteer for combat duty against the Japanese. Now that the war in Europe was over, I had been wondering what was the use of sitting around here for six months or so of occupational duty when I could utilize my talents in the Pacific Theater. Call it professional pride or simply a desire for additional action, but I decided to volunteer for duty with some parachute unit or infantry unit in the C.B.I. Theater. My desire for additional combat had nothing to do with earning medals. I had never cared about public recognition—my reward had always been the look of respect in the eyes of my men. After eleven months of war, I understood fire and maneuver, planning, and leading soldiers in combat. In garrison, I enjoyed the soldiering part, but as far as social activities were concerned, I was a class-A flop. Volunteering for Japan would relieve me of the monotony of occupation. I reckoned that I had to die sometime, so what was the use of sitting in Kaprun? I discussed
my options with Colonel Sink, who asked me point-blank, “Why are you leaving me?” He reluctantly agreed to arrange an interview with Major General Elbridge G. “Gerry” Chapman, commanding general of the 13th Airborne Division. Selected for the invasion of Japan, the 13th Airborne Division was scheduled to sail from France on August 15 to participate in the assault on Kyushu scheduled for November.

I reported to General Chapman on May 26 and informed him of my desire to transfer to his outfit. I figured that since the 13th Airborne Division had been alerted for duty in the South Pacific, combat duty beat the heck out of occupational duty. I repeated much of the rationale that I had expressed to my mother when she first heard that I intended to transfer to fight in the Pacific. I felt that God had been good enough to let me live through the European war. As a result, I was combat-wise and in a position to do some good to help a lot of men. I knew that I could do the job, better than, or as well as, any of the rest. How could I sit back and see others take men out and get them killed because they didn't understand? These new officers just didn't have “it.” Maybe I would get hurt or killed for my trouble, but so what, if it meant I could make it possible for many others to go home. Their mothers wanted them alive, too, the same as me. So what else could I do and still hold my own self-respect as an officer and as a man?

General Chapman listened graciously and told me that he would welcome me to his outfit, but—just as my mother had expressed—that I had done enough. Let the other fellows have a chance. Well, I had given it the old college try. I thanked him for his time, saluted, and departed. On returning to my headquarters, I couldn't help but think that Colonel Sink had greased the skids for my interview, but he had also asked General Chapman to disapprove my request. The 13th Airborne Division had its own officers and they didn't need me.

So, I was staying put, but apparently not for long. In mid-June General Maxwell Taylor announced that the 101st Airborne Division was earmarked to go to the Pacific at some unspecified time and that the Screaming Eagles should plan and train accordingly. The
announcement did not sit well with the troops, particularly the remaining Toccoa men. My best estimate was that I would remain awhile in Europe and would see the States in January. Following a month's leave, I expected to be training around Fort Bragg or Mackall until we deployed overseas. After such a long rest, going into combat again would be tough. I found myself changing as the weeks went by. As the frustration of occupation duty increased, I was really bitter and put out with everybody and everything. Becoming more or less resigned to the fact of returning to combat with inexperienced troops, I yearned to return home. I figured I had been lucky, mighty lucky, from the very first day, but I'd seen so many get it and go out feetfirst. I just knew if I stuck around long enough, I'd have my turn sometime because I had taken too many chances. I had to lead from the front, with my position, prestige, and job on the line. Consequently I was no longer too keen on going to the Pacific after being rejected by General Chapman, but orders were orders.

On June 28, all “eighty-five-point” men departed Kaprun. To my great satisfaction, most of the Toccoa men stopped by to say goodbye before returning home. As I told my Stateside friend DeEtta Almon, “It was a good thing you weren't around to see that one. You'd think we were a bunch of schoolgirls. If you'd heard some of the things they had to tell me, you'd understand why I want to stick around and see the end of this war out on the front line. They sure appreciate . . . everything.”

I had accrued 100 points as of May 12 and should have been en route to the United States under ordinary conditions, but my services were “needed” in Austria by Colonel Sink. Regrettably many of our men remained longer in Europe than they should have because General Taylor had been notoriously stingy in awarding combat medals to the frontline soldiers. Over the course of the war, only two troopers from the 101st Airborne Division received the Medal of Honor. One was Lieutenant Colonel Robert G. Cole, a battalion commander, who was killed on September 18, 1944, by a sniper at Best, Holland, near the bridges over the Wilhelmina Canal as we were attacking Eindhoven.
Just a few days earlier, Cole had been notified that he would receive the Medal of Honor for leading a bayonet charge in Normandy. The second recipient was Private First Class Joe E. Mann, who hurled himself on a grenade to save the lives of his squad near the Wilhelmina Canal outside Eindhoven on September 19, 1944. Officers from West Point received an unusually high number of awards, including General Taylor, who received the Distinguished Service Cross in Normandy, but for those at the grunt level, higher headquarters downgraded far too many recommendations.

And so, many of the Toccoa veterans returned home, yet all would be forever connected by their shared experiences in combat. Over the course of the war, Easy Company alone lost forty-eight men killed and over 100 wounded, incurring 150 percent casualties. This percentage was not uncommon among similar units who had fought in the campaign of northwest Europe. “At the peak of its effectiveness, in Holland in October 1944 and in the Ardennes in January 1945, it was as good a rifle company as there was in the world,” according to author Stephen E. Ambrose. How so many men survived the campaigns in Normandy, Holland, Bastogne, and Germany was a true testament to their courage, their training, and their discipline under fire.

In late July occupation duty came to an end. Second Battalion, 506th PIR, now bore little resemblance to the organization that had fought through Bastogne, Alsace, and Berchtesgaden. With few exceptions, the Toccoa men were gone, having rotated to the States. To escape the boredom, I traveled up and down the Continent three times inside of two weeks. I was bored, tired, sore, and looking for constructive ways to bide my time. On one occasion I supervised a large convoy of trucks to Paris for redeployment to the Pacific. It was a mess. Everybody turned in their worst trucks and tires. There were no tools to change tires and the drivers were a bunch of “8-balls.” Many of the soldiers were replacements with little or no combat experience. Since most of the battle-hardened NCOs had already returned to the States, discipline became a major challenge. I worked my head off keeping that mob together and at the same time, I drove them into the ground. By the time I returned those soldiers to
Austria, they knew just what an officer in the paratroops was like—dominating as hell!

Colonel Sink was quite pleased with the job though, and he allowed me a couple of days to recuperate and then let me come up in a special chartered plane while the 506th PIR departed the Zell-am-See–Kaprun-Bruck area and traveled by train to Joigny, France. Joigny is an old town of narrow, cobblestoned streets situated eighty miles southeast of Paris. Like any other French town, it was hot, dirty, and, being French, I could not say much good about it. We moved into living quarters formerly occupied by the 13th Airborne Division. The conditions in the camp were absolutely terrible for the men. Latrine facilities were nonexistent, so I procured lumber and equipment to build several latrines. Washing facilities consisted of two little faucets about 100 yards from their quarters. The men were forced to live like pigs. Apparently nobody gave a damn, so the battalion began building washstands and coverings so the men could wash and shave with hot water. Evidently this facility once served as a Nazi work camp and the 13th Airborne Division seemed content to live like that for seven months.

Nonfraternization remained a problem, just as it had in Germany and Austria. The nonfraternization policy stipulated that all German, Austrian, Hungarian, and Rumanian women were out of bounds. That left Poles, Russians, and French foreign laborers, and it was quite a problem to tell the difference between the nationalities. I did the best I could to defuse potential problems and just said, “No messing around at all.” That covered it altogether, as far as I was concerned. However, I was army-wise enough to know that what went on behind my back was more than just a little fraternization, but what I didn't know didn't hurt me. As far as I was concerned, the results were 100 percent okay, at least on the surface. I just made myself heard, but nothing happened. I asked for 100 percent, received maybe 40 percent, but to all appearances, the results were as I wished. After about three months of being in charge of these men, they sort of snapped to when they saw me
coming. I was not exactly a grizzly bear, but if something was not right, somebody heard about it pronto. The entire process of dealing with the fraternization issue was the sort of thing that convinced me that I did not belong in the army after all.

To escape the boredom, I took a week's leave and visited England. Captain Nixon accompanied me and through a little creative collaboration, we stretched a seven-day leave into fourteen days. I had a wonderful time—went straight to Aldbourne to visit the Barnes family and I spent ten beautiful days right there. Mr. Barnes had passed away in October 1944, shortly after we left to jump into Holland, leaving only Mother Barnes and her store. I knew she had saved my room and bed for me, just as I left it, and there would be a cup of tea. I went to town once to a show, but the rest of the time I just puttered around the garden, cut the grass, or slept. It was my way of thanking the Barneses for being my second parents. After ten days in Aldbourne, I traveled to London and spent four days just watching shows. The day I was supposed to leave, the plane didn't show up, so I returned to London for one last fling. That evening was the most lonesome night I had spent in years. The city was full of air corps men, not a man or soldier in the bunch. I couldn't talk to any of them; they were mere boys, kids, no depth. Hell, I quit and found a corner in the lounge to myself and read. Get me back to my battalion!

When I returned to my unit, everyone wanted to know what kind of time I had, and how I had spent my leave. Most were surprised when I mentioned that I had spent the majority of my leave in Aldbourne until I told them that going to Aldbourne was like going home. What these men had forgotten was what home was like, what a real home was. Oh, they wrote home to their folks and friends, and they talked and planned about coming home, but you can't actually be away from home three or four years and remember what home is like. That was precisely why “my home” in Aldbourne meant so much to me. As I wrote Mrs. Barnes, “I was still walking around on that cloud that you had put me on during my recent visit. I really enjoyed those songs and
hymns that were so dear to you, as well as those Bible readings and prayers.” That was just the way things should be, and it was so soothing to me to find a small niche in this mad world that was still sane, quiet, peaceful, and in order.

Later, I attempted to tell Mrs. Barnes, albeit inadequately, what she had meant to me during the war. Now that the fighting was over, I needed time to relax. Physically I always was fully prepared even in the hottest combat, but mentally I was strung tight as a fiddle. I knew when something was wrong and I could tell exactly what it was, but responsibility, work, the accumulation of past problems, and present and future challenges had placed me in such a mental state that I began functioning more like a military machine than an understanding officer and a human being. After seven day's under Mother Barnes's care, I regained a lot of the caring that I had forgotten existed. As I told her, “There were times when your influence on me permitted me to pass my thoughts and feelings along to other officers and men.” I addressed my letter, “Dearest Mother.” After I finally returned to the States, I maintained my friendship with Mrs. Barnes through a warm correspondence and exchange of gifts until her death in the 1970s.

On August 11, Colonel Sink received a well-deserved promotion, and he was assigned as assistant division commander of the Screaming Eagles. During the war many officers had accepted promotions and moved up the chain of command, but Sink always elected to remain with the 506th. I had thought about that as the war went on. Sink was very proud of the regiment and was very dedicated to it. With the fighting now over, I was happy that he finally received (and accepted) just recognition for his services. In recommending Colonel Sink for promotion to brigadier general, General Taylor stated that our regimental commander was “temperamentally quiet, resolute, and cool under the most trying conditions of battle. He possesses all the qualities desired of an Airborne General Officer.” In short, Bob Sink was an extraordinarily talented officer who was the heart and soul of the 506th. He did things with a personal flair, and his southern drawl was full of
homespun sayings that endeared him to the regiment he led so gallantly beginning in July 1942. He always talked to his soldiers on a man-to-man basis. He gave us all a sense of “we.” The 506th PIR was going to fight the war together, not as a series of independent battalions. To have been a member of the “Five-Oh-Sink” had been a badge of honor.

How Colonel Sink welded a disparate group of citizen soldiers into a first-class fighting unit is a topic that merits a book of its own. The army had given him kids fresh off the streets. Many were undernourished and poorly educated. The officers were not much better—and I include myself in that group. I was a year out of college. I had gone through Officer Candidate School, so I was a newly minted second lieutenant, a ninety-day wonder. This was the kind of officer Sink was assigned and told to turn the group into a crack airborne unit. Colonel Sink straightened us out. He was the one who put it all together. I was highly skeptical of his ability at first, but he proved me wrong. In my opinion, our regimental commander was one of the finest West Point officers of the war. Colonel Sink remained in the army after the war and retired with the rank of lieutenant general.

With Sink transferred, his executive officer, Lieutenant Colonel Charles Chase, became commander of the 506th PIR. Three days later, on August 14, Japan surrendered. Apparently the atomic bomb carried as much punch as a regiment of paratroopers. It seemed inhumane for our national leaders to employ either weapon on the human race. Within weeks of Japan's surrender, General Taylor left the 101st to assume duties as superintendent of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Colonel Sink followed Taylor to West Point in December. Now everyone was going home, regardless of points.

With the war finally over, my time in Europe drew to a close. On September 2, the day Japanese officials signed the documents of surrender aboard the U.S.S.
Missouri
in Tokyo Bay, a number of officers with the necessary points departed for the States by plane. Though Colonel Sink had declared me essential, as of the 15th of the month, all officers were now allowed to leave if they desired. Naturally, I wished
to go. In May I had contemplated transferring to the Pacific, but after four months of occupation and “make work,” I was ready to return to civilian life. I could see in the wind just how the army was changing, or at least close enough so that I could appreciate the fact that I did not wish to be associated with it in any way. In the paratroops, the money looked good. That was the end of it though, for it was a big party after that, with troopers growing lazy, both mentally and physically and going to hell fast. They could have it all; I'd dig ditches first.

It would have been an honor to leave for home with the 101st Airborne Division, for I was a bit sentimental about my outfit. The thing was, however, there were only about half a dozen officers and men left who were worth saying hello to or goodbye. Late one evening, Speirs, Welsh, and Nixon—my remaining buddies—dropped in and spent a few hours reminiscing about the good times we had shared. Nixon departed Joigny the next week, making me about as lonesome as a lovesick sailor who married a Wave on an eight-hour pass. As for Harry Welsh, he became my constant companion, but drinking remained his outlet to pass the time. During one of his spells, he told off some soldiers from another command. Being a good friend, I smoothed things over by sending Welsh off and explaining that Harry was just a bit “off”: too many mortar shells and artillery barrages—just feeling the reaction since the war was over.

Other memories of Joigny are few. Each day I would go for a run, play football, or join the men for a baseball game. On September 20, I made my final parachute jump, which was my first since we had jumped into Holland the previous September. Exactly one year earlier, we had hit Holland and attempted to hold open fifty miles of road so the British 2d Army could make an end run. I'm not sure why I scheduled this jump other than to break the monotony of things around Joigny. It was a voluntary exercise and those who did not wish to jump just had to say so. Quite a few of the men came up with flimsy excuses to miss the jump, feigning illness when the real reason was nothing more than to avoid injury. Others, like Staff Sergeant Robert T. Smith,
participated just to see if he still “had the guts to do so after not jumping for a year and three days.” Yet even Smith agreed that he experienced the worst three minutes that he had ever spent on a jump since he was among the four “high pointers” who weren't sure that they were doing the smart thing. Having survived the war, Smith and the veterans who had jumped into Normandy no longer desired taking unnecessary chances with regard to their physical safety.

As the paratroopers put on their chutes and boarded the aircraft, more than a few suddenly got very serious. In combat, these same paratroopers usually horsed around before climbing aboard the plane. Things seemed different now, but as soon as the veterans buckled up, they started to play around and to rib the replacements. After the aircraft took off, Staff Sergeant Smith reconsidered the wisdom of risking his life on an unnecessary jump. In his own words, he “couldn't talk, he couldn't move, he felt stiff all over, and he had sweat pouring from his eyes.” Once out the door, however, the panic left him as he felt that friendly jerk that signaled that his canopy was fully deployed. Personally, I would jump for $10, and for $100, I'd land on my head. During the war if a man refused, it was standard operating procedure (S.O.P.) to send him to the guardhouse, no pay, and at least six months' hard labor. My, how things had changed! Now, they just said, not today, thank you. Oh well, I didn't hold anything against them, provided that they were old combat men.

Four days before my last parachute jump, I reflected on where I had been one year earlier when we jumped into Holland. I wished that I could relive some of those thrills and glows of satisfaction that filled a man when he outmaneuvered, outfought, and outguessed the enemy. Great sport! Then there was the day that a lieutenant in the company (Lieutenant Brewer) was shot. I had told him a hundred times in training not to walk around in front like that or he would get it, sure as hell. That day I walked up front with Brewer, demonstrating just how I wanted his platoon to cross this open field to the suburbs of Eindhoven. He took off, but he didn't think—which was why most people
got shot. As I walked two hundred yards behind him, I remarked to some of the men, “He's going to get it.” He did, seconds later, right through the neck. Brewer went down like he had been hit with a baseball bat. Then I was forced to make one of my better decisions. I took over the platoon and pushed them forward to the town and sent back for another lieutenant to replace him. It ended up that I had to remain with the lead platoon until we secured the town. By pushing forward, we saved a lot more men and the medics were able to save Brewer's life.