Jack Holmes remembers the battle of the bulge
The cries of the wounded and dying"I remember the night of December 22, 1944. The fighting had been fierce that day, and we had killed hundreds of Germans. We lost two tanks with five men each and 24 infantrymen. It was so cold that we thought we would freeze to death, but we couldn't have a fire because that would have given our position away. So we huddled together in the dark. It was quiet. Then we heard screams and cries coming from the battlefield. It was the Germans - the wounded and the dying. Many were crying out for their mothers. Colonel Abrams had told us not to leave our position, so there was nothing we could do except listen. It was then that I realized those poor boys out there dying in the snow were not very different from us. They were just ordinary soldiers serving their country. They weren't the monsters we thought they were. They stopped screaming a couple of hours before dawn, so we thought their people had rescued them. At dawn, we moved over the battlefield, and they were all dead. Those who hadn't died from their wounds had died from the cold."
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Christmas 1944: The Day we all lied about"We knew it was Christmas. Earlier that day, Ben, Ernie, and Dave found a little spruce tree and claimed it as our Christmas tree. Christmas Day was no different than any other day - we killed Germans, and they tried to kill us. That night, we huddled together in almost darkness, trying to stay warm, and we wrote letters home. I wrote a letter to my mother telling her how we were all eating turkey and dressing around the campfire and singing Christmas carols. Everybody wrote letters like that. I wasn't about to tell her what it was really like - we were so cold and tired and miserable. There was no turkey. We had cold field rations, and we were glad to have them. We couldn't have a fire that night because the Germans were so close. Some of the men were humming Christmas carols, but nobody was singing because we were too close to the Germans. One of the chaplains came around and led us in a quiet prayer. Mack and I talked about all of the great Christmases we had in Longstreet, about how his father would go into the woods and chop down the biggest tree he could carry home, and about how my mother would be cooking for days before Christmas. It seemed to both of us that our past belonged to other people, not to us, at least not during that night in Belgium. So, we all lied to our families. I never told my mother about the real Christmas of 1944."
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The Day Mack Died"It was January 4, 1945. Colonel Abrams [commander of the 37th Tank Battalion] had told us to swing around to the southeast to flank a Panzer unit, so my unit and three others moved into position and began firing. The Panzers were tough, and they had plenty of anti-armor ammo with them. We kept moving over the field, firing at the Panzers, when suddenly there was a loud exposion to our left. I looked through the crack in the hood and saw Mack's tank engulfed in flames. No one was running from the tank. Mack and the other four men were killed instantly. Mack and I had grown up together, we went to LSU together, we worked together at Standard Oil, and we had joined the 37th Tank Battalion together. But I felt no sorrow for my best friend. I had to keep fighting or else we would all end up like Mack. So we pressed ahead, firing at the Panzers until they were destroyed. Then, we went back to Mack's tank. It was still smoldering, but Ben and I dragged the five burned bodies out of the wreckage, or at least what was left of them. I remember thinking that his parents would want to know how he died and what his last words were. I decided if I did make it back home, I would tell them that he died instantly and didn't suffer any pain. I put Mack out of my mind for the next three weeks as the battle continued. Finally, on the day after the battle had ended, the chaplains had a funeral service for all who had been killed in the battalion. We buried them near the field where Mack had died. I could finally feel now that the battle was over. I think the feeling was worse than the battle. My best friend was gone forever. His loss was like a knife in my stomach. I got a letter from his parents a couple of months later, asking how I was doing. They had just lost their only son, and they were concerned about me? I had to go off by myself and cry. The image of Mack's tank in flames and the thought of his parents grieving back home haunted me for years. They still do."
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The Battle of the Bulge
On December 16, 1944, the German launched a desperate offensive in the Ardennes Forest of Belgium and surrounded the position of the 101st Airborne Division near Bastogne. Allied Supreme Commander General Dwight Eisenhower asked General Patton how quickly he could move the Third Army to Bastogne. General Patton's statement that the Third Army could arrive in less than 24 hours was met with disbelief from the command staff because the entire Third Army was 150 miles southeast of Bastogne. Patton turned to the 4th Armored Division to spearhead the drive into the Ardennes. They traveled 150 miles in 19 hours to relieve the desperate 101st Airborne Division and then began the Ardennes Counter-Offensive on December 18, 1944. The Fourth Armored Division ravaged the German infantry and Panzer divisions, earning the nickname given to them by the Germans, "Patton's butchers." The American First Army, along with British and Canadian forces plus resistance fighters from both Beligium and Luxembourg, joined Patton's Third Army. The Battle of the Bulge lasted for 30 days, claiming the lives of almost 25,000 Allied soldiers, including over 19,000 Americans. It was a momentous victory for the Allies and marked the beginning of the end of Nazi Germany.