James K. (Jim) Truitt, U.S. Army

WORLD WAR II - EUROPE [A SPECIAL DAY] By James K. (Jim) Truitt

My position was Rifle Platoon Leader in Company C in the First Battalion of the 398 Regiment in the 100th Infantry Division assigned to the 7th Army. The Division entered the Line in the Lorraine area of France at the southern end near Switzerland. We were facing the Maginot line of forts built by the French for defense against the Germans. Totally useless. They just went around them. The Germans generally ignored them for their own defense, but at the southern end decided to make use of them, even though they were facing the wrong way. That really didn't make much difference since they went down seven stories and were connected at the bottom levels by tunnels. They did not rise much above ground level.

One evening I received orders to take my platoon and position the men to fire at the gun ports of the central fort, thus protecting the Battalion as it moved out on the attack in the morning.

First, I got the men into a crater created by one of our 5OO lb. bombs located right on the front line. Next, with the three squad leaders, we worked our way through low brush to the fort. It was no problem to walk up on top of the fort and locate the rotatable turret. Needless to say we were very quiet. I was surprised that I could hear the Germans talking. It turned out that it would have been very helpful if any of us could have understood what they were saying. After determining where the squads were to dig in we returned to the bomb crater, explained the plan, and headed out to the fort.

While it was still dark, everyone got their foxholes dug and we even stacked some rocks in front of the turret, screening the view of the attack area. It did seem strange that I could no longer hear the Germans talking.

As dawn came, a lone German soldier came up the hill toward us. He was not armed and he had his hands in the air obviously planning to surrender. I'm guessing, but I think he was probably a conscripted Pole. We had had a couple of these to show up very soon after we had entered the line. I had one of the men take him back to our lines. With all this going on there was still no sign of activity, (like shooting at us) from the fort. That was shortly corrected.

The Germans had seen us from some location other than the fort and called for artillery. The first round was a big one, probably 180 millimeters, perhaps 220. It sounded like a freight train coming in. This headquarters fort had a flag pole on it. That first big round took it off. Each time the big one let drive, a bunch of 75 mm pieces were fired. It was the worst barrage we had ever experienced.

We had been told that a small group had tried approaching the fort a day or so before our effort and that two of them had tried to enter the fort by going down the ladder into the moat where the entrance was located. The Germans apparently dropped a grenade into the moat. The two did not come back out. We were cautioned to stay out of that entry way. During a lull in the shelling one of my squad leaders hollered over to me that two of his men had run to the ladder and gone down into the moat and that nothing had happened. I was convinced by this time that the fort was no longer occupied so I gave the order that at the next lull all of us would head for the ladder and get out of the shelling. The moat could not be hit from that direction.

All of us got down into the moat and found the two dead GIS. The door to the fort was standing open. The artillery stopped firing at us and shifted to the area where the Battalion must have started their attack. Shortly it stopped, but there was no sign of the Battalion.

Sizing up the damage we had sustained, I found we had remarkably little.
One man had been cut by a piece of shrapnel, but not deep. My rifle which had been on the edge of my foxhole was blown apart. That seemed to be about it. The low brush on and around the fort had been totally blown away.

With the door to the fort standing open, the obvious thing was to send a few men in to check it out. I warned them that there could be booby traps, so use caution. They did find two booby traps but neither of them would have gone off. One was connected to a light switch but the power was off. The other was a pressure firing type, {shoe mine}, placed under a bunk corner. The arming pin had not been pulled. Down in the tunnel, seven floors below they found a tray of glass spheres. They brought the tray up for me to examine. From what I could make out, the clear liquid these spheres contained was nitro-glycerin. I suggested they carefully take the tray back down the stairs and leave it in the tunnel.

There still was no sign of the Battalion launching an attack. Even the German artillery had gone silent. There seemed to be nothing further for us to do, so we all went inside to await developments.

I finally made contact with our troops and found that the planned attack had been called off. I indicated in the sub title that this was a special day. It was December 16, 1944. What was special was that the Germans had mounted a substantial counter offensive up north of us. This came to be known as "The Bulge". It was kind of a last gasp, but caused our strategists to decide to pull back to holding positions.

There was nothing special about our day except for a lot of dumb luck for which I will always be grateful.

James K. Truitt

Left the service as a captain having spent most of my time, (as an officer), in the 100th Infantry Division. I was 22 and glad to be heading back to school.