Right after the mortar rounds fell, I heard an awful racket coming up the road. Couldn't imagine what on earth it was. Soon a horse came into view pulling two ammunition carts. My first thought was the Jerries had mined the carts with a time bomb. I got up and waved my hands and just as the horse got opposite me it seemed to slow up. I kept waving my hands and
the horse kept going. It was a big black fine looking animal. After it had passed I could see it had been hit with one of the mortar rounds and had part of its harness torn off.
We set up in position here and stayed the rest of the day, At about one o'clock that night I was called over to the C.P. and given the information we were going to attack the town the next morning. We were to be ready to pull out at 4:30 and I didn't wake up until then so we were about half an hour late. We moved into position in a large field just at 'the bottom of the hill. At the point we stretched out in a long skirmish line and waited for the attack. Artillery was to fall on the town 10 minutes before we attacked, Six o'clock was H hour and we started to attack. The Jerries opened up with machine guns and caused quite a few casualties. One of my men was hit in the head but not bad. His name was Felig
[Feliz?] and he had only been in the platoon a short time,
We advanced across an open field and finally I could see one of the machine guns that was causing all the trouble. Luck was with us again, because if it had been covering the field we were coming across it would have gotten each and every one of us. We ran into the town without much opposition. The men had a lot of fun cleaning the houses, throwing grenades and shooting down doors. One of my men robbed the post office and came out with a handful of Francs. We set up in the town and walked through some of the buildings. It was a nice little town and we found quite a bit of wine and cider. Sgt, Kumler and I were going through one house that had three stories. We were up on the third story and admiring the house and more or less taking it easy. I happened to walk over to a little door that led to an attic and casually opened it. There sat a German officer just as calm as you please. . I didn't have my gun so I could shoot, but did step back because I thought he might be covered from the top, I motioned for him to come out and he came out with his hands-up.
He was a typical looking Nazi officer. I kept him covered and Kumler searched him and took his pistol. He evidently had given up hope and was waiting for someone to come and get him. We took him outside to the Col. and he stepped up and saluted the Col. He surely was a good looking soldier. They talked back and forth in French. He was a 1st Lt, and I felt kind of proud to think I had captured him because we hadn't taken any officers, Most of the Germans in the town had bicycles and they were strung along both sides of the road. We were supposed to set up a road block and I decided to take one of the bicycles and ride up on a reconnaissance. I picked out one of the best bikes and rode up to a hill. Just rounded a curve and boy! a Jerry opened up on me with an, automatic weapon. The old boy just missed me and you should have seen me turn that bike around and head down the hill. The Germans at This time was laying a heavy artillery barrage on the town so we had to withdraw.
We set up again in an open field and I surely didn't like the set-up. We didn't receive any more casualties here and soon moved back to the same position we had occupied before. As we passed down the road we saw the body of a, dead officer, It was Lt. Williams, He was the youngest officer in the BN. and one of the best liked fellows. We all felt bad about this and a couple of days later a telegram came stating he was the proud father of twin boys. That would have made him the proudest man in the Army, .All of us knew his wife and she was a, very sweet person.
Later Pollack and Polasky came arid told me one of the officers was in a house drunk. They wanted to know if they should take him back and I said no, if he didn’t have any more sense than to get drunk at a time like that just let him stay. Later we found out he had combat-exhaustion.
We sat up in an old defense area and soon were relieved. It was rumored that we were going back to a rest camp. At Pretat the chow truck was coming up and had the mail on it for us. It hit a mine in the road and was blown up. Most of the mail burned so a lot of us didn't get any at all. We did move to the, rest area and went through the town of Etinville again. Just before we hit the area we saw a plane coming over and it had been hit. It was a P-47 and was coming in low. The pilot bailed out just before it crashed, but he was too late, the chute didn't open and he was killed.
At the rest area the men dug slit trenches because some artillery fire was falling in this urea. I sat up the Platoon C.P, in a little house and we had a fireplace to cook our meals.
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