My plane, I was the jumpmaster, was bouncing around like a bucking
bronco. Our pilot turned on the red light short of our destination and
my stick (the jumpers in the plane) stood up and hooked up at my
command. I ordered them to stand in the door and sound off. Each man
called out " his number all OK" meaning that he was hooked up and ready
to jump.
We could hardly stay on our feet the plane was bouncing around so much.
Then the pilot turned on the green light and my stick followed me out
the door into the night and the flak. Once out of the plane the night
was very quiet and the flak not so near.
We were very low when we jumped; about 500 feet above the ground, just
high enough for our chutes to open before we hit the ground. I had only
a moment to check my feet and my equipment before landing. I landed in
the corner of a cow pasture in tall thistles that made it impossible to
see anything at ground level.
As I lay on the ground getting out of my chute I heard footsteps coming
toward me so I rolled over on my stomach, cocked my Tommy gun and waited
breathlessly. Whatever was coming toward me was making plenty of noise
against the brush and bushes and their pace was very steady. I was
ready, tensely waiting and ready to fire.
Then out of the night came a black and white milk cow that was as glad
to see me, as I was to see her. She walked right up and licked me in the
face as I lay there. She did not want to leave me. Within a moment I was
out of my chute; I stood up, arranged my equipment and listened for
other sounds. The cow followed me to the fence, which I crawled through.
I could hear footsteps on my left so I walked toward them and ran into
one of my own men. It was strange, we had just separated from the plane,
yet I was so glad to see him it was as if we had been apart for years.
I asked him if he had seen any others from our stick and he said "no".
Then another man from the stick walked up and I sent him up a telephone
pole to cut the wires.
Within the next 10 minutes all 18 men in my stick reported in and we
started down a road in the direction of a firefight and burning
buildings we could hear and see in the distance. The burning buildings
lit up the sky in a bright orange glow ... we were at war.
As we walked along we came to a large farmhouse and I went to the door
and knocked. It was about 2 a.m. by now and a French woman in her night
robe and hat came to the door. I spoke very little French and she spoke
no English but she did point in the direction of the fire and kept
saying, "Bosh, Bosh". We went back to the road and continued
walking toward the firefight and red glow of buildings burning in the
distance. As we went along I kept collecting other paratroopers who
could not find their own units.
I had them fall in at the rear of my small column as we continued on our
way. After about a half hour we walked right into the Division
Headquarters of the 82nd Airborne Division.
Staff officers were working in the dim lights of lanterns and talking
very softly. A staff officer saw my group come in and he stopped me
with..."Sergeant, what unit are you from?" I told him I was from E Co.,
2nd Battalion, 508th Regiment. Then he asked me how many men I had with
me.
"I have 18 men of my own stick and a few others that joined me as we
came along...I think about 25 all together. There are 2 men from the
101st Division."
The staff officer said, "Let's go check your column." We started walking
down the road where my men were lying down.
They all got up when they saw the officer with me. It was still dark and
hard to see clearly. Every thing was in slow motion, whispers and
shadows. The staff officer and I continued walking on down the line,
asking each man what unit he was from. When we got to the end of the
line, there were over 40 troopers in it; the last three men were
officers.
The staff officer became very angry and asked the officers what they
were doing in the back of the column when they should have been up front
and in charge.
One of the officers, a Major, replied, "He seemed to know where he was
going and what he was doing and as I had no idea where we were I just
let him lead on." The staff officer then told the officers to go report
in at the Division Headquarters and then he had the men from the
different units join up together and wait for him to come back.
He said to me, "First Sergeant, you take your men along with the two men
from the 101st, they said they wanted to go with you." He then pointed
in a southerly direction, and said to walk that way for about a mile and
you will find Col. Lindquist, your commanding officer, at the edge of
the river. Then he added, "I just left him there. The colonel will be
very happy to see you because he told me all of his men in Regimental
Headquarters Company had their typewriters but no guns. He is mad as
hell."
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