09 April 2015
Starter challenge: A group of small objects: a postcard from Paris dated April 9, 1945 from a GI, Dan McKay. Addressed to his sister in Billingham, Washington. It read “ Dear Sis, No [german] helmet yet. Perfume to come” written on back, A miniature of a painter with a nude on a stand, a hand sized silex/flint stone axe, a string of stone beads, a pine cone, a miniature of a mill cottage, a miniature of a double bass fiddle.
Souvenirs of War
“McKay, come on, it’s time to move out. Get your gear on the truck”. Sargent Bass was counting off his men as the convoy ahead, began to move up.
“Just a minute Sarge, I’m writing my sister.”
“I don’t care if you’re writing your mother, I want you on that truck NOW.”
“Well if they didn’t require all those apo address lines I woulda been done a long time ago” Dan thought to himself as he hastily scrawled out the note. “No helmet yet. Perfume to come.” He handed it off to the clerk checking off equipment going into the trucks, with a “Please put it in the mail bag” as he hoisted his pack up into the high back of the truck and clambered up with his rifle slung over his back.
It had been a great week of R and R. April in Paris, 1945. If it hadn’t been for the streets being filled with allies in uniform, it was almost as if the war did not exist. Dan and his 3rd platoon buddies from the first US army division had made their time in Paris well spent. And most of the men were very well spent, in energy and of their money.
How could the trinket business come back so quickly given all the resources being directed to the war effort. The streets had been filled with children hawking souvenirs and all the Gis were buying, even if it had nothing to do with the war or even Paris. Dan had his kit filled with miniatures. Not for him the bars and ladies. He had spent his time searching out galleries and looking at paintings and finding things to bring back to his family in Billingham. Wandering the streets and looking at the buildings, he had actually been a tourist for a week..
Dan was always a bit out of step with rest of his platoon. He had joined them just after Dday along with his best friend Jonesy from back home. They were thrust into a group that had started the war together in 42, all from Georgia. So Jonesy and Dan had watched each other’s back all the way across france and through the Hertgen forest fighting in the terrible winter of 44-45. And now they were heading back into the line for the final push through Germany and to bring an end to their war.
Many were looking to the long ride back to the Rhine and the Division, as a way to catch up on the rest they did not get in Paris. Recreation was over. However, the unreality of their last week began to hit them them as the miles rolled by in the back of the truck. What had begun as a chatty group, bragging of conquests, real and imagined, now turned to silence as they got further into the devastation that was north western France and what they might face in the months ahead.
It was just after midnight when their truck pulled into the row with the others. The men jumped down as their packs were thrown onto the ground and Sargent Bass formed them up.
“We’ll sleep here tonight and then tomorrow it will be back into the line. So get some chow and turn in. It will be a long day of walking.”
“Everyday is a long day of walking Sarge,” Billy Bob Johnson yelled out. “How come I didn’t get assigned to tank duty?”
“Because you’d have to think,” was the quick riposte from Sargent Bass. “I don’t want you thinking. I want you walking.”
Bass had been with these men since basic training. He gave the Georgians, especially Billy Bob, the platoon joker, a bit of slack that was not provided to the “outsiders” as Dan and Jonesy and the other replacements, were privately referred to. But Bass was hard on all the men because he cared. His experience was often all that was between them and being simple cannon fodder.
And so it began again for the platoon, the routine of war. March behind the tanks, follow them into German towns, clean out snipers, sort out prisoners, eat cold rations, sleep where they fell at night, ignore the casualties as well as the replacements that came (you did not want to get too close to people) and move ever eastward, and the meet up with the Russians.
All through April and into early May, the First Division led the way deeper into the heart of Germany. There was the constant sound of gunfire, airplanes and artillery overhead, battering the next town in their assigned path. The German army may have been beaten but soldiers were still fighting for some reason. Perhaps now, the idea of protecting their homeland had given them renewed effort, but the allies were overwhelming all opposition. On the GIs part, there was grim satisfaction in seeing the destruction they were causing. It’s payback thought many.
On May 7, it was announced that the war would end on the following day. The next morning, Sargent Bass’ platoon had been sent off from the main part of the army to secure a small German village along a hillside. Their was no reason to believe there would be any trouble. Hitler was dead, the German army disintegrated. This was just one of many mop up missions being taken on.
Bass as usual was at the head of the platoon. He had sent Billy Bob, a natural born hunter from the Georgia hills, off to scout the next village, as the men came behind in two loose files. Then there was shooting and Bass signaled the men to spread out and take cover as he went forward in a crouch with Dan and Jonesy behind.
They walked carefully up a lane which passed alongside a stream. Ahead, they saw Billy Bob, sprawled in the road, not moving. Bass sent Jonesy back to bring up the platoon and motioned Dan to follow him as they crept ever more slowly along the bank of the stream.
On the hillside above was a small cottage with a mill wheel being turned by the water sluicing down from behind, then flowing on into the stream along the road. With a nod, Bass sent Dan off to the right with the intent to flank the cottage where the shot must have been fired at Billy Bob.
All Dan’s senses were now on overload. A year’s worth of these experiences had made him wary of every sound and signal. However, the cascade of the water flowing over the wheel, made it difficult to hear imminent danger.
Dan looked back and saw the platoon coming across the field to the left preparing to assault the cottage. Just then shots rang out and again the platoon hit the ground, searching for cover and began shooting back at the cottage.
Dan, careful to avoid the fire from his own men now found himself in a thick grove of pine trees to the side of the cottage trying to see where the German shots were coming from. It was at that moment that he heard footsteps behind, hurtling at him. He barely had time to turn his head before a large blond haired man in a tattered German uniform was on him.
Dan’s rifle was knocked from his hands as the man launched himself onto Dan’s back. The German had a bayonet in hand and thrust it at Dan who barely managed to roll away and avoid the point. But the German was bigger than Dan and he came on again and they were now embraced in each others arms, grappling to the death..
Dan’s left hand held onto the right wrist of the German, the one with the knife, while he flailed away with his right fist with little effect. As they rolled on the ground, Dan’s right hand touched a large sharp stone which he managed to grab. Using all his flagging strength, he began to pummel the German’s head with the rock. Finally Dan hit him with the sharp edge right above the German’s ear who then slumped to the ground with a big sigh, ending up on his back as Dan, astride, hit him repeatedly, in a blind rage of pent up fear and stress,
Just then Jonesy came up and shouted, “Dan. Stop! Dan. He’s finished.”
Dan, exhausted, on his knees, looked down at the still form in front.
“I thought I had bought it there for a while,” Dan gasped.
Jonesy looked down at the German and then gave a wry smile to Dan. “Well, I guess you got your war souvenir.”
“What do you mean Dan?” replied. “He has no equipment but his knife. He barely has a uniform.”
“Yeah,” Jonesy said. “Look at his name.”
Dan looked down at the name stripe sewn above the pocket of the dirty uniform shirt and read out loud, “Helmut Jergens.”
After a moment, realizing the allusion to his often joked about war memento, Dan added softly, “Well, its not the helmet I wanted. But I think I was very lucky to have been able to get this one.”