The rest of the tanks returned to Consdorf for gasoline and ammunition. Task Force Riley sent tanks carrying infantry into the edge of Echternach on the morning of 19 December. American infantrymen jumped on top of the enormous Panthers and Jagdpanthers, as they rolled through the streets and killed the crews, with thermite grenades thrown into the turrets. A number of the divisional vehicles had broken down en route to Luxembourg; a part of the artillery was in divisional ordnance shops for repair. His two divisions generally had reached the line designated as the LXXX Corps objective. gathered about sixty men in the Parc Hotel as the enemy closed in. day it may be said that the German opportunity to exploit the initial surprise and attendant tactical gains commenced to fade. Both units would therefore be involved in guarding the cross-corridors and ravines which stemmed from the gorge itself. The division saw extensive action in . With this reinforcement a new defensive line was organized on the hills just east of the village. Having lost over 5,000 battle casualties and 2,500 nonbattle casualties from trench foot and exposure, the division now had to be rebuilt to something approaching its former combat effectiveness. The cemeteries are in Belgium and Luxembourg. The counterattack moved off on the morning of 18 December in a thick winter fog. . Research | Military Units | Newsletter Archives | Soldiers Registry | Veterans Assistance | WWII Memorial Registry | Books| DVDs | Film & Video. The tanks opened fire on the German flank and rear, while all the infantry weapons in the village blazed away. Since any static linear defense was out of the question because of the length of the front and the meandering course of the two rivers, Barton instructed his regimental commanders to maintain only small forces at the river outpost line, holding the main strength, generally separate companies, in the villages nearby. . howitzers, the reconnaissance company of the 803d Tank Destroyer Battalion, and the 2d Battalion, 8th Infantry, were hastily assembled in Colbet, a mile and a half south of Mllerthal, and organized at 1104 as Task Force Luckett (Col. James S. Luckett) . By 1130 the remainder of Company G, armed with rifles and one BAR, was surrounded but still fighting at a mill just north of the village, while a platoon of the 2d Battalion weapons company held on in a few buildings at the west edge of Lauterborn. The little column came in on the flank of the 2d Battalion, 320th Regiment, which was in the process of moving two companies forward in attack formation across the open ground northwest of Dickweiler. Morale was good, bolstered superbly by the company cook who did his best to emulate the "cuisine soigne" promised in the hotel brochures by preparing hot meals in the basement and serving the men at their firing posts. There they re-established contact with Company E and covered the withdrawal of outlying detachments to the hat factory. The combat engineers in Scheidgen returned to Hill 313 and occupied it without a fight. On 20 December there was savage fighting in the 4th Infantry Division zone despite the fact that both of the combatants were in the process of going over to the defensive. Strength sufficient to achieve a quick, limited penetration the German divisions possessed, so long as the assault forces did not stop to clean out the village centers of resistance. But a thick winter fog rolled in before the Americans could occupy the hill. a few houses, but were in the process of being reinforced by Nebelwerfers and armored vehicles. eleven tanks and six half-tracks and made their way past burning buildings to the new 4th Division line north and east of Consdorf. General Barton, it may be added, had refused absolutely to permit the artillery to move rearward. judgmental sampling is also known as . For this reason the 212th was assigned the mission of protecting the flank of the Seventh Army, just as the latter was responsible for guarding the flank of the forces in the main counteroffensive. Task Force Chamberlain had been placed in reserve the previous day, but it was not immediately feasible to withdraw the two task forces that were still engaged alongside the 4th Division for it would take General Barton's division a few hours to reorganize on a new line and plug the gaps left by the outgoing armored units. These units vary in size from a small number of people up to and including an Army Group. There was, of course, no means by which the VIII Corps commander could know that the Seventh Army scheme of maneuver was limited to a swing only as far as Mersch, eight miles north of the city. Battle of the Bulge Here is every one of the 158 Wisconsin burials and MIAs at the three main American cemeteries in Europe that are from the Battle of the Bulge. The 4th Division would not be left to fight it out alone. Unit commanders and noncommissioned officers were good and experienced; morale was high. By now the German artillery was ranged inaccurately. Two platoons from Company A, 19th Tank Battalion, which had just. In six days (through 21 December, after which the Americans would begin their counterattack) the units here on the southern shoulder lost over 2,000 killed, wounded, or missing. 4th Infantry Division troops dash across a Bailey bridge while under enemy fire near Moesdorf, Luxemborg, January 21, 1945. Caveat: This Battle lasted more than a month, with assignments in considerable flux. Elements of Task Force Standish were strafed by a pair of German planes but moved into Berdorf against only desultory opposition and before noon made contact with the two companies and six tanks already in the village. The prospect must have brightened considerably at the 4th Division headquarters when the promise of this reinforcement arrived. It was too late. The tank commander offered to cover the withdrawal of Company E from the city, but Capt. Middleton had nothing to offer but the 159th Engineer (Combat) Battalion, which was working on the roads. Late in the morning two enemy companies attacked Dickweiler, defended by Company I, but were beaten off by mortar fire, small arms, and a .50-caliber machine gun taken from a half-track. While CCA, 10th Armored, gave weight to the 4th Division counterattack, General Barton tried to strengthen the 12th Infantry right flank in the Osweiler-Dickweiler sector. In the central sector Companies A and G, with five light tanks, started from Lauterborn along the road to Echternach. General Beyer's orders for 20 December, therefore, called upon the 212th and 276th Volks Grenadier Divisions to crush the small points of resistance where American troops still contended behind the German main forces, continue local attacks and counterattacks in order to secure more favorable ground for future defense, and close up along a coordinated corps front in preparation for the coming American onslaught. His outfit would launch a gas filled balloon tethered to a ground-based winch. The two companies in Berdorf reported a combined strength of seventy-nine men, while the 2d Battalion of the 22d Infantry listed an average of only sixty in each company. The leading companies of the two German assault regiments began crossing the Sauer before dawn. When the fire lifted the attack was resumed, but the enemy fought stubbornly for each house. In Dickweiler the troops of the 3d Battalion, 12th Infantry, had been harassed by small forays from the woods above the village. Leake's force had only one .50-caliber machine gun and a BAR to reinforce the rifles in the hands of the defenders, but the Germans were so discouraged by the reception given their initial sorties that their succeeding attempts to take the building were markedly halfhearted. Pole charges or bazooka rounds had blasted a gaping hole in one side of the hotel, but thus far only one man had been wounded. On the night of 13-14 December the 212th commenced to strip its extended front in concentration for its part in the counteroffensive. narrow that the tanks had to advance in single file, and only the lead tank could fire. Here the 2d Platoon (with twenty-one men and two artillery observers) held out in the stone farm buildings for four days and from this position harassed the Germans moving up the ravine road to Berdorf. The right wing was held by the 99th Infantry Division, whose positions reached from Monschau to the V-VIII Corps boundary in the Buchholz Forest northwest of the Losheim Gap. After suffering more than 6,000 casualties in heavy fighting in the Hrtgen Forest during the autumn of 1944, Maj. Gen. Norman Cota's 28th "Keystone" Division was sent to an area that First Army thought would be a quiet sector to rest and replace their losses. 4th armored division battle of the bulge. The tanks were hardly out of sight before the Germans began an assault on the hat factory with bazookas, demolition charges, and an armored assault gun. The 320th had not reached Osweiler and the first assault at Dickweiler had been repulsed handily. Most important, just before midnight the corps commander telephoned General Barton that a part of the 10th Armored Division would leave Thionville, in the Third Army area, at daybreak on 17 December. By nightfall the situation seemed much improved-despite the increased pressure on the 4th Division companies closely invested in the north. Later Barton phoned the corps commander to ask for reinforcements. After two hours, and some casualties, a patrol bearing a white flag worked its way in close enough for recognition. By daybreak all wire communication forward of. At noon the picture of battle had sharper definition; so General Barton authorized the 12th Infantry to commit the 1st Battalion (Lt. Col. Oma R. Bates), the regimental reserve. There was no guarantee, however, that the enemy had committed all his forces; the situation would have to develop further before the 4th Division commander could draw heavily on the two regiments not yet engaged. In Echternach Company E, 12th Infantry, had occupied a two-block strongpoint from which it harassed the German troops trying to move through the town. Finally, in the late afternoon, Colonel Chance sent a call over the radio relay system: "Where is Riley?" Equipment, which had been in use since the Normandy landings, was in poor condition. In midafternoon the remaining companies of the 2d Battalion, 22d Infantry, started for Osweiler, advancing in column through the woods which topped a ridge line running southwest of the village. According to War Department General Order 114, December 7, 1945 there were approximately 2,000 units that received the Ardennes Credit, (The Battle of the Bulge). The Parc was a three-storied reinforced concrete resort hotel (indicated in the guide-books as having "confort moderne") surrounded by open ground. During the night of 18-19 December the 9th Armored Division (-) withdrew to a new line of defense on the left of the 4th Infantry Division. antitank gun which had been placed here to block the gorge road. The two were of one mind on the need for counterattack tactics and arranged that CCA (Brig. Picture 1 of 2. . Immediately after the Battle of the Bulge, the tag "a calculated risk" would be applied to . Barton was apprehensive that the enemy would attempt a raid in force to seize Luxembourg City, and in the battle beginning on the 16th he would view Luxembourg City as the main German objective. This was unfurled on the shattered roof. Accordingly, the 316th Infantry began to cross the Sauer, moving up behind the center of the parent division. At dark the Americans drew back to the hotel, while the Germans plastered the area with rockets, artillery, and mortar shells, lobbed in from across the river.2. At daylight on 20 December the 1st Battalion, 423d Regiment, which had been brought in from the Lauterborn area, initiated a counterattack against the team from Task Force Standish at the edge of Berdorf and recovered all the ground lost during the previous two days. Early in the day Company B and ten tanks from the 70th Tank Battalion renewed the attack at Berdorf in an attempt to break through to Company F, still encircled at the opposite end of the village. The first German assault here did not strike until about 1100, although Echternach lay on low ground directly at the edge of the river. In the early days of the Battle of the Bulge John would find himself fa. The enemy here was in considerable strength and had established observation posts on the ridges ringing Lauterborn and bordering the road. At the opposite end of the line enemy guns and mortars worked feverishly to bring down Dickweiler around the ears of the defenders, but the Americans could not be shelled out. At Lauterborn, however, they were told that the tanks could not be risked in Echternach after dark. Troops from the 320th Regiment and fusilier battalion circled around Echternach and Lauterborn meanwhile in an attempt to cut the main road at Scheidgen. Battle of the Bulge. This house-to-house assault gained only seventy-five yards before darkness intervened. Soldiers of each army grappled with knives and bayonets in the open streets as machine gun fire and mortars rained down around them. Morris had already dispatched one of his armored infantry battalions to help the 9th Armored in an attack intended to retake Waldbillig. This turned out to be only a patrol action and the enemy was quickly beaten off. Colonel Chance took Company C, the last troops of the 12th Infantry, and sent them to the 3d Battalion command post for use on the morrow. arrived from the 9th Armored, the assault gun and mortar platoons of the 70th Tank Battalion, a battery of 105-mm. First a ten-pound pole charge would be exploded against a wall or house; then a tank would clank up to the gap and blast away; finally the infantry would go to work with grenades and their shoulder weapons. The Schwarz Erntz, taking its name from the rushing stream twisting along its bottom, is a depression lying from three to five hundred feet below the surrounding tableland. In the first week of December the 4th Infantry Division (Maj. Gen. Raymond 0. It was clear that to capture Mllerthal, or even to block the southern exit from the gorge, the surrounding hills and tableland had to be won. The Fall of the Golden Lions. Meanwhile the sixty-some members of Company F remained in the Parc Hotel, whose roof and upper story had been smashed in by German shelling. New. The 82nd Airborne Division began its illustrious military career as an infantry division during World War I. Although the German penetrations on the left and in the center of the 12th Infantry sector deepened during the day, the situation on the right was relatively encouraging. American shellfire finally drove the enemy away from the bank, necessitating a new effort in broad daylight farther to the north. A white-clad soldier from the 8th Regiment, 4th Infantry Division, with young German prisoners captured during fighting in the Sauer River sector. $8.98. The Germans had cut the road back to Consdorf; so the right team of Task Force Standish was withdrawn from the attack on Hill 329 and spent most of the afternoon clearing an exit for the men and vehicles in Berdorf. At the same time elements of the 276th Volks Grenadier Division struck through Waldbillig, the point of contact between the 4th Division and the 9th Armored, in an attempt to push the right wing of the LXXX Corps forward to a point where the road net leading east to the Sauer might be more easily denied the gathering American forces. General Sensfuss had determined to erase the stubborn garrison and led the 212th Fusilier Battalion and some assault guns (or tanks) in person to blast the Americans loose. reserves to the threatened left flank to block further penetrations and to reinforce and relieve the garrison villages in the north. The 12th Infantry commander already had given permission for Company E to evacuate Echternach, but communications were poor-indeed word that the tanks had reached Company E did not arrive at the 12th Infantry command post until four hours after the event-and the relief force turned back to Lauterborn alone. In the fire fight which followed the 2d Battalion companies became separated, but the early winter darkness soon ended the skirmish. The replacements received, mostly from upper Bavaria, were judged better than the average although there. The tanks rolled down the road from Scheidgen with. The 12th Infantry was on the left (next to the 9th Armored Division) and fronting on the Sauer; the 8th Infantry was in the center, deployed on both the Sauer and Moselle; the 22d Infantry reached to the right along the Moselle until it touched the First and Third Army boundary just beyond the Luxembourg border. The 109th Infantry, the 9th Armored Division, the 4th Infantry Division, and CCA, 10th Armored Division, had to win both the time and the space required for the assembly of the American counterattack forces. It moved south to Luxembourg, "the quiet paradise for weary troops," as one report names it, taking over the 83d Infantry Division positions on the right flank of the VIII Corps (and First Army) while the 83d occupied the old 4th Division sector in the north. The plans to utilize these positions were briefed by General Barton to his commanders on the 13th. US ARMY 1ST ID FIRST INFANTRY DIVISION PATCH BIG RED ONE 1 VETERAN FORT RILEY. In December, 1944, the gorge represented a formidable military obstacle, difficult of traverse for both foot troops and vehicles, capable of defense by only a few. The American artillery forward observer's tank was crippled by a bazooka and the radio put out of commission, but eventually word reached the supporting artillery, which quickly drove the enemy to cover. Both sides were forced to rely largely upon radio communication, but it would appear that the Germans had particular difficulty: prisoners reported that "nobody seems to know where anybody else is.". During the seven days of fighting for the village between 13 and 19 December, the 78th Infantry Division lost approximately 1,515 dead, wounded, missing and injured, according to the division's records. He told Barton that if he could find the engineers he could use them. Further, the German inability to meet the American tanks with tanks or heavy antimechanized means gave the American rifleman an appreciable moral superiority (particularly toward the end of the battle) over his German counterpart. The 1st Battalion, 423d Regiment, overran three of the outpost positions, captured the company mortars, machine guns, and antitank guns sited in support of the forward detachments, and moved in on Berdorf. As a result, these two units faced four German regiments in the 12th Infantry sector. 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