In August of 1942, at the age of 22, I was drafted and given a choice of what I wanted to do. I chose to be trained for Field Artillery. I had an uncle in Field Artillery during
World War One and that’s the only reason I chose it. Not a very good reason, but that was it.

During basic training a buddy and I went to my commanding officer and asked, "What do we have to do to become officers?" So he told us we should go to night school and study for the test. This was a six-week prep course and included mathematics, trigonometry, and field artillery among other things. I took the course at night, and did Basic during the day. I took the Officer Candidate School tests, and I barely passed, but I did pass!

Next I was off to Fort Sill, Oklahoma, for Artillery and Officer training. On March 18,1943 I was commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant. I remember the training as being physically and mentally difficult. It was wintertime and we did lots of crawling around outside on cold hard ground with live ammunition being fired overhead. We’d crawl through obstacle courses and under barbed wire. I also had a month long survey course; map reading is essential for the artillery. Next I had two months of "sound and flash" training.

I was assigned to the 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion and shipped off to Great Britain in the fall of 1943. The reality of what was to come hit home when an oil tanker just off the left bow on the trip overseas was blown up by a German submarine. It exploded into fire and it was a fearsome sight.

In September of 1944, my unit and I landed in France on Omaha Beach in a landing ship and quickly went into combat at Aachen, Holland. My job was to command a Sound and Flash unit. Our mission was to place instruments and microphones along the front line that would detect the position of the German artillery units, relay any intelligence information we could gather, and determine the coordinates to successfully adjust our artillery to support our infantry.

To accomplish our goals we had to get close enough to actually see the enemy. That made it a dangerous job. We placed our instruments about every 1,500 yards apart along the front line. Since we were an artillery unit, the sound and fury of incoming artillery always surrounded us. My personal weapon when I first arrived was a .45 pistol. My most vivid memory of the war is the sound of me loading my .45, and the feeling in the pit of your stomach-- "now it starts"--you are going into battle where there are people whose job it is to kill you. The funny thing is that I never even qualified with a .45! I trained with a carbine and achieved expert. I finally traded my .45 for a Thompson submachine gun, because even if I wasn’t very accurate, I sure could spray a lot with one!

A typical day for me was trying to keep from getting killed. Sometimes we had good shelter and sometimes we didn't. Our food was typically A-rations, prepared by cooks in the field, which weren't very good. Actually they were fairly awful. It’s not that the cooks were bad, it was the stuff they had to work with. We also had C-rations, which were actually pretty good, and D-rations, which were chocolate bars pumped up with nutrients. I never really went hungry, but it sure was frigid that winter in Europe.

I spent Christmas of 1944, cold and sleeping in a pup tent. On Christmas Eve the war "shut down" at midnight on both sides and it was quiet for a few blessed minutes. I also remember during the Battle of the Bulge when a portion of the army was trapped in Bastogne. General Patton gets the credit for the breakthrough, but I can still envision the sun coming out as our planes flew overhead and the sound the planes made going over. I think they softened up the Germans and were responsible for the break.

The saddest experiences during the eight months I spent in Europe were learning of the massacre of many of my friends by the Germans at Malmedy, Belgium and the
death of my brother in Europe. I had been with that platoon of 30 men until just before coming to Europe so I knew those men well. They should have been taken prisoner, but the Germans just shot them all. I saw my brother overseas once just for a few minutes and then two weeks later he was killed in action.

Being scared was a normal part of being a participant in the war. Whenever I would hear the "whump, whump" of artillery fire or the sounds of a Burp gun it was a scary time. My unit saw action from Holland, through the Hurtgen Forest in the
Ardennes, the Battle of the Bulge in Belgium, and Germany until the end of
the war in May. Our unit was so busy all the time; it helped control the fear.

As an officer one of my duties was to censor the enlisted men’s mail. It was not a pleasant job. Some guys would write stuff just for the effect it would have on the censor. What I found interesting at the time was that the guys on the front lines, the ones who were in the most constant danger, wrote the most uplifting and cheerful letters. The support personnel, the supply drivers and cooks, fellows like that were having the most difficult time with the war. Their letters were depressed and fearful. Now, I think it was a coping mechanism for the men.

We always had a few very unpopular guys in the unit. They walked around, not even trying to keep hidden. They were full of bravado. I realize now that they were the most frightened of all and this was their way to keep from breaking. Sometimes guys did funny things to keep their sanity. One fellow fastened a globe to the hood of his jeep to identify it as his. We always knew who was coming when we saw that globe.

Today I wonder at how little I regarded death of the enemy. It was extremely disturbing to see dead GIs or even dead animals on the battlefield and yet I could walk right by a dead German soldier and feel nothing, no regret. I find that difficult now. Hitler and Goebbels and the rest of their gang had no qualms whatsoever about taking human life. Near the end of the war, you realized the German soldiers were kids too. At the end they were sending 14 and 15-year-old boys and 60-65 year old men to war. They didn’t even have uniforms.

Infantry takes a break during the night, but not the artillery, so we were at war 24 hours a day. I got my very first break from combat in May of 1945 and was in Paris on May 8, VE Day. Paris is a pretty wild town anyway and it was pandemonium that day as everyone celebrated in the streets. I was glad the war was over in Europe and I fully expected to go to the Pacific to fight the Japanese.

Now I am very sad for all the people, especially the noncombatants, who were killed during the war but I can never, ever forget how relieved our unit was when the A-bomb was dropped. We were certain we were headed to the Pacific. Not only were there the Japanese to worry about, there were all those horrible tropical diseases like malaria to be endured. We loved Harry Truman because he had the courage to make the decision that he did.

I came home from Europe in the summer of 1945 and was separated from the Army on May 20, 1946 as a First Lieutenant. The Army awarded me three Bronze Stars, the American Theater Ribbon, and the Victory Medal.

I am proud to have done my duty as a citizen. I would never hesitate to counsel young people to enter the armed services. It is an uplifting experience and makes you proud to be a part of this wonderful country. I entered the service a buck private and left as an officer and that gave me a lot of confidence. I was able to go to school for much of the time and I learned a lot. All I all being in the military was a positive experience for me. My grandson is a Marine, and I’m very proud of him.