In December of 1944, a German attack into Belgium threatened the allied armies that had landed after the Normandy Invasion. In what became known as the Battle of the Bulge, 250,000 Germans attacked westward heading towards Antwerp, the only deep water port that was just put into service the previous month.
To stem the flood of Germans heading west, the allies sent everyone available into the fight including the 101st Airborne which quickly became surrounded in the key town of Bastogne. The 101st was rushed to the front in trucks carrying only minimal amounts of ammunition and almost no warm winter clothing. Food and medical supplies were an afterthought. The winter weather worsened into what became the coldest European winter in 30 years. Frostbite, constant enemy artillery and death was all around.
With 7 roads in and out of Bastogne, holding the town was one of the keys to slowing the German advance. Lose the town and the Germans might just have made it to Antwerp, splitting the allied armies and perhaps changing the outcome of the war.
The General in charge of the 101st at the time was Anthony McAuliffe. McAuliffe graduated from West Point in 1918, just as World War I came to an end. He joined the artillery in 1920 and spent the next 20 years in various commands around the US. He graduated from the United States Army War College as a Lt. Colonel and entered the Supply Division of the War Department where he worked on the development of the jeep and the bazooka.
With the start of the war, he joined the 101st Airborne Division as the commander of their artillery division. He parachuted into Normandy on D-Day and landed in a glider in Holland during Operation Market-Garden. McAuliffe became the Assistant Division Commander of the 101st when Lt. General Don Pratt was killed on June 6, when Pratt’s glider crashed during the D-Day landings.
When the 101st Airborne was sent to Bastogne, McAuliffe was the acting Division Commander as his boss, General Maxwell Taylor, was in the US for meetings.
On December 24, Christmas Eve, McAuliffe distributed the document below to his troops. (scroll down for a more legible copy).
McAuliffe’s Christmas Message
Reprinted below for easier reading:
Headquarters 101st Airborne Division Office of the Division Commander
24 December 1944
What’s Merry about all this, you ask? We’re fighting – it’s cold – we aren’t home. All true but what has the proud Eagle Division accomplished with its worthy comrades of the 10th Armored Division, the 705th Tank Destroyer Battalion and all the rest? just this: We have stopped cold everything that has been thrown at us from the North, East, South and West. We have identifications from four German Panzer Divisions, two German Infantry Divisions and one German Parachute Division. These units, spearheading the last desperate German lunge, were headed straight west for key points when the Eagle Division was hurriedly ordered to stem the advance. How effectively this was done will be written in history; not alone in our Division’s glorious history but in World history. The Germans actually did surround us. their radios blared our doom. Their Commander demanded our surrender in the following impudent arrogance.
December 22nd 1944 To the U. S. A. Commander of the encircled town of Bastogne.
The fortune of war is changing. This time the U. S. A. forces in and near Bastogne have been encircled by strong German armored units. More German armored units have crossed the river Ourthe near Ortheuville, have taken Marche and reached St. Hubert by passing through Hombres Sibret-Tillet. Libramont is in German hands.
There is only one possibility to save the encircled U. S. A. Troops from total annihilation: that is the honorable surrender of the encircled town. In order to think it over a term of two hours will be granted beginning with the presentation of this note.
If this proposal should be rejected one German Artillery Corps and six heavy A. A. Battalions are ready to annihilate the U. S. A. Troops in and near Bastogne. The order for firing will be given immediately after this two hours term.
All the serious civilian losses caused by this Artillery fire would not correspond with the well known American humanity.
The German Commander
The German Commander received the following reply:
22 December 1944 To the German Commander:
NUTS!
The American Commander
Allied Troops are counterattacking in force. We continue to hold Bastogne. By holding Bastogne we assure the success of the Allied Armies. We know that our Division Commander, General Taylor, will say: Well Done!
We are giving our country and our loved ones at home a worthy Christmas present and being privileged to take part in this gallant feat of arms are truly making for ourselves a Merry Christmas.
A. C. McAuliffe
McAuliffe’s response to the Germans became the stuff of legend. When the Germans received his response they had to ask the US soldier delivering the message what it meant. The soldier responded explaining that McAuliffe was declining their offer and essentially telling the Germans, “You do your worst. We’ll do our best”.
On this Christmas Eve, no matter what problems you may have, no matter that your entire 2014 year may well have been a terrible year; take a moment to reflect on something positive in your life.
When dealt a lousy deal, think about McAuliffe’s response to the Germans and just say, “N-U-T-S”.
On December 16, 1944, the Germans launched a massive attack against the Allies in the Ardennes that became known as the Battle of the Bulge. Some 250,000 German troops in 14 infantry divisions along with 5 panzer divisions surged forward against just 80,000 American troops defending a 60 mile front.
Of the roughly 180,000 US deaths in World War II in Europe, nearly 40,000 of them are tied to this battle. The US would suffer the 2nd largest surrender of troops of the war as some 7500 troops of the 106th Infantry Division surrendered at one time at Schnee Eifel (12,000 Americans surrendered at Bataan in the Philippines in April of 1942). The fighting was so intense that desertion became an issue. So much so that General Eisenhower felt forced to make an example of Private Eddie Slovak, the first and only American executed for desertion since the Civil War. More than 21,000 Americans received a military sentence of one kind or another for desertion including 29 death sentences. All were commuted except Slovak’s who had the misfortune to be undergoing a clemency review just as the Battle of the Bulge was raging and at a time when Army moral was at a low point due to fighting losses. The personnel situation was so bad that cooks and truck drivers were handed weapons and sent to the front lines.
During the course of the battle, the Nazis would commit a number of atrocities including the murder of 72 captured US troops at a place called Malmedy. And at another place called Wereth, a tiny hamlet in Belgium, 11 black troops of the 333rd Field Artillery Battalion were murdered by the SS.
It all began with a desperate plan by Hitler to try to split the allied armies and recapture the only functioning deep water port of Antwerp that was available to the allies in 1944. The hope was to isolate and cutoff the British and Canadian Armies north of the surging German Army and to force their surrender. If Hitler could not force the British and Canadian Armies to surrender, he hoped to at least try to split the Allied resolve for unconditional surrender. If Hitler could somehow accomplish this, maybe he could survive the war and remain in charge in Berlin. At a minimum, by reaching Antwerp, the Germans hoped to cut off the easy flow of supplies to all the Allied Armies in Europe and force them to go back to landing supplies in Normandy which meant huge logistic issues. Their hope was to slow down the assaults from the west so that Germany could put more of its shrinking resources into fighting the Russians who were moving west through Poland towards Berlin.
The allies were not totally in the dark about a coming German offensive. Despite the Germans trying to keep radio traffic to a minimum, decoded “Ultra” intercepts from Bletchley Park indicated that the Germans were massing for an attack although the date was uncertain. The real culprit here was the total belief by Eisenhower’s staff that the Germans were all but beaten. General Omar Bradley, in charge of the US 1st Army in the Ardennes was completely caught off guard and was lucky that he was not relieved of duty and sent home. As was often typical of the fighting in World War II, the German Generals, in this case Walter Model head of Army Group B and Gerd von Rundstedt completely outmaneuvered their American counterparts in the initial stages of the battle . And as was also typical of the Allied Generals of World War II, only one US General, George Patton, was able to act decisively and effectively to counter the surging German Army with a decisive attack of his own.
Leading the charge west for the Germans were 2 Panzer Armies. At the front of the attack was Joachim Peiper of the 6th Panzer Army who was one of Germany’s most decorated tank commanders. It was Peiper’s SS division that would perpetrate the Malmedy massacre on December 17 on the north side of the bulge. He and the overall commander of the 6th Panzer Army, Sepp Dietrich would be put on trial for their involvement in the massacre after the war.
South of Dietrich’s 6th Panzer Army, von Mantueffel’s Fifth Panzer Army attacked towards Bastogne and St. Vith, both road junctions of great importance with many roads leading out of them in all directions. Capturing these towns would give the Germans many options of where to attack next, making it more and more difficult for the Allies to defend and stop the assault.
As the battle raged, the Germans were able to surround Bastogne but could not capture it due to the tenacious defense by the US 101st Airborne. Additionally, the Germans failed to capture the high ground of the Eisenborn Ridge. Elements of the 99th Division of the US 1st Army Group under Hodges were able to hang on to the dominating heights of the ridge with effective help from the British XXXth Corps artillery. If Peiper had pushed the Americans off the Eisenborn Ridge, he could advance on the River Meuse. And if he could cross the river, the path to Antwerp was wide open.
Despite launching a surprise attack with overwhelming force, the Germans had plenty of their own problems. Their first was that Hitler promised the Wehrmacht nearly 50% more tanks than what was actually delivered. Despite having a fresh supply of Germany’s largest King Tiger Tanks, a 70 ton beast firing an 88 mm cannon that could cut through the armor of a US Sherman Tank like a hot knife through butter, they only had about 100 of them. These were mixed in with tanks of other designs. Additionally, the Germans suffered from a severe lack of fuel and the advancing Panzer Armies were forced to forage for fuel as they tried to attack west.
An even bigger German problem was that the Luftwaffe was mostly out the picture by December of 1944. As a result, the Germans had little ability to attack from the air or even to get aerial reconnaissance of the Allied positions. Coupled with the bad weather that kept everyone’s planes from flying, this severe limitation kept the Germans from knowing exactly where along the Allied lines they should attack to achieve the best results.
Further confounding the German effort was the ability by the Allies to eventually muster a huge force to counter their attack. The British under Montgomery began to arrive with large amounts of artillery and began pounding the advancing units of the 5th Panzer Army along the northern edge of the bulge on December 22. On the southern edge of the bulge, Patton’s 3rd US Army began arriving on December 23 and started cutting into the German’s southern flank. Patton was heading towards Bastogne where he intended to relieve the besieged 101st Airborne.
By December 24, with the weather starting to clear and more Allied divisions entering the fight, the German position was becoming more and more untenable. Allied resupply by air began on December 23 and large numbers of American P-47 Thunderbolt fighters began cutting into the advancing Panzer units.
On December 26, the lead elements of Patton’s army broke through to Bastogne which effectively left the advancing German armies with no easy means of retreat.
The Wehrmacht knew their position was becoming precarious on December 24 when they failed to capture the bridges over the Meuse. That evening General Hasso von Manteuffel recommended that Germany halt all forward efforts and withdraw. Hitler rejected the idea and the Germans fought on.
Heavy fighting continued for some time despite the ever worsening position of the Germans and the strengthening of the Allied position. On January 1, Eisenhower pressed General Montgomery for all out British attack from the north and for Patton to continue his drive north into the southern flank of the Germans.
As with what happened in Normandy at Falaise, for a number of reasons, the Allies were not able to close the gap and trap all the Germans inside the pocket. Large numbers of Germans would eventually escape back into Germany from the bulge after January 7, when Hitler finally agreed to allow their retreat. Even with this, it took until nearly the end of January for the front line to return to where it was before the attack began.
Although the battle is often thought of as mostly an American victory, the truth is a bit more complicated and a lot more interesting. General Omar Bradley’s handling of the US 1st Army was so poor during the battle that several of his largest divisions were moved under British General Montgomery’s command. Montgomery was able to reorganize the chaos and bring his artillery units into action against the Germans. But Montgomery and the US Army held each other in tremendously poor regard. Montgomery, often prone to self aggrandizement, held a press conference on the same day that Hitler ordered a withdrawal (January 7) where he described his own contribution as being the most significant part of the allied victory despite US troops outnumbering British troops by 10:1. As you could expect, the reaction of the US commanders was not good. Both Patton and Bradley threatened to resign. Eisenhower, encouraged by his British deputy, Arthur Tedder, who also disliked Montgomery, decided to fire Montgomery for even holding the press conference in the first place. It was only due to the intervention of Eisenhower’s Chief of Staff, that Eisenhower reconsidered and allowed Montgomery to just apologize for his poorly timed comments. All this controversy created by Montgomery probably saved Omar Bradley from being fired for his lack of defensive preparation in the first place. Either way, it all once again proved that if something big needed doing, Patton was the General who could get it done.
More than 600,000 US soldiers fought in the Battle of the Bulge and it was the deadliest of the US battles of WW2 with more than 80,000 casualties.
For black soldiers in the US Army, the battle proved to be a turning point in the history of the US Army. The shortage of fighting men forced the army to integrate many of the units fighting in the battle by bringing in black soldiers to fill in for battle loses. By breaking down this barrier to integration during a time of crisis, the US Army was no longer able to justify the segregation policy under which it had previously operated. This opened the door to full integration of the armed forces by President Truman a few years later.
Up until this point of the war, black soldiers were often relegated to all-black support units such as cooks and truck drivers. During the fighting in Italy, several all-black infantry units under US General Marc Clark had abandoned their positions during heavy fighting. Clark had written scathing reports to the General Marshall about the behavior of these all-black units. This reinforced all the stereotypes that the US Army had used to justify the non-integration policy. There is no equivalent story to the Tuskegee Airmen in the US Army’s history. But the positive result of integrated units with black soldiers fighting during the Battle of the Bulge completely changed the situation.
At the end of the battle, Germany had suffered over 85,000 casualties and had used up most of Wehrmacht’s personnel reserves. The Luftwaffe was further decimated and the Allies were poised to enter Germany proper as they raced toward the Rhein. Hitler’s hope of some sort of separate negotiated peace with the western allies was dashed thus ending any chance he might have thought he had to survive the war.
Memorial at Bastogne
Memorial at Bastogne
A view of the Malmedy Memorial
Names of the murdered on the Malmedy memorialPlaque on the Malmedy MemorialMemorial to Co. E, 506 PIR 101 Airborne on the outskirts of Bastogne on the road to Foy
Today I find myself in Puerto Galera, some 15 miles south of Batangas in the Philippines. Here to dive for a couple of weeks, today we are on-shore as Typhoon Rubi slowly moves across the Philippines creating plenty of chaos and leaving a path of destruction in its wake.
As I gaze out into the bay, I am reminded of another time in December of 1944, when, not far from here out at sea, Admiral Chester Halsey’s Task Force 38 sailed directly into the path of another Typhoon known as Typhoon Cobra.
Task Force 38 consisted of 7 fleet carriers, 6 light carriers, 8 battleships, 15 cruisers and nearly 50 destroyers. These 86 ships were operating about 300 km east of Luzon fighting to knock out as many land-based Japanese fighters as possible. This was in support of the land invasions then were underway to clear the Japanese from the many Philippine Islands.
Without the benefit of modern weather radar, what Halsey and his meteorologists didn’t realize was that a major typhoon was building in the area. On December 17, the fleet sailed directly into its path. By the time it was over, just under 800 sailors had drowned, 3 ships were lost and 28 more were heavily damaged including the relatively new Battleship Iowa.
Of the 50 destroyers assigned to TF 38, 3 were lost during the storm, the Hull, the Spence, and the Monaghan. The design of the ships was partially to blame as during the course of the war, a never ending amount of new and heavy equipment was always being added near the top of the ship. This added weight acted to raise the center of gravity of each ship, making it easier for them to capsize. As the war went on, more and more anti-aircraft guns were added to counter the threat of Japanese Kamikaze attacks. The addition of radar masts further added weight as did more torpedo launchers, and more depth charges. Already top heavy with this new added equipment, the problem was further compounded as the destroyer fleet had been running hard and was low on fuel. To compensate for the use of the fuel which is stored low in the ship below the center of gravity, the ships would pump in sea water to create ballast to keep them from becoming too top heavy. But the need to refuel in the worsening sea conditions caused considerable chaos as orders were received, rescinded, and then reversed on whether or not to pump out the sea water ballast and take on more fuel.
With their fuel tanks dangerously low and without seawater as ballast the ships became top heavy which made them prone to roll in good weather. In bad weather, it proved deadly.
Of the 3 destroyers, the Monaghan was of special interest.. She had been at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 and was on picket duty just as the attack started. A Japanese 2-man sub loosed a torpedo at her which missed by just 50 feet. The Monaghan counter attacked, ramming the midget sub and then dropping depth charges on it as it submerged. An oil slick soon appeared signifying that the sub had been destroyed. Thus the Monaghan became the first US ship to score a kill in the Pacific War.
On December 17, 1944, the Monaghan, the Hull, and the Spence, with some 900 men aboard would all capsize. Some of the men were able to get off the ship and into the water. Many more drowned as they were trapped below deck and unable to get out. For the survivors, being thrown into the ocean in a typhoon with hundred foot waves was not much better. Some of the men were able to grab onto life rings and other types of floating debris. Anything to hang on to was useful as they rolled down and then up and then down again on 100 foot swells.
At one point, the crew of a small Destoyer Escort, the Taberrer, designed for use in the North Atlantic for convoy duty spotted a few survivors of the Spence in the water. This was the first indication that a serious accident had occurred. Unfortunately, the Taberrer could not radio for help as her radio mast had been destroyed by the storm. The Taberrer herself was not in great shape. She was rolling nearly 90 degrees in one direction and then rolling nearly 90 degrees in the other direction. Her ability to withstand this sort of abuse was no accident. Her Canadian and British designers (she was actually designed as a North Atlantic Corvette) had designed her so that her center of gravity was only 18 inches above the keel. This made for a ship that would roll in high seas but would be very, very difficult indeed to capsize. Perfect for the stormy North Atlantic. The US had borrowed the design, renamed it a Destroyer Escort and built nearly a hundred of them.
Luckily for the survivors of the Hull, the Spence and the Monaghan, the quick eyes of someone on watch on the Taberrer spotted men in the water. The Captain of the Taberrer, Lt. Commander Henry Lee Plage, despite his own ship’s bad condition, began a recovery effort. The rough seas made rescuing men from the water extremely dangerous but Plage figured out that he could put the rolling ability of his ship to good use in helping to fish men out of the water. He began to time his approach to a man in the water with the roll of the Taberrer and to bring the ship alongside just as the Taberrer reached its highest roll. In this way, the crew of the Taberrer could pull a man onboard just by dragging them horizontally across the surface of the water until they landed on the deck of the Taberrer which was nearly perpendicular with the surface of the water. As the ship began to roll the other way, the man would find himself on board the Taberrer where just moments before they were floundering in the water. For more than 72 hours the Taberrer steamed back and forth in a box pattern searching for survivors. First finding survivors of the Spence, then men from the Hull, Plage had no idea how many ships had gone down and no idea how many men were still in the water. Eventually they happened across another US Warship and signaled her with their latern that at least 2 ships had gone down. With this, a fleet wide alert was issued and a much larger rescue attempt was underway. But when it was over, the Taberrer had rescued 14 men from Hull and 41 from Spence, just 56 saved from a crew of over 500. Another Destroyer Escort, USS Brown managed to find 6 men from the Monaghan as well as some others. 93 men were rescued in total, 56 by the crew of the Taberrer. More than 700 perished. For his actions during that 72 hour period, Plage would be awarded the Legion of Merit. Each and every crew member of the Taberrer was awarded the Navy Unit Commendation.
A further interesting event occurred onboard the USS Monterrey, one of the 6 light carriers assigned to TF 38. Onboard the Monterrey was a certain Lt. Gerald R. Ford. The Monterrey carried a full load of planes on its hanger deck and during the storm, one of the planes broke free from its chains. This set of a cascade of events that caused a giant fire aboard ship. The fire was so bad that the Captain was about to issue an abandon ship order when he sent a fire control team that included Ford to try one last time to put out the fires raging below deck. After about 2 hours the fire was finally brought under control at which point Ford was told to head to the conning tower to inform the Captain that the ship was saved. Communications had been cut due to the fire damage and someone needed to actually traverse the pitching flight deck to get to the conning tower. As Ford made his way across the deck, the ship rolled to more than 30 degrees causing Ford to begin sliding across the deck and right off the side of the ship. Surrounding the flight deck was a small raised metal edge that is there to prevent tools and bolts from sliding off the flight deck. As Ford slipped towards the edge of the deck he knew his only chance was to somehow grab onto this edge. If he missed it, he would go right off the side of the ship to be lost at sea. As he neared the edge, Ford jammed his foot hard onto the raised edge and desperately reached out to grab it with a hand. He contacted just enough of it so that he could contort his body 270 degrees and drop down onto a catwalk that was below the flight deck, thus saving his life.
When TF 38 returned to Ulithi Atoll, the large US anchorage in the Western Pacific that served as the US forward Naval Base during this part of the war, a Court of Inquiry was convened by Admiral Nimitz into Halsey’s handling of the events surrounding Typhoon Cobra. Although they cited errors in his judgment, Halsey was exonerated by the Court. But in June of 1945, Halsey once again sailed TF 38 into another typhoon. Although only 6 sailors lost their lives in this second typhoon, there was again considerable damage to ships and equipment. Halsey again had to face a Court of Inquiry. This time the Court was going to rule against Halsey but Nimitz stepped in and saved him from being relieved of command. There was no way that Nimitz was going to see his most successful fighting Admiral forced out of command by a typhoon.
