Never have I been so scared in my life. My first glimpse of combat I thought would be my last. We encountered a German infantry division inside Luxemburg as we were on our way pushing towards Germany. I was a private and only recently had entered the war.
We saw the enemy in a small town, bullets followed soon after. I sought cover behind a nearby building. I peeked-ever so slightly around the corner. I saw a German infantryman. With a shaky hand I raised my M1 Garand and fired..he went down.
A volley of bullets pinged across the aged building as I resumed my position. My comrades in arms were slowly getting pushed back. I had to do something to help or this could end very badly. I didn't want to be a hero but I had to do something.
I brought out one of the standard grenades we were allowed to carry and hurled it at the enemy position as hard as I could. I began the long crawl to my brothers in arms I recognized him as Ben.
"Have you been hurt?" I asked shouting over the exchange of gunfire. "It's just my leg." He replied with a tone of great strain. I saw the wound was covered with a string of clothing. "Have you seen the medic?" "No" he answered.
"Hang in there!" I called as I continued crawling closer to the frontline. The Germans were pressing on us hard and like I said I didn't want to be a hero but I ended up doing a whole lot more than I excepted to.
Germans fired on my position and I returned fire wounding one more.
How long would this last? Everything seemed to happen in slow motion yet so much happened. I saw one American soldier on the very front line go down.
I crawled further ahead this time and encountered the sergeant and 3 others and the sergeant was saying: "We need soldiers to outflank them we need soldiers to get around the town and do so." "It is a very dangerous mission..any volunteers?"
My hand and one of the 3 others-Jerry to be specific shot up. The sergeant gave us a simple plan: Work your way around the Germans and take out as many as possible while they supplied covering fire.
We set off immediately. The Germans we made sure did not see us as they were matched with round after round of covering fire. Hurrying through the decimated town we reached a destroyed building with a nice roof for a sniper. Jerry was the company sniper so we hurried up the building as Germans approached. Once we were there Jerry took care of them.
It took us a while but we did not encounter anymore-enemy infantrymen. At last we were behind enemy lines and Jerry quickly got their attention with the sniping of one soldier and I unloaded my M1 Garand unto them.
One after one we used the element of surprise to eliminate them. The remaining Germans advanced upon us and one of their bullets caught Jerry in the chest.
There was nothing I could do for him but I tried I dragged him into the building we took cover by as bullets whizzed past us. I returned fire. The rest of the infantry advanced upon the Germans and thus diverted most of the enemy attention away from me.
3 enemy soldiers entered the building and I dodged enemy fire and I brought down the first 2 and as I raised my weapon all was a: Click!
I dropped the gun and as he raised his I tackled him and we struggled on the floor.
He threw me off of him and pulled out a knife and swung it at me. I dodged and we struggled for control of the knife he thrust it suddenly and I turned it and used his force against him sending the knife through his chest.
Eventually the Americans outlasted the Germans and it was over.
That was a day I never thought I would survive. But I did.