Band of Brothers

12 THE BREAKING POINT *

BASTOGNE

January 1-13,1945

During the siege Easy had been on the defensive, taking it. The greatest disadvantage to being on the defensive in the woods was that the pines gave an optimum tree burst to artillery shells. But in other ways being on the defensive had some decided advantages. By New Year's Day, the snow was a foot deep in some places, frozen on top, slippery. Even the shortest infantry movements were made under the most trying conditions. To advance, a man had to flounder through the snow, bending and squirming to avoid knocking the snow off the branches and revealing his position. Visibility on the ground was limited to a few meters. An attacker had little contact with the men on his left and right, and he could not see a machine-gun position or a foxhole until he was almost on top of it. There were no roads, houses, or landmarks in the woods, so an advancing force would report its position by radio only by approximation. Squads on the attack had to move on compass bearings until they bumped into somebody, friend or enemy. Ammunition boxes for resupply were hand-carried to the foxholes, as always, but in this case by men who had no clear idea of direction.

Attacking in the cleared grazing fields was equally daunting. There was only one road, Noville-Foy-Bastogne, and it was ice-coated on top, with black ice under the snow. German 88s were zeroed in on the road, which was also mined. But the alternative to attacking down the road was to come cross-country over the fields, which offered no concealment.

The cultivated woods that had been home to Easy for twelve days were called the Bois Jacques. They extended to Easy's right (east) a couple of kilometers, to the railroad track and beyond. To its front (north) an open field sloped down to the village of Foy. The Germans held the Bois Jacques to the northeast. Their position was a wedge into the 101st lines; it was the closest they were anywhere to Bastogne, only 3 kilometers away. Before the 101st could launch any general offensive, the Germans had to be driven from the Bois Jacques and Foy taken. The next objective would be the high ground around Noville.

New Year's Day was quiet, but that evening Division assigned 2nd Battalion of the 506th the task of attacking and clearing out the Bois Jacques. That night, a few German planes dropped bombs on E Company. Sergeant Toye was hit by a piece of shrapnel on his wrist. This was his third wound; he had been hit in Normandy and then again in Holland. He was a walking wounded; the medic sent him back to the aid station to get patched up. Before leaving, Toye checked in with Sergeant Malarkey, who said in parting, "You lucky S.O.B!"

To carry out the attack, at first light on January 2 the battalion shifted to its right, to the railroad track; 1st Battalion, in regimental reserve, moved into 2nd Battalion's old position. Second Battalion formed skirmish lines on the Foy-Bizory road, looking to the northeast into the dense woods, waiting for the order to move out. (This was the same place from which 1st platoon had moved out on patrol on December 22.) A battalion of the 501st was on 2nd Battalion's right. It would be attacking in support.

Winters called out the command, "Move out!" The men began the advance. Moving in those dense woods was an exhausting process under the best of circumstances, completely so when carrying rifles, machine-guns, mortars, grenades, knives, ammunition, and rations. The struggle to get through caused the body to sweat profusely, which was not a problem until one stopped; after a few minutes the wet underclothing could chill the body to the bone.

Immediately upon plunging into the woods, contact between platoons, even squads, sometimes even man to man, was lost. The snow and trees absorbed the noise so that even the clank of equipment, a sign that the men on each side were advancing with you, was absent. The sense of isolation coupled with the feeling of tension to create a fearful anticipation of the inevitable enemy response.

Machine-gun fire from directly in front hit E Company. Simultaneously, supporting American artillery began to whine over the heads of the men. Immediately German artillery fired back, but not as counterbattery; the German shells were landing in and on the paratroopers. As quickly as it started, the firing ceased. In Sergeant Christenson's analysis, "The denseness of the woods was a bewilderment and confusion to the Krauts, whose visibility was no better than ours. Had they known that two battalions were moving toward their position in giant skirmish lines, the shelling and machine-gun fire would have been much more intense."

The advance resumed. Again machine-gun fire broke out, as the lead elements began to encounter the German OPs. American artillery resumed firing, salvo after salvo. German counterfire became intense. Cries of "I'm hit!" and shouts for medics could be heard all along the line. Still the advance continued. Men threw grenades and fired their rifles at Germans retreating through the woods.

After covering between 800 and 900 meters (Easy Company men refer to this as the "1,000 yard attack"), the attackers came to a logging road through the woods. There most of them halted, but some men penetrated a few meters into the woods on the other side to make certain no Germans were hiding there. Christenson was standing on the road with a few of his 1st platoon men when suddenly, to the right, there was the most improbable sight. A German soldier on horseback came galloping into view. As the Americans saw him, he saw them. He whirled the horse around and began to retreat. Corporal Hoobler quickly got off three shots, smiled and jumped into the air, shouting, "I got him! I got him!" Christenson found himself having the odd thought that he had been hoping the horseman would make his getaway.

From over to the left, in the woods across the road, Pvt. Ralph Trapazano called out, "Hey, Chris, I've got a Kraut." Christenson moved down in his direction, went 5 meters past his position, and cut into the woods, holding his M-1 ready to fire with safety off. He approached the German from his right side. "There stood a very strong looking S.S. trooper; camouflage jacket on, submachine-gun in his left hand, his arms hanging straight down his sides. But his weapon was pointed at Trap. Trap was down in a prone position with his M-l pointed at the Kraut's chest. There wasn't a hint of fear on the S.S. trooper's face."

Christenson pointed his M-l at the German's chest and told him, in his high school German, to drop his weapon. The German looked in Christenson's eyes and saw he meant to shoot, looked at his rifle and sensed that Christenson was taking up the slack on the trigger. He dropped his submachine-gun and raised his hands.

Christenson told Trapazano, "The next time you are confronted with an arrogant son-of-a-bitch like this, shoot the bastard."

So far Easy had been lucky. To its right the 501st had been attacked while it was attacking. The 26th SS Panzer Grenadier Regiment of the 12th SS Division (Hitlerjugend) hit with tanks, artillery, and infantry, inflicting heavy loss. On Easy's left flank, tanks and infantry from the 9th SS Division hit the other companies of the 502nd."But in Easy's sector, things were relatively quiet.

Darkness was coming on. The word went down the line to dig in. The men were harassed by sporadic machine-gun fire and occasional artillery bursts, which prompted them to cut branches from the nearest source to cover their foxholes. This was dangerous and difficult, because it meant exposure. When machine-gun fire or shell fire came in, it was a desperate mad dash for the foxhole, with adrenalin racing through the body. When the foxhole sanctuary was complete, a man was exhausted, his clothes and body drenched with sweat. Now he sat, got cold, then colder, then began uncontrollable shivering. "When you were convinced that your body could stand no more," Christenson commented, "you found out that it could."

Hoobler was in a state of exhilaration after shooting a man on horseback. He moved from one position to another, hands in his pockets, batting the breeze with anyone who would talk. In his right hand pocket he had a Luger he had picked up on the battlefield. A shot rang out. He had accidentally fired the Luger. The bullet went through his right thigh, severing the main artery. In great pain, Hoobler rolled about the ground, crying out for help. Private Holland, the 1st platoon medic, tried to bandage the wound. Two men carried Hoobler back to the aid station, but he died shortly after arrival.

It was a severely cold night that never seemed to end. Dawn came slowly. There was no firing. Sergeant Martin came walking down 1st platoon lines. Although his reputation was that he seldom raised his voice and never gave orders in a harsh tone, this time he said gruffly, biting off the words, "I want all the 1st platoon noncoms at the platoon CP in ten minutes."

Sergeants Rader, Randleman, Muck, and Christenson, and Cpls. Robert Marsh and Thomas McCreary gathered at the CP. Martin suggested that they sit down. Lts. Stirling Horner, Peacock, and Foley were there. Horner spoke first: "Your platoon commander, Lieutenant Peacock, has been awarded a thirty-day furlough to the States and he leaves today." He explained that the PR man at Division HQ thought it would be a great idea to send one officer from each regiment involved in the heroic defense of Bastogne to the States for a war bond drive and other publicity purposes. Colonel Sink decided to make the selection by drawing lots. Captain Nixon won, Peacock came in second in the 506th. Nixon said he had already seen the States and didn't want to go, so Peacock got the assignment.

Everyone looked at Peacock, who stammered, "I have been awarded this furlough, I feel certain, because of the great job you men did in Holland and here, and the only thing I can say is thanks."

Sergeant McCreary jumped up, ran to Peacock, and started pumping his hand, saying, "Boy, am I glad to hear you're going home, Lieutenant! That's the best news we've had since we left Mourmelon."

Peacock, completely misunderstanding, blushed. He said he felt overwhelmed, that praise from one of the men was the highest praise. The sergeants smiled at each other. They were feeling as happy to see Peacock going as he was to be going. The noncoms felt they had carried his load throughout Holland and the Ardennes. "No one tried harder than Peacock," Christenson declared, "but it was a job he was not cut out for."

Peacock announced that Lieutenant Foley was taking command of the platoon. Then with a cheery "Good luck to you all," he was gone.

As Peacock left, Father John Maloney brought Joe Toye back from the aid station in Bastogne in his jeep. He dropped Toye off by the road. Toye started walking across the field toward the front line. Winters saw him, his arm in a sling, heading back toward the front.

"Where are you going?" Winters asked. "You don't have to go back to the line."

"I want to go back with the fellows," Toye replied, and kept walking.

That afternoon, January 3, Winters pulled 2nd and 3rd platoons, plus an attached bazooka team from the 10th Armored, out of the advanced position. He left 1st platoon, temporarily attached to D Company, which like most of the companies in the 101st was down to 50 percent or less of authorized strength and needed help to maintain the MLR. Second and 3rd platoons began hiking back to their old position in the section of the woods overlooking Foy.

It was about 1530. The lead units decided to take a shortcut across the open field to get to the foxholes before dark. The other units followed. The Germans saw them.

When the men ducked into the woods, they noticed immediately that the Germans had zeroed artillery in on the position. There were shell holes and branches from tree-bursts all around the foxholes. The shell holes were big, indicating heavy artillery, probably 170 mm. No one had to give an order; every man went to work at once to strengthen the cover of his foxhole.

Sergeant Lipton grabbed an ax and ran over to the nearest small trees, about 50 meters beyond his foxhole. He heard German guns open in the distance. There was not enough time to get back to his foxhole, so he jumped into a small open hole someone had started to dig and then abandoned. It was so shallow that even when lying flat in it, Lipton's head from his nose up was above ground. So he saw the first shells bursting in the trees.

The sound was deafening and terrifying. The ground rocked and pitched as in an earthquake. The men from the bazooka team had no foxholes; two of them were killed immediately, a number of others wounded.

Sgt. Joe Toye was in the open, shouting orders to his men to take cover. "They always said if you can hear the shells, you'll be O.K.," he recalled. "I did not hear the shell." It exploded just above him. Shrapnel all but tore off his right leg and hit him in the stomach, chest, and both arms. (The shrapnel in his chest area was later removed by two separate operations, taking it out from the back.)

As suddenly as it began, the shelling stopped. It had been the worst shelling Easy had endured in the war. All through the woods men were calling out for a medic. Lipton ran back to his foxhole to get his rifle, expecting an infantry attack. He heard someone moaning in the next foxhole; a tree 16 inches in diameter had fallen over it. Lipton tried to move the tree, but could not. Help arrived. The men dug around the tree, and Pvt. Shep Howell came out grinning.

Toye yelled for help; he wanted someone to drag him into his foxhole. Sergeant Guarnere got to him first and began dragging him over the ground.

The shelling resumed. The Germans had planned well. As they anticipated, the pause had brought men out of the foxholes to help the wounded. A shell burst over Guarnere's head. Shrapnel tore into his right leg, mangling it. After a few minutes, the shelling ceased.

Lipton came out of his foxhole. Lieutenant Dike called out to him. "I can still hear him with that deep voice of his," Lipton recalled. "He was about 25 yards away, without his helmet or a weapon. 'Sergeant Lipton,' he yelled to me, 'you get things organized here, and I'll go for help.' And with that he left."

Lipton began rounding up the men who had not been hit. "Some of them were close to breaking, some were amazingly calm." He sent some to tend to the wounded, others to organize to receive the infantry attack he was sure was coming. Then he went to check on Guarnere and Toye.

Lipton looked down at Guarnere. Guarnere looked up and said, "Lip, they got Guarnere this time." Malarkey joined them. Guarnere and Toye, as he recalled, were conscious and calm, no screaming or yelling. "Joe says, 'Give me a cigarette, Malark.' And I lit the cigarette for him."

There was a pause in our interview. I urged him to go on. "I don't want to talk about it," Malarkey said. Another pause, and then he continued: "Joe smoked, looked at me, and asked, 'Jesus, Malark, what does a man have to do to get killed around here?' " Stretcher bearers got to Guarnere first. As he was being carried away he called out to Toye, "I told you I'd get back to the States before you!"

2O6

THE BREAKING POINT

Lt. Buck Compton commanded 2nd platoon. He was very close to his men, too close in the opinion of the officers. "Compton was a close friend of mine," Malarkey said. "He didn't like the status symbol in the Army. He was more friendly with enlisted men than he ever was with officers." He was especially close to Guarnere and Toye.

When he came out of his foxhole, Compton saw carnage all around him. The nearest wounded were his friends Guarnere and Toye, their legs dangling from their bodies, their blood turning the snow bright red all around them.

Compton started running to the rear, shouting for medics, or help of some kind. He finally calmed down at the aid station; it was found he had a severe case of trench foot. He was evacuated.

Compton had won a Silver Star at Brecourt Manor on June 6, 1944. He had been wounded later in Normandy, and again in Holland. He had stood up to everything the Germans had thrown at him from December 17 to January 3. But the sight of his platoon being decimated, of his two friends torn into pieces, unnerved him.

Peacock gone, Dike-taking a walk, Compton gone, one replacement lieutenant who had turned himself in to the aid station with trench foot (which by this time almost every member of the company had) and another who was suspected of shooting himself in the hand—the battalion commander had to be concerned with the problem of the breaking point. Winters related his feelings in an interview: "I had reached that stage in Bastogne where I knew I was going to get it. Sooner or later, I'm gonna get it. I just hope the hell it isn't too bad. But there never was a fear in me that I was gonna break. I just felt that I was going to be hit sooner or later. But as far as the breaking point, no."

After a reflective pause, he went on, "But you don't see people getting hit around you every day, every day, every day, continuing on and on, and—not knowing how long this was going to go on. Is this going to go on forever? Am I ever going to see home again?"

For the officer, he continued, with the additional burden of making decisions constantly, under pressure, when there had been a deprivation of sleep and inadequate food, it was no wonder men broke.

BASTOGNE, January 1-13, 1945

2O7

It was the policy of the U.S. Army to keep its rifle companies on the line for long periods, continuously in the case of the companies in infantry divisions, making up losses by individual replacement. This meant that replacements went into combat not with the men they had trained and shipped overseas with, but with strangers. It also meant the veteran could look forward to a release from the dangers threatening him only through death or serious wound. This created a situation of endlessness and hopelessness, as Winters indicated.

Combat is a topsy-turvy world. Perfect strangers are going to great lengths to kill you; if they succeed, far from being punished for taking life, they will be rewarded, honored, celebrated. In combat, men stay underground in daylight and do their work in the dark. Good health is a curse; trench foot, pneumonia, severe uncontrollable diarrhea, a broken leg are priceless gifts.

There is a limit to how long a man can function effectively in this topsy-turvy world. For some, mental breakdown comes early; army psychiatrists found that in Normandy between 10 and 20 percent of the men in rifle companies suffered some form of mental disorder during the first week, and either fled or had to be taken out of the line (many, of course, returned to their units later). For others, visible breakdown never occurs, but nevertheless effectiveness breaks down. The experiences of men in combat produces emotions stronger than civilians can know, emotions of terror, panic, anger, sorrow, bewilderment, helplessness, uselessness, and each of these feelings drained energy and mental stability.

"There is no such thing as 'getting used to combat,' " the army psychiatrists stated in an official report on Combat Exhaustion. "Each moment of combat imposes a strain so great that men will break down in direct relation to the intensity and duration of their exposure... psychiatric casualties are as inevitable as gunshot and shrapnel wounds in warfare... . Most men were ineffective after 180 or even 140 days. The general consensus was that a man reached his peak of effectiveness in the first 90 days of combat, that after that his efficiency began to fall off, and that he became steadily less valuable thereafter until he was completely useless."1

1. Quoted in Keegan, The Face of Battle, 335-36.

By January 3, 1945, Easy Company had spent twenty-three days on the front line in Normandy, seventy-eight in Holland, fifteen in Belgium, a total of 116. Statistically, the whole company was in danger of breaking down at any time.

There was no German infantry followup attack that night, nor in the morning. The medics cleared out the wounded. The bodies of the dead stayed out there, frozen, for several more days. Lieutenant Dike reappeared. Things got back to normal.

On January 5, E Company was pulled back to regimental reserve south of Foy. There two men, the acting battalion commander and the 1st sergeant of E Company, thought about the same problem, the officers of that company.

As Winters put it, "I look at the junior officers and my company commanders and I grind my teeth. Basically we had weak lieutenants. I didn't have faith in them. What the hell can I do about this?" He knew that if he were lucky enough to get some additional officers, they would be replacements just over from the States, after completing a hurry-up training program. As to the company commander, Winters stated flatly: "Dike was sent to us as a favorite protégé of somebody from division HQ, and our hands were tied."- Winters saw no quick solution. In the meantime, he decided, "In a pinch, talk to your sergeants."

His 1st sergeant wanted to talk. Lipton asked for a private conversation. Winters said to meet him in the woods behind battalion CP that night.

They met, and Lipton expressed his concern about the company commander. He described Dike's actions, or lack of them, with damning detail. He ended by saying, "Lieutenant Dike is going to get a lot of E Company men killed."

Winters listened intently, asked a few questions, kept his own counsel.

Replacements came in. "I could not believe it," John Martin confessed. "I could not believe that they were going to give us replacements and put us on the attack. I figured, Jesus, they'll take us out of here and give us some clothes or something. But, no, they get you some replacements, and 'Come on boys, let's go.' And then that's when we start attacking."

He was right. The woods form a U around Foy, with the village smack in the middle. In the attack of January 3, the Americans had taken control of the right hand portion of the U. Next would come an attack on the left hand portion.

On January 9 the company participated in the clearing operation in the woods west of Foy. Resistance was light. The company reached its objective and dug in.

Suddenly a shell burst in the trees, then another and another. They kept coming. Cpl. George Luz was caught out in the open. He began racing toward his foxhole. Sergeant Muck and Pvt. Alex Penkala called out to him to jump in with them, but he decided to get to his own and with shell bursts all around, splinters and branches and whole trees coming down, made it and dived in.

Lipton was sharing a foxhole with Sgt. Bob Mann, the Company HQ radio man. The Germans sent over some mail. A shell that was a dud hit just outside their foxhole. Lipton looked at it. Mann lighted a cigarette. Lipton had never smoked, but he asked for one, and that night had his first cigarette.

Luz went to check on Muck and Penkala, the men who had offered to share their foxhole with him. The hole had taken a direct hit. Luz started digging frantically. He found some pieces of bodies and a part of a sleeping bag.

The 101st now held all the woods that encircled Foy from the east, west, and south. But Foy, down in its little valley, was not the objective; Noville and the high ground was. General Taylor had wanted to carry on the January 9 attack right into Noville, but for that he needed tank support, and as the tanks could only operate on the road, he had to have Foy. The village had already changed hands four times.

The 2nd Battalion of the 506th got selected to take Foy. It was pulled out of the line west of Foy and put back in south of the village. Winters picked Easy to lead the assault. It was a simple, brutal operation. Charge across an open, snow-covered field of some 200 meters in length down into the village, where every window could be a machine-gun post, where every German had brick-and-mortar protection, that was all there was to it. No subtlety, no maneuvers, just charge and get close enough to the enemy to use grenades to root them out of rooms. The key was to get across the field quickly. If the men pressed the attack, if the cover fire was heavy enough, it should be simple. If they paused, it could be costly.

Division ordered the attack to kick off at 0900. Winters did not like the timing. He argued for a first-light start, to reduce exposure, but was turned down. Winters was watching as Easy formed up for the attack. Standing behind him was a platoon leader from Dog Company, 1st Lt. Ronald C. Speirs.

Speirs was an officer with a reputation. Slim, fairly tall, dark hair, stern, ruggedly handsome, he cultivated the look of a leader, and acted it. One of his fellow D Company junior officers, Lt. Torn Gibson, described him as "a tough, aggressive, brave and resourceful rifle platoon leader." His nicknames were "Sparky" (among his fellow officers) and "Bloody" (with the enlisted). He had led a bayonet attack and won the Silver Star in Normandy. There were stories. The rumor mill swirled around Lieutenant Speirs. No one ever saw "it" happen with his own eyes, but he knew someone who did. They may be just stories, but they were believed, or half-believed, by the men of E Company.

One story was about the time in Normandy when Speirs had a major problem with drinking in his platoon. He put out a blanket order. No more wine. None. The next day he ran into a drunken noncom. He gave an order, the noncom back-talked him, and he took out his pistol and shot the man between the eyes. The conclusion to the story goes like this, "And he never had any trouble with drinking after that."

Then there was the day in Normandy when Speirs was walking down a road by himself and passed a group of ten German P.O.W.s. They were under guard and were digging a roadside ditch. Speirs stopped, broke out a pack of cigarettes, and gave one to each P.O.W. They were so appreciative he jumped into the ditch and gave them the whole pack. Then he took out his lighter and gave each one a light. He stepped back up on the road and watched them inhale and chat.

Suddenly and without warning he unslung the Thompson 45-caliber submachine-gun he always carried and fired into the group. He continued raking back and forth until all the P.O.W.s were dead. The guard was stunned. Speirs turned and walked away.

Tom Gibson, who related this story to me (I heard it from many other sources, although no one saw it happen), commented, "I firmly believe that only a combat soldier has the right to judge another combat soldier. Only a rifle company combat soldier knows how hard it is to retain his sanity, to do his duty and to survive with some semblance of honor. You have to learn to forgive others, and yourself, for some of the things that are done." Gibson said he had told the story often over the years, never naming names, but using it as an example of what can happen in war. He continued, "We all know war stories seem to have a life of their own. They have a way of growing, of being embellished. Whether the details are precise or not there must be a kernel of truth for such a story to ever have been told the first time."

Winters was not thinking about Speirs and his reputation. He was watching Easy Company attack. Speirs and other officers from the unengaged companies stood behind him. Winters had placed the two machine-guns of HQ section to provide covering fire over the open fields sloping away in front of them, about 200 meters across from the tree line to the town line.2

2. Standing on the spot in 1991 with Winters, Lipton, and Malarkey, when Winters indicated that he had set up one machine-gun just there, pointing at my wife Moira's feet, she looked down, bent over, and picked up a 30-caliber shell casing to hand to him. (The field had recently been plowed.)

There were some scattered trees and haystacks in the field.

Lieutenant Foley, who led 1st platoon on the attack, described the situation: "We knew that Foy had not been tested the previous day or scouted last evening. In the days before we were well aware of the coming and going of trucks and tanks. We were witness to the many attacks and counterattacks that had taken place. We had seen F Company get chopped up in their efforts to hold this spot. Now they were commanded by a 2nd lieutenant. So the unknown was ahead."

The company moved out, line abreast. The covering fire opened up. There were only a few random rifle shots from the village. Still, as Winters put it, "It was tough going for the men through that snow in a skirmisher formation, but the line was keeping a good formation and moving at a good pace."

First platoon, on the left flank, came on an area with some cow pens and small outbuildings. Foley had the shacks checked out. As the men from the platoon (only twenty-two of them) went to work, three Germans were seen scrambling into a shack. Foley had it surrounded, kicked the door in, then said in his best German, "Come out with hands up!" No reply.

Foley pulled the pin on a fragmentation grenade and tossed it in. After the explosion, the Germans emerged, shaken and bleeding. One was a 1st lieutenant, the other two were sergeants. Foley started questioning them about the whereabouts of other German troops. One of the sergeants reached his hand into his opened coat. Another made a similar move. The third cried out, "Dummkopf!"

One of Foley's men cut the Germans down with a burst from his submachine-gun. "We had no prisoners," Foley commented, "but we had the concealed pistols." The platoon hurried to rejoin the others.

Dike looked left and could not see his 1st platoon. His other two platoons were moving forward steadily. They were being fired on but had not taken any casualties. But Dike was naked on his left, or so he thought. He made a disastrous decision, the kind of decision that gets men killed. He signaled for the 2nd and 3rd platoons to join Company HQ section behind two haystacks.

From Winters' point of view: "Suddenly the line stopped about 75 yards from the edge of the village. Everybody hunkered down in the snow behind those stacks and stayed there for no apparent reason. I could not get any response from Lieutenant Dike on the radio. The company was a bunch of sitting ducks out there in the snow." He worried about how long he could keep up the suppressing fire.

First platoon caught up with the company, grouped behind the haystacks. Foley came to Dike for orders. Dike didn't know what to do. Foley insisted he had to do something; Lipton and the other sergeants supported him strongly.

Dike came up with a plan. It consisted of sending 1st platoon on a wide flanking movement to the left, to circle the village and launch an attack from the far side. Meanwhile he would direct machine-gun and mortar fire from the haystacks. For that purpose, Dike said he was keeping the platoon's mortar and machine-gun men with him, to participate in the suppressing fire. So eighteen riflemen of 1st platoon went out into the snow, to try to get into Foy from the far side.

Lieutenant Foley and Sergeant Martin had only a few minutes to plan the route that would get them to an assault position.

They picked a path that provided, every 10 meters or so, a tree to hide behind. The line of trees went on into the distance.

One by one they took off. Within minutes, snipers began to fire, cries for "Medic!" went up and down the line. The platoon returned the fire, but without noticeable effect. Foley went to the nearest wounded man. "This was Smith from California. He moaned and groaned as I ripped open the aid kit and before I found his wound he began 'confessing.' Imagine! And what he 'confessed' was that he and two other buddies had come across a PX ration and taken it. This consisted of Hershey bars and cigarettes! I told him that he wasn't dying as I cut open his pants leg, sprinkled on the sulfa and wrapped his leg."

Martin told Pvt. Frank Perconte to move behind another tree and start shooting into the buildings from there. "So Frank goes over and gets behind a tree a little bigger than his head, but it wasn't quite big enough for his ass. And they shot him in the ass."

(When Lipton saw Perconte later in the day, he was lying in the snow in a pool of blood but was still conscious and strong. Lipton asked, "Perconte, how bad are you hit?" He grinned and replied, "Lip, a beautiful wound, a beautiful wound.")

Martin directed Pvt. Harold Webb to a tree and told him where to fire. Foley got on the radio. "We're held up by sniper fire. We can't spot the location. We've lost five men. Can you locate? Advise."

Someone from company CP called back to say that the first haystack to Foley's right could be the spot. Foley came back, "Rake that g —— d —— stack," even as his platoon began firing at it.

Lieutenant Dike, in Lipton's judgment, had "fallen apart." He was frozen behind the haystacks, he had no plan, he didn't know what to do.

To the watching Winters, that was obvious. "Here he had everybody hunkered down in the snow and staying there for no apparent reason." Winters was frustrated by his inability to raise Dike on the radio. "Get going!" he would call out. "Keep going." No response. Easy Company was taking needless casualties. All it needed was the leadership push to get across the last open space and into town. But the leadership wasn't there.

Winters grabbed an M-l and started to run across the field, headed for the stationary company and its pinned-down 1st platoon. He intended to take command, get those men moving. But as he ran down, he thought, Geeze, I can't do this. I'm running this battalion. I can't commit myself. He turned and raced back. "And as I was coming up, there was Speirs standing right in front of me. 'Speirs! Take over that company and relieve Dike and take that attack on in.' "

Speirs took off running. Winters turned his attention to his job. Lieutenant Foley described the results: "Winters commanded the machine-gunners to lay down a base of protective fire so that we [1st platoon] could finish off what we had started, and for the mortars to concentrate on those two haystacks. A grenade launcher let go with several rounds, and when that stack began to burn, the two snipers became casualties."

Regiment put I Company (twenty-five men strong) on the right, into the attack. But success or failure rested with E Company. This was an ultimate test of the company. It had reached a low point. Neither the officers nor the men were, on the average, up to the standards of the company that had jumped into Normandy. None of the officers who led on D-Day were with the company in 1945.. More than half the enlisted men were new. The core of the old company left was the N.C.O.s. They were Toccoa men, and they had held the company together since Dike took over in Holland.

They lived in a state of high alert and sharp tension. They lived and soldiered and tried to suppress feelings, always there, feelings that John Keegan points out are the products "of some of man's deepest fears: fear of wounds, fear of death, fear of putting into danger the lives of those for whose well-being one is responsible. They touch too upon some of man's most violent passions; hatred, rage and the urge to kill."3

3. John Keegan, The Face of Battle (New York: Penguin Books, 1976), 16.

In this torrent of passion uncontrollable thoughts raced through their minds. They had seen their officers take a walk or break or just cower, or go mute (as Lieutenant Dike was at this moment of crisis). If they did not have the option of walking away, they did have the option of not leading. No one could force them to do so.

Just as they could not force Dike to act. These N.C.O.s were Toccoa men, all that was left in Easy from that hot summer of 1942 and Captain Sobel. They had held the company together through a long stretch of inept command at the top and heavy losses among the enlisted ranks.

So this was the test. Back in '42 the question was, Can a citizen army be trained and prepared well enough to fight Germans in a protracted campaign in Northwest Europe? Hitler was not the only one who had answered no. But the answer that counted would come on the snow-filled fields of Belgium in January 1945; for Easy Company the test was now being given.

The sergeants had it ready to be tested. The Toccoa core of the company was ready to be led, and to lead. At this moment, Speirs arrived, breathless. He managed to blurt out to Dike, "I'm taking over."

Sergeant Lipton and the others filled him in. He barked out orders, 2nd platoon this way, 3rd platoon that way, get those mortars humping, all-out with those machine-guns, let's go. And he took off, not looking back, depending on the men to follow. They did.

"I remember the broad, open fields outside Foy," Speirs wrote in a 1991 letter, "where any movement brought fire. A German 88 artillery piece was fired at me when I crossed the open area alone. That impressed me."

Standing at the site in 1991 with Winters and Malarkey, Lipton remembered Speirs's dash. He also recalled that when they got to the outbuildings of Foy, Speirs wanted to know where I Company was. "So he just kept on running right through the German line, came out the other side, conferred with the I Company C.O., and ran back. Damn, that was impressive."

As the platoons with Speirs moved out, 1st platoon started to move toward them. Sergeant Martin made a last-minute check. He noticed Private Webb, in firing position behind a tree, not moving. "Come on, Webb, let's go, get out, come on!" No response. "Well, hell, they were still shooting, so I made a dash over to the tree, which is just a little bigger than your hand. And I jumped right on top of him, because it's hard to lay down beside. I turned him around and they'd shot him right between the eyes."

The company surged into Foy. The men fired the full range of weapons available to a rifle company: M-1s, tommy guns, bazookas,

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light machine-guns, mortars, and grenades. They had artillery support. They created a tremendous uproar with bullets zinging off buildings, explosions in the rooms from American grenades, the thump of the mortars taking off, the boom when they hit, scattering bricks and dust through the air.

Resistance was strong, even so. German snipers, bypassed in the first rush, began to inflict casualties. No one could locate one guy especially, who had stopped movement at a corner with two hits. Then Shifty Powers, the man who had spent so much of his youth spotting for squirrels in the upper tree trunks of the Virginia mountains, called out, "I see 'em" and fired. "We weren't pinned down anymore," Lipton remembered, "so we continued the attack."

Everyone resumed firing and advancing. Strong as the opposition had been, the Germans—the 6th Company of the 10th Panzergrenadier Regiment of the 9th Panzer Division—were only fighting a rear-guard action to cover a withdrawal to Noville. Still they fought tenaciously, skillfully, and without panic to keep the escape route open. But as Speirs moved his men forward, and threatened to cut the road behind the German position, three Tiger tanks lumbered off, all that was left of the panzer company. A platoon or so of infantry got out with them. Some 100 Germans, mostly wounded, surrendered. Easy Company had won the test of will. It had taken Foy.

Lipton and Popeye Wynn looked at the place where the sniper had held them up, the one Powers shot at. They found the sniper with a bullet right in the middle of the forehead.

"You know," Wynn commented, "it just doesn't pay to be shootin' at Shifty when he's got a rifle."

It was early afternoon. A movie camera team moved in to take film of the victory. Back on the ridge line at the edge of the woods, Winters noticed two photographers taking pictures of the stretcher bearers bringing in the wounded from 1st platoon. "When the detail reached about 25 yards from the woods, well out of danger, one photographer put down his camera and dashed out to grab hold of the soldier to help carry him. He grabbed him in such a way that he got as much blood on the sleeve and front of his nice new, clean, heavily fleeced jacked as possible. Then this guy turned toward his buddy, who was still taking pictures, and put on a big act of being utterly exhausted as he struggled across those final few yards to the woods. At that point he immediately dropped out."

That evening, Colonel Sink called for a meeting at regimental HQ for all the principal parties involved in the attack. Sink opened with a question for Winters: "What are you going to do about Company E?"

"Relieve Lieutenant Dike and put Lieutenant Speirs in command," Winters replied.

Sink agreed with the decision, and the meeting ended. Lieutenant Foley also agreed. He wrote, "We were glad to see Dike leave, not only because he failed the 1st platoon but even back in the woods when the 2nd platoon was hit with those tree bursts, it was evident that 'Foxhole Norman' wasn't meant to be our C.O." It quickly became clear that Speirs was, indeed he had already demonstrated that, in the rush on Foy.