We occupied the Koenigsmacker position for four days while the Germans slowly retreated.
90th Doughboys fought their way forward across the heavily mined fields and the pillbox studded
terrain, toward Metz for a juncture with 5th division, We fired heavily all the time on targets picked up
by our observers. At night our interdiction fire crashed into road junctions, towns, and enemy battery
positions.
November 17 found us on the road again. Passing around Fort Koenigsmacker we dropped trails
rapidly – first near Valmestroff, then Metzeresche, Metzervisse, Vigy, and finally Laneauville as our
infantry met the 5th Division and sealed off the escape routes for any Krauts left in Metz. There were
some left. The first two nights in position we spent catching prisoners. Our alert guards picked up the
bewildered Wehrmacht and SS troops whenever they entered our areas. Our haul for the two nights was
around 50 prisoners, most of them collected by B and C Batteries.
During our fighting around the Moselle, rain fell continually. Without our M5 tractors, it would
have been impossible to move out of the mud in which we often found ourselves. Time and again our
competent drivers and their tractors saved the day for us. It was a common occurrence for our drivers to
move us from one mud hole to the next mud hole and then take their tractors off to help one of our 105
battalions make a displacement.
With Metz in American hands, the 90th was off to the Saar River and the Siegfried Line. We
followed the path of the 10th Armored Division which had crossed the Moselle on our bridgehead and
turned east. The 345th moved to La Croix and then to Grindorff where we fired heavily at targets just
short of the Saar. We were about to enter Germany: our observers were already there.
The 29th of November was the big day. The 345th entered Germany for the first time. That
night the Heinies gave us such a hot reception that we almost wished we hadn’t. In the afternoon
incoming shells began to whistle. As usual, one of the first shells hit the Officers’ latrine (how that
thing did draw fire)! Baker, Able and Headquarters caught the bulk of the fire. That night, after
everyone in the CP had gone to sleep except the night crew, the Krauts got the range and threw a round
almost in the window of the room in which the fire direction crew was sleeping. The shell tore the wall
out completely. Freakishly, no one was hurt, although until we dug the crew out from under the ruins,
there were a few anxious moments. Corporal Spear provided the most amusing incident as he was being
dragged feet first from the debris. Complained Corporal Spear, “Take it easy! Do you want to hurt
somebody?”
Then came December. On the 3rd we moved across the anti-tank ditch to Gerlfangen. The
division was planning to force a crossing of the Saar River and crack through the Siegfried Line in the
vicinity of Dillingen. For the crossing the battalion moved to Guisingen. Very little firing was done
from this position until 0415 on the 6th of December when our infantry stormed across the river in
assault boats into the pillboxes on the opposite shore. Before daylight our doughboys had gained a
foothold in Dillingen and our observers, Lt. McAtee and Capt. Crenshaw, who crossed with the leading
wave, were firing. From the first the fight was hot and heavy. Enemy shell fire made bridge
construction costly and almost impossible. Ferries provided the only means of getting tanks and TD’s
across the river. Flanking fire from bypassed pill boxes prevented reserves from reaching the assault
troops during daylight. Lt. McAtee and Captain Crenshaw fired on pillboxes to their front, rear, and
flanks. Capt. Crenshaw knocked out several of the little forts by adjusting direct 155mm gun fire on
them. Communication was a difficult problem for the attackers as wire would not stay in; many times
the radios of the observers were the only means of communication for the bridgehead. Fanatical
 |
 |
 |