difficulties and was completed at 0230 hours, November 10th. Within a few hours tanks and tank
destroyers were moving across to support the infantry in its attack to the east.
The next barrier in the path of the eastward driving troops was the town of Silly-en-Saulnois.
During the night of November 9th, arrangements were made and an assault schedule prepared for a
combined attack by infantry of the 5th Division and tanks of the 6th Armored Division.
The drive began at 0700 hrs, November 10th, and almost at once ran into machine gun and
mortar fire from the town of Alemont. Alemont was in the zone of the XII Corps on the right flank of
the XX Corps where a pocket had been left by the 80th Division. The town was situated on
commanding ground dominated a large area to the north in the XX Corps zone of advance. After
determining that no XII Corps troops were in the danger zone, tanks and infantry, in a combined assault,
took the town by 1100 hours and continued to drive, under heavy artillery fire, to seize the high ground
to the southeast of Vigny.
While the attack was progressing on the southern flank of the 5th Division, the assault eastward
from Louvigny on the north flank was resumed. The town of Pagny-les-Goin, although its defenses had
been softened by air bombardment, still put up a stiff resistance. A fortress battalion, armed with
automatic weapons, was placed in position behind temporary obstacles of logs, masonry, and machinery,
and resisted all efforts to storm the town. To make matters worse the town of Goin on the exposed left
flank of the Division laid enfilading fire on the attacking forces with deadly effect. The thunderous din
of a "serenade" by Division and Corps artillery slowed the fire and quelled the will of the Germans to
resist, and the American troops cleared the obstacles to seize Pagny-les-Goin before noon.
A combat command of the 6th Armored Division, preparing to knife east along the highway
through Vigny, was blocked by a demolition bridge, and a detour through Pagny-les-Goin as soon as the
town was cleared was planned. When Pagny-les-Goin had been taken, elements of the 5th Division
moved quickly to the high ground north of Vigny and captured it from the German defending force. The
tanks of the 6th Armored Division followed quickly into Vigny and raced on to Buchy.
Infantry troops of the 5th Division were next assigned to attack across 4000 yards of open
country from Pagny to Silly-en-Saulnois and to take the objective by nightfall. The seemingly perpetual
fall rains and heavy ground mist of the Lorraine region came to the aid of the attackers in this difficult
maneuver, screening them from enemy observation. The attack went well until it reached the slope only
200 yards from the town, at which time heavy mortar and 20 mm fire began to fall on the assault waves.
This only served to give impetus to the race for the cover provided in Silly-en-Saulnois. With the aid of
concentrated fire poured into the town by the tanks of the 6th Armored Division from the south, the
infantry drove in and captured Silly-en-Saulnois by 1700 hrs, November 10th.
Because of the speed and power of the infantry of XX Corps, the devastating shock effect of
Corps artillery, and the close air ground cooperation, the Germans lost their defenses along the Seille
River. Enemy efforts to form a wedge defense against the Northeast expansion of the bridgehead south
of Metz were already being thwarted by carefully laid plans of XX Corps to encircle the city and choke
it off from reinforcement from the east.
The encircling arm of steel bending up from the south was already shaping half of the noose that
was to strangle the citadel of Metz.
 |
 |
 |