| Table of Contents < - - - return Chapter 28 - Caught in the Middle < - - - next Don Bennett's War Chapter 27 - Coal Country _______________________ We moved out of
town and down a trail through a forest. We were moving down the trail,
when small mortar shells hit among our platoon. Our Mexican scout was
leaning against a small alder when a shell hit on the other side of
the tree. He wasn't hit, but it shook him a little, and he hit the ground
fast. One hit next to me and a few fragments hit one of our squad and
one of the replacements. I could see when and where the fragment went
into his leg, a small flesh wound. Our Platoon Sergeant yelled as if
one had put a hole clear through him, and he yelled for a medic. When
the medic came up and cut off his clothes around his "wound",
he found that the fragment hadn't even reached his skin. We were slow
upon getting off the ground, and our C.O. came back and told us to get
the hell up trail. We moved on up the trail and toward night we received
a few more shells, bigger ones this time, but no one was hit. The Germans
seemed to know where we were most of the time. We moved up to the edge
of a clearing and remained there for the night. At dawn we made ready
to jump off toward a target, which the regimental officer and one battalion
officer (we still had a few left) were looking at through their binoculars.
We moved out 'across some open fields toward a town to the north. On
the way we passed piles of coal, some of the famous Alsace-Lorraine
mines. About 2:00 we came close to the town, partly circled it,
and entered it. It seemed deserted, but when we came down into the main
part of town, all the men ran for the side of the road. I ran, too,
and when I looked up at the road, I saw what the men were afraid of.
We had run onto an enemy tank force just leaving town via a main road
up a hill. The enemy tanks started firing, but not at us, but over our
heads at the hill behind us. Sometime recently our battalion had been
assigned a tank destroyer group who were battling it out with the tanks
ahead of us with us in the middle. Chapter 28 - Caught in the Middle < - - - next Table of Contents < - - - return _________________________ Copyright, Donald Bennett
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