Reflections of My Life by JL Byars – page 22

You would think that after the Germans lost the battle of the Bulge that they would give up, but no, they kept fighting.  Most of the battles from here on were not as powerful as before as they had lost their most highly trained soldiers.  Day by day, battle after battle, we would hear they had surrendered.  We would celebrate only to find it was just another rumor.  The Battle of the Bulge was very costly in terms of both men and equipment.  Hitler’s last ditch attempt to bring Germany back into winning the war had failed.  During this battle the Germans had expended the majority of their air power and men.  The Allies however had plenty of men and equipment left.  With few forces left to defend “The Reich,”the Germans could not prolong the inevitable.  The Germans final defeat was only months away.

On or about April 25, 1945, we got the final word that it was all over.  We were in a small town of Sangerhauen.  We were billeted in civilian dwelling houses.  We tried to relax and get the dirt out of our hair.  The German people were extra nice and they had not wanted war but had no other choice.  I saw my first steam truck while we were there.  The German ladies washed and ironed our clothes and we would in return get food for them from the kitchen if we did not get caught getting it.  The few days we were there we learned a lot about what they did for a living, but most of them had to turn over any extra food and clothing to Hitler’s army.

The First Army traveled over 700 miles from invasion to the peace signing in Germany.  We captured over 76,000 prisoners from June 29, 1944 when we entered combat until May 8, 1945.  That is over five times the total strength of the Division.  It does not include thousands, which were in the Rose pocket and the Harz Mountains.  I fought in 5 western European campaigns – Normandy, Northern France, The Rhineland, The Ardennes, and Central Europe.  I was given separate bronze stars for each of these campaigns and a large Bronze Star for all of them put together.     I spent one year, eleven months and 3 days in Foreign Service.