Opening Moves

In their own rubber boats, or those taken from the rest of the battalion, with small craft ‘liberated’ from along the river, plus anything that could be sat on that floated or, in some cases, hanging onto the sides of one of the above, the reinforced company of sappers rode the steady current towards their objective.

Trendelburg had one solid bridge standing and they were to take and hold it, preventing its destruction at all costs.

Chekov checked his watch and silently signalled around him for some extra pace in their advance, paddles and rifle butts digging into the water, adding more energy to the boats northward advance.

Unseen shapes moved in the darkness all over the area that night, in many cases bringing silent death with them before moving on to new victims. A young American sentry taking shelter under his cape, hiding from the fury of the downpour, had his life taken by a soaked apparition. He went without a chance to scream or even recognise that he was dying on a wicked blade.

Blade and man moved inexorably on into the night seeking further victims.

The advance group of the 1st Rifle Battalion was tasked to steal quietly into Stammer, 3rd Rifle Battalion was given Exen. On the other side of the Diemel River, 1st Company, 12th Guards Motorcycle Regiment, without their bikes, bore silently down upon Seilerfeld with murderous intent, accompanied by the assault platoon of Zin’s penal Company on their right.

All did bloody work in the driving rain, but none more than 1st Battalion, who butchered the entire 3rd Battery of 453rd AAA Battalion as they slept, moving on to do exactly the same to the headquarters group of A Company, 330th Infantry Regiment.

Two shots split the night, fired by the Headquarters Warrant Officer as he walked in on the deadly business and was spitted on a long bayonet. However, it seemed that the sound of the Colt was lost in the ferocity of the thunderstorm and their deadly work continued.

1st Battalion’s Siberians had killed sixty-four men in silence.

0352 hrs Saturday 11th August 1945, US Front Lines, Stammen, south of Trendelburg, Germany.

Mortar Platoon, A Company 330th Infantry had long since acquired a reputation for their ability to scrounge anything anywhere, and to cope with the extremes that life, nature and the war could throw at them.

That was why Major Buck G. Brennan Jr had chosen to venture out into the night, rather than stay in his own miserable, partially dry headquarters.

Accompanied by 1st Lieutenant H.H.Brown and Warrant Officer Frazzoli, he had arrived at the mortar platoons position and experienced a moment of disbelief, followed by wonder, substituted by suspicion, replaced by panic, and finally coming to rest in admiration.

‘Sonofabitch’.

Brown laughed quietly and confided to no one in particular.

“You have to hand it to old Caesar but he sure as shit knows how to get his outfit comfy.”

Brennan could not disagree and turned back to examine the view, helpfully illuminated by some sustained lightning.

His mortar platoon had four 81mm mortars and four 60mm mortars, and each firing position was covered over with a watertight roof, some of which looked suspiciously like rubber dinghies, although the camouflage tended to disguise the shapes that the lightning tried hard to reveal.

Grinning mortar crews were observing his approach, one or two waving their commander into cover.

Criminals and thieves they may be, thought Brennan, but they are goddamn efficient.

He had the sudden vision of Captain Catesby of the 308th Engineers going mad looking for his equipment and somehow the thought made him grin widely, for he didn’t like the man personally.

He then became further distracted by a large irregular shape sat behind the positions.

If it were not for the green colour, he would have sworn it was the USO entertainment tent used by Jack Benny and Ingrid Bergmann some days back.

He took advantage of more of nature’s illumination and looked again.

It was.

‘Sonofabitch.’

Frazzoli chuckled, saluting Brennan.

“Guess I shouldn’t really see this, so I will take off back to the office Major.”

Brennan grinned and slapped his non-coms shoulder as he passed.

A mortar man in a long cape was pointing his Garand at them, determined to follow company standing orders, even if it meant keeping his CO out in the rain a few more seconds.

The niceties were observed and both officers ducked into the shelter, which from the inside could not have been anything else but the show tent.

“Sonofabitch!”

He hadn’t meant to say it aloud but it was too late now, he had been heard, as the grins of those warm and dry soldiers lying on warm dry beds attested to.

A cursory look around told him that everything soldierly had been attended to, from foot inspections through to weapons cleaning. The smell of cooking still hung in the air too, something that had been a disaster for his HQ group that evening.