I graduated from Amenia (NY) School in 1943. The army had a program where if you enlisted in the Army Reserve’s specialized technical program, they would send you to college. I was sent to Auburn (NY) College, learning a lot of subjects we might need in basic engineering. Then in November I was sent to Fort Dix, NJ for introduction to the regular Army. The first thing I learned was not to trust anybody — I was robbed of $20 the first night.
We worked 14 to 15 hours a day on KP (kitchen police). We were issued everything — clothes, shots, medical exams. We weren’t liked by the non coms because we smart kids had been sent to college.
After 2 or 3 weeks we were sent by rail to Fort Benning, GA. Our barracks were tarpaper huts, heated by a little sheet metal coal stove using soft coal. My bed was close to the stove. The bath and showers were down the street.
Fort Benning is a huge place. I went to the Officer’s Candidate School, where they turned out 90 day wonders. There was tank school, paratroopers, infantry, and whatever else. Some went on passes to Phoenix, AL which was a sin city. I didn’t go. There were drunks, fights, robberies and venereal disease.
After 17 weeks of basic infantry we were sent by rail to Columbia, SC. We were the Fort Jackson 87th Division, 347th Battalion Company G, 3rd Platoon. While there the Army dissolved the ARSTP — they decided they didn’t need us! — and we were stuck in the Infantry. They needed a lot more infantry than engineers. So much for the brass knowing what they were doing. We filled in for the men being sent overseas.
We were up at 5 AM, reveille at 6, chow at 7, training at 8. I got up earlier to avoid the rush to the bathroom. We’d have physical training, lectures, close order drills, and more lectures. I didn’t like the mess sergeant as he kicked me in the behind for something I did on KP. They wanted a few to go to cook’s and baker’s school. I didn’t go but I wish I had. Later the company command post and kitchen crew were a mile in the rear, sleeping in tents or captured buildings. As soldiers we slept in 2-man fix holes, one man awake and one sleeping in 2 hour shifts and the nights lasted forever. If you were caught sleeping you could get bayonetted. I was cold but I never got sick.
At Fort Jackson we had lots of marching exercises, 25 miles every Friday night. Colonel Bodner would pass us in a jeep. He’d watch us go by, then drive up 2 or 3 miles to watch us again. He must have gotten tired of that.
I was a 3rd platoon messenger and had a walkie talkie radio. This was useless as every radio in the division was on the same frequency. My entrenching tool was wire cutters — how do you dig with them? Later I picked up a shovel and after that a pick, too. And I never climbed a fence. In Auburn NY I bought a Boy Scout knife and took that with me, which was a good idea. After the war my brother Chet borrowed it and lost it. I was pissed after carrying it through the war. I had used it
all the time.
At Fort Jackson, inspection was every Saturday morning. If we failed, there were no weekend passes to Columbia to spend a little money on beers or food. If we did go we had to be back to camp before 5 AM. If we were late we were considered AWOL. Jackson was a huge camp. The 27th Division was there, too. In training we never covered what to do with the wounded, just told to call the medical aides. During the war, though, we should have given them first aid before the aides got there. Some just bled to
death. I guess they thought it would be bad for our morale by teaching it.
We were given a lecture on gas masks. The lieutenant thought he had a smoke grenade but instead it was white phosphorous. One soldier was burned badly on his back by the grenade. They put sand and water on his back trying to put it out. I don’t know how he recovered. The lieutenant was shipped out the next day, probably overseas.
We had a private who wanted to get out of the Army. He acted crazy, crowing and squawking like a chicken. I didn’t see him anymore, so I guess he did get out.
I got promoted to Private First Class, which gave me $4 more a month. I had an $18.75 bond sent home every month. $10,000 insurance was $6.50, laundry $2-3, which left me with $29.00 for the month. Food was plentiful and good. We ate 3200 calories a day and worked it off. I never did
like the raisin pie, okra or grits.
We were shipped to Fort Dix in November, then boarded the Queen Elizabeth bound for Scotland. There were 15,000 men on board, it was so crowded that only half could go on deck. We had 2 meals a day and it was lousy food. We had fish for breakfast. They charged the US for the rations. The ship had no escort as the subs couldn’t catch up. We outran them, zig zagging every 15 minutes. The only candy you could buy was Mallow
Cups — some selection!
We landed 6 days later somewhere in Scotland. Then we boarded the night train for Altrincham, near Manchester. Before the train we were given excellent tea by Red Cross ladies. I never saw the American Red Cross while I was in Europe, and I still don’t donate to them. England in the fall has rain, rain and fog. Training went on as usual. We were in houses
with no central heating. The fireplaces burned coke, which is coal with the gas extracted. When I was on coal detail our house got more than any others.
The guys would go to the pubs. The locals would tease, “Drink up Yanks before your beer gets cold.” I did get a 3-day pass to London. I saw St. Paul’s Cathedral standing with rubble all around it. It had gotten hit with three dud bombs. If one exploded it would have brought it down. Don’t tell me there is no God! There were blackouts, too.
I bought fish and chips served in a newspaper cone. I bought a pie in a bakery. I thought it would be fruit but it was mutton stew!
We left England on an LST (landing ship tank). We went over the side on landing nets to smaller vessels which took us to Le Havre, France. When we landed, it was flattened and there were no Germans in it. Later they moved back in the rubble and it took 6 months to clear them out of the city.
We were then trucked to near Reims, France. We had pup tents in the rain and the mud, which soaked our shoes and gave people trench foot. There were only 4 pairs of arctics for the whole platoon of 40 men. The sergeants got them, not the privates or PFCs. When the first prisoners were captured, I was told, “Phillips, take them to battalion!” There I scrounged around the aid station and found 2 left overshoes, one so large I
could put my right foot in it. That’s what saved my feet.
The rear eschelon got all needed items first. It should have been the front line. Wet feet get black and wrinkly and start to decay. We lost 30% of our men to trench foot. Nobody ever told us about massaging the feet to get the blood circulating. We were issued 2 pair of British navy wool socks. They were great wool socks. I’d wear one pair, and put the wet ones under my shirt to dry out. At the end of January, lo and behold we got shoes with leather tops and rubber bottoms. The Russians were issued boots one size larger, to put hay or straw into them. They also mixed oil and gasoline for the weapons. When our weapons were frozen, they were
urinated on to get them working. This raised hell with them, but if we were attacked it had to be done.
Our first battle was terrible. The German artillery was really heavy and we lost about 25 soldiers. The next morning at 9 we did a Picket’s charge on a machine gun. Nobody gave the order to charge and fire. The sergeant, lieutenant and captain gave no communication. If I did give the order I might have gotten a medal, but who would listen to a private or PFC. The place was Obergailbach on the French and German border.
We had no canvas tops on the trucks so we could fire at the Luftwaffe planes. We could see all of the artillery flashes, and knew somebody was catching hell. It was like a continuous fireworks, a continuous grand finale.
Then we attacked in Belguim. I was almost killed in Prerompe (sp?). The 3rd platoon was about 10 or 12 men and we waded the brook and got in the town. We threw a grenade in a house and heard screaming and crying and 2 civilians came out. Palmer Montgomery and I didn’t see the 1st platoon, so we crossed an intersection to look for them. We didn’t see them, so headed back, Palmer first. When I was crossing the tank opened up with a 88 artillery shell, and the turbulence of the shell knocked me down about 10 feet back. Then they opened up with a machine gun at me. I got bullets in my K rations. “You goddamn bastards,” I said. I got across but lost my rifle. I picked up a German rifle in the ditch. When I got back to where the guys were, Sgt. Schultz lay dead in the road — hit by a mortar shell, instantly killing him and bending his Browning automatic rifle all out of
shape. It was a tough day. We were bunched up in a house with no guard outside. We were green troops. And green troops with no leader. I still don’t know what happened to the 1st platoon — were they killed or captured?
The next days we attached Bonnelau and Tenneville. We went to St. Vith but there were no Krauts there. They were retreating on foot, out of gasoline. The generals couldn’t surrender their troops because Hitler would have killed their families in Germany. The Germans in retreat would set up road blocks with manned troops. We would have to rout them out. Most towns were just rubble with destruction everywhere. Bad memory
blurs as time passes. When the skies cleared the air corps blasted the Germans. There were thousands of planes attacking the retreating — the sky was full. They also dropped supplies to us. That was a nice New Year’s present.
As we advanced every day was always the same — keep moving ahead. We were dirty and unshaven after 6 weeks. My shirt collar was so dirty I took it off and scraped the collar with my knife. At the shower we were given clean clothes.
Eisenhower stopped Patton in France by giving the gas to Montgomery for his failed Market Garden fiasco. Patton had the right idea to keep attacking and not let the Krauts set up defensive positions. We did get a break in the action, and rest. You could only go so far without proper rest in order to be effective. You got burned out.
One town I remember was the town of Auw, Germany. Sgt. Macomber and I were in a house and heard a shell coming in. I rushed out, hitting the dirt. Macomber followed, but he was killed. I got nicked — a band aid job. The medic asked me if I wanted a Purple Heart. I turned it down as I didn’t want to worry my folks back home. Dumb me again!
I knew that my brother Royal was wounded in the Hurtgen forest. With trees planted in rows close together, troops got lost in the forest. That campaign should have been bypassed.
I don’t remember how we crossed the Moselle River. Later at the Rhine we were to follow the 1st Battalion in boats. They were turned back by the intense fire. So, lucky us, we later crossed on a pontoon bridge at Boppard, Germany.
Patton stopped in the middle there to take his famous picture. He would drive to the front in his jeep with the stars of a general on it — 3 stars. Our jeep had a sign on it: “looters do not delay!” Speaking of looting the officers were the worst. They could mail things back home. We couldn’t — you’d have to carry it, which was impossible.
In houses we slept on the floor as beds might have lice or bed bugs. But we slept no problem, as we needed to sleep whenever we could get it.
It was in Belguim that Captain Mahanes asked me if I wanted to be a sergeant. I answered, “No Sir, thank you!” “You will be,” was his answer. 9 months later I was Staff Sergeant. PFCs were paid $54 per month, Sergeants $78, and Staff Sergeants $94 monthly. I was the platoon sergeant at 20 years old! This is what casualties do.
Later at Fort Monmouth, NJ I was promoted to Tech Sergeant. They couldn’t do it in Europe as the company had too many sergeants on the roster who were either wounded or killed in action.
There was one town where we liberated Polish prisoners. They wanted guns to kill their guards, who were probably German.
After the Rhine it w as mostly riding on tanks that were advancing. I was on the lead tank into Plauen, Germany near Czechoslovakia. The city was rubble and all the other cities were the same. There were lots of bed sheets hanging out the windows.
End of the war. May 6th was the surrender. All of their troops were marching west to surrender. They were on both sides of the road and we rode down the middle. The autobahn was like our Taconic Parkway.
I never saw the American Red Cross. At the Lucky Strike Embarkation Camp, we got a warm Coke. I’m sure the officers had theirs with booze. If the German troops were caught by the Russians, they were sent to Siberia and worked and starved to death. I think of captured Germans, only 25,000 were returned. Between Hitler and Stalin, 50 million people died. That was horrible.
Earlier in the spring I was sent to the battalion. I assumed I was being sent to the Officer Candidate School. A major asked me how we could have had less casualties. I told him about the 4 pairs of overshoes for us when the shoe packs arrived. I guess he didn’t like to hear about my criticizing the command as I didn’t get to go. But as an Officer you were
obligated 5 more years in the reserve. Good thing I didn’t go as I would have been fighting in the Korean War, too. That episode was run by McArthur in his castle in Japan. His protege General Almond was 5 miles in the rear in a trailer with a bath and a heated latrine.
While I was interviewed for OCS, our division liberated Buchenwald extermination camp, where 5 to 7 million Jews were killed. the next day I was asked if I wanted to see it, but I refused — I had seen enough of death.
The Russians would rape German woman, and many of them committed suicide. It was a relief to have no more fighting and killing. Our division was slated to invade Japan in November. We had heavily bombed Japan, and there were no enemy planes. They were saving 300 planes to sink the troop transports, which would have been a blood bath on both sides. The citizens would be armed with bamboo spears.
The atom bombs stopped the war. If anybody said we shouldn’t have used the terrible bombs I’d sure give them my unbiased opinion. They should have been there first.
Drugs. Before I was going into the Army, Pop told me drugs weren’t healthy. That’s all a knew, and I avoided them all my life. I tried cigarettes, maybe a half pack in England, but I didn’t like them. Good choice. During the war men would have to get under their rain coats to light up at night so they didn’t get shot at. After the war codeine cough syrup was available to get high. That led to more drug addiction. As a platoon sergeant I could carry morphine syringes to give to the wounded.
Never gave it to anyone not wounded, or to myself.
Back in the US. We disbanded at Fort Benning. After a 30-day leave I was sent to Fort Mammoth, working in a finance office typing checks for discharged men. The checks had to be perfectly typed. I went home for the weekends, traveling by train.
A few years ago we went to Fort Benning to see the new infantry
museum. It cost $10 million minus $1 to build. When I told them I’d been in the war I got first class treatment. In order to view the movie they had to have 8 people signed up to see it. The showed it to just us! Celebrity status.
George E. Phillips served in the US Army during World War II and fought at the Battle of the Bulge.
