WWII Diary of Chick Bruns – 70 Years Ago

God O’mighty were we shelled again last night. That tank slipped back in again and seemed to be right in our backyard. We would hear the report of gun and then would hit the ground because baby she was a coming. The 88 was whining above our head about 15 ft and bursting about 100 yards away. I finality got mad and went to bed. If there going to get you their going to get you. But there’s no use of taking too many chances. We worked around the rest of the day and then moved up to the new area. They shelled our area just before we moved in. We went right to work digging fox holes and Badali and I dug one big enough for forty of us to sleep in. You can just hear the shells screaming down your neck.

William Gray & Clayton O.Giese

Boy what a night. Some tanks slipped down into the valley and shelled us. It got us up out of bed. All of the fellows went down in the ditch behind our tent and I went down to talk to Melgard on the radio.  I soon got sleepy again and went back to bed. They were still shelling when I went to sleep. I woke up about 4 AM and could still hear them shelling but it was far off. We worked around camp this morning. Had another mail call and also got in some PX supplies. Vince and I wrote some letters and then went to bed.

Noriss Butts

One year ago today we loaded on boats to go over sea’s. The two fellows came in this morning. They had been shot at, Hand grenades thrown at them and stayed in the bushes behind enemy lines all night. When morning came, they came home. We are going to move again today. Had a large mail call. Moved up about 4 miles, but the artillery had our area. We were lucky as the Germans threw in some aerial burst and killed 12 men. We came back to our old area and I was glad. We pitched our tents and went to bed.

Packed up and moved today. We moved about 2 miles and stopped for awhile. They are shelling our area that we are to move into so we had to wait until they stopped. We moved down into a large valley this time about 5 more miles. You could hear a tank battle going on in the distance. We set up our tent and issued out a few things. The fellows are sweeping mines out ahead of the infantry and were sniped at by snipers. Two of the fellows are feared of being captured. Caught a German motorcycle and rider. They were on patrol. Can still hear the tanks battling and some shells light not far away.

We had a good nights sleep last night but you went to bed with the fear of being shelled.  Well they didn’t shell us anymore so they must have knocked out the guns.  We went and got some clothes from the battalion and issued them out.  That’s about all for today.

Wow!  Oh my god!  4:30 AM we came tearing out of the tent as we were being shelled.  The first shell hit and Wellman who was on guard at the time came in and woke us up.  I asked him where the first shot landed because if it was 500 ft away I was going back to sleep.  But then sh-sh-sh-sh-snap and dirt flew all over the tent.  I hollered “that’s enough for me” and out I came.  We were shelled for about an hour.  Some came close and some far as 500 ft away.  The rest of the day was quiet.  I played a little cards.  Wrapped my Christmas package to mom and dad, layed around the rest of the day.  We always start an argument just before we go to bed and every one gets a good laugh out of it.

We are bivouac in the middle of the artillery and when their guns cut loose, the concussion practically roll you out of bed.  All night it was bang, bang, bang.  Little sleep you get.  We worked all day.  We are trying to out flank the enemy.  The company is still out working so we will have to pull guard.

I was on guard from 4 o’clock until the company got up.  sat around and wrote letters.  The company is supposed to rest today as they have been working night and day.  We moved in the afternoon about four miles.  We passed a few Jerry trucks that were destroyed.  There were a few German bodies laying along the road.  One of them was so bloated that he was about burst. His shoes were gone.  Somebody must have stole them.  Another was laying half burnt up and his guts strung all around him.  To look at them used to turn our stomach but now we are used to it.  We moved into our area pitched our tent and went to bed.