Introduction

Drafted

Operation Torch

Conversation Part 1

Sicily

Conversation Part 2

Anzio

Breakout

France

Germany

Austria

OPERATION TORCH

November 1942

By now we knew where we were going and the officers and noncoms were busy with the plans and logistic. This operation was known as Torch, and the 3rd Division was targeting Fedala and Casablanca in French Morocco.

I was chosen to be KP chaser on the evening before the landing. All went until daylight than I was trying to find my KPs. They were about to hit the cargo nets to board the Higgins boats. I was on the top side staring into the dawn when I heard a big explosion and saw water thrown into the air with the most beautiful display of colors. The shell landed in the ocean about a mile from the ship. Hey, those guys were shooting at us. Then one of our cruisers came barreling into the fray, did a right face and let go with a broadside.

This old country boy was beginning to have his doubts about this being a nice war. The big guns were talking on both sides, noisy and spectacular, but when only 26 percent of the landing craft returned for our supplies and service troops, things got a bit iffy. We lined up at ships edge and began the descent into the Higgins Landing Craft. I had only seen a cargo net and this was the first for using it as a gang plank. I had quite a bit of experience climbing up and down mine ladders in shafts and raises so this did not prove to be a problem. We landed without getting our feet too wet and I was picked a point to see what was over the rise just beyond ht beach. Well, first was a group of seven-foot Senegalese French soldiers milling about but they appeared harmless. Our small group wandered about with no duty. We walked by the French coastal guns and saw several French soldiers killed. I had never seen a dead person before and I can still remember these young soldiers with red tassel on their berets. When we were sitting alongside the road a tall dirty Arab walked by begging and looking at his face there was no flesh and the smell I still remember. Night came and we slept by a roadside. The next morning came and we awoke with a swarm amount of bugs flying about our smelly bodies. We had been 18 or 19 days without a bath but this was no the cause; we had slept on straw and manure piled along the road.

Souvenir of Morocco

I can't remember much more that happened but about the second or third day I was told to help First Sergeant Alelosh Levesque of A Company to repair and get a small switch engine to operate so the material stacked and piled along the beach could be moved to dumps and for use. He was in WWI and could speak French with the best of them. His voice would carry for blocks. He found the Arab train crew and I believe we got that ancient old engine working.

Ernie Pyle gives credit to Sergeant on pages 50 and 51 in his great book Brave Men better than who. This is another story that bears repeating. This great sergeant spent his later years in El Paso and passed away a few years back.

We were hard pressed. The small Higgins Landing Craft proved vulnerable to rocky beaches and 219 out of 320 were wrecks on the first waves. On November 11, 1942 the transport Hewes and on November 12 the Scott, Bliss and Rutledge were torpedoed by German submarines that finally caught up with us. These ships contained our supplies. I heard the dull explosions and saw the dull red glow in the dark. The next morning sailors were searching the beach for the dead and hopefully alive.

The capture of Casablanca's wonderful harbor was a life saver for us and later it funneled supplies to the hard pressed troops in Tunisia. The railroad across North Africa was put in running order, which is another story worth telling.

Casablanca Conference (Jan. 14-24, 1943) at the Anfa Hotel: 3rd Division soldier stands guard

What I also remember was our brief stay in the Anfa Hotel, the best in Casablanca and it was a German Command post. I hope I got this hotel right. I got a much-needed bath and clean clothes here. If you didn't encounter cleanies nobody objected as we all smelled alike but before the bath I wonder why the Arabs walked around us. We also had a look at the forbidden city walls in Casablanca.

Well this life of the tourist couldn't last. The next stop was life under a cork tree, where we spent the rest of winter. That was a pleasant experience. We had a whole pup tent to ourselves and it was floored and partially walled by beautiful mahogany boards. We had to keep Franco in his place in Spain.

Oh yes, I won about $400 learning how to play black jack and poker. I played once more and never played again Ð lost a few dollars or francs. I sent it all to my savings in the Metals Bank in Butte Montana. This amount would send me back to Montana School of Mines for another year, if such would happen.

La Poste, Rabat, Morrocco