The 3rd U.S. Infantry Division Crosses the Meurthe

by E. A. Reitan

Author’s Note: On 15 August 1944 the U.S. Sev­enth Army landed in southern France, moved quickly westward to take Marseilles, and then swept north up the Rhone Valley, reaching the Vosges Moun­tains by mid-October. At this point the attack stalled; German resistance stiff­ened, supply prob­lems became acute, and the rugged terrain proved hard going for battle-weary troops.

I was briefly part of this story. I joined Com­pany F, 2^nd Bat­tal­ion, 7^th Infantry Regiment, 3^rd In­fan­try Division, as a replace­ment rifleman on the Anzio beach­head. I got my baptism of fire during the Anzio breakout, enjoyed our tri­um­phant entry into Rome, stood guard at Mussolini’s headquarters on the Piazza Ve­nezia, participated in six weeks of stren­u­ous training for the landing in southern France, and landed with the first wave at Cavalaire.

Although the landing did not compare in cas­u­al­ties with Sa­lerno or Normandy, the 7^th In­fan­try had fifty-eight men killed, includ­ing eleven from Company F. I got mine the next day when I was wounded in the knee and sent back to a hospital in Naples. Thus I missed out on the fabled “Champagne Campaign.” In Oc­to­ber the doctors decided, in view of the great shortage of riflemen, that I was sufficiently re­cov­ered to return to combat. I re­joined my unit in mid-November, just as the Sev­enth Army was preparing for its push toward Strasbourg and the Rhine.

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The Army’s immediate objective was to break through the “Winter Line” that the Germans had spent several months pre­par­ing in the Vosges Moun­tains (see Map 1). The 3^rd Division’s as­sign­ment was to cross the Meur­the River above St. Die and then cut through the mountains to Sa­ales, where it would be on the main road to Stras­bourg. To the north, the 100^th Division would attack from Raon L’Etape, while to the south the 103^rd Division would take St. Die it­self.

Nestled in the valley of the Meurthe, St. Die was a tough obsta­cle similar to St. Lô in Nor­mandy. The most likely strategy was to outflank it, and for this reason the Germans had built ex­ten­sive fortifications north of the city along the river. The Meurthe is not a large river but it flows rapidly down the valley, and in November it was swollen by autumn rains. The riverbanks were soft and muddy. Just north of St. Die at LaVoivre, however, there were two good sites for the Bailey bridges that would be needed to move the division’s ar­mor and other heavy equip­ment across the river.

The division decided that the most dangerous part of the com­ing operation would be the actual crossing of the swift-flowing Meur­the. The Ger­man for­ti­fi­ca­tions were weakly manned, and once our infantry got across the river they could be taken by as­sault. The land west of the river, though, was bowl-shaped: a flat plain surrounded by mountains, over which the Germans had ex­cel­lent observation, and in the days before the attack, the Ger­mans used this advantage to shell the division’s crossing area. A daylight attack would certainly come under heavy artillery fire, especially at the vulnerable time when the troops were crossing the river. For this reason the di­vi­sion decided to cross the river at night, at­tack­ing at dawn after heavy artillery preparation. Com­pany F had had a brief respite from combat, the time being used for training, repairing equip­ment, and practicing night maneuvers and river cross­ings. The date for the crossing of the Meurthe was set at 20 November.

LaVoivre and the bridge sites were assigned to the 2^nd Bat­tal­ion commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Clayton Thobro, one of the most respected bat­tle­field com­mand­ers in the division. La­Voivre was a village of about twenty houses, one and one-half miles north of St. Die, which had been converted by the Germans into a strongpoint. It was situated on rising ground about 1,000 yards from the river. The plain be­tween the river and the town had been mined, and the rising ground in front of the village was blocked by felled trees, barbed wire, and trenches. The hills and woods behind the town provided ideal lo­ca­tion for the German ar­til­lery units, who were zeroed in on the riverbanks where we were likely to cross.

The houses of LaVoivre had been converted into fortifications, with buildings connected either by breaches in the walls or by underground tun­nels. Because the buildings were sited on a slope, their basement walls were open on the side facing the river, from which connections were made with trenches. Isolated houses on each end of town had been re­in­forced by sand-bagged win­dows. If La­Voivre had been adequately manned, it would have been a tough nut to crack. For­tu­nately, division intelligence had learned that La­Voivre was defended only by approximately sixty men. There was no Ger­man armor that might counterattack.

When the attack began, the 7^th Infantry was bivouacked at Fremifontaine, about fifteen miles from the crossing point. At 2300 hours on a chilly, damp evening, the 2^nd Battalion left Fremi­fontaine by truck but encountered a traffic jam when a battalion of tanks from the 14^th Ar­mored Di­vi­sion wandered into 3^rd Division ter­ri­tory. The delay was short, but the tanks chewed up most of our telephone wire.

We left the trucks at LaSalle, about a mile from the rivers, go­ing the rest of the distance by foot. We were under strict orders to maintain complete si­lence, an order we scrupulously obeyed, since no one wanted to draw en­emy fire. Our 1^st Battalion moved into position on our left about the same time. The 3^rd Bat­tal­ion was in reserve, ready to move through the assault bat­tal­ions when the initial ob­jec­tives were achieved.

Earlier in the evening, Com­pany F’s third pla­toon had gone ahead, crossing the river in wooden boats, and established a perimeter on the east side of the river, and the combat engineers installed two footbridges down­stream from the planned Bailey bridge sites. These were standard floating bridges with a three-foot gangway and attached cables for hand guides. One was 84 feet long and the other 96 feet. For­tu­nately, the Ger­mans were una­ware of the bridge building, and their random artillery fire dur­ing the night was apparently routine harassing fire.

At 0345 hours, Company F, commanded by First Lieutenant Earl Swanson, led the battalion across the footbridges (see Map 2). (I still re­mem­ber the black­ened faces of the engineers as we crossed the bridge.) We spread out quietly on ground that I recall as hard, damp and cold. There was no thought of digging in, which would have made noise. Company E, under Lieutenant James Powell, followed and took its place to the right of Company F. Lieutenant Leonard Han­ney’s Com­pany G remained in reserve back by the river in a line of trees. It was in a column of pla­toons parallel to the river with orders to make a large loop to the south end of the town. Sections of Company H, the battalion’s heavy weapons company, were attached to the three rifle com­pa­nies. The 1^st Battalion crossed on footbridges to our left, and far­ther north two battalions of the 30^th Infantry also crossed.

Once in place, we lay for two hours in the silent darkness. All was quiet until about 0600 hours when the German artillery rou­tinely shelled the riverbanks and hit several men in Company G; I do not recall that any of the wounded cried out.

An important part of the plan was a massive artillery barrage to precede our infantry attack. The firepower devoted to this rather modest op­er­a­tion was indeed awe­some. The official history of the Seventh Army summarizes it this way:

H-Hour was preceded by thirty minutes of the most in­tense artillery preparation fired for the 3^rd Division since the breakout at Anzio. This was followed by thirty min­utes of counter-battery and deepening fires on enemy po­si­tions. The initial preparation was fired on the enemy’s main line of re­sist­ance, from which infantry elements were but 200 yards away… Over 6,500 rounds were fired by 3^rd Infantry Division artillery alone, in addition to that fired by corps and group. In sup­port of the VI Corps assault across the Meurthe sixty-four sor­ties were flown by the XII Tac­ti­cal Air Corps prior to noon.

Our regimental cannon com­pany also provided indirect fire while direct fire was provided by anti-tank guns, tanks and tank de­stroy­ers from hull-down po­si­tions, and anti-aircraft guns. The division’s reconnaissance troop manned six .50-caliber ma­chine guns and the 7^th Infantry’s battle patrol manned twenty, all of which were mounted along the riv­er­bank to provide overhead direct fire support for the advancing in­fan­try.

At 0617 hours the barrage be­gan. It alerted the Germans, who assumed that the river was being crossed at that time. They placed mortar fire on the riverbanks and plain and we could do nothing but lie there and take it. Seven men in the company were hit. One mor­tar shell landed about three feet behind my right foot. It seemed like the ground dropped out from under me and I fell back on my stomach with a thud. I can still see that smoking black hole.

Despite the shelling, we held our places and maintained si­lence. Nobody panicked. Be­sides, there was no place to go.

The battalion jumped off at 0645 hours (see Map 3). By that time LaVoivre was burning and a cloud of smoke from it rose in the pale No­vem­ber dawn. Our artillery was still flying overhead and the direct fire weapons poured fire on the town. One report attributed the Germans fail­ure to occupy their trenches to the volume of direct fire support. In the meantime, dive bombers at­tacked the German ar­til­lery po­si­tions in the rear, thus pre­vent­ing German counterfire while the advance was in progress. I still have a vivid mem­ory of a dive bomber swooping down on the town and dropping its bomb, which at that dis­tance looked to me about the size of a jelly bean.

Our advance was delayed about half an hour by felled trees, and this gave the Germans time to get out of their cellars and pour machine gun fire on us. Most of it came from a fortified house on the north end of town. We needed another half-hour to reach the wire and the trenches, which fortunately were un­manned. The company then took shelter on the hillside north of town while Lieutenant Swanson directed the 1st Platoon to attack the house; he later estimated it contained ten men with a heavy ma­chine gun and other automatic weapons. The 2^nd Platoon (where I was) swung around in back of the town and then began working its way down the street, clearing houses.

In the meantime, on our right, Company E did not encounter the obstacles that slowed our ad­vance, and its soldiers attacked the town in quick rushes, reach­ing the wire and trenches in about fifteen minutes. The leader of Com­pany E’s 1^st Pla­toon was new to combat, and many of his men were new replace­ments. The pla­toon was sup­posed to link up with Company F, which was still work­ing its way through the felled trees and re­ceiv­ing fire from the fortified house at the north end of town.

Company E did not receive any fire from this house until its 1st Platoon veered southward to the main part of town. Then the Germans in the house opened up on them. The platoon scattered for cover until Lieutenant Powell, the company commander, got it organized and firing back. The platoon stopped firing when they saw our 1^st Platoon attack the house. The rest of Company E stayed busy clear­ing houses and taking prisoners.

Company G attacked by loop­ing to the right, its purpose being to take the road that led south­ward to St. Die. It ran into a mine field and lost an entire ma­chine gun squad from Company H, plus several of its own sol­diers. But then it ad­vanced rap­idly and reached the south end of town about 0730 hours and prob­a­bly took most of the prisoners the battalion claimed that morn­ing.

A secondary objective of the battalion’s attack was the site of a blown bridge south of town. Here the Germans had a roadblock com­posed of a squad of men with a machine gun and automatic pis­tols. The division’s battle patrol forded the river at this point about 0830 hours and attacked the roadblock with support from Company G. Eight or ten pris­on­ers were taken, and other Ger­man defenders fled into the hills. German ar­til­lery and mortar fire fell on the road, however, and cost Company G an estimated sixteen casualties. The bridge site was secured about 1045 hours and the engineers immediately began in­stall­ing a Bai­ley bridge for the armor to cross and continue the division’s advance. By that time, too, other en­gi­neers were already building another bridge at the site near the footbridge.

By 1100 hours the battle was over. The 1^st Bat­tal­ion took the village of Hurbache and the 3^rd Bat­tal­ion was committed, cross­ing on the foot­bridge and taking Denipaire (see Map 1). We were sent back to catch our breath and re­or­gan­ize. The 7^th Infantry Reg­i­ment had 167 casualties that day, includ­ing thirty-one killed and 136 wounded. The 2^nd Bat­tal­ion had eleven killed (three from Com­pany F) and fifty-seven wounded. It captured forty-five pris­on­ers.

When we dug in for the night, I opened my pack to take out my blanket. I found it was full of holes. My first reaction was: “Somebody took my blanket and gave me this moth-eaten one.” Then I looked again and saw that a piece of shrap­nel had passed completely through the pack and blanket about two inches above my back. Obviously, this was from the mortar shell that had blown me off the ground in the early morning shelling.

What can we learn about in­fan­try combat in World War II from this account of the crossing of the Meurthe? An official report prepared by the Seventh Army historical team, which I have used to flesh out my own recollections, shows the extensive planning and coordination that was necessary to launch an attack by one battalion on one small vil­lage, an attack completed in less than four hours. Most of the men who planned and led the op­er­a­tion were ordinary Americans with minimal training who had learned how to do it mainly through experience. Common sol­diers like me had little knowl­edge of what was hap­pen­ing, but we did our duty anyway. The 7^th In­fan­try relied on heavy sup­port­ing fire to destroy the enemy’s willingness to resist and then sent in rifle companies to occupy the ground, mop up any remaining resistance, and take prisoners. 

The Germans in LaVoivre put up a respectable fight and then sur­ren­dered or fled. By the time the ri­fle­men got into the town, most of the enemy were gone or were ready to surrender. As a ri­fle­man, that’s the way I liked it!

Crossing a river at night was unusual and re­quired careful plan­ning, good leadership, and well-disciplined troops. In this respect, the 7^th Infantry per­formed well. The risk in the plan was premature discovery, for when the two battalions had crossed the river and taken up their jump-off positions, they were vulnerable to German ar­til­lery and mortar fire. In the dark­ness, they could neither attack the town nor retreat across the river. The gamble paid off, but the 2^nd Battalion paid a price, the least of which was my ruined blan­ket. We were fortunate the price was not higher.

The crossing of the Meurthe established a method of crossing rivers at night that was used suc­cess­fully by the 3^rd Division on several oc­ca­sions during the Colmar Pocket operation. Clearly, the division was capable of or­gan­iz­ing and carrying out a so­phis­ti­cated and risky op­er­a­tion.

At LaVoivre, as is inevitable in a citizen army, leadership de­ter­mined what happened. The ri­fle companies were greatly un­derstrength, and the constant turnover of riflemen meant lack of battle experience and inev­i­ta­ble confusion. The com­pany com­mand­ers were proven lead­ers, and with com­pa­nies at half strength or less they ex­er­cised con­sid­er­a­ble personal control over the ac­tion. Sometimes the lack of experience may have been an asset.

What about the riflemen? In 1947, S. L. A. Marshall’s Men Against Fire astonished a nation whose view of World War II had been shaped by wartime news­reels, movies, and morale-building articles, plus the tales of personal daring and danger told by returning veterans. The theme of Marshall’s book was the lack of aggressiveness on the part of U.S. ground troops, which he dem­on­strated by showing the unwill­ing­ness of ri­fle­men to fire their rifles.

After surveying numerous bat­tles in the Eu­ro­pean Theater and in the Pacific, Marshall found that in any battle no more than twenty-five per cent of the ri­fle­men fired their rifles, and much of the time the figure was closer to fifteen per cent. I know I did not fire my rifle at LaVoivre, and I am confident that most members of the 2^nd Pla­toon did not, al­though other platoons did. Coming around the back of the town, firing by the 2^nd Platoon was more likely to injure friend than foe.

The crossing of the Meurthe showed that the riflemen would fire their rifles where there was a target and when their officers or NCOs showed the way. There are enough deadly missiles flying around a battlefield anyway with­out adding un­nec­es­sar­ily to the congestion. The purpose of in­fan­try is to advance on the enemy and occupy ground. When this purpose is carried out, the ri­fle­men are fighting the war, whether they fire their rifles or not.

In retrospect, the crossing of the Meurthe River, although it had some special features, was the kind of small unit action that took place con­stantly in combat and would be repeated over and over until Hitler’s Reich was no more. All along the great front that stretched from the North Sea to the Alps, other battalions were doing approx­i­mately the same thing. Although it is important to understand war in its broadest context, if there is any lesson for the modern U.S. Army in this account of the crossing of the Me­urthe, it is that war eventually comes down to small unit ac­tions. It is at that level that doc­trine, training, lead­er­ship, weap­ons and morale prove their worth.

GIs rush to the aid of a fellow soldier who has been shot by a sniper while crossing a footbridge.

 

Map 1.

Map 2.

Map 3.