Death Traps: The Survival of an American Armored Division in World War II by Belton Y. Cooper Page A
Authors: Belton Y. Cooper
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is terrified, he develops the courage to cope with this terror and is able to function, and through this functioning he is able to survive. I remember reading somewhere, “Courage is fear that has said its prayers.”
After crossing the bridge, we proceeded down the road about half a mile, turned right on a small country road, and climbed to the top of the hill where B Company was located. Dead cattle littered the fields on both sides of the road; the bodies were bloated by the hot sun, and the stench was strong.
I immediately went to see Captain Roquemore, commander of B Company of the maintenance battalion. Rock was a tall, slender, lazy-eyed Southern country boy with a slow drawl and an easy, subtle sense of humor.
“Cooper, put it to me,” he said. “What the hell is happening over there?”
I told him we had a lot of losses and that Dick Johnson needed help. We went over the maps in detail, and I showed him the areas that Dick had picked out for B Company. Rock concurred and said he would like to move at daybreak. It was already dark by this time, so I decided to spend the night in the B Company bivouac.
My driver, Smith, had already parked the Jeep next to a hedgerow and started digging a foxhole. I pitched in with a shovel. The earth here had been a plowed field and was much softer than that across the river at Airel. The digging was made even easier by the fact that we weren’t being shelled.
We dug a two-man foxhole approximately seven feet by five feet by two feet deep. We cut down some small saplings and placed them across the hole, then laid our shelter half tents on top. We covered this with dirt, which we tapered from about eighteen inches in the middle to about six inches on the sides. We left a small entrance at one end. Although the foxhole would not stand a direct hit from an artillery shell, it would protect us from any that landed nearby.
The night before on the hill at Airel, a number of artillery shells had hit close by. From that experience, I concluded that what we had been taught at the bomb disposal school at Aberdeen Proving Ground in January 1943 was true. As long as we could stay below an explosion’s blast cone, we had a reasonable chance of surviving. Also, the Germans sent their planes up at night to drop butterfly bombs, small bombs about the size of a hand grenade that are scattered from a large canister and had a considerable effect against personnel sleeping in uncovered foxholes. We’d had a number of casualties in the maintenance battalion back at Isigny due to butterfly bombs.
Thoughts on the Reality of Combat
Smith and I climbed into our foxhole and stretched out on our bedrolls. I took off my boots and helmet, put my pistol under my helmet, and relaxed. I could tell by Smith’s deep breathing that he had gone to sleep immediately, but I could not sleep right away. I was excited, concerned, and frightened all at the same time. I thought about those young soldiers marching up the road to go into combat for the first time, then I thought about having to lead B Company across to the VCP tomorrow. Where would we have to go after that? I became extremely nervous and sad. Tears came to my eyes when I thought about the two soldiers we saw who had been blown out of their Jeep. I began to wonder if I had the strength and courage to go through this for who knows how long.
I began to reflect on my whole life and my ideals, particularly my religious views. I thought about my early Sunday school days when I was a child in the Methodist Church in Huntsville, Alabama. I remembered being taught the Twenty-third Psalm. “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.” The words came clearly, and I started crying. I continued saying the words to myself: “Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me. Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me.”
Then a feeling of calm came over me. I stopped crying and finished the psalm, thinking
After crossing the bridge, we proceeded down the road about half a mile, turned right on a small country road, and climbed to the top of the hill where B Company was located. Dead cattle littered the fields on both sides of the road; the bodies were bloated by the hot sun, and the stench was strong.
I immediately went to see Captain Roquemore, commander of B Company of the maintenance battalion. Rock was a tall, slender, lazy-eyed Southern country boy with a slow drawl and an easy, subtle sense of humor.
“Cooper, put it to me,” he said. “What the hell is happening over there?”
I told him we had a lot of losses and that Dick Johnson needed help. We went over the maps in detail, and I showed him the areas that Dick had picked out for B Company. Rock concurred and said he would like to move at daybreak. It was already dark by this time, so I decided to spend the night in the B Company bivouac.
My driver, Smith, had already parked the Jeep next to a hedgerow and started digging a foxhole. I pitched in with a shovel. The earth here had been a plowed field and was much softer than that across the river at Airel. The digging was made even easier by the fact that we weren’t being shelled.
We dug a two-man foxhole approximately seven feet by five feet by two feet deep. We cut down some small saplings and placed them across the hole, then laid our shelter half tents on top. We covered this with dirt, which we tapered from about eighteen inches in the middle to about six inches on the sides. We left a small entrance at one end. Although the foxhole would not stand a direct hit from an artillery shell, it would protect us from any that landed nearby.
The night before on the hill at Airel, a number of artillery shells had hit close by. From that experience, I concluded that what we had been taught at the bomb disposal school at Aberdeen Proving Ground in January 1943 was true. As long as we could stay below an explosion’s blast cone, we had a reasonable chance of surviving. Also, the Germans sent their planes up at night to drop butterfly bombs, small bombs about the size of a hand grenade that are scattered from a large canister and had a considerable effect against personnel sleeping in uncovered foxholes. We’d had a number of casualties in the maintenance battalion back at Isigny due to butterfly bombs.
Thoughts on the Reality of Combat
Smith and I climbed into our foxhole and stretched out on our bedrolls. I took off my boots and helmet, put my pistol under my helmet, and relaxed. I could tell by Smith’s deep breathing that he had gone to sleep immediately, but I could not sleep right away. I was excited, concerned, and frightened all at the same time. I thought about those young soldiers marching up the road to go into combat for the first time, then I thought about having to lead B Company across to the VCP tomorrow. Where would we have to go after that? I became extremely nervous and sad. Tears came to my eyes when I thought about the two soldiers we saw who had been blown out of their Jeep. I began to wonder if I had the strength and courage to go through this for who knows how long.
I began to reflect on my whole life and my ideals, particularly my religious views. I thought about my early Sunday school days when I was a child in the Methodist Church in Huntsville, Alabama. I remembered being taught the Twenty-third Psalm. “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.” The words came clearly, and I started crying. I continued saying the words to myself: “Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me. Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me.”
Then a feeling of calm came over me. I stopped crying and finished the psalm, thinking
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