Aachen: The U.S. Army's Battle for Charlemagne's City in World War II (31 page)

Cox's 2nd Battalion was first held up by fire from enemy positions in Adolphschacht, but by 0900 Captain Hopcraft's Company K was able to move on the battalion's right flank, capture seventy prisoners, and stop this hostile fire. This enabled the rest of Cox's forces to take the town. Despite having trouble disposing of 200 to 300 civilians, the 2nd Battalion was able to reach the high ground east of Merkstein by 1200 hours. At this time, Hopcraft's Company K detached from Cox's control, moved to the west of Merkstein, and rejoined the 3rd Battalion.

Colonel Sutherland had requested an air strike between Merkstein and Herzogenrath before Greer's and Cox's forces moved farther south, but this did not hold up Lieutenant Colonel Brown. “After Merkstein-Hofstadt was captured, fire from the left flank of the 3rd Battalion was eliminated,” he later noted. “With the help of a platoon of tanks and two TD's, a successful attack was launched on 7 October against the pillboxes to the southeast that had been holding [us] up since the beginning of the operation. Tank fire drove the enemy infantry into the pillboxes and when our infantry came up they filed out and surrendered.”
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One of Brown's officers added his own perspective to the day's operations. “The morning of the 7th the situation began to look better. The 1st Battalion was moving and we were first to establish contact with them,” remembered Company L's Lieutenant Knox. “The 1st Platoon sent a patrol out, contact was made and Captain Stanford then took the company to the 1st Battalion.”
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However, Herlong's forces had moved out in a “big hurry,” leaving one Company L platoon behind. “A squad leader was left, pinned down with his squad,” Knox continued. “He brought his troubles to me; he had been able to withdraw his men and he pointed out the exact position of the Germans. I told Colonel Brown the situation.”

By this time Company K was back under the 3rd Battalion's control. Brown explained to Knox that Captain Palmer's reconstituted Company I would attack to their left. The Company L squad previously left behind quickly took twelve prisoners, and then Captain Stanford moved the rest of the company up. “Things really began to break loose after that,” Knox recalled.
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Before nightfall the company had helped clear about 20 pillboxes. The officers and SS men had all left. Those that were there were not interested in fighting. They told us how they had been locked in the pillboxes by the SS troopers. It was a great haul, the most this company ever gathered up in one day. Everyone got a pistol, a new map case, a watch, a new knife or whatever he wanted. We set up that night in a pillbox that had once been an aid station. Prisoners continued to come in all night.

Following the midafternoon air strike between Merkstein and Herzogenrath, Major Greer's 3rd Battalion of the 120th Infantry Regiment moved steadily forward across open ground until it reached the road leading into Aachen opposite Noppenberg; this town was just east of Bierstraf, which was on the northeast outskirts of Herzogenrath. Greer's companies occupied a line approximately 1,500 yards wide, anchored to the east just above Zopp. During the day, his forces had captured 406 prisoners, including a battalion commander and his staff in Merkstein.
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Brown's 3rd Battalion secured the right flank when Merkstein-Worm was occupied at 1600. His left flank was next to the railroad line leading into Herzogenrath; booby-trapped mines connected by primer cords filled the streets here. Herlong's 1st Battalion companies were between Brown's and Greer's forces on a line centered south of Ritzerfeld; the road from here led into Herzogenrath before intersecting with one of the two main roadways into Aachen. Lieutenant Colonel Herlong's right flank was on the other side of the railroad track opposite Lieutenant Colonel Brown's 3rd Battalion. Colonel Sutherland's front line had been extended from the former 120th Infantry Regiment's position near Kerkrade—where the feint attack ordered by General Hobbs had been directed back on 2 October—southeastward to within 500 yards of the western outskirts of Alsdorf. The Germans’ effort to check the 119th Infantry Regiment's penetration had definitely collapsed.

In Colonel Johnson's 117th Infantry Regiment zone of operations on 7 October, two battalions attacked abreast from zu Ubach for Alsdorf. “The 3rd Battalion really opened up with a power drive,” noted one account.
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A 1st Battalion history mentioned the attack that day
“provided a welcome relief from the slow slugging previously encountered in the Siegfried operation.”
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A little over 5,000 yards from zu Ubach to the southeast, Alsdorf fell before noon.

The 3rd Platoon of Company A, 743rd Tank Battalion, led this attack ahead of Lieutenant Colonel McDowell's 3rd Battalion companies. Rolling out at 0700, Company I's CO, Lieutenant Thompson, pointed out, “The tanks were a tremendous morale factor when they started to work cross-country and spray the German foxholes with machine gun fire.”
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Advancing right behind these armored vehicles, Thompson's men and the soldiers of Company L were able to stay close; Lieutenant Tempe's 1st Platoon spearheaded the drive for Company I with Lt. Gale Dougherty's 2nd Platoon of Company L to his left. These officers had a bet on who would reach Alsdorf first. It was later judged to be a tie; so fast was their advance across the open farmlands that German soldiers were caught sleeping in houses here during the race toward the town.

“The Germans were dug in the beet fields northwest of Alsdorf,” one of Lieutenant Tempe's men remembered. “They kept their heads down when the tanks were firing, and then surrendered in large numbers when our infantrymen came up behind the tanks.”
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Many were nabbed before they could offer any resistance. Lieutenant Colonel Duncan, commander of the 743rd Tank Battalion, later noted that overall resistance was generally “light” for Company A, and two enemy armored cars were knocked out nearer to Alsdorf. The tanks were on their objective at 1030.

The American infantrymen encountered some hostile artillery fire around the railroad track that cut across the main road just outside of Alsdorf, and then scattered small-arms fire greeted them when they got to the edge of town just before noon. Lieutenant Tempe later recalled that they also met a little bazooka and antitank fire, but not long afterward Company I's Sgt. Leroy Gurley found twelve German artillery observers in a cellar and captured them along with fifteen radio sets. Others were taken prisoner while they were still digging defenses. A battalion commander's jeep, complete with maps and a working radio, was also seized. Major Ammons's 2nd Battalion had moved down from their positions in Ubach to join the attack that day. His men followed the 3rd Battalion, mopping up and protecting the regiment's exposed left flank as the assault companies kept striking toward Alsdorf.

Company A's 1st and 2nd Platoons of tanks spearheaded the attack in Lieutenant Colonel Frankland's 1st Battalion area. Captain Spiker's Company B moved to the right of the main road to Alsdorf while Captain Kent's Company A advanced across the open fields just to the west. Lieutenant Foote, still commanding Kent's 3rd Platoon, remembered the tank/infantry actions that day as “the best co-ordination my platoon has ever seen.”
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The tanks moved about 200 to 300 yards ahead of the infantry to the right of the road. Company A first made contact with German forces manning defensive positions in a large farmhouse known as Neu Merberen; they were taken prisoner before the men moved rapidly to the village just west of Alsdorf-Wilhelmschact. The company had taken one hundred prisoners thus far; most had simply come out of their foxholes and surrendered when the tanks got close. Wilhelmschact fell quickly and the Americans then moved into Alsdorf through its western fringes. “Alsdorf was a ghost town when we came in,” remembered Captain Kent. “It was so damn quiet it scared you.”

There were evidences that the place was full of civilians, but not one was to be seen. All activity seemed to have stopped abruptly only a few minutes before. Not a sound was to be heard, nor a movement seen. Actually, residents of Alsdorf were surprised at the arrival of the GI's, did not know what to do, and fled into the depths of their houses in terror. Advance units arrived at about 1000, well ahead of schedule and sweated out an air strike due at 1030. Orange signal panels were quickly spread over the top of the attached tanks and oncoming planes spotted them in time to keep from bombing the captured town.

This air strike had actually proved very beneficial. Fifteen P-47s came in and bombed and strafed a retreating German column around a slag pile on the western edge of Alsdorf. After this, both Kent's Company A and Captain Spiker's Company B moved to the southeast edge of town. Captain Stoeffer's Company C had also arrived by this time; it was noted his company was “entrenched on the extreme right flank of the town, facing Aachen.”

By nightfall, Colonel Johnson's 117th Infantry Regiment was well established in the village. Major Ammons's 2nd Battalion had taken up defensive positions in Wilhelmschact, and Lieutenant Colonel McDowell's 3rd Battalion was straddled across the road that led into Würselen, then Aachen, through Birk; his right flank was at the intersection of the road that came into Alsdorf from Schaufenberg. “But, the situation did not look good,” noted one account. “The left flank was wide open to counterattack from the east, and the regiment attacking on the right [Greer's 3rd Battalion, 120th Infantry Regiment] had lagged far behind. The 117th Infantry's positions stuck out like a ‘bump on a log.’”
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Colonel Johnson's forces nevertheless held positions across one of the two main supply routes into Aachen. This had not gone unnoticed by the German command. Reports covering 7 October revealed the following:

A further push in the direction of Mariagrube was prevented. In the evening, however, a gap of two kilometers had opened up at the southeastern outskirts of Alsdorf which had to be closed. As a consequence, an attack was planned with the newly brought in Mobile Regiment von Fritschen, attached II Battalion, Grenadier Regiment 689 (246th Division), Engineer Battalion 246, and Panzer Brigade 108 with attached elements of heavy Panzer Battalion 506 (four Tigers) for 8 October. At 2200 the briefing for this operation was held by the commanding general [
General der Infanterie
Köchling] at the command post of the 49th Infantry Division.
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Two Shermans, one Stuart, and an attached M10 tank destroyer were lost to antitank mines when CCA's left column attempted to enter Boesweiler on the morning of 7 October. Led by Col. Ira P. Swift, who had just taken command of CCA from Colonel Stokes, this column first waited for Company A of the 17th Engineer Battalion to sweep the minefield, and then forces under Lt. Col. Lindsay Herkness's 2nd Battalion of the 66th Armored Regiment took the town, demolishing four pillboxes in the process. Over a hundred prisoners were rounded up before a small task force under Herkness comprised of Company E tanks and Company L of the 116th Infantry Regiment was assigned the mission of attacking southeastward toward Oidtweiler to assist Lieutenant Colonel
Parker's 1st Battalion in taking this town. This attack started off inauspiciously in early afternoon when the task force ran into direct antitank fire and lost their lead tank.

Lieutenant Colonel Parker's 1st Battalion had launched their drive into Oidtweiler from the south by this time; his two assault companies were also met by well-placed heavy enemy artillery fire as they rolled toward the western edge of the village. Aided with friendly fire delivered by the armored vehicles of Herkness's task force, Parker's tanks were eventually able to knock out two German SP guns and occupy sections of Oidtweiler east of the roadway leading into Aachen. Two of his tanks were lost and numerous prisoners were taken before all CCA offensive operations were terminated at 1800.
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They established defensive positions before nightfall and into the evening. A semicircle of armored vehicles and infantry ringed the eastern edges of Boesweiler with the easternmost positions across the highway leading into Aachen; the right side of this line extended to the roadway running down to Oidtweiler. Lieutenant Colonel Parker's line covered the ground to the west of the roadway, then southward across the road before opening up approximately 500 yards on his right flank into more open ground directly west of Neuweiler. A north-south gap of equal distance still existed across the boundary between CCA and the 117th Infantry Regiment's left flank on the northeast outskirts of Alsdorf.

The
Westwall
bridgehead was now almost 6 miles long and more than 4.5 miles deep. Reaching the 30th Infantry Division's final objective, the east-west road through Würselen that was also the boundary of General Huebner's 1st Infantry Division and their objective in the linkup, now appeared to General Hobbs to be a relatively easy task. Just 4,000 yards separated the two divisions. The operations of 7 October had reinforced his exuberance, so much so that Hobbs had confidently told General Corlett by telephone during the night that the battle for the
Westwall
was over. “We have a hole in this thing big enough to drive two divisions through,” Hobbs proclaimed. “I entertain no doubts that this line is cracked wide open.”
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His confidence even carried into the next day; early that morning he told Corlett, “The job is finished as far as this division is concerned.” By noon on 8 October, General Hobbs most assuredly came to the conclusion that his confidence was misplaced and premature.

A low-hanging thick mist covered the battlefield that morning. Regiment von Fritzschen had come 100 miles from Luxemberg, traveling through the night to reach Mariadorf after being delayed the previous day by U.S. air attacks and fuel refilling problems. Their mission was to recapture Alsdorf at all costs and block the road into Aachen. The German command planned to have Regiment von Fritzschen's two organic battalions with its eleven attached tanks, twenty-two assault guns, and engineer and infantry battalions attack at dawn; however these forces did not arrive until after dawn, thereby losing the opportunity to advance on Alsdorf under the morning's weather cover.