Commentary
Speech at the Rochefort Reception
The following speech was made at the Rochefort, Belgium Town Hall on the occasion of John being made a honorary citizen of that town on June 19, 2010. Mr. Gilbert Stevenot, who was an interpreter in General Bradley’s Headquarters during WWII was responsible for the...
87th Infantry Division Lost 1,310 Killed, 4,000 Wounded in Three Months of World War II
For decades after World War II, Paul Nessman pursued the casualty figures of the 87th Infantry Division which fought in the bloody Battle of the Bulge and across Europe. Month after month, year after year, the Division Statistician spent his own time and money...
Lester Atwell: Author of World’s First Non-Fiction Novel About Infantry at War
I first met Lester Atwell on the Queen Elizabeth that was bouncing and cutting the waves, loaded with soldiers headed overseas on the Atlantic Ocean. Both of us from Brooklyn - I an aspiring journalist, he an established short story writer for the most prestigious...
Though Commended By Friend and Foe, 87th Division Remains Below the Radar
As below-the-radar as the 87th Infantry Division was among the glamorous units of the U.S. Third Army in World War II, it was actually a highly-acclaimed division. But it takes some digging to reveal the numerous commendations it received. The 14,000-member unit,...
Mail From Home Was the Infantryman’s Oxygen
Whether he scanned the mail and pocketed it in his foxhole with artillery screaming around or snow raining down, or in a barn with bullets whizzing past, and whatever information it contained, mail from home was the oxygen of an infantryman’s life. Even when they were...
The General That History Forgot; and One That Popular Lore Created
Bastogne was under siege and effectively surrounded. The Germans knew it, and the Americans knew it. Catching thousands of green 106th and veteran 28th Infantry Division troops off guard, the Germans swiftly poured a deluge of terror and death into the Ardennes Forest...
Tilly: The Sweetheart of the Liberators of Luxembourg
Little Luxembourg, a country no larger than the state of Rhode island produced a gracious hostess and a friend of the GI soldier with a heart as big as the state of Texas.
A Tale of Buchenwald — The Stench Still Lingers
The first thing I noticed was the odor. It reminded me of the Kuhner Packing Company’s waste being burned in my hometown of Muncie, Indiana. It was a warm morning in April, 1945 — calm and peaceful — unlike the grueling conditions we had recently left behind in Belgium and Luxembourg.
“The Eagle” Drops Its Gold During Short Battle Pause; What Was That All About?
Jostling rifles and carbines, some with hand grenades dangling from field jackets or overcoats, the helmeted and unshaven troopers advanced slowly in a seemingly static line. It took time to get paid in the local currency, and, as they received their paper bills and...
Battle of the Bulge Was Longer, Bloodier Than Army Admits
There can be no dissent about the starting date of the Battle of the Bulge. Early on December 16, 1944, German armies jumping off from Germany smashed through American lines from both the ground and air, across Luxembourg and into Belgium. But read a dozen books, plus...