Do soldiers enjoy killing people? (Confession of a soldier from Company B-142)

This article is written from the perspective of a war veteran… So take a break from work and be careful here…

In December 1944 , I was in hospital recovering from multiple wounds…back, hand and shoulder from a shell which had burst in a tree directly over my head… When the Bulge broke out, I was summarily discharged ,still not fully healed, and returned to my unit..,Company B-142 inf. .It was then located in the Black Forest, in the South, and about to become part of a German pincer movement to accompany the Bulge up North. The company was dug in a U-shape around the nose of a wooded hill. For added protection, our guys had placed logs covered with dirt atop their foxholes , which also was covered with several inches of new fallen snow. Along with 2 other returnees, i dug a hole in the corner of a depression in the center of the U. For several days I served as guard to the several troops who daily returned to our rear to bring back rations and water. I used these trips to load up with a large number of boxes of .45 cal. ammo for my Tommy Gun.

This guide below can help you in a survival situation

Guns have been referred to as “the great equalizer,” and there’s no weapon which can come close to them in that regard.

A lot of the popularity of firearms is due to the fact that anyone can use them effectively, not only the strong and agile. The young, the old, men, women and child can take up firearms in defense of home and family and do so effectively.

But what do you do if you can’t use a gun – or if you don’t have a gun — to protect yourself?

As a sidelight, to get these rations we would traipse thru the woods and would descend a small hill just past a group of German Teller Mines placed atop the road to the town where our HQ was located. One day, the porter in front of me, carrying a 5 gallon can of water was having difficulty mounting the icy hill. Putting my hands on his butt, I attempted to help him up. To no avail. He slipped and I watched the water can as it descended directly atop the fuse of one of the Teller Mines . My incongruous reaction…I placed a finger from each hand directly Into each of my ears !!! …………The pressure plate was obviously frozen, so I’m still here.

To continue..I awoke one morning to the sound of gunfire. Later I was to find that enemy troops…( possibly from the crack Herman Goering SS Div.) white clad to blend in with the snow cover..had infiltrated thru the opening at the top of the U. The covered holes had been made to only fire outwardly. Thus they made our guys essentially ineffective as they could not fire inwardly, from whence the enemy was advancing. Thirty-six…about 1/3 of my company…plus parts of a machine gun squad from Co. C, ….were captured with minimal resistance. With my pocket slitting knife I cut myself out of my jammed sleeping bag, and climbed out of my foxhole .I was shocked to find clusters of enemy troops running across my line of vision, at point blank ranges. My central hole turned out to be the key to our defense. With the 2 men in my hole reloading my magazines, my Tommy Gun kept up a nearly continuous fire for a lengthy time, until a relief column finally appeared some time later. My notes of the time reported that I had fired something like 2000 rounds! My body count of the dead close to my stance reached 85. During the largest part of this action, I was in a high of highs! I was screaming “Kummen Zie und Starb”( Come and Die!) in my best Yiddish -German. I loved the emotional high feelings I had for most of this action. Does that make me a bad guy, or a kook? Hell No!! I got the same emotional high when I captured, alive, 28 Nazis ( for my second Silver Star)) as well as from a number of non- combat sources…conquering a major ski hill, several different honor award ceremonies during my later career, etc. These highs are rare but definitely welcome and appreciated whenever and wherever they occur.

If you have any dissatisfaction with my content, you can tell me here and I will fix the problem, because I care about every reader and even more so about your opinion!