Bob: I wonder if you could post this to
your mail call. I have my Dad's letters home from the front. He was
a Company D BAR man at the Bulge, was nicknamed "Eaglebeak", and was best
buddies with Sam "Sambo" Emmons, Jr. and someone named "Chickie." He
writes th his Mom that " in an attack on which we rode on tanks, my tank was
disabled in the middle of an open field and I was knocked off into very deep
snow. My foot hit a fence post buried in the snow and hurt my ankle.
I managed to climb on another tank and was one of the first five men into our
section of the town where it was grenades and close fire. I was in action
the next day and night and then my foot started to hurt and when I was in
my foxhole I couldn't move my feet enough to keep from getting a beautiful case
of frostbite." He also wrote that on the way down to the hospital he heard the
radio from the states for the first time in months and hearing music after a
solid month of 88's, screaming meenies and burp guns was almost as good as the
chow and sheets at the hospital. In a later letter to his Dad, he wrote
that he froze his feet on Jan 25. It appears that the attack took place on
or about Jan 22-23.
I wonder if any of your veterans would know what
town Company D was attacking or what armored unit was carrying them? He
also wrote many other letters for the short time he was with the
517th.
**************
Chronicle on our website shows
that D Co. attacked Hunnange riding tanks and along with F Co. by
foot captured Hunnange and 149 prisoners--Ben
Boom Boom Alicki
DIFFERENT CHRISTMAS POEM
"The
embers glowed softly, and in their dim light, I gazed round the room and I
cherished the sight. My wife was asleep, her head on my chest, My daughter
beside me, angelic in rest. Outside the snow fell, a blanket of white,
transforming the yard to a winter delight. The sparkling lights in the tree I
believe, Completed the magic that was Christmas Eve. My eyelids were heavy, my
breathing was deep, Secure and surrounded by love I would sleep. In perfect
contentment, or so it would seem, So I slumbered, perhaps I started to dream.
The sound wasn't loud, and it wasn't too near, But I opened my eyes when it
tickled my ear. Perhaps just a cough, I didn't quite know, Then the sure sound
of footsteps outside in the snow. My soul gave a tremble, I struggled to hear,
And I crept to the door just to see who was near. Standing out in the cold and
the dark of the night, a lone figure stood, his face weary and tight. A soldier,
I puzzled, some twenty years old, Perhaps a Marine, huddled here in the cold.
Alone in the dark, he looked up and smiled, standing watch over me, and my wife
and my child. "What are you doing?" I asked without fear, "Come in this moment,
it's freezing out here! Put down your pack, brush the snow from your sleeve, You
should be at home on a cold Christmas Eve!" For barely a moment I saw his eyes
shift, Away from the cold and the snow blown in drifts.. To the window that
danced with a warm fire's light Then he sighed and he said "Its really all
right, I'm out here by choice. I'm here every night." "It's my duty to stand at
the front of the line, That separates you from the darkest of times. No one had
to ask or beg or implore me, I'm proud to stand here like my fathers before me.
My Gramps died at 'Pearl on a day in December," Then he sighed, "That's a
Christmas 'Gram alway remembers." My dad stood his watch in the jungles of
'Nam', And now it is my turn and so, here I am. I've not seen my own son in more
than a while, But my wife sends me pictures, he's sure got her smile. Then he
bent and he carefully pulled from his bag, The red, white, and blue... an
American flag. "I can live through the cold and the being alone, Away from my
family, my house and my home. I can stand at my post through the rain and the
sleet,I can sleep in a foxhole with little to eat. I can carry the weight of
killing another, Or lay down my life with my sister and brother.. Who stand at
the front against any and all, To ensure for all time that this flag will not
fall." "So go back inside," he said, "harbor no fright, Your family is waiting
and I'll be all right." "But isn't there something I can do, at the least, "Give
you money," I asked, "or prepare you a feast?" It seems all too little for all
that you've done, For being away from your wife and your son." Then his eye
welled a tear that held no regret, "Just tell us you love us, and never forget.
To fight for our rights back at home while we're gone, To stand your own watch,
no matter how long. For when we come home, either standing or dead, To know you
remember we fought and we bled. Is payment enough, and with that we will trust,
That we mattered to you as you mattered to us."
May God
Bless, and may WE ALL PRAY FOR OUR MILITARY PERSONNEL EVERY
NIGHT!