As the combat troops approached the fortifications of the Siegfried Line, enemy resistance stiffened and the tactical situation settled into one of a relatively static front. Opportunity was taken to regroup the medical units of First Army so that this new phase of the campaign might be more adequately covered. An area was secured midway between the army’s north and south boundaries, and the bulk of army medical units, evacuation hospitals, NP hospitals, 91st Medical Gas Treatment Battalion, the 1st Medical Depot Company, and the headquarters of the medical groups were concentrated in this area with all possible speed.
The army surgeon rearranged the army medical units to provide three identical groups. One group operated in each corps zone and was charged with the responsibility for control of army medical service. The composition of the three groups was as follows :
Continue Reading >>>
The 9th Infantry Division was activated at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, on August 1, 1940 as the 9th Division then it participated in both October and November 1941 Carolina Maneuvers and was sent later to amphibious training under the Atlantic Fleet Amphibious Corps.
Joachim Peiper (SS #132) was born in Berlin, Germany, on Jan 30, 1915. His father, Waldemar Peiper, was a career Army officer in German’s Imperial Army who fought in East Africa during World War I. He married, in 1909, Charlotte Marie Schwartz from Berlin. Joachim Peiper had two brothers, Hans-Hasso and Horst (both in the SS, one drowned with the Bismark while the other was ’suicided’ in Poland for obscure reasons.
There is something I would like to say about the 106th Infantry Division. In Belgium, as witnesses on what happened during the Battle of the Bulge, we are able to do a parallel between the 2 Inf Regts (422-423/106th Infantry Division) surrounded around the hight grounds in the Schoenberg – Armelscheid – Bleialf area and the 101st Airborne Division surrounded in the vicinity of Bastogne for 6 days. If Commanding General 1st Army would have done it the same way with the 101st A/B as they did with the 106th Inf Div, the US Army would have lost over 14000 men captured and not 6800. The 101st Troopers in Bastogne were all veterans of Normandy and Holland and they knew all the tricks used by the Germans in this perdiod. The had already face SS Troops, SS Panzer, Luftfaffe, Panzer and Wermacht Troops. In comparison, the entire 106th Infantry Division had on December 1944 neither shot a single 30.06 bullet at the Germans nor had faced a combat against the Germans.
On Dec 16 1944, at 0500-H, Germany commenced its last great offensive of World War II against the US Army Lines flanked in the woods along the German Reich’s border. This crucial Battle, known as the Battle of the Bulge, lasted until Jan 28 1945, but the majority of the heavy fighting occurred during the month of December and was among the most ferocious of the entire war. This campaign produced many acts of bravery and demonstrated the courageous character of the American fighting spirit.
