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NAZIS REPORT RUSSIANS 7 MILES FROM BERLIN; ALLIES DRIVE IN BAVARIA; NUREMBERG FALLS (4/21/45)
Microfilm-New York Times archives, Monterey Public Library | 4/21/45 | Drew Middleton, Richard J.H. Johnston, Sydney Gruson, Milton Bracker, George E. Jones, Robbin Coons

Posted on 04/21/2015 4:23:31 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson

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TOPICS: Extended News
KEYWORDS: history; milhist; realtime; worldwarii
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To: EternalVigilance

42 Division 232nd Infantry cont’d

On The afternoon of April 22, the First Battalion overcame the stiff resistance in Bromback and raced south for the Altmuth River. It’s leading elements spotted a bridge intact in the vicinity of UnterAsback and sped across just in time to keep the Germans from blowing the bridge. This was the first crossing of the river made, and put the First Battalion, as the spearhead of the attack on Munich. The First Battalion crossed the river by dusk and occupied the high ground in the vicinity of Duttenheim the night of 22-23 April. The Second and Third Battalion marched all night and crossed the river about daylight, 23 April, with the Second Battalion closing into Meinheim and the Third Battalion closing into Dittenheim. The Regimental CP was located at Apsburg.


Past Nurnberg now. I was in Apsburg as we were moving quickly toward Munich. Resistance had dwindled. There was no sign on any Nazi Redoubt.


21 posted on 04/21/2015 9:01:46 AM PDT by ex-snook (To conquer use Jesus, not bombs.)
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To: Homer_J_Simpson; henkster
Another posthumous column from Ernie Pyle.

____________________________________

They Just Lay There, Blinking

IU Archives
Boris Chaliapin drew this sketch of Ernie Pyle for the July 17, 1944 cover of TIME Magazine.
http://mediaschool.indiana.edu/erniepyle/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2015/01/blinking.mp3

OKINAWA, April 21, 1945 – Now I’ve seen my first Jap soldiers in their native state – that is, before capture. But not for long, because the boys of my company captured them quicker than a wink.

It was mid-forenoon and we had just reached our new bivouac area after a march of an hour and a half. The boys threw off their packs, sat down on the ground, and took off their helmets to mop their perspiring foreheads.

We were in a small grassy spot at the foot of a hill. Most of these hillsides have caves with household stuff hidden in them. They are a rich field for souvenir hunters. And all Marines are souvenir hunters.

So immediately two of our boys, instead of resting, started up through the brush, looking for caves and souvenirs. They had gone about fifty yards when one of them yelled:

"There’s a Jap soldier under this bush."

We didn’t get too excited for most of us figured he meant a dead Jap. But three or four of the boys got up and went up the hill. A few moments later somebody yelled again:

"Hey, here’s another one. They’re alive and they’ve got rifles."

So the boys went at them in earnest. The Japs were lying under two bushes. They had their hands up over their ears and were pretending to be asleep.

The Marines surrounded the bushes and, with guns pointing, they ordered the Japs out. But the Japs were too scared to move. They just lay there, blinking.

The average Jap soldier would have come out shooting. But, thank goodness, these were of a different stripe. They were so petrified the Marines had to go into the bushes, lift them by the shoulders, and throw them out in the open,

My contribution to the capture consisted of standing to one side and looking as mean as I could.

One Jap was small, and about thirty years old. The other was just a kid of sixteen or seventeen, but good-sized and well-built. The kid had the rank of superior private and the other was a corporal. They were real Japanese from Japan, not the Okinawan home guard.

They were both trembling all over. The kid’s face turned a sickly white. Their hands shook. The muscles in the corporal’s jaw were twitching. The kid was so paralyzed he couldn’t even understand sign language.

We don’t know why those two Japs didn’t fight. They had good rifles and potato-masher hand grenades. They could have stood behind their bushes and heaved grenades into our tightly packed group and got themselves two dozen casualties, easily.

The Marines took their arms. One Marine tried to direct the corporal in handbook Japanese, but the fellow couldn’t understand.

The scared kid just stood there, sweating like an ox. I guess he thought he was dead. Finally we sent them back to the regiment.

*

The two Marines who flushed these Japs were Corp. Jack Ossege of Silver Grove, Kentucky, across the river from Cincinnati, and Pfc. Lawrence Bennett of Port Huron, Michigan.

Okinawa was the first blitz for Bennett and this was the first Jap soldier he’d ever seen. He is thirty years old, married, and has a baby girl. Back home he was a freight dispatcher.

The Jap corporal had a metal photo holder like a cigaret case. In it were photos which we took to be of three Japanese movie stars. They were good-looking, and everybody had to have a look.

Ossege had been through one Pacific blitz, but this was the first Jap he ever took alive. As an old hand at souvenir hunting he made sure to get the Jap’s rifle.

That rifle was the envy of everybody. Later when we were sitting around, discussing the capture, the other boys tried to buy or trade him out of it. "Pop" Taylor, the black-whiskered corporal from Jackson, Michigan, offered Ossege a hundred dollars for the rifle.

The answer was no. Then Taylor offered four quarts of whiskey. The answer still was no. Then he offered eight quarts. Ossege weakened a little. He said, "Where would you get eight quarts of whiskey?" Pop said he had no idea. So Ossege kept the rifle.

So there you have my first two Japs. And I hope my future Japs will all be as tame as these two. But I doubt it.

Ernie Pyle

22 posted on 04/21/2015 9:07:59 AM PDT by untenured
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To: untenured

What a prescient ending.


23 posted on 04/21/2015 9:31:00 AM PDT by EternalVigilance (Polling: The art of determining how effectively the people were fooled by your last poll.)
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To: ex-snook

Glad to hear it. If there had been one, you might not have made it back.


24 posted on 04/21/2015 9:32:35 AM PDT by EternalVigilance (Polling: The art of determining how effectively the people were fooled by your last poll.)
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To: Homer_J_Simpson; All

You provide and I read the daily Nimitz Gray Book sheet.

I’ll take this opportunity to report on the present......

Last week I visited the Admiral Nimitz National Museum of the Pacific War in Fredericksburg Texas.

More Specifically, I visited on two days the “new” George H.W. Bush Gallery that is part of the museum. The Gallery is just fantastic, tracking the war from the 1939 Japanese occupation of China through the destruction of Hiroshima/Nagasaki in August 1945. There was a full size Big Boy bomb

The exhibits are many.......very many. They vary from printed wall graphics to original footage on several size screens. There are excellent flat table screens depicting in graphics and video the progress of several battles. There are a lot of original documents and orders and one log book from Scouting 6 pilot at Midway noting the hits on two carriers. There are small niche exhibits with a host of memorabilia from both always named individuals. There are Jap uniform parts. There are lots of weapons from both sides.

The museum hands out phone like devices to allow you to dial a number and get an audio presentation for the specific area. For me that was over kill and just too much info to comprehend.

You are advised that to see/hear it all takes two full days. Even going fairly slow and detail examination of those parts of interest took us about 8 hours on two different days.

Additionally there is the old Nimitz Museum I visited there three years ago. It pales in comparison to the Bush Gallery and is as I recall devoted mostly to Admiral Nimitz. The building is the hotel owned by his family . Out side are several Naval gun mounts and a gallery depicting the ships and personnel that served in the Pacific.

Down the street the museum has established a large exhibit depicting typical Jap pacific island fortifications. We bought tickets for a one hour reenactment of Marine assault using real weapons and hollywood like explosions..... including a 50 caliber machine gun mounted on a half track and a squad with a real flame thrower.

Prior to the reenactment, all the weapons of both sides were demonstrated by uniformed Marines and Japs. A lead demonstrator was a real cigar chomping order barking retired Marine Colonel.

I have been to several WW II museums, I nNew Orleans, Dayton D.C and Pennsecola and I must say the Nimitz is the best of the lot.

Our mission was to go to Texas, to visit the museum, to view the acres and acres of wild flowers (blue bonnets) and to visit Llano Texas and Cooper’s for the best BBQ in Texas. Our trip was a total success.

I recommend going to visit this museum


25 posted on 04/21/2015 9:34:18 AM PDT by bert ((K.E.; N.P.; GOPc.;+12, 73, ..... Obama is public enemy #1)
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To: EternalVigilance

It was difficult finding enough habitable living space to host the war crimes tribunal.


26 posted on 04/21/2015 11:22:16 AM PDT by henkster (Do I really need a sarcasm tag?)
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To: bert

Along with Mrs. henkster and my two sons, I went to the Nimitz Museum in Fredricksburg in October 2006. (At the hotel we stayed at we watched Tony Romo start his first game for the Cowboys). We also scaled the Enchanted Rock and had a nice lunch of authentic Tex-German food at the Ausländer Restaurant.

Fredricksburg and the Nimitz Museum are well worth the visit.


27 posted on 04/21/2015 11:37:55 AM PDT by henkster (Do I really need a sarcasm tag?)
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To: untenured

Pyle’s column left me wondering about the postscript: Did Bennett, Ossegge and Taylor survive the battle and return to their homes?


28 posted on 04/21/2015 12:04:02 PM PDT by henkster (Do I really need a sarcasm tag?)
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To: henkster

I googled them and got nothing but the Ernie Pyle column. Sure hope they made it. IIRC, the Marines later joined the Army in the south and had some hard fighting there too.


29 posted on 04/21/2015 3:09:52 PM PDT by colorado tanker
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To: Homer_J_Simpson
San Terenzo: US 2nd Lt. Daniel K. Inouye (442nd Infantry) while leading his platoon in an attack on German positions on Mount Musatello, performs acts of heroism which later result in him being awarded the MOH.

The future Senator?

30 posted on 04/21/2015 3:27:55 PM PDT by Lurking Libertarian (Non sub homine, sed sub Deo et lege)
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To: Lurking Libertarian

Yes indeed.


31 posted on 04/21/2015 3:50:41 PM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson ("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))
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To: bert
I recommend going to visit this museum

I'll put it on my list. I was looking for a museum located in Texas as I am planning a museum tour. The WWII museum in NOLA is on the list, as is the naval air museum in Pensacola and the Marine museum in VA. I'm also looking for a few Navy ships that have been turned into museums. USS Laffey is definitely one I want to see.

32 posted on 04/21/2015 10:34:46 PM PDT by AlaskaErik (I served and protected my country for 31 years. Progressives spent that time trying to destroy it.)
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To: Homer_J_Simpson

Fortunately for Hitler, Steiner’s assault will bring it under control.


33 posted on 04/21/2015 10:40:36 PM PDT by dfwgator
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To: dfwgator

Downfall - Hitler Rant - Original

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcJWCiXbfxs


34 posted on 04/21/2015 10:45:32 PM PDT by EternalVigilance
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To: EternalVigilance

Yep, that’s the one, it happened 70 years ago today.

Downfall is a great movie.


35 posted on 04/21/2015 10:50:07 PM PDT by dfwgator
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To: dfwgator

Well, that particular exchange was a few days off yet I think, but it’s getting close.

An excellent movie, indeed. It’s one of the few movies that I care enough about to have a copy on my shelf.


36 posted on 04/21/2015 10:53:42 PM PDT by EternalVigilance
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To: EternalVigilance

According to Wiki, it was on the 22nd...

The story resumes on 20 April 1945, Hitler’s 56th birthday, as the Battle of Berlin is under way......

The next day (the 21st) , General Helmuth Weidling receives word that he is to be executed for ordering a retreat to the west against Hitler’s orders.....

On the following day (the 22nd), General Hans Krebs informs Hitler that Berlin’s defences have further disintegrated. Hitler still believes Steiner’s attack will control the Russian charge, but Krebs and Jodl tell him it cannot be done.


37 posted on 04/21/2015 10:56:00 PM PDT by dfwgator
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To: EternalVigilance

What will always stay with me is the scene with those poor Goebbels’ children, brutal to watch.


38 posted on 04/21/2015 10:57:36 PM PDT by dfwgator
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To: EternalVigilance

Here is the “War and Remembrance” version of the rant

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huf9JUibW0E


39 posted on 04/21/2015 11:00:56 PM PDT by dfwgator
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To: dfwgator

Absolutely chilling. A historic reality unequaled by any horror flick ever made.


40 posted on 04/21/2015 11:05:44 PM PDT by EternalVigilance
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