Published: December 17, 2007 01:04 am            

When hell freezes over

"Bulge" vets endure horrors of war

The young replacement soldier, peach fuzz covering his chin, walks among frozen men in icy foxholes searching for the company first sergeant.

Upon finding the sergeant, the soldier asks where he should be. Without even looking up, the sergeant slowly motions his head over to a spot several yards from where the sergeant is sharing a foxhole with another, equally frozen soldier.

The replacement soldier gingerly walks across the ice and snow to a spot and begins to chip away at the ground with his infantry shovel. Other men who've been huddled on the front lines near Bastogne in a nondescript strip of the Ardennes forest watch with empty stares as the young man works in digging the foxhole. Finally satisfied he has finished his job, the soldier hunches down into the depression with a look of wonderment as to what may happen next.

The very faint "wump!" of a far off mortar goes unnoticed by the replacement but not to the ears of the men who've heard the sound many times before. They slowly make themselves as small as possible in their holes listening to the flutter of the 81mm shell as it descends toward their positions. The sudden crack of an explosion tells them it has arrived.

As they peer over the edge of their foxholes, the men of the 75th Infantry Division see the replacement soldier is gone. Only dark, dirty soil, burnt by the sizzling mortar round, marks where seconds before a man was. A rifle, broken in half, lies nearby. A contorted helmet lies further away. No one says a word.

They didn't even know his name.

It begins to snow again.

The 75th Infantry Division arrived in England on Nov. 22, 1944. After a brief training program, the division landed at the French towns of Le Havre and Rouen on Dec. 13, and bivouacked at Yvetot on the 14th. When The Battle of the Bulge began in the Ardennes on Dec. 16, the 75th was rushed to the front and entered defensive combat on Dec. 23, alongside the Ourthe River.

Among the soldiers of the untested 75th was Lyle Fulton of Meridian. He was one of nine men who manned a 155mm artillery gun for the 730th Field Artillery attached to the 75th. If the foot soldier is the anvil, then the 155mm cannon is the sledge hammer.

"I loaded the shell into the breach many times," said Fulton. "I have back problems to this day because of that."

The 75th was filling the gap left by the 106th Infantry Division that had been overrun by the initial German offensive. Two whole regiments of the 106th had been surrounded and captured. Immediately, the Allied forces were without 17,000 fighting men and the accompanying material. The 75th had to close the gap and help stave off the German attack. For that they would pay dearly.

"By having filled the gap, we surprised the Germans," said Fulton. "But they regrouped and began pounding us. The battle lasted several days and nights. We experienced gruesome and relentless fire as the Germans were determined to advance."

Heavy snow, sub-zero temperatures and no winter clothing only added to the misery as men had to fight the Germans and the elements. Despite the forest terrain laced with deep river valleys and high ridges, artillery barrages were frequent from both sides as the Germans, and then the Allies, tried to gain the initiative.

"With a full powder charge, we had to crouch on our knees and open our mouths to withstand the concussion of the blast from our gun," Fulton said of the massive cannon that could hurl a 90 pound shell up to 14 miles. "When we weren't firing at them, they were firing at us. White phosphorous shells would come down toward us with the snow. You could hear the round sizzle when it exploded. Sounded like angry hornets."

At one point during the battle, Fulton carried his best friend to an aid station to be treated for severe frost bite to his feet.

"His feet had literally burst open," Fulton said. "He didn't want to leave. None of us did. We had a job to do."

Fulton never saw his friend again.

On Christmas, 1944, the skies cleared. As the low fog and cloud cover gave way, Allied air forces began to rain destruction down on the German offensive. Ground forces, such as the 289th and 290th Infantry Regiments of the 75th began to make progress against heavy losses. Covered by the devastating barrage from Fulton's mates, the infantry began the bloody task of eliminating the Bulge.

In quick succession, the Allies pushed the Germans back. Lead elements of Patton's Third Army reached Bastogne, ending the siege on Dec. 26.

In the days following Christmas, the 75th advanced to the Aisne River and entered the town of Grandmenil. The division relieved the 82nd Airborne Division along the Salm River on Jan. 8, a day after Hitler finally relented ending the Ardennes offensive. But more bloody battles lay ahead.

"Once the weather broke, we could finally get out of those horrible freezing conditions," said Fulton. "That's when all our winter gear caught up with us. We didn't need it by then."

For decades Fulton couldn't speak of what he'd seen in the Ardennes Forest and the many forgotten villages and hamlets the 75th fought in afterward. The only time he could face those images burned into his memory was when he met annually with other men who had experienced the same ordeals.

Slowly Fulton, now 82, began to come to grips with the images. What was known to them at the time of the war as battle fatigue or shell shock, has since morphed into Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Fulton, as have many men and women today who suffer from the same condition, had to first face his fears, his nightmares, in order to effectively deal with them.

"It took me a very long time to get to the point where I can talk about what happened. It hasn't been an easy thing for me. But as I've gotten older, I've come to realize that was a part of my life that happened so I'd better find a way to deal with it. Plus, I don't want the young people today to forget what we went through. What we did, we did for our children and grandchildren. They should not forget," Fulton said.

Today the Ardennes Forest is quiet. Virtually no evidence remains of a time 67 years ago when man and machine collided among the majestic, snow covered fir trees. The only sounds heard now in places such as Elsenborn Ridge, the Ourthe River Valley and Bastogne are those associated with peace. It is hard to remember that at one time men fought and died in such picturesque locations. It is harder still to fathom that men, such as Lyle Fulton, survived.

        

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