Defense of St Vith

Saturday, 06 February 2010 13:10 |

Defense of St Vith

Dead August 21, 2009

(The following is excerpted from an interview given by Glenn to the Library of Congress.)

After Thanksgiving, the 7^th Armored Division was attached to the 9^th Army with orders to cross into the Ruhr Pocket; however, the German offensive changed those orders on December 16^th, as the 7^th Armored was ordered to St Vith, Belgium.

The 7^th Armored Division was asked to hold St Vith for 48 hours, but they ended up holding of the Germans for six days at a cost of 80% of their men and material. The division absorbed much of the weight of the German drive and was forced to withdraw west of the Salm River, 23 December.

It shifted to Manhay, Belgium, and by the end of December had cleared the town of the enemy. After a brief rest in January, the division returned to positions near St Vith, attacked, and captured the town.

In the early afternoon of 23 December 1944, while I was dug in on the outer edge of some woods about a mile east of St Vith, I noticed a German Tiger Tank move up on a ridge some 500 yards to my front. I crawled back to a tank battalion forward observer, and while coming up to check it out he said, "Hell, Sarge, I wouldn't dare to try to get a tank up here, he'd knock me out before I could get a round off."

So, we just sat there and waited. Just after dark, we got orders to go back some 100 yards and dig in, but, before we could dig in all hell broke loose with fire from that tank. That Tiger fired tree bursts and APCs, as well as direct fire to get anything and everything that might have been in the woods. As the fire let up, we got orders to return to our original positions.

I found out my original position took a direct hit. I set up my 30 cal. Machine gun to traverse the area in front of me at waist high and waited. I soon heard sounds from the ridge out to my front. I waited for my squad leader to fire, not knowing that he had been wounded by the tank firing and been evacuated.

Upon learning that I was now the squad leader, I began firing on the enemy troops. I soon heard Pete Andreliwitz on Alpino's fun. After emptying our full box of 1200 rounds, there was dead silence.

It wasn't until we saw the "After Action Report", that we learned that we had wiped out a huge force from the 18^th Volksgrenadiers. Orders came down to abandon our crew served weapons and withdraw to friendly lines some two or three miles southwest of St Vith

SOURCE: Bulge Bugle, May 2009

S/Sgt Glenn R. FACKLER Sr