I was in Echternach. Echternach is a town in Luxembourg. I was with an infantry outfitting General Patton’s third army and on the night of February 6th and 7th, we were scheduled to cross the Sauer River and into and through the Siegfried line – with all the pill boxes you have read about in history and so on. We had moved up under the cover of darkness and were ready to put the boats in the water.
An EXCELLENT smoke screen was created along the banks of the river. And we actually put the boats in the water under the smoke screen and we got halfway across under the smoke screen before the Germans knew we were coming. We took advantage of everything we could from this smoke screen. We heavy casualties, sure, but years passed, years passed. I am at a meeting of a Service Club in West Chester and they introduced me to a fellow, I’m trying to think of his name – black man.
He said, ‘You were in WWII, where did you go?’ I said, ‘Went to Europe.’ He said, ‘Where?’ and I started telling him. And I learned at that moment, that that black man was one of those that put up that smoke screen. He put up the smoke screen.
The black troops in WWII were used in that capacity: to drive trucks, put up smoke screens, etc. They were not used in the close combat situation. They were used for things of that nature.
How many years later was that?
Well D-Day was June 6th, 1944, and then was shortly thereafter.
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