D-Day Paratrooper Describes Moment He First Killed A German Soldier In Trench Ambush | Remember WWII

and as we were going into attack uh the the germans had had trenches across the uh the air that we were attacking and i went over one trench i jumped over the trench the i saw the the german looked at him he had the german schweizer and he raised up and he looked and when he did i hit him in the chest with a submachine gun and killed him and i didn't have any time to stay there i knew that i had killed him so that uh that was my first i guess that was my first real close combat action which i killed an enemy that was right this close to me these are the front line testimonies of a generation that came together and put their lives on the line to protect our freedoms we owe it to them to always remember world war ii if you appreciate the sacrifices made by the world war ii generation please do not forget to subscribe and click like it really helps our channel grow and by subscribing you will get access to many of the new interviews that we're putting on the channel every week and as we flew over the french coast we uh we were going to if i recall we were going to exit the aircraft at 800 feet and uh as we went over there went over the french coast this was a group of pilots that had not flown into those combat missions before as they began to get to any aircraft fire they uh extended to to approximately 2000 feet and that was a that was the altitude in which we jumped uh over into normandy when when i jumped out of the aircraft i was i was the number two men out of the aircraft and because of my platoon leader who was i was the platoon leaders radio operator and when i landed i landed into a field and the field was not anything we had been told about because the hedges in that field were about i think 30 feet high and quite thick and there was only one way in and out of that hedgerow and you had to find the you had to find the uh the exit to in order to get out of it and i don't i don't recall that i had uh i heard any i don't recall i heard any crickets that was a device were used to identify each other while i was in the headway or in the hedgerow and as i went out i was on a dirt road as i was going down the road and side of the road uh saw a glider and i looked in the glider and the person in there were dead and so i continued to walk down the road and i heard a uh heard a motorcycle coming and uh i knew that i didn't think we had a motorcycle we probably did but i wasn't aware of it so as far as i knew the motorcycle was uh was a german motorcycle and it was it was a motorcycle of the sidecar of two people and i uh opened up on them and killed them and then continued to march on into saint mary glease and as i entered saint mary glease i saw the church and on the church steeple one of our troopers still was hanging on the church steeple i thought he was i thought he was dead but he was still alive and i think he'd been wounded in the in the ankle and he got down and managed to manage to escape and that's the thing that i remember most vividly i was with i was with george company of the 505 and they were in the the germans had dug trenches around saint mary glees as if they had known that uh at one point in the conflict that they would probably be in that area and uh would probably be fighting the the uh advancing troops and but sure enough we were there in the pit and the uh they had a at an eight millimeter mortar position a five or five eighty millimeter mark position set up at the far end of the pit and uh with under under artillery fire and i wanted to tell her around got them and uh and uh unluckily killed all the martyr squad so that was my first uh that was my first introduction to combat saying well here it is and we're fighting and people are getting killed and be careful and don't get killed as careful as you can don't get video they came down and says we were taking a patrol out of eye company a personnel out of uh out of i-company for a patrol and the patrol leader is going to be lieutenant horne second lieutenant horn and uh so they came down to the company and and uh second platoon and delbert was in and said uh uh well let's i don't know why it may be because i was a radio operator that uh i wasn't going to be uh taken to that particular troll but i said well no you let him sleep i'll go to patrol and i volunteered to patrol and uh i can i can i can visualize that so clear in my mind right now that we were walking down a dirt road and bill hughes and myself in the lead and i'm here on this side and bill is over here on this side and a big mistake going down the damn road in the first place uh and i don't know why we were but and uh there's ditches on each side of the east side of the road and up front here was a little little wooded air a little wooded piece of terrain and that that german uh vehicle mechanic mechanized vehicle was in there and of course we didn't see it then and we're watching up and the first thing i hear was uh was the fire and there's automatic power from machining guns every single rate of fire is a lot faster than ours ours would go chick-chick-chick-chick-chick and there you go and they got crook and they got me in the shoulder and hit me in the ditch and then they got me in the back of the head and uh uh bill uh i'm i'm in i'm in the ditch then and bill would say bob bob are you all right and every time he would say that they'd open up again and just write a clip in my head again and i thought i wish just shut this up well he says i'm going to knock that i'm going to knock them out and he did and he saved my life he knocked that vehicle out and saved my life he had a submachine gun thompson sub machine gun and he just opened up open he was close enough to him this fire was very effective and he just opened up with him on that sub machine gun and they were worried about they were trying to keep me down they they were still firing at me and knowing that they knew that they'd hit me visually they knew they'd hit me and they're firing at him they're firing at me and and uh so he opened up on him and he got him and he knocked out the damn mechanical the mechanized vehicle and and [Music] he he really got him he shut him up and i got out of the ditch and we got back on the road we went back to our position and i went to the battalion aid station and our battalion surgeon was there and he treated me first but i know that it's a part of the uh as a part of the reaction that i still had my weapon and uh that i knew that bill was gonna open up on him so i got up to and opened up on my weapon too and uh now uh did i do any damage with it i don't know i was just firing at the book and uh that bill was firing at more specific targets and uh so i i returned fire well i'll tell you what it felt like you see that oh my god okay and there's the shoulder and then they got me right in the back of the head too here and you you feel here you can feel the seal plate in my head i survived believe it or not this happened on my 19th birthday well we were uh we were we were alerted that uh the 508 was going to participate in another action and it was a market garden and it was the uh an airborne invasion of holland and that the air that we were going into or the uh the uh 9 million area in which it was critical that we captured the bridge of naimegan to get across the river to continue the advance of the friendly troops in market garden and we uh we it was a sunday afternoon september the 17th i believe sunday afternoon september the 17th and we uh uh went out to the airfield loaded up our aircraft and uh we i one one incident i remember i think it we the the plane dropped uh their equipment the the equipment bundles were under the wing and that equipment bundle dropped and exploded and killed some of our troops that day and uh that was just just as we were taking off but we did take off we flew over um the uh the coast and the holland we got we would get intermediate uh an aircraft fire and uh as we approached our objective with nymagen and uh we uh we was we were coming in our plane was hit with flack and i've got some got some wounds in my face and my forehead and nothing really serious but my my uh [Music] platoon leader in front was hit also and i don't recall having seen him again after after he had been hit in the plane it wasn't killed but uh i guess he was wounded enough that he had to be evacuated out we took over we took our objectives and in holland and uh we were then given objectives to continue the attack and our battalion was going to attack across the open territory and uh to a to a to a town at some distance maybe 500 yards some distance away and as we were going into tact the the germans had had trenches across the uh the air that we were attacking and i went over one trench i jumped over the trench the i saw the the german that uh he had later had a had the uh looked at him had the german schweizer and he raised up and he looked and when he did i hit him in the chest with a submachine gun and killed him and i didn't have any time to stay there i knew that i had killed him so that was my first i guess that was my first real close combat action which i killed an enemy that was right this close to me and uh i had some some thought about it well this is a you know this is the enemy and this is a war and either kill him or kill me and i didn't know what he's supposed to do and but i still i still remember very much i still remember him i still remember him very vividly as i jumped over the trench looking up at me like this and he had that german spicer and i said well i had to i had a submachine gun and i just i just hit him in the chest and that was it i continued to attack and went on into a town that we took and ejected we took and could you actually tell us about the jump into holland the conditions well it was a beautiful sunday afternoon sun was out no wind and uh you had a had a great uh great dz that we're jumping into and uh it was it was it was a fantastically great successful jump and uh really took the germans by surprise the dutch underground knew we were there and uh we had a lot of a lot of information for us uh our uh our battalion third battalion of the 08 uh went into uh uh went into nine meg and got in pretty quick and uh we were in an area there that uh just on the outskirts of uh night megan and uh we we had a sunday afternoon and the germans are we say well the germans out walking with their dutch girlfriends and and uh we sort of we sort of took them by surprise that that we took a lot of prisoners that day and a few very few casualties on our side and the dutch underground was right there with us and you know really really really gave us a lot of help and you mentioned that you took some flack it hit your plane and you were wounded yeah can you tell us more about that injury please well i i was uh in my in my face [Music] you probably probably can still you probably still see the little place here where the the the dutch patched me up again or attached patched me up real quick and we kept writing them we stopped in a dutch first aid station they sewed me up to pass my head and we'll continue i i can i can remember in in holland that i used grenades saw them in the house where the germans were when uh did i kill them i don't know and we didn't we didn't get any fire out of them anymore and all that and we had to and we had we had the gammon grenade now and i remember hitting the tank with gammon grenade and stomping them right in their tracks practically and as the as the germans were coming out somebody else took them under fire i didn't that gammon grenade was was an explosive grenade is designed by the english particularly to use on mechanized tanks and man it was effective too can you actually tell us that story sir when you used the gamut grenade what happened well we were we were in a combat action with the germans and uh the i know the tanks were coming down coming down the road right by our and we had uh we had dug into position right with the road and i know that i threw my i threw my gram and grenade of the tank and i hit it and it exploded and uh i'm i'm watching that and uh i don't know what actions took part uh later but uh i got i got a tank with my gammon grenade how how close were you to the tank pretty damn close to it we're right on the side of the road the tank was coming right down inside i can remember the tank is coming down this way and riders got even with me i throw the grenade and hit it and hit right in it right into uh the upper tracks of the grenade and uh it got their attention we had uh we had left some high ground um in belgium and we've been ordered to counter-attack to retake that high ground and uh eye company was uh following up uh the uh the o5 and as we approached the high ground we were going to take artillery fire and artillery fire was in on the uh hitting the trees and a tree burst got me uh wounded me and my uh my left leg and uh my head and uh i uh uh and the medic i came by and understood the medic was a wily and he saw where i'd been uh i'd been had the wound in my face and uh he gave me a shot he gave me a shot of marpain and hadn't and wasn't aware that that had that wound in the leg someone from the unit not from my company uh seemed to see blood on my pants and i pulled down i had this very serious moment in my left leg and he called for evacuation evacuated me back to the back to the station hospital and then there back to france and then into england and they gave me um blood blood transfusion and uh as as they would come in and talk about uh decide whether or not they're gonna amputate my leg or not which really disturbed me but i remember this captain came by and says no we're not gonna we're not gonna take his leg uh we're sending back to um to uh he's gonna go back to england and uh then from their way back to the states it was a pretty good pretty good wound is about uh um oh i guess about 14 inches right open and as i sit here now i can feel the bone or this this the bone right where that what that wound was because there's no no muscle or skin or anything in there i was glad i'm glad that doctor says no we're not going to take his leg off though i think i think that uh it was freezing weather and i think it had not been the fact that that froze that i might have uh might have died from blood loss of blood right then but it froze and it frozen and it stopped the bleeding in that in that leg there and i got into the hospital and i wasn't aware that uh that i had that serious wound in my left thigh and i needed to go to the bathroom and i got up out of the bed was walking to the bathroom and all that once that blood started rolling down my leg and the nurse saw me and she says where are you going i said i'm going to the bathroom says no you can't do that you get back in bed and i had to have a blood transfusion there i wasn't nervous and i wasn't scared i was i was beginning to do something i was trained to do and most of us are glad we're going to do it and i i can recall very few uh [Music] very few people saying that i in my place that and then i was playing i was scared i was sitting that plane i wasn't scared i was sitting in that plane uh thinking well my god here we are here's what we're trained to do and we're going to do it and thank goodness we're going to do it that's incredible yeah i mean what was the atmosphere and i'm just talking about the normandy invasion right now what was the atmosphere in the plane were guys talking was everyone quiet uh fairly quite uh if if there were if there was any talk it's probably between you and the guy sitting next to you or uh or the nco that that the officer is hooked up and getting ready to jump and they're there they're hooked up and they're walking up and checking the people then you got a stand-up hook-up check-up and you got that then you're out the door and uh this is what you were trained to do and and you were doing it but i don't recall i never i don't think i ever experienced any fear uh prior to normandy i was in i was in the plane and uh i was uh i was the second man in the stick behind the lieutenant and when it come time to stand up and hook up i was getting ready to do it and of course when we came in and swung over the strong over the potential we gained the altitude we're supposed to go out at a certain altitude it was quite high when we went out of the plane and landed in the field which had not been advised here's these damn 40-foot uh hedges that had one place to get in and out and you had to walk around it's helping those germans in there that walk around and find out where you're gonna get out of that hedgerow they never never briefed us on those hedges i don't ever think i had any fear i was very confident in my training and what i'd done and if i'm going to meet a german i'm going to kill him and and uh that pretty well stayed true throughout my career and in normandy absolutely and and another career too you know you fought in world war ii korea vietnam you've seen your friends getting killed you've had to kill the enemy i mean you have actually you know you've bled for the country and for this way of life you have given more than a normal individual gives you know for the for their country what genuinely would you like to see when it comes to the younger generations what could they do to make you happy that this that your sacrifices were worth it what would you like to see them do well i would like to see them respect our kind of life and respect our country and respect our history and too often uh they show a lack of respect for our country certain groups of them do and uh i know that uh one of our one of our members in um our chapter jesus bravo was coming back out of vietnam and he flew into san francisco and he actually got involved in a brawl with the protesters and he'll tell you about it right quick i came back landed in san francisco and i'm in full dress form uh airborne combat type and nobody ever said a word to me what kind of man do you want people to always think of you as current autism a patriotic american i feel very strongly about that i get pissed off at people that don't don't think much of their country and in fact i really resent them understandably because because you've sacrificed time and time again for them to have a privileged life well i just want to say it has been such an honor to spend some time with you and and i really appreciate all your patience it takes more time and energy and effort than you would believe to find and interview all these world war ii heroes if you would like to support our mission to get every single world war ii veteran on camera please consider becoming a patron and go to our patreon page www dot patreon slash remember world war ii thank you and god bless the world war ii veterans

Channel: Remember WWII with Rishi Sharma

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Keywords: Allied heroes, D-Day accounts, Remember WWII with Rishi Sharma, WWII, WWII documentaries, WWII legacy stories., WWII memories, WWII recaps, battle memories, epic battle tales, fighting the germans, heroic veterans, historic accounts, historical footage, remember, sacrifices, thumbnail, veteran testimonies, war heroes, war stories, website

Id: OFVkETBjlBY

Length: 25min 7sec (1507 seconds)

Published: Thu May 26 2022