Seventy years ago my great-grandfather, and maybe some of your relatives, were being shot at in Europe during World War II. It was the Battle of the Bulge, the coldest winter anyone there could remember and altogether not the kind of place a country boy would want to be. But he, and so many others were there, shivering.
Tonice was a combat medic, but he never really told his family about his experiences. We learned at his funeral how he took off his field jacket one day in the coldest winter Europe could recall and gave it to another soldier. It could have been this day for all we know. It could have been every day. He was in the 137th Infantry Regiment, but we don’t know which company, or even which battalion, so this is only a regimental overview with some movements down to the company level.
So, then, for Dec. 27:
The 137th Infantry jumped off at 0800, with the 2nd Battalion on the right and the 3rd on the left. The 2nd crossed the Surre River and entered the town of Surre. Company E was held up by enemy machine gun fire. The 1st Battalion left Tintange and moved toward Surre. Late in the afternoon the entire Battalion was on the road to Surre and the point was receiving machine gun fire from its left flank. Company A was at the point and in contact with Company G in the town.
The 3rd Battalion was driving ahead on the left flank, under small arms fire and mortar barrages. In the afternoon, the 3rd Battalion was hit by a terrific artillery barrage.
The 1st Battalion had two companies in Surre that evening and was securing the town. Company E pushed out into the woods that night to run into strong enemy dug-in positions. The 1st Battalion CP moved into Surre late that night. And the 3rd Battalion reported enemy dug-in positions, the 5th German Paratroop Division, to its front.
This information is derived from the unit history, found here and here and from this unit overview. These markers are rough estimates and are meant only to be illustrative. Any errors are mine alone.
