OPERATION BODENPLATTE

CHAPTER 11

AT THIS POINT, FINDING OUT ABOUT MY GRANDFATHER’S TRUE MILITARY HISTORY AND HIS COMPANY’S INVOLVEMENT IN KEY EVENTS DURING WORLD WAR II HAS BEEN MIND BLOWING!

At this point, finding out about my grandfather’s true military history and his Company’s involvement in key events during World War II has been mind blowing! My grandfather, in every sense of the word, was a true unknown hero and that goes the same for Larry’s dad, Doc Payne, and the rest of the 2487th Quartermaster Truck Company (Aviation). Not only were they completely responsible for literally setting the stage for the arrival of all Allied troops at Normandy, responsible for supporting the Allied Forces on the front lines to continue pushing forward, responsible for supporting the 67th Tactical Recon Group and 366th Fighter Group to complete their dangerous reconnaissance and combat missions, they played a major part in almost every key event of the European Campaign, and from what I will soon find out, up to and including the final push to Germany leading to Hitler’s final defeat.

As I went further in my research of the 2487th Quartermaster Truck Company (Aviation), I continued to find references of their involvement in the Battle of the Bulge. Honestly, I really didn’t know much about the

Battle of the Bulge so I needed to find some more information. I found an article on the internet that really summed up a lot of what we have discussed so far - Normandy, the Red Ball Express, the opening of the ports at Antwerp, the Siegfried Line, segregation in the military during World War II, and it had information about the Battle of the Bulge and its importance. It definitely helped me to put things in order and to see the significance of everything occurring all over Europe after the invasion at Normandy.

According to the article, after the breakout from Normandy at the end of July 1944, and the Allied landings in southern France on August 15th, 1944, the Allies advanced toward Germany’s borders very quickly. But then a rapid thrust into the Netherlands was blocked by recovering German forces, compelling the Allies to retreat out of Holland. The British slowly retook the Scheldt estuary to allow use of the key port of Antwerp.

Canadians advanced a second time into the Netherlands in hard winter fighting. American and French armies attacked the fortified Siegfried Line and Metz farther south, while other Americans bogged down in close and bloody fighting in the Huertgen Forest. The nearby Ardennes Forest, where Americans had fought Germans in WWI in 1918, looked to be a quiet sector. It soon turned into a bloody battle zone when the German Army launched a surprise counterattack. The Battle of the Bulge, named for the bulge in American lines created by the German attack, is also known as the Ardennes Offensive. It was the last major German offensive campaign on the Western Front during World War II.

It took place from December 16th, 1944 to January