Lucky Strike

As the sun came up, I faced an amazing sight. Right in front of me was a huge billboard, like the kind that advertised Lucky Strike cigarettes in the States. On the billboard in large letters was printed something like the following:

This is Third Army Area

• Fine for not wearing helmet $25.00
• Fine for not carrying gas mask $25.00
• Fine for not saluting officer $40.00

-By Command of Gen. George S. Patton, Jr.

That was the first inkling we had that General George S. Patton, Jr. was in France and was organizing a new army. Hitler and the German high command had been led to believe that he was still in London, preparing to lead another invasion across the Channel to the Pas de Calais area of France.

We had a breakfast of cold K rations and were just preparing to move out when suddenly there was a loud bang heard inside the headquarters half-track. It was a shot! A shot that resulted in Battery B's first casualty.

It turned out that the half-track driver was picking up his Thompson sub machine gun when the safety catch caught on a piece of canvas enough to release it at the same time that his hand accidentally hit the trigger. The resulting shot sent a .45 caliber slug into the chest of First Sergeant Pearce, who was sitting in the right front seat of the vehicle. The medics were on the scene quickly and took him by ambulance to a field hospital but the wound proved to be fatal. We had been in France less than twelve hours and already had our first fatality!

By 8:15 am, the Battery's vehicles were winding their way in a convoy over narrow, dust-choked roads ... through St. Mere Eglise, where we had seen some of the fighting in newsreels at home ... through Montebourg ... through the dust that once was Valognc ... to Briquebec where we settled down for the rest of the day and night. Here a few civilians showed up to greet us and offer our first taste of calvados, a powerful apple-based drink for which Normandy is well known.

Later, a wizened little old Frenchman beckoned to me to follow him to what appeared to be the ruins of his home. In what would have been the front room of the little farmhouse, he pointed to a white, writhing mound of something that looked vaguely familiar. Maggots! Thousands of huge white maggots were arrayed on the floor in the shape of a donkey, although you couldn't see any of the original remains of the animal.

Apparently, the farmer had brought the donkey into the house in an effort to shield it from bullets and shrapnel. An exploding shell had killed it where he found it on his return after the battle. Now he was appalled by this mass of maggots and wondered what to do. I searched through the remains of his barn and found a bag of lime, which we sprinkled over the pulsating mass. Within minutes the maggots were dead and the pile was shrinking. I decided that there was not much more I could do and returned to our halftrack. But the mental image of that donkey-sized mass of wriggling maggots would live with me forever.