World War 2 In Review No. 52: Western Front

By Merriam Press

Merriam Press World War 2 In Review Series. The following articles on World War II on the Western Front are in this issue: (1) Battle of the Scheldt 1944 (2) Canadian Army and the Battle of the Scheldt (3) Operation Infatuate (4) American 30th Inf Div in the Bulge (5) Black Soldiers of the Ardennes (6) Task Force Lovelady in the Bulge (7) American Tank Distribution in the Bulge, 16 Dec 1944 to 25 Jan 1945 (8) Last Stages of the Bulge (9) 526th Armored Infantry Battalion: After Action Report, 1-31 Dec 1944 (10) Bloody Ridge: Salmchateau, Belgium, 16 Jan 1945 (11) Miracle at Meyerode: Six Americans Against SS Panzers in the Bulge (12) Relief of the Bastogne Pocket (13) Daredevil Tankers with the 82nd in the Bulge (14) Mortuary Affairs Operations at Malmédy: Lessons Learned from a Historic Tragedy (14) American and German Field Artillery in the Bulge (15) Politics and the Military in the Liberation of Paris (16) The French Farmer’s Daughter. 326 B&W/color photos/illustrations.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Oct 5, 2018
• ISBN: 9780359135356

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World War 2 In Review No. 52: Western Front

World War 2 In Review No. 52: Western Front

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Hoosick Falls, New York

2018

First eBook Edition

Copyright © 2018 by Merriam Press

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ISBN 978-0-359-13535-6

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This series presents articles and pictorials on topics covering many aspects of World War 2. In addition to new articles and pictorials on topics not previously covered, future volumes may include additional material on the subjects covered in this volume. The volumes in this series will comprise a single source for innumerable articles and tens of thousands of images of interest to anyone interested in the history and study of World War 2. While no doubt some of these images and other materials could be found online, countless hours could be spent searching thousands of web sites to find at least some of this material.

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Welcome to No. 52 of the World War 2 In Review Series

The following articles on the Western Front are in this issue of World War 2 In Review:

(1) Battle of the Scheldt, 1944

(2) The Canadian Army and the Battle of the Scheldt, 1944

(3) Operation Infatuate

(4) American 30th Infantry Division in the Battle of the Bulge

(5) Black Soldiers of the Ardennes

(6) Task Force Lovelady in the Bulge

(7) American Tank Distribution in the Battle of the Bulge, 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945

(8) Last Stages of the Battle of the Bulge

(9) 526th Armored Infantry Battalion: After Action Report, 1-31 December 1944

(10) Bloody Ridge: Salmchateau, Belgium, 16 January 1945

(11) Miracle at Meyerode: Six Americans Against SS Panzers in the Battle of the Bulge

(12) The Relief of the Bastogne Pocket

(13) Daredevil Tankers with the 82nd in the Bulge

(14) Mortuary Affairs Operations at Malmédy: Lessons Learned from a Historic Tragedy

(14) American and German Field Artillery in the Battle of the Bulge

(15) Politics and the Military in the Liberation of Paris

(16) The French Farmer’s Daughter

with 326 B&W and color photographs, maps and illustrations.

Watch for future issues of this series with more articles on the history of World War II.

Battle of the Scheldt

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The Battle of the Scheldt in World War II was a series of military operations by Canadian, British and Polish formations to open up the shipping route to Antwerp so that its port could be used to supply the Allies in northwest Europe. Led by Lieutenant-General Guy Simonds, the battle took place in northern Belgium and southwestern Netherlands from October 2 to November 8, 1944.

The well-established Wehrmacht defenders staged an effective delaying action, during which the Germans flooded land areas in the Scheldt Estuary, slowing the Allied advance. After five weeks of difficult fighting, the Canadian First Army, at a cost of 12,873 Allied casualties (half of them Canadian), was successful in clearing the Scheldt after numerous amphibious assaults, obstacle crossings, and costly assaults over open ground. Both land and water were mined, and the Germans defended their line of retreat with artillery and snipers.

Once the German defenders were no longer a threat, it was a further three weeks before the first convoy carrying Allied supplies was able to unload in Antwerp (on November 29, 1944) due to the necessity of de-mining the harbors.

By September 1944, it had become urgent for the Allies to clear both banks of the Scheldt Estuary in order to open the port of Antwerp to Allied shipping, thus easing logistical burdens in their supply lines, then stretching hundreds of miles from Normandy eastward to the Siegfried Line. Since the Allied forces had landed in Normandy (France) on D-Day, June 6, 1944, the British Second Army had pushed forward into the Low Countries and captured Brussels (September 3-4) and Antwerp, the latter with its ports still largely intact. Antwerp was, and still is, the third largest port in Europe, and was the only port capable of providing the necessary supplies to sustain the Allied advance into Germany. But the advance halted with the British in possession of Antwerp, while the Germans still controlled the Scheldt Estuary, which connects Antwerp to the North Sea.

As the American historian Gerhard Weinberg wrote: The most important single factor holding back the Allies was the supply situation. As they had advanced rapidly in August, the Allied armies had been unable to seize additional ports. Brest did not fall for months and then turned out to be so badly wrecked that it was not reopened. Other ports continued to be held by German garrisons deliberately left behind with instructions to hold on precisely to prevent use of the port facilities...The other major port, and the one which the Allies had counted on as the main base for a drive into Germany, had fallen into their hands intact, but could not be used because the Germans controlled its approaches...Although [a] system of motorized transport together with the railroads and some airlift and barge traffic enabled the Allied force to maintain their military effectiveness, these could not move enough material to the front fast enough to sustain the August rate of advance. The great arguments over a narrow versus a broad front in the West were largely academic – like the dispute over the German advance in the East after late July 1941. Until major ports, especially Antwerp, were operational and the railroad system was functioning at a high level of efficiency, there was no prospect of a major advance against the stiffening German resistance on either a broad or narrow front. The first plans for liberating Europe by the Anglo-American armies, codenamed Roundup, had been drawn up in December 1941. They had stressed that the port of Antwerp would be crucial for an invasion of Germany, as it was the largest deep-water port close to Germany that the Allies could hope to capture intact.

In September 1944, Field Marshal Montgomery of the 21st Army Group ordered General Harry Crerar and his First Canadian Army to take the following French ports on the English Channel; Calais, Boulogne and Dunkirk. On 3 September 1944 Adolf Hitler ordered the 15th German Army, which had been stationed in the Pas de Calais region and was now marching north into the Low Countries, to hold the mouth of the river Scheldt, depriving the Allies of the use of the Antwerp port. Montgomery became aware of this on September 5, thanks to Ultra intelligence. On September 4, Antwerp was taken by General Brian Horrocks with its harbor 90% intact. However, the Germans had heavily fortified Walcheren island at the mouth of the Western Scheldt, establishing well dug-in artillery impervious to air attack and controlling access to the river. This made it impossible for Allied minesweepers to clear the heavily mined river. Hitler had personally designated the island Fortress Walcheren, which he ordered to be defended to the last man. Walcheren island was held by mixture of Kriegsmarine and Wehrmacht, with its garrison consisting of the 202nd Naval Coastal Artillery Battalion, the 810th Naval Anti-Aircraft Battalion, the 89th Fortress Regiment and the 70th Infantry Division commanded by General Wilhelm Daser.

The Witte Brigade (White Brigade) of the Belgian resistance seized the port of Antwerp before the Germans could blow the port as they were planning. The Germans had been in the process of attaching explosives to the port facilities such as its giant cranes, but the Witte Brigade had intervened before the damage was done. Antwerp is a deep water inland port connected to the North Sea via the river Scheldt. The Scheldt was wide enough and dredged deep enough to allow the passage of ocean-going ships and was close to Germany. On September 5, SHAEF’s naval commander, Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsay advised Montgomery to make taking the mouth of the Scheldt his main priority, stating that as long as the mouth of the Scheldt was in German hands, it was impossible for the Royal Navy minesweepers to clear the numerous mines in the river, rendering the port of Antwerp was useless. Among the Allied senior leaders, only Ramsay saw opening Antwerp as crucial to sustaining the advance into Germany. On 6 September 1944, Montgomery told Canadian General Harry Crerar that I want Boulogne badly and that city should be taken at once with no regard to losses. By this point, ports like Cherbourg, which the Americans had taken in June, were too far away from the front line, causing the Allies great logistical problems.

From September on, Admiral Ramsay was deeply involved in planning the assault on Fortress Walcheren. He appointed Captain Pugsley of the Royal Navy, who landed the 7th Brigade of the 3rd Canadian Division on D-Day, to the First Canadian Army headquarters to start preparations. Had Montgomery secured the Scheldt Estuary in early September 1944 as Admiral Ramsay had strongly advised him to do, Antwerp would have been opened to Allied shipping far earlier than it was, and the escape of the German 15th Army from France would have been stopped. As a part of Operation Fortitude, the deception plan for Operation Overlord, the Allies had tricked the Germans into believing they would land in the Pas-de-Calais region of France instead of in Normandy, and as such, the Wehrmacht had reinforced the 15th Army in the Pas-de-Calais.

The importance of ports closer to Germany was highlighted with the liberation of the city of Le Havre, which was assigned to General John Crocker’s I Corps. To take Le Havre, the British assigned two infantry divisions, two tank brigades, most of the artillery of the Second British Army, the specialized armored gadgets of General Percy Hobart’s 79th Armoured Division, the battleship HMS Warspite and the monitor HMS Erebus. On 10 September 1944, Operation Astonia began when RAF Bomber Command dropped 4,719 tons of bombs on Le Havre, which was then assaulted by Crocker’s men, who took the city two days later. The Canadian historian Terry Copp wrote that the commitment of this much firepower and men to take only one French city might seem excessive, but by this point, the Allies desperately needed ports closer to the front line to sustain their advance.

On 9 September, Montgomery wrote to Field Marshal Sir Alan Brooke of the Imperial General Staff that one good Pas de Calais port would be able to meet the logistical needs of the 21st Army Group only. Montgomery further noted that one good Pas de Calais port would be insufficient for the American armies in France, which thus forced Eisenhower, if for no other reasons than logistics, to favor Montgomery’s plans for an invasion of northern Germany by the 21st Army Group, whereas if Antwerp were opened up, all of the Allied armies could be supplied. Montgomery had his eye on taking Berlin before either the Americans or the Soviets took the capital of the Reich. Montgomery ordered that the First Canadian Army take Calais, Boulogne and Dunkirk and clear the Scheldt, a task that General Crerar stated was impossible because he did not have sufficient troops to perform both operations at once. Montgomery refused Crerar’s request to have British XII Corps under General Neil Ritchie assigned to help clear the Scheldt because he needed XII Corps for Operation Market Garden.

Little was done about the blocked port of Antwerp during September because Montgomery chose to make the ill-fated Operation Market Garden his key priority, rather than clearing the Scheldt. With Market Garden, Montgomery intended to by-pass the West Wall and break into the north German plain in order to take Berlin, but the British defeat at the Battle of Arnhem, which proved to be the proverbial bridge too far, left the British forming an exposed salient reaching deep into the Netherlands. In the meantime, German forces in the Scheldt Estuary were able to deploy defensively and prepare for the expected advance. The first attacks occurred on September 13. After an attempt by the 4th Canadian Armoured Division to storm the Leopold Canal on its own had ended in bloody repulse, General Guy Simonds, commanding the II Canadian Corps, ordered a halt to operations in the Scheldt until the French channel ports had been taken, reporting the Scheldt would need more than one division to clear. The halt allowed the German 15th Army ample time to dig in to its new home by the banks of the Scheldt.

On the German side, holding the Scheldt was regarded as crucial. Hitler ordered planning for what became the Ardennes Offensive in September 1944, the objective of which was retaking Antwerp. The 15th Army, which was holding the Scheldt on the far right on the German line, was deprived of supplies as the Wehrmacht focused on building up its strength for the planned Ardennes offensive in December, while a number of newly raised Volksgrenadier divisions were sent to replace the divisions lost in Normandy and in Operation Bagration on the Eastern Front. However, the flat polder ground of the Dutch countryside favored the defensive and was felt to compensate for the 15th Army’s reduced numbers. It was assigned only two of the Volksgrenadier divisions. Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt told General Gustav-Adolf von Zangen: Enemy supplies, and therefore, his ability to fight, is limited by the stubborn defense of the Harbor, as intelligence report prove. The attempt of the enemy to occupy the Western Scheldt in order to obtain the free use of the harbor of Antwerp must be resisted to the utmost (emphasis in the original). In his orders to his men, Von Zangen declared:

Therefore, I order all commanders as well as the National Socialist indoctrination officers to instruct the troops in the clearest and most factual manner in the following points: Next to HAMBURG, ANTWERP is the largest port in Europe. Even in the First World War, Churchill, in person, traveled to ANTWERP in order to organize the defense of the harbor because he appreciated it as of vital importance to the struggle on the continent. At that time, Churchill’s plan was completely shattered; the same must happen again. After overrunning the SCHELDT fortifications, the English would finally be in a position to land great masses of material in a large and completely protected harbor. With this material they might deliver a death blow at the NORTH GERMAN plain and at BERLIN before the onset of winter...The enemy knows that he must assault the European fortress as speedily as possible before its inner lines of resistance are fully built up and occupied by new divisions. For this, he needs the ANTWERP harbor. And for this reason, we must hold the SCHELDT fortifications to the end. The German people are watching us. In this hour, the fortifications along the SCHELDT occupy a role which is decisive for the future of our people. Each additional day will be vital that you deny the port of ANTWERP to the enemy and the resources he has at his disposal. (signed) v. ZANGEN General der Infanterie.

In early October, after Operation Market Garden, Allied forces led by the Canadian First Army finally set out to open the port of Antwerp to the Allies by giving it access to the sea. As the Arnhem salient was his major concern, Montgomery pulled away from the First Canadian Army (which was under the temporary command of Simonds as Crerar was ill), the British 51st Highland Division, 1st Polish Division, British 49th (West Riding) Division and 2nd Canadian Armoured Brigade, and sent all of these formations to help the 2nd British Army hold the Arnhem salient. Simonds saw the Scheldt campaign as a test of his ability, a challenge to be overcome, and he felt he could clear the Scheldt with only three divisions of the 2nd Corps despite having to take on the entire 15th Army, which held strongly fortified positions in a landscape that favored the defense. Simonds not once registered complaints about his lack of manpower, the fact that ammunition was being rationed as supplying the Arnhem salient was Montgomery’s chief concern, and the lack of air support, which was made worse by the cloudy October weather.

On September 12 and 13, 1944, the Canadian First Army, under temporary command of Lieutenant-General Guy Simonds, was given the task of clearing the Scheldt once it had completed the clearing of the Channel ports, particularly Boulogne, Calais and Dunkirk. Montgomery then decided that the importance of Antwerp was such that the capture of Dunkirk could be delayed. Under his command at that time were Canadian II Corps, with the Polish 1st Armoured Division, 49th and 52nd Divisions attached, and the British I Corps. Montgomery promised the support of RAF Bomber Command in attacking the German fortifications and that of the USAAF 8th Air Force [o]n the day concerned. The 51st (Highland) Infantry Division was to give up its transport to enable the movement of forces into battle positions. Abandoning the capture of Dunkirk freed the 2nd Canadian Infantry Division.

The plan for opening the Scheldt Estuary involved four main operations, conducted over daunting geography:

Clearing the area north of Antwerp and securing access to the South Beveland peninsula.

Operation Switchback, clearing the Breskens Pocket north of the Leopold canal and south of the Western Scheldt.

Operation Vitality, the capture of the South Beveland peninsula, north of the Western Scheldt.

Operation Infatuate, the capture of Walcheren island, which had been fortified into a powerful German stronghold. As part of the Atlantic Wall, Walcheren island, with its strategic position just north of the Scheldt river mouth, was considered to be the strongest concentration of defenses the Nazis had ever constructed.

On September 21, the 4th Canadian (Armoured) Division moved north roughly along the line of the Ghent-Terneuzen Canal, given the task of clearing an area on the south shore of the Scheldt around the Dutch town of Breskens, called the Breskens Pocket. The Polish 1st Armoured Division headed for the Dutch-Belgian border further east and the crucial area north of Antwerp.

The Canadian 4th Armoured Division advanced from a hard-won bridgehead over the Ghent-Brugge Canal at Moerbrugge to find themselves the first Allied troops facing the formidable obstacle of the double line of the Leopold and Schipdonk Canals. An attack was mounted in the vicinity of Moerkerke, crossing the canals and establishing a bridgehead before counterattacks forced a withdrawal with heavy casualties.

The 1st Polish Armoured Division enjoyed greater success to the east as it advanced northeast from Ghent. In country unsuitable for armor, and against stiffening resistance, the division advanced to the coast by September 20, occupying Terneuzen and clearing the south bank of the Scheldt east toward Antwerp.

It became apparent to Simonds that any further gains in the Scheldt would come at heavy cost, as the Breskens Pocket, extending from Zeebrugge to the Braakman Inlet and inland to the Leopold Canal, was strongly held by the enemy.

On October 2, the Canadian 2nd Division began its advance north from Antwerp. Stiff fighting ensued on October 6 at Woensdrecht, the objective of the first phase. The Germans, reinforced by Battle Group Chill, saw the priority in holding there, controlling direct access to South Beveland and Walcheren island.

There were heavy casualties as the Canadians attacked over open, flooded land. Canadian historians Terry Copp and Robert Vogel wrote: the very name Woensdrecht sends shivers down the spines of veterans of the 2nd Canadian Infantry Division. Driving rain, booby traps and land mines made advance very difficult. Attacking on 7 October in heavy mist, the Calgary Highlanders came under heavy fire from German positions. As described in its war diary, the battle thickened...the Germans forces...hit back with a pugnacity which had not been encountered in the enemy for a long time. The Régiment de Maisoneuve was halted 1,000 yards from their target while the next day, The Black Watch of Canada was stopped in its attempt. On October 9, the Germans counterattacked and pushed the Canadians back. The war diary of the 85th Infantry Division reported that they were making very slow progress in face of tenacious Canadian resistance.

Back at SHEAF headquarters, Admiral Ramsay, who was more concerned about the problems facing the Canadians than their own generals, complained to Supreme Allied Commander General Dwight Eisenhower that the Canadians were having to ration ammunition as Montgomery made holding the Arnhem salient his main priority. After Ramsay raised the issue with Eisenhower, the latter informed Montgomery on October 9 about the supreme importance of Antwerp. It is reported to me this morning by the Navy that the Canadian Army will not repeat not be able to attack until November 1 unless immediately supplied with ammunition. Montgomery replied by writing: Request you will ask Ramsay from me by what authority he makes wild statements to you concerning my operations about which he can know nothing repeat nothing...there is no repeat no shortage of ammunition...The operations are receiving my personal attention.

Field Marshal Walter Model, who was commanding Army Group B, ordered: The corridor to Walcheren will be kept open at any price; if necessary, it will be regained by forces ruthlessly detached from other sectors. Model, a tough and ruthless National Socialist fanatic known for his devotion to Hitler, was called the Führer’s Fireman because Hitler always gave him the toughest jobs. Model sent the 256th Volksgrenadier division and assault gun companies to allow the release of Battle Group Chill, the fire brigade consisting of 6th Paratroop Regiment and assault gun companies. On October 10, the Royal Regiment of Canada launched a surprise attack against the German lines at Woensdrecht, but for the next days was engaged in heavy fighting against counterattacks from Battle Group Chill. Major-General Charles Foulkes of the 2nd Division sent the Black Watch to support the Royal Regiment. The German forces at Woensdrecht greatly outnumbered the Canadians and had Model known of this, he might have launched a counter-offensive. Instead he used attrition tactics by making piecemeal