28th Division tribute

[uboat534]

Here is a photo of a January 1943 M-1 with accountrements and a steel pot helmet from a 28th Division soldier from WWII. The pic symbolizes the WWII veteran and pays hommage to the men of the 28th division 1/110 INF who fought sohard and brave during the battle of the Hurtegan forrest and battle of the bulge hope you like it.

[tspike]

Very nice

[ndbbm4]

Please reply to me at ndbbm4@aol.com

Was the 28th division part of Patton's 3rd Army?
I am not sure, BUT my father fought in Patton's 3rd Army in the
Bulge and at St Vith. He is gone now and very rarely ever spoke about it, and I am curious.

[surbat6]

No, the 28th wasn't part of the 3rd Army. They landed at Normandy and fought in the hedgerows (where they got their nickname from the Germans, who called them the "Bluticher Eimer" or "Bloody Buckets" referring to the red keystone patch and, as I was told, their ferocity in combat). They were mauled at Huertgen Forest and sent to the Ardennes to recuperate...just in time to get attacked by Hitler's panzers in what was later called the Battle of the Bulge.
Patton's 3rd Army was well south of the battlefield but his foresight permitted him to turn an entire army 90 degrees from his drive for Germany to relieve the troops trapped in the Bulge. Without his insistence that his subordinates plan for just such a move, the maneuver would, at best, have taken much longer and relief would have been delayed by several days.
The troops trapped by the German advance all became infantry, no matter what their regular jobs. It was a joke in our WWII reenactment group (we portrayed the 28th Division) that they sent the cooks out to stop the Germans by giving them ptomaine.