Download - 70th Infantry Division Association
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ehind him and he said, "Brewer." I asked where is he and the man said he didn't know. I started off<br />
again the second time that night looking for the rest of our company. This time we were in a town and I<br />
walked around until I found Brewer. He was sitting down looking at something and I said, "How come<br />
you're not moving with the company?" He said, "I am; they are right over there." So I looked where he<br />
was pointing and it was a shadow. It looked like a man but it wasn't. So Brewer was waiting for that<br />
shadow to move. I finally managed to get everybody connected again.<br />
That night when we were trying to make the connection, I walked over something. It was flesh, but I didn't<br />
know what it was. The next morning I looked down at my combat boots and in my eyelets there was<br />
meat. As time went by on about the third day, I happened to go back to that same area and here was a<br />
team of one ox and one horse that had been killed by an artillery shell. The Germans had been slicing<br />
meat off of them and eating it. It turned out that was what I had walked over.<br />
That morning at 5:30 we jumped off and the fellows went across the railroad tracks where there was a big<br />
building about eight stories tall. Lt. Cheesem and I went into the building with the intent of finding an<br />
observation post and setting my guns up outside. I had three 60 mm mortars and, of course, I had a 536<br />
radio (walkee talkie). The object was to give the troops supporting fire from the observation post in this<br />
building. When we entered the building, we found two French women that the Germans had just left that<br />
morning. We searched the building to make sure there were no Germans. The one woman said, "They<br />
are coming back." What she was insinuating was that the Germans were going to counterattack and take<br />
the building back again. We released the women and they went back down to the basement. I was<br />
looking out the window over the railroad tracks with my binoculars and giving supporting fire to our troops<br />
who were crossing the railroad tracks. The people going across were getting sniper fire and a couple of<br />
our men were killed crossing the track. That sniper was making it very uncomfortable for us to cross the<br />
tracks. Now, it's daylight and there are railroad cars setting along the side of the tracks. Lt. Cheezem<br />
informed me that after the last guy went across the tracks, I was supposed to knock down my guns and<br />
go across. He left and joined the troops. I watched him cross the tracks. It was 10:00 when our last troops<br />
went across. I should have gone with my men, but the sniper fire was very intense by now. It was really<br />
getting hot and furious. We had tanks supporting us and I was in the building on the 6th floor. I heard Lt.<br />
Cheezem yelling from the street below, "Where is that Brubaker?" I left my position, came over to the side<br />
of the building and yelled down, "Here I am." "How come you haven't taken the guys across the tracks?"<br />
he yelled back. As I was proceeding to tell him, all of a sudden the place where I had been standing was<br />
hit by a German shell. The room was blown to pieces. So really, Cheezem saved my life. They were firing<br />
more rounds now into the building, because they knew we were using it for observation to fire at them. I<br />
went to the street level and met Lt. Cheezem. He said, "Get the guys together. We are going to cross<br />
those darn tracks. We are going to cross them now." I said, "You know there's a sniper." He said, "I know,<br />
but we want to go across anyway. We can't be holding off for that sniper." I said, "Look out there." On the<br />
tracks were some of our men, laying dead.<br />
He said, "We are going and we are going now." So Hoot Gibson and I went down to the tracks. We got<br />
ready to cross by stringing wire. Our guns were going to stay on that side of the tracks and we were<br />
stringing what we called "army field wire". Hoot took a spool of wire because he was going to string it. We<br />
got down and laid on the embankment next to the tracks. I said, "Hoot, here is what we are going to do. I<br />
am going first across those tracks and you follow right behind me. We are going to go right underneath<br />
that railroad car over there." He agreed.<br />
I stood up and took off running. I cleared about six sets of tracks when the sniper saw me and opened up.<br />
He missed but came darn close. When he did that, I fell down, because I knew that he was going to let<br />
another round go sooner or later if I was still standing. I let him believe I was hit. When I fell down, I fell<br />
across the rails and my helmet rolled off. I hurt my leg on the rail. Hoot was right behind me and thought I<br />
was hit. He fell down beside me and I said, "Hoot, we can't lay here. We have to keep moving." So I<br />
jumped up and grabbed my helmet. I ran across and jumped underneath the railroad car. Hoot jumped in<br />
right behind me. We were both underneath that car and I looked over at Hoot. He had on a pair of leather<br />
gloves his folks had given him. He was feeding the wire out between his two fingers as he came across.<br />
The wire was laying so fast that it was smoking off his gloves; there was actual smoke. I bet if he had run<br />
a couple more minutes with that thing it would have burst into flames. Meanwhile, that sniper opened up