Sudden Full Contact WTO (id:#61744)

(Darkest December ID: DD # 1)   [next]   [previous]

Prior Publication: Devils in the Woods

Melines, Belgium 1944-12-21 (53 others)

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Overview:

During the night of 20 December, the 116th “Greyhound” Panzer Division infiltrated the enemy lines by more than twelve miles, completely undetected. Advance units reached the outskirts of Hotton where, at 0730, a few mortar rounds shot at the town center revealed the presence of the American enemy. An officer reported the mortar attack to Colonel Robert Howze, CCR’s commander. A platoon from C Company, 23rd Armored Engineers, under Lieutenant Socha was immediately sent towards Werpin, via the hamlet of Melines to discover the road taken by the enemy infiltrators. Socha’s patrol stopped by a bridge to ask locals about German whereabouts. No sooner had the Americans been warned that the enemy was approaching from the south than heavy machine-gun fire erupted among the Yanks. The GIs quickly took cover just as a German column, led by a captured Sherman tank, arrived on the scene.

Defender: American ('C' Company, 23rd Armored Engineer Battalion)  

Errata (source)