Devils with Wings (35 page)

Two paratroopers had gone to secure the machine gun post they had been struck on landing, and brought a further three prisoners to add to the three already on the floor at the front of the glider.

The prisoners were mesmerised by the speed of events, watching these professional soldiers going about their business as if it was second nature to them. It was.

They troopers wandered over to look at the prisoners, who were all very young looking. They were probably a similar age to some of the paratroopers, but lacked the hardness of these tough soldiers who had just descended out of the sky.

They looked afraid and demoralised and Leeb felt sure they were no longer a threat.

He instructed Menzel to watch over them, promising to send help once they had completed their mission.

His men had finished pulling their equipment out of the glider and were in the process of splitting it between them.

Once he could see that his troop were ready, he sent half of them forward, the ones with the lighter loads, the MG section consisting of Geister and Beiler and Fessman with the ladder and two small hollow charges.

Behind them would follow Petzel, Stumme and Jordan, the latter two carrying one of the larger hollow charges between them.

He turned to the pilot, who was guarding the six prisoners, “will you be ok watching these on your own?”

“I’ll be fine, they’re in no fit state to do any fighting, look at them; they’re scared out of their wits.”

Leeb looked at the prisoners huddled together, sneaking a look at the mud spattered faces of their captors. He could see they were too shocked and scared to start a fight.

“Ok. I could do with you with us, but I daren’t leave them wondering around behind us.”

“Get off Uffz, I’ll be fine.”

Leeb turned and left, catching up with the leading section, which was waiting for him.

They started running east towards the area where their target should be located.

They stopped after a minute to re-group.

Leeb crouched down and they all followed suit.

“The Cupola is about fifty metres east of us. You know the score, Geister and Beiler, cover, Petzel, Fessman, Jordan, Stumme with me.”

Leeb jumped up from the ground and led them forward to the Cupola, its turret had been raised and the two seventy-five millimetre guns were looking northwards, seeking out targets to prevent this German invasion.

As practiced many times, Leeb ran to the left of the armoured doors at the rear of the Cupola, and Jordan moved to the right, with Fessman covering the rear, as the ladder and the two small charges would not be needed yet.

Petzel and Stumme ran forwards to the steel door, the concrete monolith extending at least twice their height above them.

Petzel placed his hand against the thick, cold, steel door, almost sensing the activity behind it as he heard the guns above rotating.

He placed his ear up against the armoured doors, listening to the thrumming of machinery transmitted from the encased confines of the battery.

He moved away and between them they placed the fifty-kilogram charge against the steel doors.

“God help them when this goes off,” Petzel volunteered to his colleague.

“It’s going to spoil their breakfast, that’s for sure,” responded Stumme.

After setting the ten-second fuse, they ran for cover round the side of the bunker, Fessman joining them from his exposed position at the rear.

They flattened themselves against the bunker wall and holding their hands over their ears waited for the explosion they knew was to come.

Even expecting it, the force of the blast still shook them to their very core, the ground trembling beneath their feet.

Whooomph, the remnants of the discharge, the element not eating its way into the protective layers of the doors, shot out picking up the dust and detritus surrounding the rear of the bunker, projecting it at a velocity in excess of five thousand metres per second over the rest of the troop.

They had buried their heads in their hands, grasping clumps of turf, pulling themselves down, but still it tore at them, trying to wrestle them from their place of safety.

The hot blast ripped through the steel door. The searing, molten slag splayed out killing many of the Belgian gunners hiding behind its perceived invulnerability.

A young gunner, only having completed his training three months earlier, took its full impact; a slug of heated metal, scouring his upper face, the skin pared back exposing his cheekbone and the pale white of the frontal bone of the skull.

Still alive, he was thrown back against the rear of the bunker wall screaming as he went, clutching the remnants of his face, his service with the Belgian army ended that morning.

A second gunner, having heard a clunking sound up against the door, was mimicking Petzel, his ear up against the door straining to interpret the activity outside, was equally unlucky.

The blast blew the door off its hinges, smashing it into his body, crushing him up against the concrete wall, the steel door completing the entrapment.

A third soldier, who having only eight weeks to go before his conscription was fulfilled, and he would be demobbed, missed the direct force of the explosion. But, the rapidly expanding gasses were too much for his fragile brain, which, acting like a sponge, absorbed the full force of the shock wave, rupturing the blood vessels, the blood immediately pooling inside his skull, he was dying as he fell.

The rest of the battery was either just dazed, wounded themselves or also dead. The battery would not function again, its role in helping to hold back the German invader ceased at that moment in time.

Once the explosion had expired, Petzel and Stumme both rushed back to see the state of the damage, to see if it had indeed, blown a hole in the door.

Returning quickly back they passed on the good news to Leeb, that the charge had done its work.

“It’s not just blown a hole, it’s shattered the door completely, taking it off its hinges!” exclaimed Petzel

“Excellent, but we’ll still take out the observation dome as well,” informed Leeb.

“Fessman,” he hissed, bring up those small charges, hurry let’s get this done”, he ordered, impatient to get their task completed.

“Stumme, Petzel, chuck some grenades through the entrance and spray it with machine gun fire, quickly, before they come round.”

Fessman ran forwards, Beiler at his side with the ladder. He thumped the ladder up against the bunker side; noise no longer an issue, the enemy was well aware of their presence by now.

Fessman scurried up the ladder, keen to get the job done, the weariness of his legs forgotten for the moment, the task his priority.

Once on top he ran rapidly to the dome, placing both charges on top, setting the fuses, and counting down in his head as he sped back to the ladder.

He practically fell down the ladder in his haste to get away before the charges detonated, nearly crashing into his comrade looking up, watching out for him.

In the meantime Stumme and Petzel hand thrown two grenades each through the opening and after firing a full magazine in for good measure, they could hear no activity.

“Fire in the hole!” shouted Fessman. They all hit the deck, the charge erupting a few seconds afterwards.

They waited for a few minutes for the dust to settle, then shone their torches in to the darkened interior of the obliterated artillery battery. There was no sign of life, but it was obvious that the bunker could not be used to fulfil its purpose of firing on the bridges over the canal.

Rejoining their troop, they held a quick con-flab.

“Well done,” praised Leeb, pleased with their nights work.

“We’re done here guys; this is what we’re going to do. Stumme, Petzel, rejoin Menzel, get the prisoners and bring them over to MiNord, got that?”

“And you sir?” questioned Petzel.

The rest of us will head over to MiNord ahead of you, in case there’s a problem. I don’t want you turning up with prisoners and walking into a trap.”

“We’ll be off then,” with that they both headed towards where they’d left the glider, their pilot and the Belgian prisoners.

He gathered the remaining four of his assault troop and they headed northeast towards MiNord.

The route there was uneventful, but gunfire and explosions were still occurring around the perimeter of the fortress.

They were met at the HQ by one of the sentries and quickly taken to Paul.

Once there, he could see that Fischer, Kienitz and the Unterfeldwebel had already arrived.

He received claps on his back from his two fellow Uffz’s, who were naturally pleased to see their comrade safe and well.

“Have you done it?” Asked Paul and Max in unison, both having just joined the group and keen for an update.

“Yes sir, those charges certainly do the trick, blew the steel door right off its hinges, made a right mess of the bunker inside. And the rest of you?”

Fischer jumped in first, “not so hot on our target, didn’t penetrate the turret, we had to blow the barrels in the end.”

“But it’s finished?”

“Definitely, they’ll not be firing again.”

“Sir,” interposed Max, “we haven’t got time for a school boy update.”

“Quite right Unterfeldwebel Grun, the bunker, we have plans to make.”

The Uffz’s faces reddened, recognising that they had been chattering like teenagers swapping stories, while a war was still going on around them.

They headed for MiNord, for a council of war.

They gathered around their platoon Commander, Max and Oberfeldwebel Waechter.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Oberst Whilhelm Meisters’s Infantry Regiment, with a Pioneer Battalion attached, commanded by Oberstleutnant Hans Metzger, was to spearhead the German advance to Eben Emael.

Metzger’s primary mission was to complete the capture of the fort and as a consequence relieve the hard-pressed assault group granite.

The Oberstleutnant, responsible for the attached Pioneer Battalion, ran up to the command tent pushing the tent flaps aside, seeking out his Regimental Commander.

The forty year old Commander was bent over the map table, studying the routes allocated to his units to get them to their objective. The roads would no doubt be severely congested, he thought. Various units would be given priority, his included, in order to pave the way for the bigger, heavier formations following close behind.

“They’ve managed to blow the bloody bridge over the Maas!” he said as he stormed into the tent.

The Leipzig born Oberst, looked up, “What’s being done about it?”

Metzger joined him by the map table, “an assault bridge is being put up now, sir”

“How long’s that going to take, we’re behind the schedule already?” he demanded, looking down at his watch frustrated by the destruction of the bridges in Maastricht, now slowing his advance.

“We hope to have it ready by midday sir.”

Metzger, his broad face with wide narrow mouth and flattish nose, pointed to the map, “we’re taking this route, and providing the bridge is ready on time we could be starting to cross within the hour.”

“We’ve got to get to the Fort Hans, those paratroopers will be in the thick of it already and we don’t know how long they can hold out for.”

“Or even if they’ve succeeded sir.”

“I have every confidence in them,” he said, moving around to the other side of the map table, pointing to the fort, but if they don’t succeed; then we’ve got to secure it.”

“If they don’t knock out at least some of those guns, it’ll cause mayhem at the crossing points.”

“Don’t remind me,” he responded, reflecting on the immensity of the responsibility on his and the Fallschirmjager units shoulders, “what’s your planned route after the Maas?” he continued.

“Still the Kanne bridge sir,” he said pointing to the crossing at the southern point of the canal, “we can go down Canner weg, that way we can avoid the built up areas,” he said tracking the route with his finger.

“Ok Hans, just do it,” he ordered, the frustration clearly etched on his face, “the entire bloody army is waiting on us.”

“We’ll get it done sir,” he said, starting to move towards the exit, itching to get back to his command.

“Get off with you then Hans, I’ll move my HQ to the Kanne Bridge, you can update me when I get there.”

Metzger flashed a quick salute, then brushing the tent flap aside rushed out, jumping into the passenger seat of the Steiner jeep, waiting for him outside, with its engine still running.

“Let’s go Gunther,” he commanded his adjutant.

“How’s the old man sir?”

“Frustrated as hell, but at least he didn’t chew me out.”

The Major steered the Steiner expertly through the busy streets, all of the traffic military, the civilians still in a state of shock, staring at the invaders as they passed by.

They cleared the built up area travelling north along the edge of the Maas, a barrier they needed to cross quickly.

They started to enter the built up area again, a mix of shops and commercial premises. Just as they were approaching the bridge, the one that was no longer available to them, having been blown up by the Dutch engineers, they were stopped at a barrier, manned by a section of Chain Dogs, Military Police.

The Oberstleutnant returned the Feldwebel’s salute and impatiently handed over his orders.

The policeman scrutinised the orders, not seeming in any particular hurry.

“Damn you man, let us through quickly, we have a bloody war to fight, not sit here while you scratch your arse.”

“We need to check all documents sir,” the policeman replied officiously.

“Listen Feldwebel, it says on that docket that we are to be given priority over all other units, if you can’t fucking read that then get an officer here who can,” his anger growing by the minute.

The Feldwebel knew he was on dodgy ground, and the officer was an Oberstleutnant, so he shouted to the soldier, who was manning the barrier to lift it and let them through.

Metzger flicked his hand in a mock salute and the Steiner roared through the barrier which the soldier barely had time lift up and was sure at one point that the jeep was going to hit it.