The Bedford Boys: One American Town's Ultimate D-day Sacrifice (34 page)
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Authors: Alex Kershaw
“I went to Omaha Beach in 1997,” said Danny. “I was amazed that any of them got off alive. It was just because of sheer numbers that they did. Those boys—they were all just unbelievable.” Danny also went to the graveyard above the beach where her father is listed on a wall in a Garden of the Missing commemorating 1,557 men whose bodies were never found.
Sixty years after he crawled across Omaha Beach, the last living officer from Company A on D-Day was still plagued by survivor’s guilt and the occasional episode of post-traumatic stress disorder. Not a day went by when Ray Nance didn’t think about the men he once commanded and the lives they might have led had they been as lucky as he was. Nance was also the last survivor from Bedford who landed on D-Day.
At eighty-eight years of age, Nance was tempted to go back to Omaha Beach but, having recently survived a quintuple heart bypass, he said he didn’t want to die there. Returning to those cold sands might be too much for his heart to bear. This is a shame because it is not so much in Bedford that the spirits of its lost sons are most palpable, but rather a few hundred yards from the beach where they died, in the American cemetery Colleville sur Mer.
Eleven of Bedford’s sons still lie there in graves overlooking the beach, beside 9,386 other American dead from the battle for Normandy. In a chapel at the heart of the rows of dead, each with a cross pointing west—towards home—the following words are inscribed for all to see: “Think not only upon their passing. Remember the glory of their spirit.”
AND D-DAY
Twenty-two Bedford Boys were killed in the Normandy campaign
:
Leslie Abbott
Wallace Carter
John Clifton
John Dean
Frank Draper Jr.
Taylor Fellers
Charles Fizer
Nicholas Gillaspie
Bedford Hoback
Raymond Hoback
Clifton Lee
Earl Parker
Joseph Parker
Jack Powers
Weldon Rosazza
John Reynolds
John Schenk
Ray Stevens
Gordon White
John Wilkes
Elmere Wright
Grant Yopp
Six Bedford Boys landed on D-Day and survived
:
Robert Goode
James Lancaster
Robert (Tony) Marsico
Elisha (Ray) Nance
Glenwood (Dickie) Overstreet
Anthony Thurman
Five Bedford Boys missed landing on D-Day when their landing craft sank, but landed days later
:
Robert Edwards
Charles Fizer
Clyde Powers
Roy Stevens
Harold Wilkes
Four Bedford Boys served in support capacity and did not land on D-Day
:
Earl Newcomb
Jack Mitchell
George Crouch
Cedric Broughman
The entire 116th Infantry Regiment suffered 797 casualties, including 375 killed or missing in action. The 116th received a Distinguished Unit Citation for “extraordinary heroism and outstanding performance of duty in action in the initial assault on the northern coast of Normandy, France.”
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Chapter 1
1
. Lynchburg (Va.)
News & Advance
, June 3, 2001.
2
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
3
. Bill Geroux, “The Suicide Wave,”
Richmond Times-Dispatch
, June 3, 2001.
4
. This proved correct. Of eighteen landing craft, six were lost. The casualties were similar—around a third of his men.
5
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
6
.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
, ibid.
7
. “Virginians at Normandy,” WDBJ7 public television station, Virginia.
8
. Ibid.
9
. Joseph Balkoski,
Beyond the Beachhead
(Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania: Stackpole Books, 1989), p. 7.
10
. Bill Geroux, “The Suicide Wave,”
Richmond Times-Dispatch
, June 3, 2001.
11
. Ray Nance, interview with author.
12
. John Barnes,
Fragments of My Life
(self-published, 2000), p. 61.
13
. Cornelius Ryan,
The Longest Day
(New York: Touchstone, 1994), p. 178.
1
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
2
. Ibid.
3
. Ibid.
4
. Ibid.
5
. Ibid.
6
. Lynchburg (Va.)
News & Advance
, June 3, 2001.
7
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
8
. Brookings also found that over 70 million people, 60 percent of American families, got by on less than $2,000 a year, an amount “sufficient to supply only basic necessities.”
9
. In 1937, the U.S. Government purchased 657.4 acres of land, including Sharp Top and Flat Top, for $60,000 in order to protect them from logging and other development.
10
.
Chronicle of America (
New York: Dorling Kindersley, 1995), p. 686.
11
. C. L. Sulzberger,
World War II
(New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1987), p.57
12
. Lynchburg
News & Advance
, June 3, 2001.
13
. Ibid.
14
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
15
. Elaine Coffey, interview with author.
16
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
17
.
Bedford Bulletin
, February 4, 1941.
18
. Lynchburg
News and Advance
, June 3, 2001.
19
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
20
. Lynchburg
News & Advance
, June 3, 2001.
21
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
22
. Lee Kennett,
GI: The American Soldier in World War II
(New York: Scribner’s, 1987), p. 17.
23
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
24
. Ibid.
25
. Eloise Rogers, interview with author.
26
. Eloise Rogers, letter to author, November 24, 2002.
27
. Lynchburg
News & Advance
, June 3, 2001.
28
. Ibid.
29
. Eloise Rogers, interview with author.
30
.
Bedford Bulletin
, February 20, 1941.
31
. Joseph Ewing,
29, Let’s Go
(Washington: Infantry Journal Press, 1948), p. 1.
32
. Lucille Hoback Boggess, interview with author.
33
. “Morale in the U.S. Army: An Appreciation,”
New York Times
, September 29, 1941.
34
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
35
. Lucille Hoback Boggess, interview with author.
36
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
37
. Franklin D. Roosevelt, Pearl Harbor speech, National Archives Web site.
38
. Ray Nance, interview with author.
1
. Bob Sales, interview with author.
2
. Bertie Woodford, interview with author.
3
. Lynchburg
News & Advance
, June 3, 2001.
4
. Ibid.
5
. Dorothy Wilkes Goode, interview with author.
6
. Ibid.
7
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
8
. Bettie Wilkes Hooper, interview with author.
9
. Bettie Wilkes Hooper speech, May 2000.
10
.
Bedford Bulletin
, December 11, 1941.
11
. Lynchburg
News & Advance
, June 3, 2001.
12
. Billy Parker, interview with author.
13
. Bob Slaughter memoirs, The Eisenhower Center for American Studies, University of New Orleans.
14
. Elva Newcomb, interview with author.
15
. “Remembering D-Day,”
Baltimore Sun
, June 6, 1998.
16
. Ivylyn Hardy, interview with author.
17
. Ibid.
18
. Ibid.
19
. Ibid.
20
. Verona Lipford, interview with author.
21
. Bettie Wilkes Hooper, interview with author.
22
. Elaine Coffey, interview with author.
23
. Bettie Wilkes Hooper, interview with author.
24
. Earl Newcomb, interview with author.
25
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
26
. Joseph Balkoski,
Beyond the Beachhead
(Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania: Stackpole Books, 1989), p. 34.
27
. Bob Slaughter memoirs, Eisenhower Center.
28
. Bob Slaughter, interview with author.
29
. Bettie Wilkes Hooper, interview with author.
30
. Ibid.
31
. Like other wives, Viola vowed to write to her husband every day. She did, and to the day she died, in 1994, she remembered his dog-tag number by heart—20363625.
32
.
Bedford Democrat
, June 6, 1994.
33
. Anna Mae Stewart, interview with author.
34
. Daniel Allen Butler,
Warrior Queens
(Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania: Stackpole Books, 2002), p. 46.
35.
Lee Kennett,
GI: The American Soldier in World War II
(Scribner’s, New York, 1987), p. 115.
1
. The
Queen Mary
was designed to carry 2,119 passengers with a crew of 1,035.
2
. Daniel Allen Butler,
Warrior Queens
(Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania: Stackpole Books, 2002), p. 129. Infantrymen had to carry their M-1 rifles wherever they went.
3
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
4
. Ibid.
5
. Butler,
Warrior Queens
, p. 132.
6
. That July’s issue of the popular
Yank
magazine had cautioned: “Don’t brag. Don’t tell an Englishman we came over and won the last war for them. We didn’t. England lost a million men; we lost only 60,000.”
7
. Butler,
Warrior Queens
, p. 131.
8
. Lynchburg
News & Advance
, June 3, 2001.
9
. Men often lost their pay within hours of it being issued. In 1942, lieutenants made $125 a month, sergeants around $70, and privates just $30.
10
. Earl Newcomb, interview with author.
11
. Clipping from Elva Newcomb’s scrapbook. The incident would later receive prominent space in the
Bedford Bulletin
.
12
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
13
. Ibid.
14
. Lee Kennett,
GI: The American Soldier in World War II
(New York, Scribner’s, 1987), p. 116.
15
. Docks further south were in range of the Luftwaffe.
16
. Butler,
Warrior Queens
, p. 99.
17
. Ibid., p. 107.
18
. Ibid., p. 110.
19
. Ibid., p. 113.
20
. Ibid., p. 114.
21
. Earl Newcomb, interview with author, January 2002.
22
. Bob Slaughter, interview with author.
23
. Allen Huddleston, interview with author.
24
. Butler,
Warrior Queens
, p. 114.
25
. Ibid., p.118.
26
. Bob Sales, interview with author.
27
. Butler,
Warrior Queens,
p. 116.
28
. Ibid. Also see: Captain Harry Grattidge,
Captain of the Queens
(London: Old-bourne Press, 1956).
29
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
30
. Ibid.
1
. Joseph Ewing,
29 Let’s Go
(Washington: Infantry Journal Press, 1948), p. 15
2
. Bob Slaughter, interview with author.
3
. Ibid.
4
. Ibid.
5
. Ibid.
6
. Bob Slaughter memoirs, The Eisenhower Center for American Studies, University of New Orleans.
7
. Ibid.
8
. Lee Kennett,
GI: The American Soldier in World War II
(New York: Scribners, 1987), p. 73.
9
. Lynchburg
News & Advance
, June 3, 2001.
10
. Ivylyn Hardy, interview with author.
11
. Mrs. George P. Parker, Bedford County World War II Committee,
Reports and Correspondence
Concerning Bedford County in World War II, 1943–1945
, May 1, 1943.
12
.
Bedford Bulletin
, February 4, 1943.
13
. John Barnes,
Fragments of My Life
(self-published, 2000), p. 50.
14
. Bertie Woodford scrapbook. Fellers was proud of his family’s Scottish roots and had purchased a special plaid called the “Royal Stewart” in Scotland; Sergeant John Laird’s parents had located the plaid.
15
. Taylor Fellers to his parents, private correspondence, March 27, 1943.
16
. Not every 29th Division soldier hated the moors. Brigadier General Norman Cota, who would be the most senior 29th Division officer to join the Bedford boys in combat, was so taken by their bleak beauty that he often spent his free weekends camping in a small pup tent.
17
. Allen Huddleston, interview with author.
18
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
19
. Ibid.
20
. Joseph Balkoski,
Beyond the Beachhead
(Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania: Stackpole Books, 1989), p. 55.
21
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
22
. Earl Newcomb, interview with author.
23
. In the nearest town to Tidworth Barracks—Ivybridge—the landlady was still alive in 2003 and remembered many of the Bedford boys with great fondness.
24
. Ewing,
29 Let’s Go!
, p. 17.
25
. Ellen Quarles, interview with author.
26
. Beulah Witt, interview with author.
27
. One hundred twenty thousand U.S. servicemen were in the United Kingdom as of January 31, 1943. [Morison
, The Invasion of France and Germany
, p. 51.]
28
. Parker report, July 15, 1943.
29
. Ray Nance, interview with author.
30
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
31
. Ibid.
32
. Letter from Bedford Hoback to Mabel Phelps. Quoted by Lucille Hoback Boggess.
33
. Lynchburg
News & Advance
, June 3, 2001.
34
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
35
. Ibid.
36
. Bertie Woodford, interview with author.
37
. Stevens would name his first daughter after her and stay in touch for over sixty years.
38
.
Bedford Bulletin
, May 20, 1943.
39
. Roy Stevens, interview with author.
40
. Ibid.