Our first real contact with the Germans was in the Rothbach Creek area. We had been transported from the area near the Rhine to the vicinity of Rothbach in an amphibious vehicle, a DUKW, and of course they were dubbed "ducks". Our platoon was given the mission to occupy some high ground that overlooked a valley that one of our sister regiments was to force the Germans in that area to retreat through a nearby valley. We were to cut off that retreat and capture or kill as many as possible. As we moved through the woods and approached the high ground, we started taking rifle and machine gun fire. Some of the bullets were snapping so we knew they were close, and some of the bullets clipped off branches that would swing or fall down toward us. We took our first casualties at that time. The medics put them on litters and took off for the aid station. Our platoon leader, Lt Burkett, split us up, sending the squad I was in through the woods to another side of the hill toward the high ground. The platoon leader and two other men took a different route to the high ground. Soon we were out of the woods and on top of the hill into open terrain. As we got to the top of the hill and looked down the other side we saw about 30 Germans dug in, including a machine gun position. Their backs were to us. We moved into a line of skirmishers as we had been taught and continued forward. When we were 20 or 30 yards from the nearest German, one of them saw us and fired at us. We all started firing, including Big John Adams, our automatic rifleman (John had been a hit-man with a Chicago gang before being drafted. He had a big, nasty scar in front of his right shoulder from an old knife fight, and had a dagger tattooed on it). We had caught them by surprise and were doing a lot of shooting. Soon, they all put down their rifles, stood up and put their arms up and threw their helmets away. They were our first prisoners of war. We searched them as quickly as possible for weapons and documents as we had been taught. We did find some maps and papers, and took off to rejoin our company and turn in our prisoners and the maps and papers we had taken from them. When we got back, we learned that our platoon leader and the two men with him were missing and believed captured. It turned out that the platoon leader and one man were killed and the other man was captured. That was my baptism of fire.

Related

General Orders - 274th Honor Roll