Anti-tankman turned down desk job to go to front lines

U.S. Army veteran Bill Bleakly, a member of the 14th Armored Division, was an anti-tank man during World War II.

He was one of the guys wielding weapons capable of disabling the German Panzer tanks prowling the battlefields of Europe, but it was the smaller 37 mm anti-tank gun.

“The 57 mm was too much for me to manhandle,” Bleakly said.

He weighed a whopping 106 pounds when he was drafted.

Although the calorie-rich Army chow put some meat on Bleakly's bones, he was still a lightweight.

“They tried to keep me from getting into combat units.”

Bleakly was asked if he wanted to get into drafting and work at division headquarters.

“I said, ‘No. I don't want to go there. I want to go into a combat unit where I can find those Germans,'” Bleakly said.

Arriving in Marseilles, France, Bleakly's battalion eventually made its way to the Maritime Alps.

“We spent Thanksgiving there,” he said. “At the end of November, we started north — to Alsace,” then moved on to Oberotterbach, about two miles inside the German border.

At eight o'clock one morning, the Germans opened fire.

“That whole hillside they had in front of us exploded,” Bleakly said. “Word came down — every man for himself.”

They started up the hill, and after a while, completely winded, the men eyed a big, bombed-out crater near a tree.

“We decided that would be a good place to hit the ground and catch our breath.”

A shell hit the tree, and shrapnel came flying their way.

His buddy got the worst of the blast.

“His arm was almost amputated at the elbow.”

Bleakly also got hit and spent a few days in the hospital.

The wound, “Felt like somebody stuck a match in there and ignited it. I was thinking, ‘What am I doing here?'”

In early January, 1945, U.S. troops battled back against strong German attacks at Rittershoffen.

“That was a real barn-burner,” Bleakly said. “The division fought the greatest defensive battle of the war. We held out for 10 days. We withdrew at night through a mine field.”

They later realized the Germans had also withdrawn under the cover of darkness.

The troops trudged on to the Moder River, where, once again, they met up with the enemy — armed, ready and waiting on the opposite bank.

But help was on the way. P-47 Thunderbolts — heavy-duty U.S. fighter planes — soon appeared in the skies.

“They came over and blew the heck out of the Germans.”

One time, the men were crossing a frozen creek when the ice broke, and they had to wade across.

Bleakly's feet — he felt like he was walking on pins and needles, he said — suffered terribly during these times.

At one point, “I hadn't had a change of shoes or socks for 10 days. It was a miserable time.”

In March, Bleakly caught pneumonia and spent three weeks in a field hospital in Le Mans, near Normandy.

“I spent my 21st birthday in the hospital,” he said.