Chapter 11
By nightfall on 27 March it was clear that 116th Panzer Division had been broken and at first light 8th Armoured Division began to move through Staatsforst Wesel as General Hobbs’ weary GIs waited for dawn in their foxholes. They had fought continuously against the Panzergrenadiers and their tanks since crossing the Rhine four days earlier. The firing had died down once 120th Regiment had cleared the outskirts of Kirchhellen but the men’s nerves were still shredded after the hardships of the past few days. At first light the sounds of tracked vehicles in the woods behind the GIs’ front lines momentarily alarmed a few but their fears quickly subsided as the tanks and halftracks came into view; they were American.
8th Armoured Division used the treadway bridge connecting Wallach and Ork, in the centre of 30th Division’s sector, to cross the Rhine.
An American paratrooper and a British tank commander share a smoke before heading off towards Holsterhausen.
If 30th Division had acted as the anvil to draw the German reinforcements into battle, General Devine’s tanks would act as Ninth Army’s hammer. 8th Armoured Division had started to cross the Rhine on 26 March and hour after hour columns of tanks, halftracks, armoured cars, howitzers and supply trucks had filed onto the east bank and lined up along the forest roads behind 30th Division. Three tank battalions, the 18th, 30th and 80th, three armoured infantry battalions, the 7th, 49th and 58th and three armoured field artillery battalions as well as reconnaissance troops, engineers and logistics vehicles, had waited in Staatsforst Wesel for the past forty-eight hours and, at long last, the moment had arrived; Montgomery’s planned breakout across northern Germany was about to begin.
On the left flank Combat Command A (CCA) led by Brigadier General Charles P Colson had orders to pass through 30th Division and pass south of Dorsten while Combat Command Reserve (CCR) pushed through Kirchhellen to attack Zweckel in front of 120th Regiment. However, if Brigadier General Devine thought the Germans were beaten after their trials in Staatsforst Wesel, he was mistaken. Heavy fighting broke out all across 8th Armoured Division’s front and the advance party of the 80th Tank Battalion soon found themselves surrounded by elements of the 116th Panzer Division in Kirchhellen. Although Brigadier General Colson managed to outflank the German positions in the town, rescuing the trapped tank crews, mines stopped Colonel Robert Wallace advancing any further.
Pershing tanks head deep into German territory as Ninth Army begins the breakout into northern Germany.
When it seemed as though General Simpson would have to rethink his plans for a rapid breakout along the Lippe river, a second armoured thrust was well underway in 17th Airborne Division’s sector, north of the river. Colonel Coutts had welcomed Brigadier Greenacre, 6th Guards Armoured Brigade’s commanding officer, into his headquarters during the night and the two had worked out how to mount 513th Parachute Regiment on the British tanks with the intention of advancing past Holsterhausen on the northern outskirts of Dorsten.
While the Thundering Herd wrestled with the 116th Panzer Division’s cadre, the makeshift armoured column began passing through 17th Airborne Division’s lines at 08:00 hours with 507th Regiment following behind, sweeping the fields and farms either side of the road for stragglers. There was little sign of enemy activity and as the tanks crossed the Boston and Tampa phase lines, before bypassing Holsterhausen, the paratroopers could reflect on the past few days’ fighting as they struck out into open country.
The end of the war is in sight as these GIs begin the long march into the heart of Germany.
GIs pass through German civilian refugees in a shattered town. 111-SC204735
The column kept pushing east, capturing a huge ammunition dump mined with time fuses set to blow at midnight, 29 March; Colonel Coutts’ men had beat the deadline by over twenty-four hours. German resistance was limited to rearguards left behind to protect demolition teams and at one bridge, an officer braved machine-gun fire to deactivate eight demolition charges; his actions allowed the tanks to push on towards Haltern. By midnight 513th Combat Team and 6th Guards Armoured had driven eighteen miles into German held territory – the breakout had been made; Operation PLUNDER was underway.
By the end of March the Allied Armies were streaming across Germany on all fronts. Operation PLUNDER marked the beginning of the end for Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring’s troops. As 21 Army Group raced past the northern outskirts of the Ruhr, First US Army continued to capitalise on the Remagen bridgehead. Having shaken himself free from the Westerwald, General Courtney Hodges was given the order to drive across the plains north of Frankfurt, turning north to link up with Ninth Army east of the Ruhr. General Patton had not been idle either and was expanding his small bridgehead across the Rhine, heading towards Frankfurt from the south. More attempts to cross the Rhine followed and although a few were stopped, it was only a matter of time before all of Eisenhower’s Armies were driving into the heart of Germany.
After five and a half long years the end of the Second World War was in sight. With the Americans, British, Canadians and French pushing from the west and the Russians from the east, the end of Hitler’s thousand year Third Reich was only a few weeks away.
German prisoners being marched to the ‘cage’.
