Month: May 1945

Categories
Background Germany Letters

May 8, 1945 (VE Day)

Map or 87th Division in Europe, from arrival to VE day
Map of 87th Division in Europe from arrival to VE Day

Germany surrendered on May 7, 1945. From the 346th History

Orders were received on May 5 for a limited objective attack the next morning. So Third Battalion jumped off at 0830, meeting some small arms fire and a few rounds of artillery. Plans for the following day’s attack were stopped at 0525 on May 7 by a message from the Division Commander reading: “Sit tight, hold what you have, accept any surrenders. “

GERMANY SURRENDERS

At 0945 May 7 the following message was received from the Division Commander: “Representatives of the German High Command signed the unconditional surrender of all German land, sea, and air forces to the Allied Expeditionary Forces and simultaneously to the Soviet High Command at 0700, 7 May 1945 under which all forces will cease active operations at 0900, 7 May 1945. Effective immediately all offensive operations cease. Troops will remain in present positions. Moves involved in occupational duty will continue. Due to difficulty in communications, there may be some delay in similar orders reaching the enemy troops, so
full defensive precautions will be taken.”

The commander of a German Artillery Battalion came through the lines to arrange surrender of his unit to the Second Battalion at 0500 in the morning. The German colonel did not know at the time of the surrender that the war had ended.

May 8 found the Regiment accepting the Artillery Battalions surrender at 0500 as previously arranged.

May 8, 1945
Germany

Dear Folks,
    Yesterday sure was a great day for me. We attacked on the sixth1This would have been the attack described from the point of view of the 347th Regiment on page 11 of this document, but it mentions that the 346th was also involved. and were supposed to shove off again yesterday morning. But instead of receiving an attack order, we were ordered just to stay where we were. Then a little after ten o’clock we got the news that the Germans had signed unconditional surrender. Even though it doesn’t take effect officially till tomorrow, it meant that we were though fighting. Boy oh Boy! What a feeling. The Lord has certainly been good to me. I’ve got lots to thank Him for.
   The “Stars and Stripes” also brought us some pretty good news yesterday. It said that over half of the combat troops would get a furlough back in the States before they are shipped to the CBI2 CBI stands for The China, Burma, India Theater, but evidence shows that it was used by the soldiers in Europe as a term for the Japan/Pacific Theater as a whole. Don’t plan too much on it because there’s just about as much chance against it as there is for it. But wouldn’t that be great!
   Yesterday also I received a box from you and my name was turned in for a pass to Paris. It was the package containing pop corn and it really hit the spot. The corn was still as crisp as it was when you packed it. It would have done your heart good to have seen the fellows (and me) go after it. I wish I could send the box home and let you fill it up again.
   If my pass had come a little bit sooner it might have kept me out of a little fighting but I’m glad to get it now. I’ll be going in a day or so. Considering everything that happened, wasn’t yesterday a pretty eventful day for me?
   Well it looks like Spring again today. Maybe the weather is doing a little celebrating. We’ve really had some pretty rough weather for this late in the season during the past week. There has even been a little snow. I hope it stays nice now.
   It’s been almost a week now since I got any letters but no doubt there will be two or three when they do come.
   Hope everything is ship-shape back there. Be good and God bless you.                                               
          Love
           Donald
08May1945Download
Categories
Germany Letters

May 5 (20th Birthday) – May 7, 1945

May 5, 1945
Here’s what I almost wrote
May 5, 1925

Dear Family,
    I’ve been hoping that the war would be over or something big would happen today. But the big surrender of the Germans in the north and in Holland and Denmark that we got news of last night was about as much of a birthday present as I could expect. Last year at this time I was wondering when I was going to get my furlough and this time I’m wondering when the war is going to be over in Europe. And come to think of it, it’s only ten days less than a year since I was home. I sort of hope that the war here will be over before ten more days.
     I’ve sort of been on a vacation for a couple of days now since I’ve been back at cannon company. I can’t quite understand why they wanted me back here but since it’s such a holiday I’m not complaining. There sure is a big difference just to be even no further back than this. Maybe if we were in the midst of the war instead of the tail end of things wouldn’t be quite so settled back here but its almost like having a rest period to me. I am learning a little and sure am hoping that I never have any real need to use my knowledge.
    This is really a crazy war now. You don’t know whether to expect it to be over soon or not. You know what sort of stories you hear about victory etc. at home and you can just about imagine how much worse it is here. Really the big question in our minds now is what will happen after Germany is finished. Everyone is dreading the thought about going to the other half of the war. And then if you want to hear some big rumors you should you listen to them about this. I hate to think about it but I wouldn’t be surprised to find myself among those that do go from here to Asia. As far as the army is concerned I guess there’s no big reason why I shouldn’t . The Lord is supreme there too so I’ll just trust him as I have thus far.
    As far as my birthday goes, I have received three or four cards from you. If I could get back to the company this evening I expect I would have a couple of letters. And to be truthful a letter with a little news in it is appreciated as much or more than anything that could come.

Mon. Night1May 7 
    Well I didn’t get this finished at the time I was writing it for the simple reason that I sort of relaxed for a minute and went right to sleep. Then when I awoke we were receiving orders to shove off so that fixed the letter writing. So much has taken place between then and now that I’m just going to sign off on this and start a completely new letter.
         Love,  Donald
05May1945Download
Categories
Germany Grandparents Letters

May 4, 1945

Letter to his Grandparents, Alfred and Grace Carver

Germany
May 4, 1945

Dear Grandparents,
    A lot of things have taken place since I last wrote to you - both here and over there. We have covered a whole lot of ground here and we are all trusting that this part of the war won’t last too much longer. The prospect of having to go to the other side of the world after it is over here has us pretty deeply concerned, but I know that the Lord reigns supreme there too. He has certainly been close to me over here.
    Back there Maurice has left for the Navy and your work is finished up once again. You had to work hard to keep up with the job and I am hoping that it will be possible for you to rest up a bit now that it is over. Perhaps it doesn’t sound very patriotic to my branch of the service to say that I am glad that Maurice got into the navy but that is what he wanted and anyway I had told Richard that he should consider the Navy if he had to put on a uniform.
    Well Ben had a birthday the other day and tomorrow will be mine. The Lord willing we’ll celebrate at home next year. God be with you. Your grandson,  Donald
04May1945-GrandparentsDownload
Categories
Background Germany

Germany: May 1945

The following is the official “After Action Report” for the 346th Regiment, May 1945, from the 87th Infantry Archives

After-Action-Reports,-346th,-MayDownload