REMAGEN

Probably nobody would have ever heard of the little town of Remagen if it hadn’t been for that blasted railroad bridge. Apparently it was one of the few bridges left standing over the Rhine River which is not an easy river to cross. The Germans (I believe it was the Germans) had laid planks down so they could drive their vehicles across the bridge during their hasty retreat. Our guys had taken the town and the bridge and established a foothold on the west side of the river. They had knocked out the artillery on the hill overlooking the river on the west side. There were still some snipers - well hidden here and there - from whom we were getting small arms fire. The main problem was that the Germans were firing their 88s from some place on the other side of the mountain. The shells would go over the mountain and land all over the place. They did not hit the bridge that I knew of, but they were hitting the town and the approaches to the bridge. I heard that they had a very large caliber railroad gun someplace, miles away, that was firing huge projectiles into the town. That town was a real mess and not a place to hang out. The town wasn’t very badly damaged when we took it, but the Germans were making sure that Remagen was not going to survive.

Our little outfit crossed the bridge in our vehicles. We had to keep the speed down to about 2 mph: just like a crawl. The MPs didn’t want the vehicles going any faster because there had been an attempt to blow the bridge, and they were afraid it might fall in the river. We were all closed down and all I could see from the slots was a lot of MPs and Combat Engineers along the bridge, standing out there in the open. They had no shelter. The German 88s were dropping all around and the snipers were firing at them. I don’t know how many of the guys got hit, but we found out later that, the day after we crossed the bridge, it fell in the river and several dozens of our guys were killed as a result of that.