The German bulge in the American lines was now over 40 miles deep and 60 miles wide, but consisted of two smaller salients. The first, in the central area of the Bulge overran St.Vith and skirted north of Houffalize to create a six mile-wide German advance line at its furthest point between Marche and Hotten on the Ourthe River, 30 miles short of the Meuse River at Huy. To its south another salient had advanced farther west, skirting Bastogne and reaching within ten miles of the Meuse at Dinant. This southern salient’s right tip extended almost to the northern salient at Marche, but there was still a gap. Combining the two salients, German Field Marshal Model had shoehorned a dozen divisions along a 20-mile battlefront. The most pressing threat to the Allies was the Marche-Hotten salient west of St.Vith, where German Panzergrenadiers had crossed the Salm River and by December 22-23 were approaching Marche, Soy, and Manhay near the Ourthe River.
Between December 19 and 22, there was a tough fight at Braque de Fraiture, or Parkers Crossroads, of elements of the U.S. 3rd Armored, 106th Infantry, and 28th Infantry Divisions, and arriving 325th Glider Infantry of the 82nd Airborne Division, against the 2nd Panzer and 560th Volksgrenadiers Divisions. Both sides incurred heavy losses. On December 22-24, the 504th PIR and 325th GIR earned commendations for extreme bravery in actions against the Fuhrer Begleit Brigade and 2nd SS Panzer Division at nearby Regne, Jubieval, Hompre, and Odeigne.
By December 22, a final Allied line of defense under 18th Airborne Corps Commander General Ridgeway had been completed from Trois-Ponts in the north to Marche in the center. At his disposal over a 30 mile front Ridgeway had the U.S. 82nd Airborne and 3rd Armored Divisions. For the immediate threat at Marche he also had use of part of the U.S. 84th Infantry, or “Rail Splitters,” which had raced 75 miles southwest in a blizzard through terrain swarming with Germans. After a five mile gap, the line of defense continued south west to Dinant, where the British were blocking the Meuse River bridges. The U.S. 7th Corps under General Collins, including the U.S. 2nd Armored Division, which had raced from Aachen, and U.S. 84th Infantry Division, with the U.S. 75th Infantry Division in reserve, was responsible for the actual and unmanned line between Marche and Dinant.
The 517th Parachute Infantry Regiment arrived from southern France on December 22, veterans of the Italian campaign before that, many of them were replacements from the First Special Service Force. From December 22 to the 24th, the 517th’s 1st Battalion, in support of the overstretched 3rd Armored Division, turned back the 560th Volksgrenadiers at Soy and Haid-Hits. The 517th also rescued the U.S. 75 Infantry Division at La Roumiere Hill and assisted Task Force Kane of the 3rd Armored Division at Samree, Dochamps, and Freyneaux, slowing the German advance to Manhay. Freyneux was the 517th’s “toughest fight since Anzio.” For nine crucial days of the battle on Marche Plain 517th PIR became Ridgeway’s “fire fighters.” By December 24th the U.S. 75th Infantry Division and the 517th PIR were released by General Collins to help Ridgeway. The Marche-to-Manhay road had become the new U.S. line of defense on the Marche Plain, a gently rolling landscape favorable to tanks and mounted infantry.
On the German left side of that new line near Marche, facing the U.S. 84th Infantry Division, was the 116th Panzer Division. On its right, across from the 51st Engineer Combat Battalion and 23rd Armored Engineer Battalion of the U.S. 3rd Armored Division, the 560th Volksgrenadiers were attacking Soy and Hotten, attempting to get behind the new defensive line and to push their way up the Marche-to-Manhay highway. To their right, across from the U.S. 3rd Armored and U.S. 82nd Airborne Divisions, the 2nd SS Panzer Division was attacking at Parker’s Crossroads, or Braque de Fraiture and Odeigne, and moving toward Manhay. To their right, at the north end of the German advance, the 9th SS Panzer Division, opposed by elements of the U.S. 3rd Armored and U.S. 82nd Airborne Divisions, was moving toward Manhay and Bra.
On December 24, Montgomery ordered the U.S. 3rd Armored and 82nd Airborne Divisions to reduce their exposure and fall back to Manhay, where they joined the U.S. 7th Armored Division survivors from St.Vith, the 517th PIR, and the U.S. 75th Infantry Division. This was just in time. The 2nd SS Panzer seized Manhay on the 24th as the 560th Volksgrenadiers threatened Soy. At Manhay at 1 p.m. Ridgway told his commanders, “We smash the German drive here today on our front, smash the German offensive, his spirit for this war. We lick the Germans here today.”
That afternoon things began to change through Christmas to the 26th of December. The battle had shifted to Manhay crossroads. On December 26th, Ridgeway called on the 517th’s 3rd Battalion again, to help the 3rd Armored Division stop the 2nd SS Panzer movement from Manhay to Grandmenil. Following a rolling barrage as in Italy, three 517th companies battled an SS battalion in what one 517th veterans called a “fair fight.” Two members of the 517th, Norm Allen and King Brady, later reported for smokejumper duty in Missoula, Montana, in 1946. Thirteen U.S. field artillery battalions, using “pozit” proximity fuses, had made shells of 28 Tiger tanks already suffering from U.S. P-38 and P-47 attacks. The road between Manhay and Grandmenil had become a killing ground. As the 2nd SS Panzer discovered, one 155-mm “posit” shell airburst could shred every square foot within a 75-yard diameter.
Further down the highway, the 84th Infantry Division stopped the 116th Panzer Division at Marche and crushed it in the Verdenne pocket, destroying 113 armored vehicles and taking 1,200 prisoners. On the 26th cooks, orderlies, and truck drivers were pushed into the line as the enemy attacked. General Bolling disseminated orders that “this was as far as the Germans would advance. There would be no retreat. This was a fight to the last man.” That day German Tiger tanks attacked single file, unaware that Marche was highly defended. The 84th Rail-Splitters held.
The 325th Glider, 7th Armored, and 517th PIR retook Manhay on the 27th, as the 325th Glider blocked other elements of the 2nd SS Panzer withdrawing to Tre-le-Chesling. Tucker’s 504th PIR of the 82nd drove the 9th SS Panzer from Bra on the German right. The 2nd SS Panzer tried to move from Manhay down to Grandmenil and Erezee on the March highway, but was turned back by the converging 289th Regiment of the 75th Infantry Division, the 509th PIB, 7th Armored CCA and 3rd Armored CCB troops arriving from the northern shoulder.
The 29th Infantry Regiment of the 75th Division, 517th PIR, and 3rd Armored CCA, with CCB arriving, stopped the 560th Volksgrenadiers at Hotton and destroyed the German salient towards Soy and Dochamps at a cost of 139 casualties. During the fight at Soy, General Rose, commanding the 3rd Armored Division, told his commanders, “Stay here or there will be a war fought all over again and we won’t be here to fight it.”
In the three days from December 24th to the 27th, the Germans were defeated in all engagements. But there was always a cost. First Lieutenant Norman Streit of Roundup, Montana served with the 36th Armored Infantry Battalion of the 3rd Armored Division. Streit was one of those killed on Christmas and buried at Henri-Chapelle.
The 508th PIR and 504th PIR fought the arriving 9th SS Panzer and 62nd Volksgrenadiers north of Lierneaux near Salm. The 508th was overrun but stayed in their foxholes to counterattack after the tanks had passed. At the end, the enemy lost 2,500 prisoners, leaving the German commander to observe that Allied resistance usually crumbled under the elan of the 9th SS Panzer, but the 82nd Airborne Trooper seemed a “different kind of soldier.” One of those soldiers, Missoula smokejumper Michael Bober, awarded three Bronze Stars, received a promotion for bravery with the 508th during this series of engagements.
Looking back, Roscoe Blunt analyzed the Marche Plain battle, saying there had been no real front lines. The U.S. had taken towns later retaken by the Germans, including at Grandmenil. Intelligence on both sides was sketchy. “The Germans were everywhere, and so were we.” It was not unusual for platoons to function independently from their companies or for squads to be separated from their platoons. The situation was fluid, with fragmented communications between platoons. Manteuffel’s thrusts in the north and south, in the Dinant, Marche and Manhay sectors, had been separated and broken up into a number of small pockets at Verdenne, Celle, Humain, and Grandmenil, where they were isolated and destroyed. The men of the 84th Infantry Division, Blunt said, began to feel the tide turning. After the battles on the Marche Plan, German soldiers seemed more willing to surrender, also seeing the end. On December 26, the initiative shifted to the Allied side. Manteuffel realized the Bulge was a failure even if Hitler did not.
The Marche Plain was the German high-water mark, the turning point in the Battle of the Bulge, and the last German threat in the European Theater. Manteuffel had made it this far, but his men were exhausted and his units depleted of supplies, fuel and food. Most importantly, the skies had cleared and U.S. P-47’s and British Typhoons were in the air, flying 12,000 sorties in two days before Christmas. American replacements of both men and armor were filling in the reduced battalions and companies along the line. Sherman tanks were, as Fuhrer Begleit Brigade Commander Remer said, “everywhere,” and U.S. artillery was firing from positions on the heights behind Manhay and Grandmenil.
Near Belle Haie we looked out at patches of forest and farmland where the 509th PIB, 75th Infantry Division and Task Force Brewster of the 3rd Armored Division had fought. In an interview long after the war, one scout with the 290th Regiment of the 75th described how his unit was trucked into this area on December 24 and told to move forward until they made contact with the Germans, getting out of the trucks with the Lieutenant saying,”Fix bayonets—No prisoners—Move out.” As he was fighting at Belle Haie, other elements of his regiment were being destroyed in an effort to take La Roumiere Hill. The 290th Regiment took 50 percent casualties in the Manhay sector alone. Looking at the peaceful, gradual-rolling, partially forested landscape, it is hard to imagine the horror. It is only proper that there are markers and memorials honoring the fallen and the survivors.
We drove the Marche Plain to Manhay, Grandmenil, and Braque de Fraiture, and saw the markers honoring American units engaged here at the German high water mark, and viewing the relics of war. There were German Panther and American Sherman tanks displayed in the squares and traffic circles, the German tanks bearing the symbol of the 116th Panzer and 2nd SS Panzer Divisions. Our guide, Henri Mignon, stayed in the car when we stopped in Grandmenil at the marker to the 951st Field Artillery whose batteries had supported all of our divisions engaged in the Manhay-to-Marche area. We learned later that on January 9, during our counteroffensive, the 951st had dropped 6,000 shells on the dug-in Germans in Houffalize, Henri’s hometown. One of those shell may have killed Henri’s father and destroyed the Mignon family farm.
