Yves J. Bellanger

THE 5TH INFANTRY DIVISION

"RED DIAMOND"

ACTION AT ANGERS

Briefly, the action at Angers was this:

The 11th regimental I&R platoon (Intelligence and Reconnaisance Platoon) and division reconnaissance troop led the 60-mile march. After meeting enemy resistance four miles west of Angers, the I& R platoon began a fire fight which the 2nd Bn advance guard took over the night of 7 August. Hollywood Nazis of the Organization Todt in black boots, swastika arm bands and surly looks came zooming up from St Nazaire in a staff car and bus to find Red Diamonds in possession of the crossroads at La Roche.

The 2nd Bn attacked Angers frontally, towards the east. The 1st Bn made a night march of seven miles to get into position to attack from the left flank. As the two battalions came up against an anti-tank ditch and determined resistance, the 3rd battalion moved south 3,000 yards to capture a railway bridge intact across the Maine. The bridge contained mines and explosives ready to be detonated and was under fire from 88 mm, 20 mm and 40 mm fire as well as machine gun and mortar fire but the battalion used the bridge to cross the night of the 8th, Company L leading *. L Company advanced 700 yards, was counterattacked, fell back 200 yards and held behind a hedgerow as Company K crossed at 0300 hours and at 0330 hours German infantry again counterattacked, striving desperately to get to the bridge and blow it. The Germans would run downhill toward the bridge, firing machine pistols and rifles. Yank riflemen fired at the flashes of flame and as nearly every German was hit, explosives he was carrying around his waist and shoulders for the purpose of blowing up the bridge would detonate and he would blow up, screaming his life away. Germans were killed just 15 yards from the end of the bridge but none reached it. Company E crossed as the counterattack was at its height and helped repulse it. Company I was protecting the south flank on the west side of the river.

Germans counterattacked again about daylight but were repulsed, an, although Company K suffered losses, the Battalion attacked and seized the first high ground east of the bridge, as tank destroyers of C Company, 818th TD Bn an antitank gun knocked out two German SP guns, one machine gun nest and an enemy OP (Observation Post, it was a tower built by the meteorologist Albert Cheux). Meanwhile, the 1st and 2nd Bns were pushing slowly forward, clearing out woods with tank-infantry attacks and artillery concentrations by the 19th Field Artillery Bn and the regimental cannon company. On the afternoon of the 9th, the 10th Infantry arrived and crossed the 2nd and 3rd Bns through the 3rd Bn, 11th Infantry to attack straight east and secure a chateau (Château du Fresne) and ridge south of Angers. In securing the ridge the 10th made a bayonet assault which took the Germans by surprise.

On the morning of the 10th, the 3rd Bn, 11th Infantry, and the 10th Infantry jumped off together northward toward Angers. Supporting fire of the 19th FA had been augmented by this time by fire from the 21st , 46th and 50th Field Artillery Bns. The 3rd Bn, 11th cleaned out nine 20 mm gun emplacements in its advance, capturing only two prisoners and being forced to kill the rest of the crews.

During all this, the 1st and 2nd Bns, 11th pressed the attack and converged in the outskirts of Angers. The Maine river splits the city into two, like the Seine splits Paris of the Mississipi splits St Paul and Minneapolis. The Germans blew the two northern bridges but were not given time enough to properly blow the south bridge and their hasty charge only blew a seven-foot hole in it. As a lull in enemy fire came about 1600 hours, Pfc Ferdinand Butzlaff of F Company dashed over the bridge, followed by the rest of F Company, which secured the bridge. The 3rd Bn, pushing up from the south on the east bank, contacted the 2nd Bn at the bridge and the Germans went into headlong retreat east along the road paralleling the Loire river. The 21st FA pursued them by fire and the city and two bridges were the division's by the night of the 10th; the result of quick, aggressive, three-day battle action.

At Angers, troops discovered the Germans did have one good attribute. They liked to drink and they kept good wine stocks, which they couldn't always take with them when they retreated. So on the 11th and for a few day thereafter, company kitchen issued a bottle of champagne with K-ration -- cheese, crackers and champagne, which led many to believe that an army travels, not on its stomach as Napoleon said, but in spite of it.

* In fact, it is L Company, sent to find a crossing site on the Maine river, which discovered the bridge intact, captured it with the 3rd platoon, and asked order to cross it.

Pages 11, 12 and 13 of the History booklet of the 5th Infantry Division, published at Metz, France,
in December 1944.
Comments in parenthesis are from me.

The story continues in Battle of Chartres page.
East Ward Ho

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Created in July 2001

Updated July 18, 2001 by Yves J. Bellanger