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Mr. Cox
Mr. Coleman
Mr. Cox
Mr. Coleman
Mr. Cox
Mr. Coleman
1i11 ilave that quite n'gizt. Anywd., it was uau. nO we aU got SFt up So oaO up there La our
regiment - they would take parts of our regiment - and put them with the 7th Calvary or put them
with the 1013! Airborne. Part of our guys guarded the General of the 101s at Bastogne. Part of our
guys went into the 82nd on a temporary basis because nobody had enough to make an outfit, and
they needed people where they needed them. Where they used our company, our battalion, and
our regiment to take certain areas as a regimental unit. And it just so happens, and it will never be
known no matter what history does, it will never be knowi that probably the 517th stood up under
the major, the absolute worst couple of days of battle in the whole Bulge. That will never be-
known. Everybody thinks he was in the toughest battle anyway. But it just so happens, if you
check the casualties and you do a lot of checking, and let some of history take care of it, you find
out from talking to the natives as well as guys in other places exactly how bad it was. And to this
day, as I mentioned it before, we had Belgium people that maintained cemeteries and they've spent
summers here with some of our guys. Our guys have spent summers with them. That they knew.
They're very loyal. They're building a museum ox er there now to us. They did in other towns.
We were highly decorated. We got the Croix de Guerre from Belgium. We got some sort of
citation from Yugoslavia. Our particular battalion got a presidential citation. We got, y ou know,
you can keep going on and on about that stuff. But no matter what you got there's a million guys
out there that deserve it that didn't get itL cause nobody saw it or told about it, or even knew about
it. I mean you're going to know you had it coming.
Did you get your commission?
I never did get that. I never did get that, never heard any more about it. And to be frank with you I
never really cared once I knew I was out of it. When I got to LeMon, France, I was there
Christmas day. I remember that because it was Christmas day. And I remember this doctor
coming in and saying we're going to need these beds. And I said: get me back to my outfit. He
said you're not going anywhere. You're going where I tell you. Then I knew I was out. And the
same thing happened with this boy he was in E Company. He was there with me. He was. I forget
now what was the matter wxith him, he was wounded somehow, but I don't know what it was. He
w as, I believe, from Oklahoma. And we kind of struck up that common ground deal of both being
from the same general area and all. And, of course, we were from the same outfit, so we stuck
together. I don't know what happened to him either after we left there. We went from Le Mon to
the coast of France, and there back to England. When we got to England, I got kind of panicky. I
felt like I was away from the war. Until then I kind of felt like, O.K., it's just a matter of time and
I'll be, you know, going up the road and there they 11 be. But when I got to England, I kind of got
the funny feeling that that was it.
Kind of like leaving y our family, wasn't it?
Yeah, it was a horrible situation. I remember going through different wards in that hospital
looking for guys with boots on that I could ask where everybody was. And I had ideas of getting
there somehow. I don't know how I w as going to get across that Channel. But I remember this
Captain who was a doctor...
Talking about your conversation with the guy.
Anyway. I just told him, I said let me just say it another way. I want to get out of here. I w anted
to be out of here a long time. I want to go back to my unit. I belong with my unit. I was trained
by that unit. That's what I do. That's what I do is that stuff. And he said. well. you wouldn't feel
comfortable maybe hat ing a little easier time drix ing a jeep for somebody? God! That was
insulting. And I said no I wouldn't. So he said O.K. we'll go on back. And I went back to the
- ard and it wasn't, I don't know how mans days later, they called me up before a committee of all
Colonels. And I'll never forget that guy. I thought, boy, I don't know what they're going to do to
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