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His mouth organ moved swiftly up & down his lips, while his scraggly mustache perked up and bristled. Through the strains of his music the radio abruptly squealed. The regimental headquarters wanted to know if the Colonel had any news. Pete shouted this to the Colonel, who had reappeared. "It's all screwed up," said the Colonel. "I don't know what's going on. Tell 'em to send the Air Corps." Turning to me, he said: "This sure is something."
The Grand Stand. At this moment, the German tank attack .in the valley below us reached its climax.
Sweeping out of Barrafranca, thirteen Mark-IIIs and Mark-IVs had overrun our 3rd battalion, forcing it to evacuate its position in the plain. Temporarily unopposed by infantry, the tanks came on down the valley between the hills, shooting up at us as they came.
The German tanks were skillfully handled. Lingering in hull-down position on the back of one slope, they would fire for a time. Then, moving in different diagonal directions, they would race over the top of the slope and come down and halfway up the next slope, again in hull-down position.
From a high hill, our shells crashed into the valley in increasing volume. In a mist of smoke and dust the tanks flitted warily. Forced to retreat out of the plain before the superior fire of the Mark-IVs, our light Honey tanks had hidden in a draw. They now poured a hail of diagonal fire at the German tanks. An artillery observer, awed by the gun-tank battle and our grandstand seat far above it, murmured: "You'll never see anything like this again in 20 years."
Our guns and the Honeys took the steam out of the Germans; they withdrew a little. Momentarily our rear was safe. But with the 3rd battalion driven back on our right, our position was still uncertain. The only thing to do, said the Colonel, was to attack, take White House Hill and deprive the Germans of observation. It did not matter that we would be isolated. We had to take the hill.
From long-silent Captain Kelly word arrived that he was on top of White House Hill. Just as his voice died on our walkie-talkie, machine-gun fire sounded from the top of the hill. The Germans were still there, too.
Lieut. Walter Bowland knelt on the crest of our hill directing mortar fire. His judgment had to be fine, as Kelly was getting closer to the Germans.
As the sound of German machine-gun fire thickened, Bowland fired faster. A frantic voice came into our walkie-talkie, saying the shells from our mortars were dropping on him.
"Cease fire," hollered Bowland, and our mortars were silent. The German machine gun on White House still talked loudly.
"I'm going up and stop that," said the Colonel. "I don't know what's going on, but there's no use waiting here until we find out. Let's go and take that hill." Without another word, he plunged down the slope at the head of the company and then headed up White House Hill. It was 11:15 a.m.
In a dip between two hills we came into full view of the enemy, who could now strike us with enfilading fire. Some soldiers drove into a narrow ditch to ascend the slope, but the Colonel strode straight up the hill. As we climbed everyone grew faint, turning pale and looking at each other in the naked frankness of misery.