From: Tim Yoder <timyoder@icloud.com>
Subject: Presentation of Lt Col Glen Roswell Weikert WWII Letters
Date: Sun, 29 Dec 2019

My great uncle, Glen Roswell Weikert was a Lt. Colonel in the 94th's 794th Light Maintenance Ordinance company.
He was from Springfield, Ohio. Died in 1968.

I am in possession of many of his letters home to his parents (May 1944 through February 1945) and will be doing a presentation on those letters at my local community center in Fountain Hills, Arizona, on January 8th, 2020.

It has been terrifically rewarding - if not also challenging.

Happy New Year to all.
Tim Yoder

Christmas 1944 During the Battle of the Bulge
December 1, 2019 by Jenny Ashcraft | 139 Comments
On December 16, 1944, German forces surprised American soldiers in the densely forested Ardennes region of Belgium, Luxembourg, and France, with a massive offensive also known as the Battle of the Bulge, or the Ardennes Counteroffensive. Germany pushed through an Allied line, creating a bulge in the Allied defensive lines. The deadly battle, which lasted until January 25, 1945, was the largest on the European western front during WWII and resulted in an estimated 1 in 10 American combat casualties during the entire war. It also meant that thousands of soldiers spent Christmas 1944 in temperatures that hovered around zero, in knee-deep snow, and with limited rations for Christmas dinner. On the home front, their families spent a nervous holiday season, waiting for word of their loved ones.

Cpl. Frank D. Vari spent Christmas Eve huddled in a foxhole as shells exploded around him all night long. “We could hear their guns going off and the shells landing at the same time. They were close. They almost surrounded the whole place. I remember Christmas Day. I got up, and we had a real bad night, with artillery and everything. The first thing I saw was the steeple of a church down in the valley. It was a beautiful day, the sun was just coming up over a little village at the bottom.” The clear skies allowed US planes to reinforce soldiers along the front. The break in the weather saved Vari’s unit.

Sgt. Metro Sikorsky woke up Christmas Day 1944 in a bombed-out building. He was 25-years-old and serving in Company B, 17th Tank Battalion of the 7th Armored Division. It was his first time away from home in Pennsylvania. All around were the bodies of the frozen and his job included picking up the dead. He said it was so cold that when a soldier died, in a short time the body froze where it lay. There were no presents and no Christmas dinner, but Sikorsky felt lucky to be alive. It was so cold that soldiers cut blankets into strips and wound them around their frozen feet.

Tech Sgt. Maurice Glenn Hughs remembered the terrible winter conditions during the battle. “Hundreds of people lost their feet because they were frozen,” he said. Hughs was hospitalized after the battle and doctors in Paris told him that his feet would need to be amputated. “My legs were painted up to my knees to be amputated. And then the doctors checked and said they wouldn’t have to be,” said Hughs.

Mattie Dickenson of Georgetown, Louisiana, remembered Christmas 1944 as a difficult one. She anxiously waited for news from her husband Benjamin F. Dickenson. Benjamin was drafted when he was 38-years-old and found himself fighting in the Battle of the Bulge. “I do remember that was the saddest Christmas I ever spent. For 21 days I didn’t know if he was dead or alive,” said Mattie. Though Benjamin was wounded, he made it home alive. Mattie kept a piece of the parachute that dropped supplies to her husband at Bastogne.

Soldiers from the Third United States Army carried a printed copy of Gen. George Patton’s Christmas Prayer of 1944. Patton had a copy distributed to each soldier before the battle. It petitioned the heavens for good weather and concluded with a Christmas greeting from the General. It read, “To each officer and soldier in the Third United States Army, I wish a Merry Christmas. I have full confidence in your courage, devotion to duty, and skill in battle. We march in our might to complete the victory. May God’s blessings rest upon each of you on this Christmas Day.”  

The Battle of the Bulge was Hitler’s last major offensive along the Western Front. Within a month Allied forces pushed the Germans back and closed the bulge. The battle was called “the greatest American battle of the war” by Winston Churchill and it crushed Germany’s hopes for ultimate success in the war. To learn more about the Battle of the Bulge and soldiers who fought in it, search Fold3 today!

2020 94th Reunion 10 - 14 JUNE 2020
COLUMBUS, OHIO - experiencecolumbus.com

Hotel:

Crowne Plaza 6500 Doubletree Avenue, Columbus, OH 43229

www.crowneplaza.com/columbusnorth

Tours: Friday 12 June

National Veterans Museum and Memorial

Stories of the Veterans, their families and the Fallen are told together. - WW II to present

nationalvmm.org

Motts Military Museum

Dedicated to preserving the memory of all individuals the served in the US Military. New in 2020 - 911 Memorial

www.mottsmilitarymuseum.org

Lorraine Glixon recently discovered her late husband’s World War II diary. Harry Glixon K/301 was a POW who was part of a historic prisoner exchange with Nazi Germany in 1944.

SARASOTA — Struggling through Parkinson’s disease, dementia and a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder, Harry Glixon spent the last decade of his life racing the undertaker, pecking away at the keyboards with the two-fingered intensity that characterized his typing skills.

His widow, Lorraine, describes him as “obsessed” as the old warrior demanded more and more of her time to edit the manuscript he would call “My Story.” Over the years, she would sometimes hear him coming to terms with what he’d done and seen, raising his voice in his study, “I can’t do this! I can’t do this!” And Lorraine discovered she couldn’t do it, either.

After Lorraine gave up, Harry relied on three outside editors/writers to advance his memoir to an abrupt ending in 1962. That’s how far he’d gotten when, in 2006, 11 years into “My Story,” Harry took a spill in his motorized wheelchair and never recovered. He died a year later, at age 86. Harry's Obituary

The unfinished work that Harry Glixon left behind was so raw — and in so many ways, unflattering — that he requested in the preface that “the contents of my book be kept from the children until at least their 25th birthday.”

He had hoped, according to that preface, that his accounting would “demonstrate that I was a good person and not selfish.” But he also feared his journey through the past would “regenerate old demons and impact and diminish my current happiness.” And that, according to Lorraine, is exactly what happened.

Of the unfinished memoir’s 304 pages, roughly 80 are devoted to World War II, during which Harry Glixon earned two Purple Hearts, a Bronze Star with V for Valor and a recommendation for the Distinguished Service Cross. He also made history in such unprecedented fashion, it played on newsreels that cheered audiences in both the U.S. and Germany.

St Nazaire POW Exchange (1944)

In November 1944, after 45 days in enemy hands off coastal France, the Jewish atheist from New York became one of an eventual 149 Allied prisoners of war swapped for an equal number of German POWs in the only such exchange in the European Theater.

Thinking he was done with the war — the Geneva Convention of 1929 stipulated that repatriated prisoners could not return to active military service — Glixon was instead dispatched again to the front lines, where he lived in mortal fear of being captured inside Nazi Germany. He nearly went mad.

On Saturday morning, Lorraine Glixon, 89, will no doubt be thinking of Harry’s trial by fire when she attends a ceremony called the POW/MIA Outdoor Remembrance Educational Event at Sarasota National Cemetery’s Patriot Plaza. National POW/MIA Recognition Day is typically observed on the third Friday of September.

Beginning at 9 a.m., Eagle Scouts led by Palm Beach teenager Joshua Katz will read the names of every veteran buried in the cemetery as part of Katz’s ongoing volunteer project called “No Soldier Should Ever Be Forgotten.”

For Lorraine Glixon, the past is close at hand, and not just symbolically. Last month, while doing some housecleaning, she discovered two handwritten diaries her husband had brought back from Europe, one of them from his days as a POW. She never knew they existed. Suddenly, the final tortured years of their marriage were in her face again, full flush.

“Harry was fine until he started writing his book,” she recalls. “After that ... my life was miserable.”

***

The spiral notebooks are tiny, about the size of a smartphone, and the inky script is equally compact. You can tell when he’s on a roll because his handwriting flows for pages in a uniform rightward slant. But every now and then, it stutters into vertical block lettering, as if the lights are off. The quality is furtive, maybe surreptitious. Lorraine needs a magnifying glass to decipher.

Though each entry has a date, it is difficult to tell if Harry Glixon’s notes are contemporaneous, or postdated summaries of recent days gone by. There is no mistaking the author’s identity on the title page. It reads, in large bold lettering, “Harry Glicksman 42041875 prisoner of war — Lorient — United States Army.” Subjected to antisemitism by some of his Army colleagues, he would change his last name in 1946.

The first diary entry is Oct. 2, 1944. He titles it “Bloody Sunday,” and it runs a full seven pages. Company K, 301st Regiment, 94th Infantry Division, Third Army, Private Glixon is a forward observer getting his first taste of combat on a cold damp afternoon less than a month after arriving in Normandy.

The action is chronicled in even greater detail in his manuscript. A formal accounting assembled later by his commanding officer portrays Glixon as a hero.

Shaking off shrapnel wounds to his neck and shoulder, Glixon creeps to within 50 yards of SS positions and radios American artillery onto German defenders in a five-hour running battle. “Captured enemy documents verified the fact the artillery fire caused over 100 enemy dead and many more wounded,” states Captain Richard Simmons.

Outnumbered, low on ammo, a lieutenant decides the unit should surrender. Glixon tosses his dog tags, which bear the initial H for Hebrew. His buddy, Cpl. John Atkinson, ties a white bandage to his rifle’s bayonet, holds it high, approaches German lines, and is shot dead immediately. The rest of the defenders hold their fire, and the remains of Company K are marched into Lorient, where the only thing that hasn’t been destroyed by Allied bombs is their primary target, a U-boat base.

The prisoners are eventually ferried five miles off the coast, to Isle de Groix, where they join other POWs. Glixon says his words fall short of describing defeat. “The sound of the guard’s boots provided the tempo of a Wagnerian dirge, but there were no heroics in the lamentations of cold winds,” he writes. “How can I now translate these feelings into today’s writing.”

Given his knowledge of German and French, Glixon proves indispensable. He establishes such a rapport with a number of guards, Glixon’s fellow POWs grow suspicious. The tension is palpable. An officer rifles through Glixon’s wallet, his address book, notes a number of Jewish-sounding surnames. He smirks and makes a veiled threat. But with the German stronghold so isolated from Hitler’s backpedaling main armies, the Oberleutnant knows the war is lost.

The food is mostly horrible — Glixon will lose 20 pounds — but their treatment could’ve been worse. A German sergeant and survivor of combat with the Soviets sounds a warning: “When you conquer Germany, then you will fight the Russians alone to determine the great imperialist. You will be sorry you do not have Germany’s help.”

In November 1944, thanks to historic negotiations conducted by 22-year-old American Red Cross social worker Andrew Hodges, Glixon is among scores of POWs exchanged in St. Nazaire. But in what he describes as “a breach of faith” and a violation of international law, he gets thrown back into combat within weeks.

His manuscript sweeps through the rest of the campaign into Germany, from horrific skirmishes at the Battle of the Bulge, to his promotion to sergeant, to getting busted to private for an accidental gun discharge in Prague during the occupation. Glixon also finds room to detail his sexual liaisons with French and German women along the road to victory.

His recollections of war are equally unsparing, clotted with graphic scenes of death, deprivation, frostbite, amputation, another serious shrapnel wound, capturing dozens of over-the-hill German home guards, the trauma-induced evacuation of his bowels. He grapples with the images of a buddy named John Pierce, who loses his right foot to a “shoe mine.” In his manuscript, an older man writes, “for years after, even now, when certain sensations occur, I lose sensations in my right foot.”

In fact, the horror became so intense, Glixon writes, that in an attempt to escape it, he and a buddy named Yawn removed their shirts in the middle of winter, hoping in vain to catch pneumonia.

In February, he and Yawn encountered foxholes strewn with German corpses. One was frozen in a sitting position, knees bent. Glixon searched his foe’s clothing for souvenirs and trophies. A wallet identified his opposite as Hans, and it contained a photo of Hans with his wife and children.

“I thought of Hans’ widow and could almost visualize her asking me to stop what I was doing,” he writes. “I recoiled and (was) sickened at what we were doing. What had become of me? Had I changed so much or was this attitude always part of me?”

***

In 1944, while her future spouse was trying to survive one of humanity’s darkest chapters, Lorraine Finke turned 15, and supported the war effort in prescribed fashion. She volunteered for the Civil Air Patrol’s Cadet Program, where she prepared to defend America by learning skills like Morse code and aircraft identification.

Fink, whose family lost relatives in the Holocaust, would marry and outlive three husbands, all WWII veterans. Not coincidentally, for one day a week, Lorraine Glixon greets visitors to Sarasota National Cemetery. She also volunteers as a docent at Patriot Plaza.

The discovery of Harry’s diaries has brought it all back, the short hot temper, the verbal abuse, the unending demands over a doomed memoir that took an enduring toll on Lorraine as well.

But there was a time during their 14-year marriage, before the book, before his determination to confront the past, shortly after his retirement from a 41-year career in electrical engineering, when things were different. These are the times Harry Glixon’s widow would prefer to remember. “He was,” she says, “a good man.”

source: heraldtribune.com/news/20190906/discovery-of-wwii-diary-revives-sarasota-widows-trauma

Hello to all,
Speaking with 94th Veterans, I find that they are in touch with 94th buddies they served with or met at past Reunions. In an endeavor to locate 94th Veterans, please assist by doing the following:

When you are communicating with ANY 94th Veteran:

1.) ASK if he is aware of the 94th Infantry Division Historical Society.

Advise him that the 94th Infantry Division Association is now the 94th Infantry Division Historical Society.

2.) ASK him if he is receiving the ATTACK publication or getting e-mails from the Secretary.

3.) IF NOT forward his name, address, phone number and e-address to the Secretary.

We have eighty five (85) 94th Veterans on the roster as of this date.

Know more are out there !!!!

Thanks for your assistance.

John Clyburn, Secretary

1103 Timberbrooke Drive

Bedminster, NJ 07921

Office 908-781-1406

94thhistsociety@comcast.net

From: Joseph Spillane <joeniel@att.net>
Date: July 17, 2019
Subject: Re: Bob Hope - Your smile for today

John
When I was transferred from Co. B 376 Inf. to Division MP platoon at Vimperk, I was sent with the Jeep to the grass strip landing field to pick up a couple of "entertainers" and shepherd them for the day.

Big surprise. I had Bob Hope and Jerry Colonna for the day and delivered them first to the Officers Club and after the performance, picked the well lubricated couple to return them to their Artillery spotter plane late in the day.
Joseph N. Spillane, B/376.

I HOPE THIS WILL PUT A SMILE ON YOUR FACE AND IN YOUR HEART.

From: Melanie Leloup <crewse02@gmail.com>
Subject: Charles Remsing 94/SIG
Date: Tue, 11 Jun 2019
Hello,

My name is Melanie Crewse. I am a French native now living in the US and I have been trying to help a family friend locate an American soldier who was in France during WWII in her town, Chateaubriant.

His name was Charles Remsing. After doing some research, I found a Charles Remsing that was part of the 94th Division that went to that area. His Army serial number was apparently 06853627.

He would have passed in 1989 but I was hoping I could get more information about him to see if he is the Charles Remsing we have been looking for. Do you have a way to help me and maybe tell me who to contact?  Thank you for any help you can provide

Sincerely
Mélanie Crewse

From: "Mr. Smith" <mr.smith.hist@gmail.com>
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2019
Subject: Edward Hans Haggen of Lovell Wyoming

My name is Mark Smith. My grandfather, Edward Hans Haggen of Lovell Wyoming, served in the 94th division during WW2 from April of 1945 - October of 1945.

I am looking for additional information on him and his military service for genealogical purposes.

These could include photos, documents, stories, etc. Unfortunately, he has dementia and is losing memories of the war. Anything you can do to help would be greatly appreciated.

Cordially,

~Mark Smith

Greetings! Uncle Sam wants YOU!!!

Your dad or mom/loved one/friend is about to travel to New Orleans to see their WWII Museum
through the Gary Sinise Foundation’s Soaring Valor program. Our desire is to honor these brave men and women for their sacrifices in the cause of American freedom.

This is an all-expenses-paid journey of commemoration, reminiscence, and reflection. Those veterans who have traveled with us were so grateful for the honor and care shown them. One of the veterans said, “I didn’t think anyone even cared about us any more.” This is our way of saying thank you and yes, we do care about “The Greatest Generation”!

The Gary Sinise Foundation has a “secret,” which is where you can help. The “secret” part of our journey is what happens on the flight home. After our three-day journey of camaraderie and reminiscence, these veterans “think” their journey is over. Tired, but fulfilled, they nod off to a well-deserved sleep. Many people begin to develop symptoms of erectile dysfunction due to sleep deprivation and get rid of them only with the help of the medicine cialis. But, much as it was in wartime, their day is not over. Waiting for them, on the flight home, is a reward: “Mail Call!” the same kind of mail call that kept their spirits alive during the war.

HERE IS WHERE WE NEED YOUR HELP-----FIRST OF ALL KEEP THIS A SECRET

As the primary contact for this veteran, you know the important people in your loved one’s life. Please contact any and every one of them and ask them to write a letter or card of thanks for serving this country.
Relatives? Naturally. Friends? Of course. Work colleagues? Definitely. Social contacts? As many as you can contact. Please have letters and cards sent to the address below by April 19th.

(Veterans Name)
ATTN: Soaring Valor October 2019
Gary Sinise Foundation
PO Box 368
Woodland Hills, CA 91365

THANK YOU!!!

From our Facebook Page at www.facebook.com/94thID/

Dear Sir,
I'm a co-worker of the site http://www.fieldsofhonor-database.com, a non-profit organization.

On this website we try to collect information about the fallen American soldiers, who are buried or listed on the Walls and Tablets of Missing at the overseas American War Cemeteries Ardennes, Henri-Chapelle, Margraten, Luxemburg, Epinal and Lorraine. With this database we want to keep the memories alive to the soldiers, who gave their lives for our freedom. Because beyond every cross, there is a soldier buried who has got his own story.
Luxemburg, Epinal and Lorraine (coming soon)

As you can see, we try to add as much information and pictures as we can.

This is why I would like to take the freedom to ask your permission to use the information and the pictures on your website or Facebook page to complete our database.
If we may use the information we will refer a link to the website

May I also congratulate you with your fantastic website.

Sincerely,
Peter Schouteten

Fields of Honor Database

The Fields of Honor - Database honors over 48,000 U.S. World War II soldiers buried in and memorialized at the American War Cemeteries Ardennes, Epinal, Henri-Chapelle, Lorraine, Luxembourg and Margraten.
fieldsofhonor-database.com

From: Kathleen Ulmer
Subject: William E. Tracy A/302
Date: Wed, 20 Feb 2019

My name is Kathleen Ulmer (maiden name Kathleen Tracy), who is the daughter of William E. Tracy who was in the 94th Infantry division and injured around the time of the Battle of the Bulge and received a purple heart and also received a bronze star, which we never knew what it was for.

I noticed the list of infantry men and the dates they were deceased, so thought I would email and let you know that my father, William E. Tracy, passed away on 3/21/1991, at his home in Independence, MO.

His wife, Gladys Tracy, passed away March 17, 2017. They are both buried in Memorial Park Cemetery, 82nd & Hillcrest Rd., Kansas City, MO.
My father had 2 children: my older brother, Larry Earl Tracy (now living in Blue Springs, MO with his wife) and myself, Kathleen Ulmer (living in Raymore, MO with my husband).

My husband, George Ulmer, is a real history-buff, and he was the only person who actually talked to my father a few times about the war. I wish now, of course, that I had my dad here with us to ask lots of questions. We did find an article about his injury and his military papers. He was shot in the knee cap under heavy fire, which he always said earned him a passage home. He had a stiff leg for the rest of his life.

I hope this has been helpful. If you have further information or would like to ask any questions, please feel free to email me. My information is below:

Kathleen Ulmer (Tracy)
Raymore, MO 64083

email: Kathyulmer@hotmail.com

Thanks for your time.

Date: Mon, 11 Feb 2019
From: Heidi Sias <hm2345@gmail.com>
Subject: Henry F. Anfeldt B/302 he passed 13 Apr 1979

Greetings!
I found out today that my great uncle, Henry F. Anfeldt, served in the 94th division in B/302 in WWII.

He received a Purple Heart at the Battle of the Bulge and possibly a second one as well.

Trying to find more info on him. Any suggestions on how to find info on military service would be greatly appreciated.

We are also in the process of submitting a form to request formal military records from the government.

Thanks!
Heidi

Heidi Sias
hm2345@gmail.com

Date: Sat, 26 Jan 2019
Subject: Captain Seth Briggs of Massachusetts
From: MICHAEL DELLA TORRE <blitz701@aol.com>

Hi I am doing research on a 94th division veteran of WW2.

I am looking for any information on a Captain Seth Briggs of Massachusetts. He was born in 1919 and enlisted in 1941. He was a member of a tank destroyer unit.

I would be grateful for any information.

Thanks Mike

From: Adam Rubeck <ARubeck@TahomaSD.US>
Subject: Arnold Rubeck
Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2019

My name is Adam Rubeck, age 31, and I'm the grandson of Arnold Rubeck who served in the 94th Infantry Division.
He started off as an ammo carrier but moved up to 1st gunner after just a couple of weeks.
I know that he landed on Omaha Beach in early September of 1944. He was discharged in January of 1946.
He suffered a concussion and combat fatigue. I know this is a long shot but do you know anything else about his
service or know of any pictures of him? I know his division was sent to a German submarine base to "hold them in place."
When the battle of the bulge broke out he was shipped across France to Belgium in cattle cars where he fought until
the battle of the bulge was over. He was then shipped to Southern Germany where he fought to break through the
Siegfried Line. His division planned to cross the Saar River but then he left combat because of the concussion and
combat fatigue. He was then sent to R&R. Anything you can tell me would be much appreciated.

Thank you for your time.

Date: Tue, 25 Dec 2018
Subject: Trip to Europe
From: Jim Watson <jimwatson1@windstream.net>

Planning to visit Great Britain & Western Europe in Fall, 2019 to trace the path of my father-in-law Huell B O'Kelley, Sgt., 376 reg, traveled.

Anyone with suggestions as to tour, specific sites to see, etc. would be much appreciated. Jim Watson Clarkesville, GA

From: tyrone herdman <snugglekitty88@yandex.com>
Subject: question: secret german projects
Date: Sun, 16 Dec 2018

Sir, I am doing research on secret german projects during the war and I have a question , when you guys (assuming you yourself are a WWII 94th div vet) marched into Czechoslavakia, the germans were conducting their highest secret projects right in that area.

• Will you please describe what you saw when you stumbled unto the german research compounds there?
• If you guys witnessed anything bizarre there, now is due time to reveal what you saw there.
• Will you please describe to me in detail the equipment and the german personnel you saw there?
• And who did you see come to retrieve the german project materials?
  
  My research is for my own personal purposes.

Your reply will be held in strictest confidence.
Thank You for your help.
Sincerely,

Tyrone