“The infantryman’s war is . . . without the slightest doubt
the dirtiest, roughest job of them all.”
He went in as a military history buff, a virgin, and a
teetotaler. He came out with a war bride, a taste for German beer,
and intimate knowledge of one of the darkest parts of history. His
name is Dean Joy, and this was his war.
For two months in 1945, Joy endured and survived the everyday
deprivations and dangers of being a frontline infantryman. His
amazingly detailed memoir, self-illustrated with numerous scenes
Joy remembers from his time in Europe, brings back the sights,
sounds, and smells of the experience as few books ever have. Here
is the story of a young man who dreamed of flying fighter aircraft
and instead was chosen to be cannon fodder in France and Germany .
. . who witnessed the brutality of Nazis killing Allied medics by
using the cross on their helmets as targets . . . and who narrowly
escaped being wounded or killed in several “near miss” episodes,
the last of which occurred on his last day of combat.
Sixty Days in Combat re-creates all the drama of the “dogface’s”
fight, a time that changed one young man in a war that changed the
world.
內容試閱：
Chapter 1FROM COLLEGE FRESHMAN TO ARMY DRAFTEEJune 12, 1942,
through July 2, 1943Like my boyhood friend Horace Jeffrey-we called
him Jeff-I had a passion for airplanes. But unlike him, I had never
made plans to go to college. To my father''s dismay, I had not taken
one of the high school math courses needed to enter college as an
engineering student. I felt my talents were limited to drawing,
commercial art, and playing the clarinet. In high school my plans
for a career were to become either a commercial artist, or maybe a
cartoonist, or maybe a jazz clarinetist, or possibly even an
airline pilot.It was on a June day that summer of 1942, just after
I graduated from high school, that Dad invited me to join him
downtown for lunch. He asked me if I would consider getting a
college engineering degree-perhaps at his alma mater, Iowa
StateCollege-and someday take over his small business. I painfully
declined, suggesting that either of my two younger brothers would
be a better choice when the time came. "Dad," I said, "you have
many years before you may want to retire. And to be honest, if I
went to college I would only be interested in aeronautical
engineering, not mechanical. I''m not cut out to follow in your
footsteps as a power plant sales engineer."He understood, and from
that point on it was tacitly understood that my brother Stanley
would one day take over the business. But I was faced with a
dilemma. On July 21, my eighteenth birthday, I would be eligible
for the draft, and unless in college I was almost certain to be
called up before the end of the year and sent to the dreaded
infantry-in my mind the dirtiest, least glamorous military service
imaginable. I gave no thought to joining the navy; I was a poor
swimmer. Like thousands of other draft-age American boys, I dreamed
of flying P-51 Mustang fighter aircraft with the U.S. Army Air
Corps.At Jeff''s suggestion, I went with him on a trip to the
registrar''s office at the University of Colorado in Boulder, and
was told that I would be accepted as an engineering freshman that
fall if I passed a summer night class in solid geometry. I had
found a summer job running an ancient knitting machine at Gates
Rubber Company, making radiator hose for tank engines. My pay was
all of forty-four cents per hour, and I spent most of it taking
flying lessons and attending a night school class in solid
geometry. By summer''s end I had accumulated just five hours in a
little Piper Cub when my flight instructor was called off to join
the Civil Air Patrol. I was almost broke, and that ended my first
shot at getting a pilot''s license. It wasn''t until 1948, courtesy
of the GI Bill, that I earned that coveted license.Dad and Mother
had been carefully saving enough money to send all four of us
children to college. My piano-playing sister was well on her way to
a degree in music at Colorado College. And now, in August 1942, Dad
agreed to pay for my college education in aeronautical engineering
at the University of Colorado. And so it was that in mid-September
Jeff and I became roommates in an old widow''s rooming house within
walking distance of the CU campus in Boulder. The main attraction
of the newly formed School of Aeronautical Engineering was an
expert who had been hired away from Purdue University to head it.
His name was Professor Karl D. Wood, better known to us all as K.
D.-author of Technical Aerodynamics, probably the best textbook in
the field at that time.On the war fronts, while Jeff and I
struggled through our first months as freshman engineering
students, Russia was holding off the German armies in front of
Moscow, the British had stopped Rommel at El Alamein in Egypt, and
the hated Japanese in the Pacific were licking their wounds after
their disastrous defeat at Midway. Our navy was building up its
strength with new, fast carriers, battleships, cruisers, and
destroyers now coming off the ways at record rates. And General
Douglas MacArthur was getting ready to take the offensive from
bases in Australia.The name Dwight Eisenhower was not yet on the
front pages, although he had just been given two stars and would
become famous as commander of the forthcoming invasion of North
Africa. Nor was George Patton yet famous, although-like
MacArthur-he was a prima donna with an insatiable love of personal
publicity. But in my opinion the similarities between these two
egotists ended there. Patton was perhaps a bit crazy, but he was a
tactical genius who loved to fight and whose troops both feared and
respected him. On the other hand, MacArthur was a much-ridiculed
tin god and obnoxious snob who thought of himself as the world''s
best global strategist. I believed then, and still believe today,
that he fancied himself a president-perhaps even king.At
Christmastime in 1942 I came home for a welcome respite from the
spartan life and colder climate of Boulder, where I could never
seem to stay warm. My mother invited a couple of GIs for Christmas
dinner, responding to a call from Central Presbyterian Church, and
it was of considerable interest to me to hear them talk about army
life. I could not know it, of course, but that winter holiday of
1942 was to be the last I would spend at home until four years
later, when I returned from the war as a twenty-two-year-old
veteran wearing the coveted Combat Infantryman''s Badge and platoon
sergeant''s stripes.During the Easter break in the spring of 1943 I
rode the train to Denver and joined our family at the Easter
sunrise services up in the huge amphitheater of Red Rocks Park.
From every seat of that amphitheater one could watch the sun rise
over Denver as the city lights blinked out. I remember wondering,
as I looked over the Plains toward Nebraska, if my fate would take
me across the Atlantic to Europe, or west to the Pacific, when my
number was called.Before returning to Boulder, I rode with Dad on a
business trip to Colorado Springs. We talked about the war and my
hope to join the Army Air Corps. En route we passed close to Camp
Carson and spotted several hundred khaki-clad infantrymen hiking
toward Pike''s Peak, leading long strings of heavily laden mules. I
could not know that this was the same outfit with which I would
serve in combat only ten months later. Those slogging GIs belonged
to the 5th Infantry Regiment, part of the newly organized 71st
Light Infantry Division.In June 1943 I completed my freshman year
in engineering at CU with a B average. The big question was whether
I would be drafted before completing a second year. Desperate to
know where I stood, I borrowed my mother''s car, drove down to the
Denver draft board, and put the question to an old gentleman. He
looked at a file and informed me that, as I would turn nineteen in
July, my number would almost surely be called by November, even if
I had started my sophomore year.Disappointed, I asked, "How do I go
about volunteering for the Army Air Corps? I would like to fly, but
I would be happy as a crewman, or even as an aircraft engine
mechanic. Anything rather than being sent to the infantry.""That''s
easy," the old gentleman said. "Volunteer for early induction today
and you can choose your branch. But if you wait until November
there''s no such guarantee. I can set your physical up for this
week, and if you pass you''ll be called in July."I said I''d take a
walk and think it over. I walked around the block, agonizing
whether to go to my father''s office for his advice. Then I thought:
No, this decision is mine alone. Half an hour later I had made up
my mind. I returned to the draft board and signed the papers. It
was a month before my nineteenth birthday. That night my parents
tried to hide their pain when I told them I had volunteered to be
drafted five months early to avoid being sent straight to the
dreaded infantry.Two days later I drove downtown to take the
physical, which I nearly flunked. First, a little hammertoe on my
left foot attracted a team of three doctors, who had me walk naked,
back and forth, with and without shoes. My heart fell as they
deliberated. "Oh, no sir," I assured the senior doctor. "It doesn''t
bother me! I walk without a limp. See? I was a Boy Scout, I play
tennis, I''m a fast runner, and I climb mountains with the Colorado
Mountain Climbing Club." It was all true. So they smiled and passed
me.The second problem was an unsuspected polyp in one of my
nostrils, discovered by an ear, nose, and throat specialist in the
line of examiners. "That''s bad," he said. My heart fell again as
the specialist wrote something on the form. But the last doctor in
the line looked over the form, signed it, and said, "Passed with
flying colors. Get dressed, take this form to the next room, and
wait for the next swearing-in."What a relief! Army Air Corps, here
I come, I said to myself. The thought of being classified 4-F
physically unfit for military service and seeing the unspoken
question "Young man, why aren''t you in the service like my son?" on
countless faces I would pass on the street was almost as horrible
as the thought of serving in the infantry.Little did I know that
before the war ended my questionable feet would carry me many
hundreds of miles across Europe as a lowly infantryman.My orders
were to report at the induction center on July 2, 1943. That
morning I brought my single suitcase down the stairs, hugged my
brothers and kissed my sister good-bye with studied nonchalance,
then went out on the front porch with my mother as Dad pulled the
car around to the front of the house. Wonder of wonders, Mother
smiled bravely and shed not one tear that I could see. Our embrace
was quick, I strode thankfully to the car, turned just once to
wave, and then off we drove. I have no doubt that she cried after
we were gone.Ten minutes later we pulled up in front of the
induction center in downtown Denver. What happened there at the
curb was totally unexpected. Still playing the cool grown-up, I
shook my father''s hand and said something like, "See you, Dad.
Don''t worry. I''ll write home often." My beloved Rock of Gibraltar
father opened his mouth but could not speak as tears rolled down
his cheek! I knew he was trying to say, "I love you, son," but
nothing came except a sob of grief. Unwanted tears welled in my own
eyes, and now it was I who couldn''t speak.I put my hand on his
shoulder, turned wordlessly, got out of the car, and with suitcase
in hand rushed into the building through a crowd of onlooking
draftees. That was the only time I ever saw my father cry until
just before he died, in June 1976, thirty-three years later.Chapter
2THE U.S. ARMY AIR CORPSJuly through September 1943There must have
been more than a hundred of us seated on folding chairs in a large
room in the Denver induction center. A sergeant came in and bawled,
"Awright, all you guys who wanna be pilots, stand up!" About half
of us gullible new draftees stood up, and the others had a good
laugh when the sergeant said, "Okay, each of you pilots fold up yer
chair and pile it up on that stack over there, then come back and
git the other chairs."When we were done with that chore, we were
all lined up alphabetically and given name tags for our suitcases.
Shortly after that, several army buses drove up in front of the
center and we climbed aboard. I spotted a few familiar faces from
South High School in the crowd but recognized no one from the
University of Colorado. The hackneyed phrase "You''re in the army
now" kept going through my mind as the convoy of buses pulled out
and headed for the processing center at Fort Logan, near the suburb
of Englewood, southwest of Denver.The day had started bright and
sunny, but by the time the convoy entered the Fort Logan gate, huge
cumulus clouds were piling up, and the mountains to the west were
obscured. We unloaded in a large parking lot and formed a ragged
line under the direction of a sergeant and two corporals in sun
helmets and suntan uniforms. After a long wait, an officer arrived
in a jeep and the sergeant reported, "Company B present and
accounted for, sir." The officer made a short speech of welcome,
then left as the wind rose and the first raindrops began to fall.
We recruits were soaked by the time the noncoms double-timed us
down to the new white barracks, where we left our suitcases. Then
we were run back up a hill to the mess hall for our first army
meal.After lunch we were issued summer Class A suntan uniforms with
cap, tie, a web belt with brass buckle, green army fatigues and
fatigue hat, two pairs of GI shoes, olive-drab socks, shorts, and
undershirts, two barracks bags, one mattress cover, two towels, and
a bar of yellow GI soap. Back at our barracks the sergeant passed
out copies of The Soldier''s Handbook and told us we had twenty-four
hours to memorize the General Orders by heart and learn how to
salute. A corporal showed us how to arrange our gear in the green
footlockers, told us what civilian personal items we could keep,
and gave us ten minutes to get out of our civvies into our
olive-green fatigues, and repack our suitcases with stuff to be
sent home. He reappeared with a pfc carrying pails, brooms, mops,
and rags, and we new recruits were put to work mopping the floors
and dusting shelves, windowsills, and double-tiered bunks.Three of
my friends from South High were in my barracks, all with orders
assuring us that we would be sent to the Army Air Corps. These were
Stan Detrick, Bill Bromm, and Gordon Bungaard. We four picked bunks
close to one another and helped each other make up our bunks in
army fashion, as demonstrated by a corporal-blankets tucked with
"hospital" folds at the foot and stretched tight so that a dropped
coin would bounce. Bungaard, who had been in high school ROTC,
showed us how to salute properly, with elbow forward and forearm
and hand swept up to the forehead in a straight line. By the time
we marched to evening chow I had accepted the fact that I was no
longer a civilian but a soldier in Uncle Sam''s army.
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