The Pittsburgh Press (September 10, 1944)
Yanks 14 miles from Germany; million men poised for attack
Allies seek victory before snow falls; West Wall pounded
By Phil Ault, United Press staff writer
In range of Siegfried Line outposts, Allied forces are poised for the “big push” on the Western Front. As zero hour neared, the Allies smashed an attempt of Germans trapped along the Channel to break out (1). The U.S. 1st Army was within 14 miles of the German border west of Aachen (2). Gen. Patton prepared the 3rd Army for an attack in the Metz–Nancy area and crushed a German attempt to slip around his flank (3). In the south, the French-American 7th Army was 42 miles from the southwestern corner of Germany (4).
SHAEF, London, England –
The U.S. 1st Army to within 14 miles of the Gertman border west of Aachen Saturday and advanced 20 miles through the Ardennes Forest to the south as Allied armies virtually completed their deployment for the storming of Germany’s last western ramparts in quest of victory before the snow falls.
Driving eight miles north of Liège, the 1st Army’s tanks reached the vicinity of vise on the Meuse 14 miles from the German border, 16 miles from Aachen and seven miles south of the big Dutch fortress of Maastricht.
Lt. Gen. Courtney Hodges’ troops drove completely through the Ardennes Forest and reached the area of Saint-Hubert, 18 miles from the Luxembourg border and 32 airline miles from Germany.
Aerial bombs are already crashing down on the Siegfried forts and German troop dispositions in a furious 24-hour softening-up attack as Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower’s troops, more than one million strong, prepared for the attack and as the first cold winds of autumn swept the European battlefield.
A front dispatch said that U.S. troops in Belgium were digging out their mufflers and wool-lined combat trousers for protection against the cold nights.
Another U.S. column, ironing out a salient between the 1st and 3rd Army spearheads, captured the town of Écouviez, just below the Belgian border and only 17 miles from the Duchy of Luxembourg.
The 3rd Army battled into the town of Pompey, four miles northwest of Nancy, and began mopping up the dense Haye Forest lying between them and the city while other units were reported in the “immediate vicinity” of the big fortress of Metz, 21 miles from Germany’s borders.
East of Liège, the Yanks were less than 18 miles from the German border and their armored spearheads were reported early today resuming their dash for the Reich, driving the Germans in confusion before them.
Mopping up western Belgium, British troops threw three bridgeheads across the Ghent Canal, broadening Lt. Gen. Sir Miles C. Dempsey’s front moving on Holland and easing Allied communication problems. The crossings were made at captured Ostend on the coast, in the area of Oostcamp, four miles south of Bruges and at Nieuwendan, 13 miles west of Ghent.
While enemy resistance stiffened and heavy fighting developed on both Allied flanks, the Germans’ retreat through eastern Belgium in the center of the line grew more disorganized and confused by the hour, front reports said.
At Liège, German planes flew low over the city without firing a shot, apparently thinking it was still in German hands.
Allied artillery had moved within range of the Siegfried Line’s outer works and Berlin broadcasts said that U.S. troops were drawing up to the Reich frontiers with new heavy weapons of an unstated type.
As the hour for the “big push” approached – the exact hour and the direction of the main attack were among the best kept secrets of the war – the Germans were struggling desperately against the Allied avalanche that had cut their western armies to pieces and crowded the remnants back behind their own frontiers.
Tens of thousands of enemy troops who had been trapped near the Channel coast by the drive through Belgium attempted a breakout attack Friday but were sent rolling back to their besieged coastal forts with appalling losses.
A large enemy tank force tried to slip around Lt. Gen. George S. Patton’s 3rd Army flank on the Moselle and attack the Yanks from the rear but our artillery knocked out between 30 and 40 tanks, captured nearly 1,000 enemy troops and killed as many more.
Everywhere along the 200-odd miles of the battlefront, and at Gen. Eisenhower’s headquarters, there was increasing tenseness as the first chill winds whistled across France and the Flanders fields turned to mud in some places.
The Allied goal is to crush Germany this year, and unless the decisive blow is struck within a short time there is danger that the campaign might drag into the winter months, when Allied air supremacy would be hamstrung more than it was during the rainy season just after D-Day.
It was almost at the same time of year, in September, that the Meuse-Argonne and Hindenburg Line offensives were launched in 1918, leading to the final defeat of the Kaiser’s armies.
More than 2,000 big U.S. Flying Fortresses and Liberators Saturday blasted the big Rhineland defense centers of Mainz, Düsseldorf and Mannheim, situated 60 to 100 miles in advance of our armies, thus doubling the weight of Friday’s 1,000-bomber assault on targets behind the West Wall.
By night, RAF Mosquitoes and the new U.S. P-61 “Black Widow” fighter were raising havoc with the belated but now frenzied rush of German troops and supplies into the fortifications belt.
A U.S. 1st Army spearhead had smashed without about 15 miles of the first forts of the Siegfried Line, to curve across the northeast corner of Belgium and around the tiny southern projection of Holland.
The French Patriot-controlled Radio Toulouse said that the Yanks had smashed to within 20 miles of German Aachen in this sector, where Lt. Gen. Courtney Hodges’ tanks, bringing up the line to form a solid front against the German frontier, were advancing in great leaps against badly disorganized opposition.
By contrast, the Germans had rallied on both flanks and were putting up fierce opposition but they failed to prevent the British 2nd Army from throwing a second bridgehead across the Albert Canal, this one at Gheel, 12 miles northwest of Friday’s crossing at Beringen and 13 miles from the Dutch Frontier.
The Beringen bridgehead, already five miles deep, was being steadily expanded despite the stiffening opposition and was held in “very great strength,” an official spokesman said.
The 2nd Army, which has captured 52,162 prisoners since D-Day, captured Dixmude and Roulers in the course of mopping up western Belgium, reached Thiel where sharp fighting was underway and began wiping out enemy remnants in the northern outskirts of the Flemish city of Ghent. Another column was in the outskirts of Bruges.
Front dispatches said that great forces of guns, armor and infantry were moving up to the Moselle front for Gen. Patton’s impending smash into the Siegfried Line as grim and costly fighting, with heavy casualties on both sides, progressed around the perimeter of five U.S. bridgeheads across the river.
The Germans were reported to have arrayed first-class fighting men along the Moselle in contrast to the rabble encountered earlier in Gen. Patton’s drive, and their commanders were men from the Regular Army War College rather than SS men picked for their political instead of military qualities.
On the Channel coast, the Canadian 1st Army was slowing closing in on Calais and Dunkerque despite the handicap of German-created floods, and the towns of Leonplage and Bergues, respectively eight miles west and five miles south of Dunkerque were occupied.
Berlin broadcasts said that the doomed German garrisons were being shelled from the sea, indicating that the Allied navies had joined the battle.
