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The Price of Victory (1945) – Classic WWII Documentary of Courage and Sacrifice is a powerful World War II documentary that chronicles the Allied campaign and the immense sacrifices made during the fight for freedom. Featuring authentic wartime footage, historic battles, and firsthand accounts of courage and determination, this classic documentary offers a compelling look at one of the most significant conflicts in human history. A must-watch for history enthusiasts and fans of vintage war documentaries.
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Short filmTranscript
00:00:17I have been asked to be the spokesman for this Allied Expeditionary Force in saying a word of introduction to
00:00:23what you are about to see.
00:00:25It is a story of the Nazi defeat on the Western Front.
00:00:28So far as possible, the editors have made it an account of the really important men in this campaign.
00:00:35I mean the enlisted sailors and airmen that fought through every obstacle to victory.
00:00:42Of course, to tell the whole story would take years, but the theme would be the same.
00:00:49Teamwork wins wars. I mean teamwork among nations, services, and men.
00:00:57All the way down the line, from the G.I. and the Tommy to us brass hats.
00:01:03Our enemy in this campaign was strong, resourceful, and cunning.
00:01:08But he made a few mistakes.
00:01:10His greatest blunder was this.
00:01:12He thought he could break up our partnership.
00:01:15But we were welded together by fighting for one great cause.
00:01:20Into one great team.
00:01:22A team in which you were an indispensable and working member.
00:01:28That spirit of free people working, fighting, and living together in one great cause has served us well on the
00:01:35Western Front.
00:01:37We in the field pray that that spirit of common-ship will persist forever among the free peoples of the
00:01:44United Nations.
00:01:45To be continued...
00:01:51To be continued...
00:02:18To you who now, living in love and hope, whose sense of future in the surrounding air, this testament is
00:02:24offered.
00:02:25Here you may look on the violent fragments of our age, and the once thinness of the little thread that
00:02:31made us then the citizens of freedom.
00:02:34For dark was Europe, and the face of man, when this began.
00:02:38The nation had gone mad, and struck out everywhere the compass knew.
00:02:42The ebb tide of our honor fell away, and left its wreckage on a hundred coasts.
00:02:46The German cast his fires about the globe.
00:02:49His strength, drawn from the smoking Tsar and Ruhr, lay in our weakness.
00:02:54And at last his conquests smoldered behind the barriers of his arms.
00:02:59Along the channel where the sea strikes France, stood the west wall of concrete, stone, and steel, to mock the
00:03:06frail hopes of the petty breed.
00:03:08Wounded, hard pressed, and wasted on our strength, almost like madmen then, we planned to breach the wall and smash
00:03:16the German spine.
00:03:17But where?
00:03:19We searched the coast of Europe like fierce eagles.
00:03:22Between low flushing and deep harbored Cherbourg, our eyes sought out the place of the assault.
00:03:28Exits and tidal range marked shallow flushing off.
00:03:31Sand and the wind canceled the Belgian coast.
00:03:34The North Seine beaches were too small, and cliffs barred the approaches.
00:03:39Cote-en-Tin, too narrow.
00:03:40The Pas de Calais, heavily defended.
00:03:43It all resolved on Normandy, encore.
00:03:47Where planes could land upon the carpet ground.
00:03:49The coast defenses were more light, and tides had a good range, and men were safe from wind.
00:03:56So, on five miles of still unblooded sand, the fretful course of fate would be assailed by armored nations.
00:04:03Now our people bent to the construction of a steel array, and took the builders' hammer in their hands.
00:04:09It seemed almost as though the sun stood still, till our free peoples, full of rage and power, heaved through
00:04:15the air the plunderous spear of war.
00:04:18This is our people's story, in their words.
00:04:36I suppose if the vessel of the North Atlantic hadn't gone right, things might have been considerable different.
00:04:45It was an ugly time for all of us. Merchant ships, naval escort, air patrol.
00:04:52I guess I had my share of bad luck.
00:04:55I lost three ships, and some good friends.
00:05:13I remember reading somewhere that when a seagull comes down on a patch of oil, its feathers stick together, and
00:05:19it can't get off the water again.
00:05:21There must have been a lot of dead seagulls around the North Atlantic.
00:05:26Of course, we only saw it happening on the wall map, and yet it was, well, quite real.
00:05:32When I started there, those markers we used reminded me of toys out of some children's game.
00:05:37But soon they became U-boats, and ships carrying cargoes, food and supplies and weapons, and men to use them.
00:05:49I remember coming over, the worst thing about the trip was you didn't know where you were going.
00:05:53Wherever it was, you'd be a stranger, and nobody likes that.
00:05:57That ship was loaded from stem to stern with sad sex.
00:06:01Around the third day out, things got pally.
00:06:03Like the fella said, we're all in the same boat.
00:06:06The comic.
00:06:09Finally, we got to Liverpool.
00:06:11They had a band to play us in, an English Army band full of chimes.
00:06:15I'm dreaming of a white Christmas they played.
00:06:18To tell you the truth, it was pretty corny.
00:06:20But nobody said anything because, well, you know, it was a nice gesture.
00:06:27Funny thing.
00:06:29On the way over, you felt like you were the whole works.
00:06:31You couldn't help it.
00:06:33But then, all over the UK, you'd see things that made you begin to realize you were just part of
00:06:38a big proposition.
00:06:40All kinds of things.
00:06:57Are you ready for this?
00:07:01He's one of the best developers who took care about, runs, it.
00:07:01They were sponsored.
00:07:01Everyone that wasn't enough, you must put your answer.
00:07:01All than the other people who shared space You couldn't help with!
00:07:02What are you guys looking for?
00:07:02Thelynn Madeleine Dive?
00:07:02The born of Scottish Nebraska, his investigating is THE GREEGENT
00:07:02What can a wall say?
00:07:04Some of the shades you were left,
00:07:04or the crow Nossa,
00:07:05or the fl sommes,
00:07:09I wouldn't too much怀.
00:07:37I was a pre-med student at Johns Hopkins in civilian life.
00:07:42Now, I do know a little something about anatomy.
00:07:45And I say it is scientifically impossible for the human body to stand up to the training we receive.
00:07:50An absolute impossibility.
00:07:52The muscles and tendons and bone structure was not designed to withstand that battery.
00:07:58Don't ask me how it happens that we did stand up to it.
00:08:00I don't know.
00:08:01It has no scientific explanation.
00:08:11Listen to this out of one of them army pamphlets.
00:08:15To a young man, soldier in the army of today offers exceptional advantages and opportunities,
00:08:22such as physical training, foreign travel, sport and many other facilities which are normally
00:08:30denied to those engaged in the majority of civilian occupations.
00:08:35The majority of occupations in civil life become monotonous to say the least.
00:08:40But in the army, life is so varied that there is little or no prospect of a monotonous or irksome
00:08:48time.
00:08:51So men were girded for their highest hours while they learned the lethal arts of war in small
00:08:56and secret rooms that planners met to watch their work mature.
00:09:01Beyond our view, the German crowd and confident stood calm in deep emplacements on the armored coast.
00:09:08The war was not yet one of men and blood.
00:09:11The weapons were the factories and the maps and voices speaking in the hidden light.
00:09:16Season by season all our plans advanced.
00:09:18And those few men on whom the mass of war rested with all its weight worked ceaselessly.
00:09:25I used to wonder whether the millions of people doing their various jobs
00:09:29realized they were part of it all, paving the way for the invasion.
00:09:35We kept bashing away at German targets, mostly steel and oil.
00:09:39Serua, Hamburg, Battle of Berlin.
00:09:42Things were getting tougher every trip.
00:09:44More ground defenses, more night fighters, more crews not coming back.
00:09:56We got away early in the morning.
00:09:58Sometimes we'd see Lancasters coming back.
00:10:01A lot of times we'd stoke up the same target as they did.
00:10:04We'd beat up aircraft factories too.
00:10:06It was a deluxe service, day and night, 24 hours a day.
00:10:11We dropped agents over France.
00:10:14Must be awful to risk your neck and have to keep it secret.
00:10:17One man submarines, torpedo boats, commandos.
00:10:20We used them all to bring back cups full of sand from the beaches for analysis.
00:10:24It had to be quick drying with a solid clay foundation.
00:10:26It would have to support 30 ton tanks.
00:10:29I must have photographed nearly every field in France.
00:10:31The real job, of course, was the car area, but I didn't know that, nor did Jerry.
00:10:34We dropped stuff to the Mackie, arms, ammunition, sabotage materials and so on.
00:10:38Then went over ourselves and taught them how to use it.
00:10:41We built it to specification, but we had not the least idea of what kind of a gadget it was.
00:10:45The only name it had was Mulberry.
00:10:47It was vital to know all about the plain bay and the tides.
00:10:50And we trained the men to negotiate those tides and landing craft.
00:10:53Wearing down German sea power in preparation for the day.
00:10:56Special study of the weather along the Normandy coast.
00:10:58Miles of wire netting for the beaches.
00:11:007,200 tons of petrol per day.
00:11:02With an underwater pipeline to carry it to France.
00:11:05A white star is the emblem of liberation.
00:11:07Triple inoculation for all personnel.
00:11:09New ships pouring from the stocks.
00:11:11Old ships adapted.
00:11:12Listening to the German radio output for fresh intelligence.
00:11:16That was just part of the free invasion work.
00:11:18By December 43, the plan itself was set and we took it to Tehran for final discussion.
00:11:22The three leaders approved the plan.
00:11:25Our Russian forces advancing from the east.
00:11:28And invasion from the west.
00:11:30And then the date was set.
00:11:42I assumed command at shape with the best all-round team for which a man could ask.
00:11:48Some had already been working for months in England.
00:11:50Others I brought with me from the Mediterranean.
00:11:54We adopted first a master plan.
00:11:56And then had to coordinate every last detail of the ground, sea and airplanes.
00:12:03While this was going on, we led off with an air show.
00:12:07Designed to make the landing points as soft as possible.
00:12:10To batter the German communications.
00:12:12And to make certain we'd have control of the air.
00:12:15It was quite a show.
00:12:17Those airmen did a magnificent job.
00:12:27We had Polish, French, Czechs, all sorts in our outfit.
00:12:30They'd natter away in the mess about what they'd been up to.
00:12:33The only word you could ever make out was marshaling yards.
00:12:36Those bombardiers seemed to do nothing but look down on French bridges those days.
00:12:39We used to ask each other, have you cut any good bridges lately?
00:12:42Well, finally, there was only one whole railway bridge left over the same between Paris and the sea.
00:12:51Down in the late spring through the wounded towns of England moved the mass made by our patients.
00:12:57Two precious years of plans were put away.
00:12:59The offices were empty.
00:13:00All the maps were rolled up on the walls.
00:13:02What had been paper at last had come alive.
00:13:05Across the channel, aware of our assault, with cold contempt, alerted Germans stood beside their guns.
00:13:11And reinforcements rumbled from the right.
00:13:13Their generals were prepared.
00:13:15Their might was poised.
00:13:16They looked across the heaving sea and grinned.
00:13:19They would reap harvest of us on the beaches.
00:13:22And even death himself would stand amazed.
00:13:25Yet faint across the groaning of the sea came the thin thunder of a mass of power.
00:13:30Born from the great free peoples of the earth,
00:13:32is gathered in the ancient ports of England to crowd upon the steel encumbered ships.
00:14:27It was a funny sort of feeling marching down to the ships.
00:14:30We'd done it plenty of times before, of course, on schemes and that kind of thing.
00:14:35They didn't tell us this was the big show.
00:14:37Might have been just another exercise.
00:14:39Some of the chaps cracked gags.
00:14:41They wasn't very comic, but we laughed.
00:14:44I think we all guessed.
00:14:45The general feeling was, okay, if this is it, let's get in there and get it over with.
00:14:50Waiting always got on my nerves.
00:14:52Even waiting for a bus, never could stand it.
00:14:54Well, after a bit, our ship found its place in the middle of all the rest of the stuff.
00:14:57And there we stayed for days.
00:15:21They gave us the final briefing, then.
00:15:23We knew what to do and how.
00:15:25They told us where and when.
00:15:26That's a briefing.
00:15:28I listened to every word.
00:15:30Wrote it down in my head like a record and kept playing over and over again.
00:15:34Piece of beach in the morning.
00:15:37Ever since I became a soldier, they were getting me ready for this.
00:15:41Before, there'd been time in front of me.
00:15:44Protecting me.
00:15:45Now the time had worn away and there were only a few hours left.
00:15:50In the morning, I'd have to face it.
00:15:53I tried to imagine how much fear I would have, you know, to keep me from doing my job.
00:15:59I suppose everybody else was wondering the same thing.
00:16:18Nobody said anything official, but all of a sudden the ship got much busier.
00:16:24And over the amplifier, the chaplain said he'd be saying mass at 1830 hours.
00:16:30Funny, I don't think I ever believed, even after the final briefing, that the invasion was going to come off.
00:16:35And a voice in the loudspeaker said,
00:16:37Men who wish to take their anti-sea-sig pills should take the first one now.
00:16:42That did it.
00:16:45The Red Sea
00:16:46The Red Sea
00:16:49The Red Sea
00:16:58The Red Sea
00:17:18THE END
00:17:50THE END
00:18:30I was tugging a glider the way we always practiced it, except that I've never been in the air with
00:18:35a whole army before.
00:18:36Three airborne divisions, a British, an 82nd, and 101st American.
00:18:42Just before the glider pilot cast off over the landing zone, I wished good luck of the radio.
00:18:48Seemed a sort of inadequate thing to say.
00:18:54As Supreme Commander, let me break in at this point to say just a word about the Navy.
00:19:00From the moment of embarkation to that of landing, the full burden fell upon the Navy and our merchant fleets.
00:19:06They had to sweep the mines, bombard the coastal batteries, marshal and protect the transports along the coastline preparatory to
00:19:15landing,
00:19:15and, finally, man the small boats that carried the soldiers to the beach.
00:19:20On that day, there were more than 8,000 ships and landing craft on the shores of Normandy.
00:19:27It was a most intricate task, and a vital one for the success of our plans.
00:19:32The courage, fidelity, and skill of the Royal and American Navies have no brighter page in their histories than that
00:19:40of June 6, 1944.
00:19:47The
00:19:47The
00:19:47The
00:19:47The
00:19:53The End
00:20:24The End
00:20:51The End
00:21:23The End
00:21:34The End
00:21:55Back in London, only a few people knew. It was a well-kept secret.
00:21:59Around daybreak, we correspondents were called and told to be at the Ministry of Information.
00:22:03At eight. Then they told us.
00:22:34They called Abbie, Joe.
00:22:35I went to Omaha. Don't ask me why. I've never been to Omaha, the one in Nebraska, I mean. It's
00:22:42anything like Omaha, France. You can have it. I understand Omaha was the roughest spot. We lost some good men.
00:22:50Took a few prisoners. It was a lousy trade. We've been told what to expect. So it wasn't like a
00:22:57surprise or anything. It's just, well, one really happens.
00:23:01Yeah. For a while there, we were pinned down. But lucky thing, the other beaches were going better. So we
00:23:09got a little more than our share of the old teamwork. The Navy come in, the air guys, and finally
00:23:14we got moving good.
00:23:17Now you hear a little bit. Now you hear a lot about how long it takes to make battle-hardened
00:23:20soldiers out of green troops. Listen, I got to be a veteran in one day. That day.
00:23:29And so they paved the beaches with their blood and lurched across the dunes and reached the roads. The German
00:23:35parried fiercely. In the depths of rich green pasty of Normandy, the three airborne divisions, first of all for land,
00:23:41fought lion-like against most grievous odds.
00:23:43And loud across the cratered face of France came German reinforcements. From Berlin, a voice cried out, the allies must
00:23:49be hurled into the sea before another day had burned its hole in history. Locked in battle, the armies clashed.
00:23:56Our first objective, then, was to merge all the beachheads into one and 50 miles of men drive on together
00:24:02beyond the red sands through the broken wall.
00:24:13Where I was, it wasn't too bad getting ashore. After that, it started. We had to fight for every bloody
00:24:18field. And it was the same each time. Crawl on your belly, keeping your backside dick like you'd been told,
00:24:25chuck in a few hand grenades, then rush them.
00:24:28Sometimes they killed us, but we were killing more of them. The trickiest part was the farms. They were regular
00:24:35little jerry fortresses. If we couldn't manage them on our own, then we'd have to wait while the company commander
00:24:40called back for artillery support.
00:24:43The Navy was still with us, too, chucking in shells ahead of us. In three days, we advanced seven miles.
00:24:50Then we were told to stand fast and dig in. Next morning, we heard the news. We got it from
00:24:55the BBC. It sounded great. We'd joined up all along the bridgehead. There was a solid line, 45 miles of
00:25:03it. We'd got a foothold. We were in.
00:25:24We didn't have to do much navigating to get there. You just followed the convoys. I was doing close support.
00:25:31We waited around, and then the ground troops would whistle us out and told us about some Han target they
00:25:37wanted removed, and then in we'd go.
00:25:39No. We were like taxis on a cab ring.
00:25:53Something nice about a beach. Any beach. You think of a beach, and chances are you'll remember something nice. Like
00:26:00a party or a picnic. Pals from the old days. Girls in bathing suits.
00:26:05The one I worked, Utah, looked more like a freight yard once we got going. For quite a while, we
00:26:11brought more supplies right over the open beach. Like we'd practiced it, and like we'd made up as we went
00:26:16along.
00:26:16We worked a 24-hour shift with ducks, lights, rafts, rowboots, all sorts of Rube Goldbergs. The stuff just kept
00:26:24pouring in. Tanks, trucks, food, ammo, guys. Millions of things.
00:26:35We didn't think we'd spend 15 days in the same field outside Conn. The wood behind us, and the Germans
00:26:41in another wood half a mile in front of us. A little empty valley in between. Each side mortaring each
00:26:48other all the time.
00:26:50Just meant you had to live in a slipped trench. You got into a routine. You know, stand through from
00:26:57half past four to half past five, and two hours wait for breakfast. Came up fairly hot. Tin bacon, sausage,
00:27:06tea, and of course, biscuits. We'd been living on compo food since D-Day.
00:27:13It was good food, but, well, you know, you got tired of it. Might have given a lot for a
00:27:19slice of fresh bread and butter or a cup of fresh tea.
00:27:24Fifteen days is a long time to stay in one place and be mortared. You'd say you think everyone's coming
00:27:30straight for you.
00:27:52I can remember every case we ever had, especially the first one. The ambulance brought him in late one afternoon.
00:28:00I came over to where he was lying and he looked up and grinned. I asked him how he felt.
00:28:06He said something about the German with a machine pistol using him for a dart board. He was quiet and
00:28:14patient and a little bewildered. He'd never been hurt before.
00:28:18He asked how the fighting was going, then he passed out. The doctor came over and looked at his wounds
00:28:24and swore. He said he had no business to be alive.
00:28:29We put him on the operating table and did what we could. The doctor kept swearing all the time he
00:28:35was operating. We couldn't stop the bleeding.
00:28:38I remember the radio news that night. They said the casualties had been surprisingly light.
00:28:54They said the whole thing was dear old Winston's idea. A collapsible prefabricated harbour with everything on it except a
00:29:01nappy.
00:29:02Well, I wouldn't put it past him. It's the sort of idea he would have. Worked in the end. Mulberry,
00:29:08they called it.
00:29:09Well, I felt pretty good about it because I'd watched it grow right from the sinking of the first ships
00:29:13for the outer breakwater.
00:29:15And further along to the west, the Yanks had brought one over too.
00:29:20Then on D plus 13, I think it was, an onshore wind started up. Not much at first, but it
00:29:27got worse. Unloading onto the open beaches got very tricky.
00:29:32We heard that over on the Yanks section, the other harbour had been put right out of action.
00:29:37And when the wind dropped, old Mulberry looked pretty sick. And up to that time, it was the only bleeding
00:29:43harbour we had.
00:29:48At the green tip of Normandy, the town of Cherbourg made a harbour for supplies. Our need for ports was
00:29:54vital as our breath.
00:29:55The German knew our lack and swiftly drew his forces into tight defensive groups so to contest the issue.
00:30:01All our plans turned upon Cherbourg. All our strategy waited upon its empty docks and piers.
00:30:06So the Americans sent all across Normandy to the coast, swung toward the north, impatient for the port.
00:30:12Through hedge and field, they carved their heavy way.
00:30:32You remember back now when it seems like we took Cherbourg a couple of days after we hit the beach.
00:30:37Actually, it took 19 days to cover 30 miles. 30 miles and about 92,000 hedgerows and a battle at
00:30:43every hedgerow.
00:30:45Otherwise, it was nice country, like Connecticut. Pretty trees and orchards, lots of cows and nice little farmhouses.
00:30:52The apples were too green to eat, I remember. We hit it off fine with the people. Farmers, nice people.
00:30:58It got tough when we pulled up on the outskirts of Cherbourg. They had great defenses.
00:31:03Then the artillery really carried them all. For three days we sucked it to them.
00:31:07Sometimes we were pouring in at point-blank range over open sites.
00:31:13Finally, old von Schlieben, the German commander, tossed them the sponge.
00:31:18That's after telling his men to fight to the dead.
00:31:21We took Cherbourg on June 25th. Everything was rosy except the harbor we come from.
00:31:27The Jerry's had really smeared that harbor.
00:31:30But right away our guys went to work cleaning it up.
00:31:33And the way they tore into it, you could see that pretty soon it would be working for us fine.
00:31:39Then, well, we fought our way up the peninsula. Now we'd have to fight our way out of it.
00:31:49And everywhere inside France, we men of the Maquis were fighting too.
00:31:54I was in the north myself. We caught telephone and telegraph and high tension lines.
00:32:00And eventually when the allies landed, we fought in the open war.
00:32:04In the Savoie mountains, our friends held up German convoy.
00:32:08Well, it was a little easier in the mountains.
00:32:11Bosch reinforcements were delayed for many days.
00:32:14Factories and bridges would frequently disappear.
00:32:19But the price we paid for it was frightful.
00:32:23In the village of Oradour alone, the Germans slaughtered 1,100 out of the 1,200 population.
00:32:31And the place was completely burnt.
00:32:35They were accused to have ambushed German troops.
00:32:38Every house was destroyed.
00:32:41Women and children died in flames in the church where they had been locked.
00:32:46Yes, the price we paid was very great.
00:32:50But our job was done.
00:32:57Cor is a town through which the easy on ripples its slow way to the waiting sea, capital of Normandy.
00:33:02And here the British struck a stone wall of Germans.
00:33:06This was no Cherbourg advance, a knife thrust through the fields, but rather was the grinding of a drill, inch
00:33:12by inch forward.
00:33:14Here it was, the German feared a quick breakthrough to the river Seine.
00:33:17And here it was, he massed his army's best.
00:33:19Ten of the twelve divisions of his armour.
00:33:21Paratroops, SS men, the young, the cruel, against the veterans of Alamein.
00:33:26We wanted him to fight here and to hold the battered ground, because the future plans depended on him standing
00:33:31where he was.
00:33:32At Cor, the dust was diamond. Every foot of ground was priceless.
00:33:37For by mid-most summer, Cor was to be the pivot of the war.
00:34:17The DRACHESеро
00:34:27- Hershey
00:34:51Conn was the first decent-sized town we had taken, but there wasn't any celebration because
00:34:56we knew nothing had been settled.
00:34:58Jerry was as strong as ever.
00:35:00One of the men said, God, are we going to have to go right across the world doing this to
00:35:04beat him?
00:35:05Because Mr. Conn was dust, just plain dust.
00:35:09I wondered what Hamilton back home in Canada would look like after a beating like that.
00:35:14Well, anyway, our tanks and the birdies started massing and moved south out of the city.
00:35:18We knew there was a big dew coming up.
00:35:27The shore for us began south at Kong, where the Poles joined up with us.
00:35:31When we began moving forward, I heard a lot of the lads say, Rommel's on the run.
00:35:35But I'd been at Alamin.
00:35:37I knew he wasn't on the run.
00:35:38And I was right.
00:35:40There was nothing lovely about the battle south at Kong.
00:35:43No pinsome rumours, no out-flanking, no nothing like that.
00:35:46Just an hard, bitter, bloody slogging match.
00:35:49We had to stay there and give as good as we got, even if we couldn't give better.
00:36:19Beyond the rubble and the dust of Kaur, the Empire troops kept up their endless pressure.
00:36:23The Germans did not dare to disengage, but fought for all his cunning and his strength,
00:36:28still unaware of what we'd planned for it.
00:36:30West by St. Lowe, the base of his defence, Americans were poised and bent to fire an armoured arrow
00:36:36that would set alight the flame of freedom from the whole France.
00:36:39But till St. Lowe was seen, the arrow waited.
00:37:15The End
00:37:16The End
00:37:27The End
00:37:38The End
00:37:47The End
00:38:08One minute is quiet, but the birds sing.
00:38:11The next minute the column of Sherman tanks come round the corner going wide open.
00:38:15My buddy says, where'd those tanks come from?
00:38:18So I asked the tanker.
00:38:20He yells down there, the Third Army taking off.
00:38:22Been waiting for three weeks.
00:38:24Prepare somebody to let the rabbit out of the hat.
00:38:27Man, what a rabbit.
00:38:28With pearl-handled revolvers.
00:38:32When I think back to the breakthrough, I don't seem to be able to remember anything but the French people.
00:38:38People beside the road, kids we couldn't stop to give candy to, FFI boys bringing in the krauts from the
00:38:44fields,
00:38:46and farm workers waving as we went by.
00:38:49It was easier to look them in the face and smile and wave back at them when you hadn't had
00:38:53to smash their homes to pieces first.
00:38:56The morning we got into Wren, boy that really was liberation.
00:39:34At Wren, American armor planned to drive east and northeast, and thus surround and take the German colon divisions in
00:39:40the rear.
00:39:41The Foley plans to stop the arrow dead by cutting its supply route to the point where it stretched narrowest
00:39:46along the coast.
00:39:47So a great force exploded toward Mortaine, hoping an approach to achieve the scene, and drag our hopes down to
00:39:55the smoking ground.
00:40:06There's a lot of places I'd rather talk about than Mortaine.
00:40:10That's where I got hit.
00:40:12We've been going great up to there.
00:40:13Some of the guys had even been singing, harmonizing.
00:40:17And then that first German artillery caught us.
00:40:20Pretty accurate, too.
00:40:21An hour later I was short, 18 men.
00:40:24Well, we hold in and we hit back with everything we had.
00:40:28They weren't just trying to stop us, see.
00:40:30They wanted to come right through.
00:40:31And then me.
00:40:33I get a belt in the face, left side, and I keel.
00:40:36The last thing I remember is looking up and seeing those RAF typhoons.
00:40:40When I heard them screaming up ahead, I thought, geez, I'm glad they're on our side.
00:40:56I was sitting in front of the intelligence office doing a bit of sunbathing when headquarters came through saying the
00:41:00area northwest of Mortaine was packed with German armor heading west.
00:41:03Well, that started it.
00:41:04For six hours, the wing kept it up absolutely nonstop.
00:41:07Take off, attack, land, refuel, rearm, and take off again.
00:41:10It was the same on every airfield in Normandy.
00:41:12The only briefing I gave the chaps was, well, you know where they are.
00:41:15And the only interrogation when they got back was, well, how many did you get?
00:41:31Three days it lasted.
00:41:33Every kind of soldier was in there and every weapon.
00:41:35For me, it was just eating and smoking and loading at 105.
00:41:38No sleeping.
00:41:39Then things quieted down and the word came back.
00:41:41We stopped them cold.
00:41:43Everybody felt like celebrating, but that was a tough order out there.
00:41:45I tried drinking a whole bottle of cough medicine.
00:41:47It worked fine.
00:41:48I got stiffer in a plank.
00:41:52The counterattack, which took us by surprise, still did not hinder our deceptive plans.
00:41:57For down from corps, the foe had drawn a force and left his north flank weakened.
00:42:02Now the stage was set.
00:42:04Toward Pallet swept the Empire troops together with the foe.
00:42:07The German heard behind his back American armor churned toward Argento.
00:42:11Out general and out port, he found himself within a closing trap.
00:42:19The G
00:42:20The G
00:42:32THE END
00:42:53THE END
00:43:28THE END
00:43:58THE END
00:44:06THE END
00:44:14THE END
00:44:22THE END
00:44:26THE END
00:44:34THE END
00:44:47THE END
00:44:50THE END
00:45:22THE END
00:46:02THE END
00:46:04THE END
00:46:07THE END
00:46:21THE END
00:46:30THE END
00:46:32THE END
00:46:33THE END
00:46:51THE END
00:46:59THE END
00:47:10THE END
00:47:13THE END
00:47:18THE END
00:47:29THE END
00:47:33THE END
00:47:35THE END
00:47:37THE END
00:47:38THE END
00:47:40THE END
00:47:42THE END
00:47:45THE END
00:47:47THE END
00:47:51THE END
00:47:52THE END
00:47:52THE END
00:47:52THE END
00:47:52THE END
00:47:52THE END
00:47:52THE END
00:47:52THE END
00:47:54THE END
00:48:04The people of Russell laughed and cried and threw flowers in the tank and said goodbye, Tommy, when they meant
00:48:11to say hello.
00:48:13Man, they were happy.
00:48:15I suppose they were no longer afraid.
00:48:18I remember wondering then how the first German civilians would react to us.
00:48:29I remember one day we were coming across a big flat field.
00:48:32Didn't look like nothing special.
00:48:34I hopped a barbed wire fence and a guy says to me, guess what?
00:48:36So I says, what?
00:48:37So he says, you're in Germany.
00:48:38There's a sign over there says.
00:48:40Then like a dope, I thought, well, it won't be long now.
00:48:43I went to quit over the fall of Paris and Tim Bobham Brussels.
00:48:46I had a fiver on it being over by October the 1st.
00:48:49I remember the point system for getting out of the army came out about this time.
00:48:52I began to think of that gray chalk striped double-breasted suit in the mothball.
00:48:56I was in the 7th Army coming up from the south of France.
00:48:58One day a lieutenant said, take a ride with me.
00:49:00I got some prisoners for you to guard.
00:49:02How many Isis?
00:49:03About 20,000, he said.
00:49:04A whole German division had surrendered.
00:49:07We Canadians were advancing in the north.
00:49:09One day we came across a thing I'd never seen before.
00:49:12I guess it's a flying bomb site, the officer says.
00:49:15Well, that really made me feel good.
00:49:16The prisoner told us the newest Jerry gag.
00:49:19If an aircraft shows up white, it's American.
00:49:21If it shows up dark, it's British.
00:49:23And if it never shows up, it's the loop whopper.
00:49:25Every time they sent me along to set up a forward switchboard and I got my earphones on,
00:49:30I found out that the rear switchboard had leapfrogged five miles ahead.
00:49:34I wrote to the old man in St. Louis.
00:49:35He owns a men's store.
00:49:37I told him he better cut prices on GI neckties and socks if he didn't want to be stuck with
00:49:41a lot of military apparel.
00:49:42Someone asked the sergeant major what he thought the chances were for a spot of leave.
00:49:45Don't you worry about leave, lads, he says.
00:49:47We've got the Japs to finish here.
00:49:49Reagan a soldier, of course.
00:49:51Key.
00:49:53It was a terrific feeling crossing the German border.
00:49:55We were sure nothing could stop us.
00:50:07Then it happened.
00:50:08Just outside Metz.
00:50:10We run out of gas.
00:50:12There just wasn't any to be had.
00:50:14I looked at my 30-ton Sherman sitting there, a useless hunk of iron.
00:50:18I wanted the ball.
00:50:20I don't know how far we could have gone on, who knows.
00:50:22But I'd just stop and sit there in the road.
00:50:25I knew then we were in for a rough time.
00:50:31When we took Arkin, the rations were short and mostly K-rations at that.
00:50:36But we ate.
00:50:37Then we started to run low on ammo.
00:50:39Well, that was serious.
00:50:40You can't kill a man with K-rations.
00:50:42At least I never heard of such an instance.
00:50:46From Antwerp to the Belfort Gap, our drives came to a stop.
00:50:50We could not then proceed until we had a port through which supplies could reach our armies.
00:50:55Crouched beside the keys, the German suicide garrisons held the port so sorely needed.
00:51:02When the German port strategy became apparent, we had to move swiftly to counteract his plan.
00:51:08We captured Scherberg in a mighty rush, but he hung on to other cargers.
00:51:12And when he couldn't do that, he destroyed them.
00:51:16That was the story of Brest, where American ground, air, and naval forces fought such a long, bitter battle.
00:51:23In Brittany, where we were joined by French resistance forces.
00:51:27At the channel ports of Calais, won by the Canadians.
00:51:31Le Havre, captured by the British.
00:51:33Dieppe and Boulogne, Canadians.
00:51:36And Dunkirk, beads by the Czechs.
00:51:38It takes a lot of freight per day, per man, to keep an army fighting in the field.
00:51:43The fellows I charged with getting it to the front had a tough nut to crack.
00:51:47We just didn't have enough working ports.
00:51:49That's all.
00:51:51Supplies suffered.
00:51:53Our offensive was slow, and the German was gaining time to consolidate a new defense line.
00:52:00When our supplies petered out, we'd just reached the Siegfried line.
00:52:03That's as far as we got.
00:52:05We went through the first part easy.
00:52:07Dragon's teeth and stuff like that.
00:52:09Then we hit the pillboxes, forts, obstacles, hidden position.
00:52:12It was, well, it was like going into one of those joints in Coney Island where you get lost.
00:52:17Instead of mirrors, they had guns.
00:52:20With supplies, maybe we could have cracked it then.
00:52:22Maybe not.
00:52:23I don't know.
00:52:25Frontal assault upon the Siegfried line was for the moment fatal.
00:52:29There, encased in trench and pillbox, lurked the German power.
00:52:33A hydra hundred-headed, still unslaved.
00:52:35And all the cunning of a thousand years of war had gone to mold its walls of steel.
00:52:40Yet every line must somewhere have an end.
00:52:42In southeast Holland, nothing lay between the British army and the German plain, except two rivers and a town.
00:52:50And so we made our plans.
00:52:52To send an airborne army down to seize Eindhoven, and the bridges at Nijmegen and Arnhem.
00:52:58Then to hold them for the force that would sweep up like thunder from the south.
00:53:03Thus, where no line existed, would the Rhine at last be crossed in force.
00:53:11I was to jump last at Arnhem, so I sat right forward by the window.
00:53:15I could see nothing but blue skies and the coaters with the fighters up topside like midges.
00:53:20One of the boys was reading a newspaper.
00:53:23He showed me a funny piece in it.
00:53:25I couldn't laugh.
00:53:28The coast of Holland came long before I was ready for it.
00:53:31Someone yelled, running up now, and got to action stations.
00:53:35I remember thinking, what a bloody bit of bad luck to be bumped off now when the war's nearly over.
00:54:17The Limey's dropping on them, and we come down and go to a place called Eindhoven, Holland.
00:54:23She goes good, get right, dig in, set up at the fence perimeter, and wait for the British Army to
00:54:28come up.
00:54:29Then we join them and head out for Nijmegen.
00:54:34The bridge at Nijmegen hardly had a mark on it.
00:54:37We crossed the river and started out for Arnhem, but we didn't get far.
00:54:40The Hun knew as well as we did that we'd got to get through, and he put in everything he'd
00:54:42got.
00:54:43That was the worst eye ever struck.
00:54:45Knowing our men were there waiting at Arnhem, and we couldn't get to them.
00:54:52At Arnhem, we got ourselves well dug in, us and some of the Poles.
00:54:57We were short of ammo and food.
00:54:59That was our main worry.
00:55:02I'll never forget those supply-dropping missions.
00:55:05The way Jerry let loose at them, and the way they just came straight on into it.
00:55:11Towards the end, we knew the situation was bad.
00:55:14We knew we were hemmed in.
00:55:16We knew it was possible we wouldn't get out.
00:55:19More than anything, I remember the way everyone behaved.
00:55:23Men you knew as the toughest fighters became gentle, kind, and considerate to each other.
00:55:31I knew a lot more about men after Arnhem.
00:55:37The guns died out in Arnhem.
00:55:40Then we knew the greatest gallantry was not enough to cross the final bridge.
00:55:44And now no choice remained to us.
00:55:47Direct assault against the Seagfried Line would be the only way to carve our corridors into the Reich.
00:55:53The first support was needed for supplies.
00:55:55Antwerp we had.
00:55:57But thundering German guns controlled the 30 cold miles of the Scheldt from Antwerp to the sea.
00:56:01The docks were still, the winches silent, all the ports lay dead.
00:56:06A useless city severed from the sea.
00:56:08It would stay dead until we cut away through the grey Scheldt.
00:56:13So the battle formed to free the estuary for our ships.
00:56:17I covered that battle for the Associated Press.
00:56:21I only wish I could have written the story with the greatness of the men who fought it.
00:56:26It was vicious and fearsome fighting all the way.
00:56:30The Canadians and the Poles clearing the south bank of the river.
00:56:34The Royal Navy and Marines and Norwegians charging knee-deep in blood and water
00:56:38into the mouths of the nine-inch shore guns at West Capelle.
00:56:42It was the kind of fighting that makes legends.
00:56:46And the minesweeping of the Scheldt afterwards.
00:56:49It was the greatest operation of its kind in history.
00:56:53The cost of that first ship into Antwerp Harbor
00:56:56was the lives of thousands of our bravest men.
00:57:01I reported it as well as I could.
00:57:04But their memory deserves more than words.
00:57:18I was hauling on the first convo out of Antwerp.
00:57:21When I got to the front, I saw more empty supply dumps than I'd like to see.
00:57:25The boys wanted to know where the stuff was.
00:57:27You can't fight without stuff.
00:57:29Anybody knows that.
00:57:30I made lots of trips.
00:57:32I don't know how many.
00:57:33Driving all day, all night.
00:57:35Singing.
00:57:35So is to keep awake.
00:57:37Songs like Milkman, keep those bottles quiet.
00:57:53My job was to see to it that they had a new toothbrush and a cot,
00:57:58maybe a book to read when they came over from the East Bank
00:58:01to the West Bank of the Moselle for a little rest.
00:58:04We brought them over one company at a time
00:58:06because that was all the regiment could spare from the line at any one time.
00:58:10Somebody had tapped them on the shoulder and said,
00:58:13All right, boy, you're going back across the river for 24 hours rest.
00:58:17And here they were where they could rest.
00:58:19They just couldn't believe it.
00:58:22Here they were for just 24 hours without war.
00:58:24Everything was down to essentials.
00:58:26Counted out like dollar bills through a teller's window.
00:58:29One night's sleep, one day's hot meals, one clean change of underwear,
00:58:33one clean pair of pants, one shave, one hot shower, one movie.
00:58:39I used to wonder what was the best of that day.
00:58:42Was it the chance for them to write home,
00:58:45the hot shower, or that long-legged girl on the screen?
00:58:50Whatever it was, all of it was over by morning.
00:58:53They were going back with their one clean suit of underwear,
00:58:56the hot shower, the clean shave, and the good night's sleep.
00:58:59Back across the Moselle to their holds in the ground.
00:59:03And the shelves.
00:59:08By that time, we knew we were going to see a winter campaign.
00:59:12There was no way out of it.
00:59:14Germans were dug in, and they were tough.
00:59:17And it was plain that until we got a lot stronger,
00:59:20we weren't going anyplace.
00:59:22The squadron was operating whenever it could.
00:59:24There wasn't a lot of flying.
00:59:25We were iced up and fed up.
00:59:27Suppose you're having a swell time in Paris, my cousin wrote me,
00:59:31with all that perfume and silk stockings and that champagne.
00:59:35They called our end of the line south.
00:59:38We were in the Vosges Mountains with the American 7th Army.
00:59:42But it was very little warmth in the south.
00:59:45I recalled with pleasure the Mediterranean,
00:59:47where we had landed in August.
00:59:49Ah, but memories do not keep one warm.
00:59:53Before I joined the Army,
00:59:54I'd have thought it was certain death to dig a hole in me back garden
00:59:57and live in it for the winter,
00:59:58but that's what we did.
00:59:59The sergeant said,
01:00:01well, squirrels do it every year.
01:00:03Yes, I thought,
01:00:04but they don't man machine guns as well.
01:00:06There was no heating in our Brussels office.
01:00:08I put on so much under my uniform,
01:00:10they called me the Bundle from Britain.
01:00:12I never smoked before,
01:00:13but pretty soon I found myself smoking as high as a pack a day.
01:00:17I worry about that old law of percentages.
01:00:19My company was melting away.
01:00:22You'd look up one day and be fighting alongside a stranger.
01:00:24It was an awesome feeling.
01:00:30Our hunk of the line was the Ardenne.
01:00:33Pretty quiet.
01:00:34A lot of outfits had gone up north.
01:00:36I started a million latrine-ograms
01:00:37about the wearing one of our offensive.
01:00:39Then one day I'm standing guard
01:00:41and these shells stopped.
01:00:43I thought for a minute this was it.
01:00:44Until I realized these shells weren't outgoings, brother.
01:00:47They were in comings.
01:00:49Next thing I knew, German tanks.
01:00:51It was an offensive, all right,
01:00:53but it was going the wrong way.
01:01:04The offensive we were mounting to the north
01:01:06was suddenly forestalled and set aside.
01:01:09As through the rugged, thinly-held Ardenne
01:01:11von Rundstedt struck.
01:01:12He cut a fiery path through the American lines
01:01:15and sent his tanks desperately driving
01:01:17toward the River Merz.
01:01:18A night of fog and pale December frost
01:01:20saw the beginning.
01:01:22None foresaw the end.
01:01:23He aimed for Antwerp's harbor through Liège.
01:01:26And all our plans held fire
01:01:28while we bent our strength
01:01:30to curb the Germans in the bulge.
01:01:57One night I was a replacement in England
01:01:59playing Shove Hay Penny in a pub.
01:02:02The next day they shoved me in an airplane
01:02:04and that night I was fighting Germans
01:02:06and being kicked around.
01:02:08I don't know about the other outfits,
01:02:10but mine was being cut to ribbon.
01:02:12They were dropping all around me.
01:02:14The thing that still sticks in my head
01:02:16is the medics.
01:02:18The only weapon they had was a needle,
01:02:20but they were around
01:02:20right where it was the hottest.
01:02:22You hear that yell,
01:02:24Medic, Medic,
01:02:25me there.
01:02:37Our whole division got a presidential citation
01:02:40for what happened up at Bastoma.
01:02:42Even me, just a cook.
01:02:43I'll never forget that old lieutenant
01:02:45running into the field kitchen
01:02:46and hollering at me
01:02:47if I had any idea
01:02:49how to operate a bazooka.
01:02:50I said no,
01:02:51and he said,
01:02:53well, you're going to learn now, son.
01:02:54I did,
01:02:55and I'll be doggone
01:02:56if in the first shot out the barrel
01:02:58I didn't get me a Jerry Tank.
01:03:00Got interviewed later
01:03:01by Stars and Stripes.
01:03:03They said it was a crackerjack story.
01:03:05I tell it at the drop of a half.
01:03:11We've been up north
01:03:11where things were a bit static,
01:03:12so we were quite glad
01:03:13to be moved down
01:03:14to the top side of this bulge.
01:03:16Coming down through Belgium,
01:03:17we noticed how scared
01:03:18some of the civilians looked.
01:03:20Natural, I suppose.
01:03:22We were held in reserve for a week,
01:03:23and then they sent us into action.
01:03:29On account of the fog,
01:03:31we couldn't get any air coordination.
01:03:33You sure miss it bad
01:03:34when you've gotten used to it
01:03:35all the way since D-Day.
01:03:37And then on December 24th,
01:03:39like a Christmas present,
01:03:40that sun come up,
01:03:41after a while
01:03:42we was giving him
01:03:42the old one-two again.
01:03:44we got out of it.
01:04:13We stopped them dead, finally.
01:04:15It cost us plenty of men, but we stopped them.
01:04:17And we started moving ahead again.
01:04:19The rest of us.
01:04:47Rundstedt reeled back on a recoiling spring.
01:04:49His great attempt was over.
01:04:50And his armies that had devoured such a wealth of blood
01:04:53sagged sodden towards the Rhine.
01:04:56At Yaltaven, while dire explosions shook the German fronts,
01:04:59the three great architects of freedom met
01:05:01to fix the final blow and plot the peace.
01:05:04And even as they met, we moved to act upon our strategy.
01:05:08We wished the foe to stand and fight
01:05:10upon the western bank of the Grey Rhine.
01:05:11For there we could destroy him.
01:05:14Outside his fortress, open, unprotected by any bridge-less river.
01:05:18Down we cast the gauntlet, challenging him.
01:05:21Stand and fight.
01:05:42Down we cast the gauntlet,
01:05:44down we cast the gauntlet.
01:05:58Up into the pit!
01:05:59The churras!
01:06:01The smithlet, the Cozz, the glute, the Endless River.
01:06:08Down we cast the gauntlet,
01:06:10down we cast the gauntlet.
01:06:11Down we cast the gauntlet,
01:06:18We were attacking in the north of the Canadians, round about the Reichswald forest and Dutch frontier area.
01:06:24It was wet and filthy.
01:06:26They nicknamed our army commander Admiral Kruehler.
01:06:30Well, anyway, the enemy put up some very stiff opposition.
01:06:33But actually, this was just what we'd hoped for.
01:06:36It showed that Jerry's emotions about fighting for every foot of his beloved fatherland were getting the better of his
01:06:41sense of strategy.
01:06:43And every German killed on our side of the Rhine was to make it easier for us on the further
01:06:46bank.
01:06:47And a lot of the Bosch were killed, I can tell you.
01:06:50Reichswald was the bloodiest show I've seen in this war.
01:06:59It was one of the push. The captain told me eight divisions.
01:07:02He usually knows. He follows things like that.
01:07:05I was with the outfit that took Mönchengladbach, I think you say it.
01:07:10There weren't many civilians in the streets, and even the ones that were there we weren't supposed to talk to
01:07:14unless we had to.
01:07:15There was a $65 rack for fraternization.
01:07:18I wonder how they happened to figure out that number. I mean, why $65?
01:07:25We could see the Cologne Cathedral a long time before we got there.
01:07:29That tower was our objective. It was on the Rhine River.
01:07:32We went fast, and by the time we got in the town, there wasn't too much fight left in them.
01:07:37Cologne was mangled, all right, but there were still a few buildings standing.
01:07:41I was sorry. I thought of those French cities. Flattened.
01:07:46Anyway, we got our objective. Now, we had to cross that river.
01:07:54I thought they must be very short of men when they put us sailors in the battle dress,
01:07:57lugged the assault boats on the trucks, and sent us across Belgium by road.
01:08:01We talk about silent service. I'd never been sick at sea, but I was sick as a dog on the
01:08:05road.
01:08:06When we reached our destination, I was feeling lousy, longing for a breath of sea air,
01:08:10and found the whole bloody landscape under a stinking smoke screen.
01:08:14Like London it was.
01:08:15The next day, we got up to the Rhine.
01:08:17It was good to get a glimpse of the water again.
01:08:27Our Air Force has given the old lumps on the east bank of the Rhine, but I was still nervous.
01:08:32The Germans had blown the bridges, and we knew the crossing would be amphib.
01:08:35When I'm nervous, I get off my feed.
01:08:37For two days before that crossing, I couldn't eat nothing but a couple of Milky Way bars.
01:08:41It was going to be D-Day all over again.
01:08:44Dangerous.
01:08:48A miracle.
01:08:49There it was, sitting there, big and black.
01:08:52I'm no architect, but to me, that Remargan bridge was the most beautiful bridge in the world.
01:08:57In the Army, when things go as per plan, that's wonderful.
01:09:00But when they go better than plan, then you figure the chaplain's working overtime.
01:09:04There was a break at that bridge, and we cashed in on it.
01:09:06And the first guys over the river were over in style.
01:09:09The watch on the Rhine was finished.
01:09:11Washed up.
01:09:12What a coin of phrase, kaput.
01:09:28Well, you got the flux of sodium to crack.
01:09:30Well, you got it.
01:09:47The End
01:10:14We got across okay and everything was going fine.
01:10:16But suddenly I get Stito to guard some German prisoners.
01:10:19I'll never forget their faces when them airball blokes started to come over.
01:10:22They just stood there looking up at them.
01:10:23And then after about half an hour of it, one of them looks at me,
01:10:26looks up at the sky and says, propaganda.
01:10:45The End
01:11:05The Reward Pocket was the first big objective across the Rhine.
01:11:09We and the heavies sealed it off, then the ground forces wrapped it up.
01:11:12After that, they exploded in all directions.
01:11:15Cut the Jerry armies up in pockets, then take them one by one.
01:11:17That was the program.
01:11:19The third wreck was being carved up like a Christmas turkey.
01:11:26Chasing the Bosch was getting a little bit monotonous.
01:11:28We hardly ever saw him.
01:11:29Only burning houses, a few shells, an occasional sniper's rifle shot.
01:11:33It was a silly kind of defiance, I thought.
01:11:35Then one day the routine was broken.
01:11:37We came across a prison in a war camp.
01:11:38Other ranks.
01:11:39Yanks, mostly.
01:11:40They went mad when they saw us.
01:11:41Screeched red Indian war cry.
01:11:43Hummeled one another and asked what the news was.
01:11:46Seemed a shame to tell them when they were so happy.
01:11:49Well, there's nothing for it.
01:11:51I told them.
01:11:52President Roosevelt died yesterday afternoon, was it?
01:11:56You should have held them quietened down.
01:11:58For once in this campaign, they all felt as though they'd suffered a major defeat.
01:12:03I don't like to stay there, talking to them, trying to cheer them up.
01:12:06But we had no time to lose.
01:12:07Jerry only had a few hundred square miles of earth left to scorch.
01:12:10Our job was either to hurry him up or scorch it for him.
01:12:15We were on the homestretch, cutting deeper all the time,
01:12:17when we ran into these displaced persons, slave workers.
01:12:21They were sick and hungry from all over Europe.
01:12:23The roads were jammed with them.
01:12:25But they kept out of the way and didn't give us any trouble.
01:12:29Like a fellow said,
01:12:31there's a lot more than town's going to have to be reconstructed.
01:12:37I wondered what was up when all R.A.M.C. personnel in our lot
01:12:41down to Stretcher Bed, as we're urgently called for.
01:12:43I soon found out.
01:12:45We'd taken the Belson Consultation Camp.
01:12:49Well, I'm not squeamish.
01:12:51I've seen amputations, operations, deaths,
01:12:53long before I went to the Army in 41.
01:12:56I was a warden.
01:12:58I lost count of all the arms and legs
01:13:00I pulled out of the wreckage down in Croydon
01:13:02and got quite used to it.
01:13:04But this was different.
01:13:06Very different.
01:13:08I don't know any words big enough
01:13:10to make you understand what we all felt.
01:13:13All I can say, and I'm proud of this,
01:13:16is that I had to fall out
01:13:17and be quickly sick from the courtyard.
01:13:20As I say, I'm not squeamish,
01:13:22but, well, I'm human and thank God for it.
01:13:31The government sent a few of us congressmen
01:13:33over to see those camps.
01:13:35And if there's anybody left
01:13:37who wonders if this war was worth fighting,
01:13:40well, I wish they could have been along.
01:13:42There it was, right in front of us.
01:13:45Fascism and what it's bound to lead to,
01:13:48wherever it crops up.
01:13:49I talked to some of the prisoners,
01:13:52the ones that had the strength to talk.
01:13:54Their offenses were the usual Nazi crimes.
01:13:58You know, wrong religion,
01:14:00or wrong race,
01:14:02belonging to a union,
01:14:03or the wrong political party.
01:14:06In Germany, it led to over 400 camps,
01:14:09like the ones I saw.
01:14:11It was the worst thing I ever saw in my life,
01:14:13and I wouldn't have missed it for anything.
01:14:29When an army gets to moving in a hurry,
01:14:32that's where air transport comes in.
01:14:34We'd been flying in the stuff
01:14:35along with the British Transport Command
01:14:37since D-Day.
01:14:38Towards the end,
01:14:39they seemed to be moving faster on the ground
01:14:41than we were in the air.
01:14:46As pocket after pocket of the foe fell,
01:14:48our hopes rose higher than the soaring flames
01:14:50that marked the broken towns of Germany.
01:14:52In Italy, a million prisoners came in,
01:14:55as with a single sudden blow,
01:14:56the German power was smashed.
01:14:58Then our tanks drove through the southern mountains,
01:15:01where the foe had hoped
01:15:02to make his furious final stand.
01:15:04The Russians took Berlin
01:15:06and cut the heart from Hitler's empire.
01:15:09And he himself,
01:15:10who planned to rule the earth from pole to pole,
01:15:12vanished like smoke among the falling walls.
01:15:15Upon the green banks of the River Elbe,
01:15:17we waited for the east and west to meet.
01:15:38We linked up with the Ruskies at the Elbe River.
01:15:40I hung around for a couple of days
01:15:42with a Tommy gunner named, uh, uh, Connie Cobb.
01:15:45He didn't know any English,
01:15:46so I taught him to say my aching back,
01:15:48and he taught me tovarish.
01:15:49That means comrade.
01:15:51We drank toast to Len Leeson,
01:15:53had a million laughs.
01:15:54Then old Connie Cobb found an interpreter
01:15:55and gives a toast to the great American soldiers.
01:15:58That stopped me.
01:15:59We did all right,
01:16:00but I don't like to think
01:16:01where we'd have been without them.
01:16:17We were going towards the Danish frontier,
01:16:19Bremenfeld in Hamburg.
01:16:21The rot was setting in.
01:16:23A million and a half surrendered in the north.
01:16:24The fighting was nearly over,
01:16:26and our job was beginning.
01:16:28We'd been training a long time
01:16:29for the administration of Germany,
01:16:31and we were prepared for plenty of trouble.
01:16:33Sabotage, passive resistance,
01:16:35or perhaps something more violent,
01:16:37you know, werewolves and sheep's clothing.
01:16:39But as it turned out,
01:16:40most of them were docile
01:16:41and did what they were told.
01:16:43They seemed healthy, well fed.
01:16:46Their disease was in their minds.
01:16:48A German woman,
01:16:50looking at what was left of her time,
01:16:52said to me,
01:16:53if only you'd given up in 1940,
01:16:57none of this need have happened.
01:16:58A German woman,
01:17:12and I'll see you next time.
01:17:12I'll see you next time.
01:17:13I'll see you next time.
01:17:47At one minute after midnight,
01:17:49May the 9th, 1945,
01:17:51the gun stopped.
01:17:53D plus 337.
01:17:57Now it starts.
01:17:59All the arguments about who won the war.
01:18:02Well, here's what I say.
01:18:04That no country on earth
01:18:06could have won it alone.
01:18:07So what does that mean?
01:18:09That anybody who wants to take a bow by himself
01:18:11is not only boasting,
01:18:13but nuts.
01:18:17I spent four years in the infantry
01:18:19and I saw my share.
01:18:21During that time,
01:18:22I only met three men that liked to fight.
01:18:24They were a little cracked,
01:18:25but it had to be done.
01:18:27Now that it's over,
01:18:28I feel good,
01:18:29except for one thing.
01:18:31All this talk about World War III.
01:18:34These big pessimists
01:18:36that talk so easy about another war
01:18:37just didn't see this one.
01:18:39Or enough of it.
01:18:42We watched them bringing in
01:18:43some high-up prisoners,
01:18:45quite ready to be friendly,
01:18:46some of them.
01:18:48I was thinking of fellas
01:18:49I'd known who'd bought it,
01:18:51crashed,
01:18:52shot down,
01:18:52missing,
01:18:54right through from
01:18:54the Battle of Britain.
01:18:57I remembered their faces
01:18:58or some joke they'd played
01:18:59or maybe just the way
01:19:01they laughed or something.
01:19:04There seemed to be
01:19:04such a lot of them
01:19:05I remembered.
01:19:13To the victor belongs
01:19:15the spoils.
01:19:16That's what they say.
01:19:18Well,
01:19:19what are the spoils?
01:19:20Only this.
01:19:22A chance to build
01:19:23a free world
01:19:24better than before.
01:19:26Maybe the last chance.
01:19:28Remember that.
01:19:38Now the time has come
01:19:39to put our victory
01:19:40to the tests of peace
01:19:42in company with men
01:19:44of many lands
01:19:44to sift from ashes
01:19:46what the struggle taught.
01:19:48In the rebuilding
01:19:49of a broken earth,
01:19:51may we keep in our hearts
01:19:53this ancient prayer.
01:19:55O Lord God,
01:19:57may thou give us
01:19:58to thy servants
01:19:58to endeavour
01:19:59any great matter.
01:20:01Grant to us also
01:20:02to know
01:20:02that it is not
01:20:04the beginning
01:20:04but the continuing
01:20:06of the same
01:20:07until it be thoroughly finished
01:20:09which yieldeth
01:20:10the true glory.
01:20:28got to know
01:20:28what is going on
01:20:28our
01:20:28our
01:20:28our
01:20:34gathering
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