La belle France! Through the rear end of a British lorry 504 men saw little of France on that first day, November 16, 1944, that was belle. A cold drizzle fell, and on the floor of a springless lorry the condition of French roads, at best pitted and canyonized by erosion, was exaggerated in its flagrant disregard for GI comfort. What those men, whose curiosity was not completely nullified by aching bones and freezing feet, saw through a crack in the draped canvas tarpaulin was not of a nature to induce exclamations of joy. Grey, peeling, depopulated villages, strung like a necklace of barnacled oyster shells along the road, caused many a sodden GI heart to become more sodden. “Hell, where are the cabarets and winking mamselles?”
Camp Sissone, some fifty acres of three-story barracks, had evololved from a French army post in the ’20s through a dark history as a German concentration camp for the FFI and panzer park to its present status as base headquarters for the 82nd Airborne Division. The division band marched briskly up and down the company streets to the traditional welcoming tune of “We’re All American” as cruddy paratroopers piled out of the trucks and stretched the kinks out of cramped legs in a beeline for the Clubmobile. Louise bobbed around like a cheerful beacon in a storm of red-eyed, dirt-lined grinning faces, shaking hands, squealing joyous hellos and for a fortunate few, planted friendly kisses on besmudged, stubbly cheeks.
There were passes to Rheims, a dull cathedral city formerly famous for its champagne, but now only known for its lack, which paratroopers with benevolent interest tried to liven up until their campaign of cheer began to assume the proportions of an international Incident, bringing down the wrath of SHAEF.
There were passes to Paris, too – theoretically about 10 percent of the regimental strength every four days – where, so far as Americans could see, was concentrated all the sparkle of the nation. Judging by pre-war standards, Paris was sad at heart; its natives had little enough to laugh about, but the Eiffel tower still stood with all its post card excitement, the eternal flame burned with extra meaning beneath the Arc de Triomphe, and l’eglise de Sacre-Coeur smiled whitely over the city from atop the Montmartre.
It cost money to do the town of Paris. Naples was Gimbels’ bargain basement compared to the French capitol where champagne sold for eighteen dollars per bottle if you were a new face and fifteen if the manager counted you among his friends. It was SOP to start out the evening by talking about seeing the famed Folies Bergere, but few 504 men ever saw the Folies; there were too many noisy little cabarets that served to distract the GI from his predesignated course. He forgot the war in a tumult of brassy music, painted lips, purple hair, sky scraping coiffeurs, can-can kicks, the pop and fizz of chilled champagne, all encased in claustrophobic closeness and bathed in chromium plated light.
Upon returning from the battle of the Ardennes, the regiment discovered that what had formerly been the division area was now the 241st and 242nd general hospitals. The division’s loss was the 504’s gain, since the outfit was moved to Camp Laon, a better area in every respect and one in which the regiment was afforded a certain amount of highly valued seclusion.
At Laon there were more passes to Paris, a few seven-day furlos to England and the Riviera, and an occasional three-day pass to Brussels, Belgium.
American and British armies lined up along the West Bank of the Rhine gave extra significance to the training undergone by the regiment at Laon. The new C-46 Commandos were jumped by the 504 for the first time in the ETO and were proven to be all the designer had hoped for. The double doors, and especially the left-hand door about which so many paratroopers sweated lest they turn through force of habit into the wind when jumping, turned out to be nothing more than another mental hazard. However, the dirty work in the airborne crossing of the Rhine was left to the 17th Airborne Division. 504 men stood on the ground and peered into the clouds as the sky trains roared overhead Into the East.
The Prop Blast, the 504’s own regimental newspaper, was reborn after almost two years spent in limbo; Marlene Dietrich, Mickey Rooney and several lesser satellites of the entertainment world made their appearance on the 504 stage. Company parties became a regular feature, and everyone had as much fun as they did at the English tea dances, despite the fact that the French soirees were almost without exception terminated by the opening of hostilities.
The 1st Battalion was officially decorated with the Presidential Unit citation ribbon for their action at Cheneux, Belgium, and Private John R. Towle was posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for single-handedly beating back an enemy armored attack during the battle for the Nijmegen Bridge in Holland six months before.
The time passed quickly in Laon, as it had always done, and as the war in Europe went into its final phase, the 504 once again boarded “40 and 8s” and went into their last battle.