Letters from George

Dear Marian

I got your letter the other day? and was really glad to hear from [you. I haven't] been getting very much mail lately [but] the letters [don't] suppose me because I had moved? several times?. He? came [---] [has] been [---] worrying [about] [what I had] been [doing]. I'll write? a story out of this letter [to fill you in as best I can].

The invasion is probably the greatest thing that I went through but at that time I didn't know it. It was new to me so I didn't really [realize] what it was [I was] going through. [We] hit the beach the first wave? of the landing?. The Germans had worked? and [---] [---] but the [---] at that beach [---] to keep [---] for landing. As soon as we landed we started pushing forward? [---] [---] two close to us. After this Patton started rolling. He went so fast that we couldn't keep up with him so they gave us a rest [near] about forty miles from Paris. I had [already] driven straight through Paris and [didn't] really see? it so I took off with a couple of fellows without permission and spent two days. That took off the good conduct list so I don't get a promotion? for that.

Not long after that we were taken out of action and given a job at an Engineer Dump in Belgium [where] Tommy Coleman? was working. I caught? an office? job there checking the trucks coming in and out. That lasted for a month and then we were sent to [a] very [nice] still in Belgium[,] for another area? job. I had to work for a living there but it was a nice city. Plenty of Cafes, girls, movies, and everything.

Just when I thought I had a racquet? in the Army they sent us back in action to the Hurtgen Forest in Germany. We weren't there very long though when the Germans started their push back into Belgium. We were sent back to help check it. Instead of picking up German mines we were laying our own mines to stop the Germans. Christmas and New Years I spent [de]mining one of these mine fields of ours.

Then when the Germans were checked and being pushed back again we had to build bridges that they blew up as they retreated. When the Germans were pushed back out of Belgium we got another [few] weeks rest and then went back to Germany.

We were getting ready to make the crossing of the Roer River that started the drive through Germany. The day before the crossing was when I got hurt. We were fixing a bridge on the super-highway a mile from Duren. German jet-propelled planes swooped in and bombed us. They made a direct hit on the bridge we were working on. I didn't get hurt bad but I went back to the hospital and missed the Roer Crossing.

I got back with the boys though before they hit the Rhine. We were with the Armored Division that took Cologne. We didn't build a bridge or anything across the Rhine. We? had to do [---] keep Civilians away from the River so they could do what they? needed to do? [---] them when they swept through Germany and off the Ruhr Valley and then kept going to meet the Russians. We were going to build a bridge across the Elbe River but that was where they met.

I'm in a little town now called Triedelburg?. You won't be able to find this on the maps but it is between Halle, Dessau, and Leipzig. We aren't doing anything now, just waiting until they decide what to do with us. I don't have enough points to get home for good but I hope to get a furlough before going to the Pacific.

Give Nick, Gary, and all my regards. I hope to see you all soon but I wouldn't bet on it.

Your brother George