By some miracle, I managed to stay alive and unhurt. We were attacking Germans entrenched in an old monastery on a hill called Monte Cassino. There was ferocious fighting, small arms, mortar, artillery, bombing, much pushing forward and then retreating. It seemed as if we were never going to get past this defense position the Germans had set up. Many Italian prisoners came in, but the Germans were fighting to the last man. It looked to me as if we were going to lose the war, or at least keep fighting until either I was killed or died of old age.
Rumor spread along the lines that we were about to mass a major attack coordinated with division, corps, and army artillery. I, personally, wasn’t ready. I was at the very limits of what I could endure, but then so was everyone else.
I was half asleep in a hole with a friend called Stan Cramer, when Sergeant Messer came up to our hole.
‘OK, you two, haul ass outta there and follow me, the captain wants to see you.’
We crawled back on our bellies, in the mud, to the company CP. The CO was as dirty as the rest of us. Somehow he’d also managed to survive. He was one of the only company commanders in our battalion who had lasted this long.
He wanted us to go on a reconnaissance patrol. The word patrol had taken on a special quality of its own for me. My brain, my insides shook when I heard it. I was so frightened I couldn’t speak. I listened with Stan, as the CO pointed at his dirt-smeared, often-folded map and explained what was going to happen, what we had to do.
‘Now, this is only going to be a “recon” patrol, you two, so don’t get your ass in an uproar. We just want to find out if a little bridge up ahead has been mined or has been set to be blown. If anyone opens fire or you see anything that looks like a serious defensive position, hustle your asses right back here. This whole battalion is supposed to attack at oh-six-hundred, right through there, and if that bridge is intact, it would sure make things a lot easier. Artillery will start coming in at oh-five-thirty, so get on back here before then. You understand?’
He explained how the bridge was over a small stream. The stream could be forded but would be hard for the antitank guns and heavy-weapons people. He wanted to know just what was there if we could find out.
He gave us C rations: hot hash and hot coffee. Then he left us. We ate leaning against a piece of broken masonry near the CP. We didn’t talk much. We rested. It was good to be off the line, even if it was only a hundred yards back. We had four hours before we were to move out.
At four o’clock in the morning we started. We moved behind our own lines, north, till we were in line with where the bridge was supposed to be. I remember the password that night was Lana-Turner. We came up to the last outpost on that part of the line. It was the Third Platoon. They challenged us and we gave the password. We slid down into the hole with them. We told them what we were supposed to do. They told us they hadn’t seen any bridge but could tell us where the stream was, down the hill, just before you had to start up the next hill. They insisted the hill was absolutely infested with Jerry. They scared us with descriptions of suspected mortar emplacements here, snipers there.
We went out carefully; I could taste the coffee in my nose and in the back of my throat – sour. I should never have drunk it. We slid and slipped down the hill. It was hard mud with flat loose shale over the whole surface. We came to the stream. We stopped.
Stan had the map and was sure the bridge had to be farther to the north yet, although it was actually supposed to be more east than north. I had no idea. I was interested only in going through the motions and getting back.
We started working our way up along the draw formed by the stream. It was hard going because it was so dark. The sky had that little bit of light that always seems to come before dawn when you’re on guard duty and waiting for relief. But, as usual, it didn’t help much. Mostly, we guided ourselves by the sound of water running in the stream.
The sides of the draw began getting steeper, so we slipped more and more often into the water. Then Stan stopped. He pointed. There was a bridge. It had to be the bridge we were looking for. It was a typical Italian bridge one finds around this area, constructed of stone part way out on each side and the middle built with heavy wood. It was longer than the stream was wide, so the stream must have run more fully in the spring. We crept up a little closer. Stan leaned close to my ear.
‘You willing to slide out on that thing and take a look-see? I’ll scramble up the side of this hill to cover you.’
I was willing but I didn’t want to. I nodded my head. Stan put his mouth close to my ear again. He had a luminous watch he’d taken from an Italian officer.
‘We have about half an hour before all that corps and division crap is supposed to hit. We sure as hell want to be far from here by then. Give me five minutes to get up in a good spot to cover, then scramble out on the bridge and give it a quick going-over.’
He started off up the ridge. I sat and wondered what I was doing. I had a carbine and four grenades. Out on that bridge I’d be a dead duck if anyone were guarding it. Only the dark was in my favor. This was one of those patrols that could turn out to be only a cold, wet walk or a last walk into the final cold.
When I figured Stan had to be in place, I started. Twice I slipped into the streambed till it was over my boots, so I figured I’d walk along in the water at the edge of the stream; it was easier and I wasn’t going to get any wetter. I was reaching the point where I was not only scared but scared of being scared. When you get too scared, you don’t do the right things at the right time in the right way; that can be really dangerous.
I wondered if I should be higher up on the side of the hill with a chance to scurry for cover. The problem is, when nothing is happening, I get careless.
Now, as I got closer to the bridge, there were bushes and reeds growing along the edge. I moved into them and looked at the bridge carefully. There seemed to be no one there. I started to worry about the time; my watch is only a normal Bulova, which doesn’t glow in the dark, and I couldn’t read it, no matter which way I twisted my wrist. The orphanage, St Vincent’s, gave it to me as a high school graduation present because I was first in my class. It’s amazing it’s still working after all it’s been through. It’s an ordinary watch, not waterproof, but it’s been in a lot of water.
I reached the bridge on our side of the stream. I slithered under it and felt for a mine or dynamite sticks. There was nothing. I pulled myself up onto the bridge quietly and stretched out there. At this point, I began to feel that the moon, the stars and all possible light available were concentrating on me. I looked under my arm, almost expecting I’d cast a shadow. It was too dark; my imagination was running amuck.
I pulled myself on my belly and reached over the edge of the bridge to check each of the supports. I figured if anything started, I’d just let myself drop into the water and float on downstream. I was probably not actively thinking this, but the thoughts were there.
The secret to success on any patrol is full-fledged paranoia. You have to expect the worst to happen and be prepared for it, at any minute. The least surrender to a sense of security is an invitation to sudden death.
I slid farther along the bridge. I tried to stay beneath the cover of the railing and reached far under to the center support where the diagonal wooden braces met. It’s the place where dynamite should’ve been placed if somebody really wanted to blow this bridge. There was nothing. I was beginning to feel more confident. I slid farther along and now only had to check those supports where the wood fit into the stone on the other side. Stan and I had agreed that, when I was finished, and if everything was OK, I’d wave my arm so he’d know to start back to our meeting place, the place where we’d separated. This wasn’t the first patrol I’d been on with Stan. We’d take turns doing the hard parts, and it was my turn.
I leaned over the edge of the bridge again, feeling for something there but not really expecting it. Then, two hands reached out from under the bridge and