Christmas, 1944Remember our Troops throughout the world on this Glorious Day. Remember them on other days too.
Colonel Wallace M. Hale, Division Chaplain, 88th Infantry Division, writes in his Christmas letter this year about the "Blue Devil" Division on the Winter Line in the sector east of Highway 65.
"I will always recall that Christmas of 1944 in the midst of hand-to-hand conflict. The weather that year was atrocious and only young men could operate in the sleet, bitter cold, and 3 to 4 feet of snow. The Germans were trying to hold up our advance, and they made any gain expensive."
"I asked my Division Headquarters to print over 5,000 Christmas Bulletins. We asked for six volunteer choir members, loaded our public adress system into a jeep trailer, had Ordnance construct a portable Christmas tree lighted with 50 auto bulbs. Van Iderstine - my driver, assistant, professional organist (all, while being my best friend) - and we headed for the front."
"Wherever we found 20 or more soldiers we played Christmas carols, sang carols, read the Christmas story from the Bible - concluded the service with a GI, 5 feet tall, wearing a steel helmet singing 'Away in a Manger' with a tenor voice that must have made all the angels stop and listen - and I wept along with the battle-weary 'dog-faces' as we prayed that someday we would be home again." (from the Military History Network)
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