It is may 29, 2014, in wellington, florida. What is your name . My name is harold berkman. I was born on february 26, 1926 in brooklyn new york. Ive been a resident of florida since 1975. Im 88 years old and in order to accurately trace my military odyssey, ive drawn from four sources one, my memory, two, my discharge papers, three, letters i sent to my parents when i was in europe, and, fortunately, my mother had saved my letters, and number four, regimental and battalion history of the 317th regiment at second battalion that had been declassified. A neighbor of mine who was an expert in terms of accessing the internet did the research for me. Lets back up for a minute. You said you are from brooklyn, new york . Did you were you raised and grew up in brooklyn . The first 11 years of my life, i spent in brooklyn. Then my father retired and we spent time in a town called monticello. That is where you went to school . That is where i went to junior high and high school. It is in my notes as i go along here. Do you have any brothers or sisters . One brother who is deceased. I came from a small town called monticello at the foothill of the catskill mountains. Monticello was approximately 90 miles from new york city. I was inducted in the army in 1944, shortly after graduating high school. I was 18 years old. Other inductees and i traveled by bus to fort dix, new jersey, where we were processed. When the processing was complete, we were put on a train and we were sent to camp crop, south carolina, outside of spartanburg. Lets back up for a minute. Do you remember growing up during the depression . During the depression, my father was in the nonferrous scrap metal business. He always made a good living for his family. My wifes father also, she was brought up in the depression. She was born in 1929, actually, and the family made a living. Both she and i are first generation americans. Her mother and father came from kiev, russia. My mother and father came from it varied as the borders shifted. One day it was russia, one day it was poland, and now on the map, it is belarus. That is where they came from. They came to this country, could not read or write english. Learned how to read and write english. Both my wifes father went into business and became an entrepreneur. My father went into business and also became an entrepreneur. So, we love america, ok . America, the United States has been very good to me and very good to my wifes family as well. Do you remember on december 7, 1941, where you were and how did you find out about the attack on pearl harbor . No. I have no recollection. At that time, i was in high school. Probably, as you had indicated previously, probably heard about it over the radio. Thats about it. Directly, was not affected because in my age category, no one, obviously, was being inducted and no one was volunteering. We were all too young at that point. Later on, of course, we knew what was going on as people from our town were inducted. I came from a very small town. In the winter time, there were 2500 people, and in the summer time, it jumped to half a million. It was a resort area. So everyone knew everyone elses business. If someone went into the army or into the navy, immediately, everybody knew about it. You couldnt hide it. Conversely, if you did not go, then everybody knew about that, too. So there was a stigma attached to that. Were you drafted . I was drafted. I completed 16 weeks of basic training. I was assigned to company b, 36th infantry training battalion. One sergeant was a phenomenal drill sergeant, a little guy probably no more than about four foot 4, 4 foot five, but he had a voice like a fog horn. The other sergeant had recently returned from the pacific. I was in excellent shape when i was drafted. I only weighed 145 pounds. I had played varsity soccer, varsity baseball, and i ran track. The training, as you are well aware, consisted of a lot of close order drill, calisthenics, how to throw a grenade, bayonet obstacle course, how to put on a gas mask, exposed to live ammunition with a machine gun, and the rifle range, which is something everyone looked forward to. We were all issued and m1 durand, eight clip rifle which weighed nine and a half pounds. After completing the requisite target practice on the rifle range, the usual results was what we called the m1 i and and m1 funk. The m1 i came about because you were taught to put this thumb under your eye when you are holding the rifle. The recoil from the rifle, you wound up with a black eye. The clip that went into the rifle, if you did not pull your thumb out quickly enough, you wound up with a thumb that was black and blue. That is something you never forget, by the way. I completed the 16 weeks of basic training and then went back to fort dix for embarkation to europe. The allies had suffered severe casualties during the battle of the bulge and replacements were being rushed overseas as quickly as possible. So i had a one week furlough and then, boom, i was on the queen elizabeth, which was a big cruise ship, if you will recall. A big ocean lighter. That big ocean liner. The ship was loaded with 22,000 men. In order to get that many people on the ship, one night, you spent in the cabin and the canvas bunks were stacked about four high. Then one night, you had to go up on the promenade deck. The promenade deck was enclosed with glass, but it was cold. I found a storage closet with duffel bags and instead of going up on the promenade deck, i spent the odd nights on top of my duffel bags in a closet. The food, by the way, on this ship, was terrible. You had to line up, you got two meals a day, and it took three hours until you finally got a meal. And it was an english ship, so they were serving mutton. Mutton has an odor its something that one never forgets. I lived on chocolate bars and cocacola during the voyage that we had across the atlantic. As an aside, there was no convoy because the ship was so fast that submarines could never get this ship. So we did a transatlantic crossing without a convoy. We went from new york harbor, we went to glasgow, scotland. We spent one night in glasgow, scotland and then, the following morning, we were put on a train and we were sent to southampton, where we were loaded that night onto another ship and we crossed the english channel. Which, by the way, was extremely rough because it was january. A lot of guys got seasick. We landed in le havre, france and they put us into an enormous tent city. There were probably about six guys in a tent. No heat. So we were scrounging to find wood to heat the stove in the tent. We stayed there for one day and then they put us with what the french called the boxcar held either 40 men or eight horses. We moved up toward the front, and as we moved up toward the front, we went through what was called replacement depots. The nickname was rebel double. You are also coming into contact with veterans who had been wounded and they were going back to their original outfits. The advice you get from these guys is that if you are going to go into the infantry, and that is where i was headed to go, the best job was to be a mortar man. So, because mortar men always stayed behind and were below a berm, so the enemy couldnt see them. So we got up to my division, my particular company what division were you in . I was assigned to company f, second battalion, 317th infantry regiment, 80th Infantry Division, third army. That, of course, you know is general patton. I joined my outfit in luxembourg. First lieutenant came out and he immediately said do we have any good mortar men here . Quick as a bunny, i raise my hand. He said you are now a machine gunner. So, at any rate not what you wanted . Not what i wanted. Im sure you know machine gunners after a while have to be exposed. Once you are exposed, the average longevity is about 35 seconds. Mortar men seemed to have a better longevity. The bulge lasted from december 16, 1944 to january 25, 1945, who were involved . There were a million men involved in this action. 600,000 americans, 55,000 british, and half a million germans. Casualties the americans had 81,000 casualties. Of the 81, 000, 19,000 were killed. The british had 1400 casualties and out of the 1400, 200 were killed. The germans, they had 101,000 who were killed, wounded, or missing in action. As far as the equipment is concerned, each side, the germans and the americans, they each lost a thousand tanks. The germans also lost a thousand aircrafts that had been shot down. Its the largest land battle that ever took place in terms of American History. Now, as you this was my first exposure, so to speak, to the guys i was going to be with. Your first combat experience was in the battle of the bulge . This was the battle of the bulge. My decorations include three campaigns, battle of the bulge, rhineland, and central europe. At any rate, im sure you know, but an Infantry Company consists of three rifle platoon and one weapons platoon. I was assigned to the weapons platoon. They have a headquarters, headquarters includes supply, administration and mess. The weapons platoon has two squads of machine gunners and two squads of mortar men. Originally, as a first gunner, second gunner, first ammo bearer, second ammo bearer. I was the second ammo bearer. You cant get any lower than that. The first action that you go into is something you never forget. The veterans who had been up there before, they dont want anything to do with you. Because they dont know how long you are going to last. So they dont want to become friendly with you. Im sure you undoubtedly know that as far as the world war ii veterans are concerned, there are only 200,000 of us alive today. 8000 of us die a day. Out of 16 Million People that served in the armed forces, approximately only a million actually saw combat, real, real combat. The infantrymen, seven out of 10 were killed. As im sitting here with you, im very fortunate to be here. I think the total dead in world war ii was Something Like 60 million. Pattons army, its in the history books, you know that. The third army was led by the fourth Armored Division. Im very friendly with a gentleman who was a Lieutenant Colonel and who retired as a general who was in the fourth Armored Division, so im privy to a lot of stuff that went on. He wrote three books and i read all three books. The 80th infantry vision used to follow the fourth Armored Division. Fourth Armored Division was a spearhead. 80th Infantry Division in the 26 division used to follow them and they used to mop up. Eisenhower asked patton how long is it going to take you to get up to up to baston . Patton was in Southern France and said 48 hours. They looked at him and they said you are crazy. You are never going to get up there. Remember, this is the wintertime. In mud, sleet, rain, ice, whatever, he gets up there in 48 hours. Now, he didnt tell them he was going to go 24 hours and 24 hours because they were moving at night, they were moving us at night as well. Its in the history books. This was a remarkable feat. The third army, the casualties for the third army, 2515 were killed out of 15 divisions. 14,977 were wounded and 5559 were missing in action for a total of 23,050 one people. Were you part of that march . No, i came in afterwards. Fortunately, i was not part of that march. I have heard a lot about it from general alvin or take who was a Lieutenant Colonel and had a tank battalion. He was one of pattons favorite tank battalion commanders. A fabulous guy. After baston was relieved, we started the big push and we started to push back. You never forget your first combat experience as i had indicated. Its like your first car, your first girlfriend, your first job, etc. So my first combat experience was a night crossing of a river. It was the border between luxembourg and germany. The river on one side, in luxembourg, is called suyi river, on the german side, its called the sauer river. Trucks took us to the drop off point and for you get on the truck, you are handed two grenades a fragmentary grenade and you get a phosphorous grenade. As soon a trucks start to move, the experienced guys take their grenade and bend the pins back and throw them off the side of the truck. The minute you get off the truck at the drop off point, the supply sergeant is there and he hands you two more grenades, so it was like routine. They know you are going to throw the grenades away, so they are going to give you two more grenades. Picture that on 145 pounds. Ive got a blanket, a shelter half over my pack, im wearing a winter overcoat, im carrying a carbine over one shoulder, and they hand me two boxes of machine gun ammunition. But nobody told me i was going to have to carry these two boxes of ammunition and nobody told me look for some cord, look for some straps, tie the two cans together, swing them over your shoulder like a dutch girl carrying two buckets of milk. So im carrying these two cans of ammunition and im thinking my arms are going to get ripped out of my shoulders. As we get close to the waters edge, somebody slaps a paddle under my arm. Now we get into the pontoon boat, a little pontoon boat and start paddling across. As we are paddling across, the germans are shooting up flares. They were shooting up flares while we were approaching the bank as well. In basic training, you are taught if a flare goes off, stand absolutely still. However, the experienced guys are hitting the ground. So i learned very quickly, you follow their lead. You also learn with the artillery shells, the germans had the adh, which was a classic weapon. The adh, you learn when you hear the whistle or wu a woosh, you know you are alright. Whoosh its when you dont hear it you know youve got a problem. When the shells land, there is an order an odor that comes from cordite, which is another thing you never forget, the odor of cordite. What did you think of the fighting ability of the german soldiers . Very well disciplined. Extremely well disciplined. In some instances, their equipment was better than our equipment. As an example, if you take a normal rifle platoon, and the rifle platoon, you have a squad and most of the guys in the squad have m1s. One of the guys has a browning automatic. So it not highly automatic. With the germans, its the reverse. Most of them have automatic weapons. They have a weapon called the burke gun. It has a magazine about yay hi and it was an automatic weapon and it did have, by the way, a particular sound that sounded like a burp. The other things the germans had that was better than ours was the machine gun. Our machine gun, when the barrels get hot after you fire the gun with so many rounds of ammunition, you can actually see the bullets because every fifth or sixth bullet is a tracer and you can see the tracers coming out and they are wobbling. When you want to change the barrel, you have to take the gun apart. So there is a downtime with that. The germans, their barrel, they had a clip, boom, boom, boom unhinge the clip, the barrel comes out, screw another barrel in. So there weapon was much better than ours. Either way, thats another thing you never forget. In the machine gun, and i was not trained as a machine gun, i was trained as a rifleman. In the machine gun, when you take the gun apart, there is a bolt about two and a half inches long and about two inches high. The bolt can go in two ways and you learn, double beveled edge up and toward the front. If you dont put it in that way, the gun wont fire. Thats another thing thats 70 years and it is indelibly impressed on my mind. At any rate, the engineers were attempting to put a pontoon bridge across the river. When we got across the river, we found the barn and we got into the barn and took shelter. The second platoon was already there. They had crossed earlier. After getting settled in the barn, sergeant calls me over and calls over the other ammo bearer, his name was donald. He said borrow a litter from the medic and he said psc perez hurt his ankle. Carry him back to the rivers bank and they will take him back across. Why was he so nice about this . Pfc. Perez was 39 years old and he was due for rotation. The sergeant figured send them back. So he went back. So we carried him back, then walked back to the barn. The next morning, we get up, it is light and we look outside and theres a big sign in german that says we had walked through a minefield three times. Fortunately, we didnt get hurt. That morning, the platoon sergeant grabs a hold of me because im on the bottom of the totem pole and he says come on, we are going to go scrounge for some rations. We start moving up the bank and as we are moving up the bank, we see dead american soldiers. Half submerged in the water and half on the land, bloated, white, and that was obviously the first time i saw dead americans. We get back to the barn and the First Lieutenant of the second platoon was having an argument with my sergeant another thing you never forget his name was Isadore Beckerman and he came from brooklyn. He was having an argument with the sergeant. He wanted the machine gun section to come outside and give his men cover as they were going to go up this very steep slope and attack the germans who were dug in on the top of the slope, on the crest of the slope. My sergeant refused to go. He had been wounded in france, so he was extremely cautious. Lets say risk aversive. He didnt go, we didnt go. At any rate, the second platoon starts to go up and they get about one third of the way up and the platoon sergeant set steps on mine. And it must have been a big one. It blew off his legs. Shot up into the air, came back down again and his head hit another mine and it severed his head. That was the first time i had ever seen anybody get killed. They got about a third of the way up and the germans unloaded. Pushed them back into the barn. They stayed there until that night, and that night, the rest of company f nate across the river and we moved into a night attack. One thing you learn when you go into a night attack as you never fall out. Ive seen guys urinate in their pants, defecate in their pants, dont fall out. You fall out, you get lost, you are never going to find your outfit. Another thing that is scary at night, sound travels a lot at night and you can hear the tank tracks. Thats the scariest sound in the world when you hear tanks moving around. We kept moving forward pattons philosophy is the only way you can win a war is to attack. And then you attack again and then you attack some more and then you keep attacking. And thats what we did from the end of january into february, we were constantly engaged with the end. Ny. You move forward, you dig a hole, you engage with the enemy. You get up, you walk again, you dig another hole. And this is what you constantly dominate you constantly moving forward. February 10 was a date that i remember. February 10 we crossed at the junction