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MEMORIES OF LEO H. SCHEER about the invasion of France, June 6, 1944 World War II, Omaha Beach First, I should write a few words about the unit I was with. We were the 7th Naval Beach Battalion and were organized in Camp Bradford, Little Creek, Virginia. We received training there and also to Fort Pierce, Florida. After three months in Florida, we went back to Virginia and then to Long Island, New York. From there we were shipped to Glasgow, Scotland on the H.M.S Aquitania. We went from there by railroad to Salcombe, Devon, England which was to be our base. A Beach Battalion had three Companies, three platoons to each company. I was in platoon B-5, and each platoon had eight medics and a Doctor, eight motor mechanics, eighteen seamen, some signalmen, plus the Beachmaster and Assistant Beachmaster. Our job was to go ashore with invading troops and work between ship and shore. After a few months of training and maneuvers in Southern England, we went to Southampton, England where we were put aboard Coast Guard L.C.I. 94 (Landing Craft Infantry) on June 4th, 1944. The invasion was supposed to go that day, but a sudden channel storm came up and canceled the plans for that day. There were Army Engineers and Naval Beach Party on the craft, and for something to do, I suppose, on the delayed day, the Army men were moved to the forward hold and the Navy men to the aft hold. This move probably saved my life and also eight of my buddies lives the next day. On the evening of June 5th, we left the port, formed into a convoy and started across the channel. The water was rough, but not many men got seasick; they were probably too excited and no one slept much. During the night, the cook of the L.C.I passed out canned goods which he had in the ships pantry. He said we would probably enjoy it later on, and he felt his ship would never leave France. It turned out he was right. The ship had been in invasions in Africa and also Sicily. We were kept below deck all night. We knew out time to land was H-Hour plus 30 minutes. This was supposed to be after the Navy Demolition Team, Army Rangers, and parts of the Army 1st and 29th Divisions landed, if I remember correctly. It seemed about 6:00 or 6:30 in the morning when the L.C.I. was speeded up and we felt it hit the beach. The winches were operating to pull out the gangplanks. After a while, the ship began to back off the beach. We went in reverse for what seemed like a quarter of a mile and was told the water was too deep in our first attempt to try to wade ashore. We were below deck all this time and getting very nervous and dry in the mouth. When we started forward again, the ship was running so hard that everything was vibrating. We hit the beach, bounced and went forward; hit the beach again, bounced and went forward; hit the beach again, and then heard an explosion up forward. As we were waiting for our door to open, we heard a lot of shouting and men running up topside. Then we heard another explosion up forward. Suddenly, our hatch was opened and an excited crewman told us to throw off our packs and gear we were carrying and get over the side into the water. We hurried up the ladder then and went out on deck. It seemed the whole forward part of the ship was a sheet of flames. I threw off my blanket and clothes pack, two large medical packs carried on each hip, my gas mask and belt with water, knife and other bandages. When I jumped over the side into the water, I went under and my helmet came off and sank. I really felt naked without it in a few minutes. When I came up, I set off my inflatable life belt and started swimming toward the beach. We were wearing tank suits like the Army had, coveralls on over everything; an oily set of coveralls that was supposed to protect us from mustard gas of the enemy were to use it. I soon found that swimming in a fairly heavy surf with all these clothes and heavy boots on was not easy. The Germans were hitting us with everything they had: mortars, machine guns, rifle fire, and artillery. When I realized how things were and the possibility of being killed was very real, a feeling of sadness and worry came over me. What would my mother and father do when they got the news? This feeling of worry over causing my folks grief stayed with me all day. While swimming toward the beach, I helped a man who was thrashing around the water frantically. I helped him get hold of a log tank and landing craft barrier. He seemed to fear drowning most, but I found he had on two life belts. The barriers had several mines on them and he almost hit one thrashing around. I did not want to, but I left him there for fear he would hit a mine and kill us both. A little further towards the shore, I came on an Army Engineer who was trying to swim while carrying large radio packs. He was so exhausted he was about to go under. I wanted to take the packs off of him, but he would not allow me to do so. He was supposed to get this gear to the beach and he would drown before he took them off. I swam and dragged and struggled with him until we realized we were in water which was shallow enough to stand on the bottom. Artillery and mortars were hitting the water close to us and a pattern of machine gun bullets started splashing the water and moved toward us and stopped just inches from us. The Army Engineer indicated I should go on in, so I left him there and started crawling on into dry land. Somewhere while all this was going on, I saw a helmet floating in the water like a little boat. I grabbed it, put it on, and felt more protected. The tide was moving in fast as I was struggling in, but I finally got out of the water and onto sand. When I got in a little closer to the breakwater, I heard some of my buddies yelling encouragement to me to make it on in. I got up a tried to run, but finally ended up crawling on all fours; not only from exhaustion, but it was safer. The breakwater was made of logs and was 4 to 6 ft. high in the area where I got to it. After awhile, I realized everyone was using it for protection. It was the front line—at least in this area of the beach. As I look back on that day, I guess everyone who was on the beach was the assault force, and we were supposed to secure the beach because no other troops landed that day as far as I know. After awhile, an Army Officer started walking along the beach, (I think he was a one star general) and started organizing things. He ordered anyone who had a gun to stick it up over the edge of the seawall and fire away. Anyone who did not obey his orders soon got cussed out real good. I remember one machine gun crew who complained that they couldn’t see what they were shooting at and he ordered them to shoot up the hill anyway, and cussed them out good while he was doing it. After some time of firing, I think I remember whistles being blown and the Infantry began going up over the seawall.
It was not my job to go with them, so I put my back against the wall, made a
step with my two hands and helped a lot of guys up over the wall. I was
damn glad I did not have to go with them. They really were brave
men.
I then got with one of my fellow medics by the name of Mullen and we started treating the wounded. We were trained to stop excessive bleeding, sprinkle sulfa drug on the wound, and bandage. Also, we were to give morphine as needed. Since we had left our medical pack and everything else on the landing craft, we used the bandages that each man carried, and soon learned not to pass a dead man without taking his bandage and water as emergency supplies. We had no trouble getting lots of extra bandages. I remember one Army Engineer that we used 14 bandages on before leaving him. We were supposed to move to our right (or to the west end of the beach) to our Beachmaster’s area. As we moved along, we treated the wounded that we came upon. Moving was mostly crawling or crouching behind the seawall where it was high enough. One of our big adventures moving down the beach was when we approached one of the very few of our tanks that made it in, and it was up on the road which went along the beach. The German artillery was trying to hit our tank, but their shells were landing just a little long in front of us on the beach. After waiting awhile, Mullen got up and said, “Let’s run past the tank”. For some reason, I grabbed him and pulled him down, and in just seconds, an artillery shell landed where we would have been. After our hearts calmed down, we got smart and started to time the shells coming in. As soon as one landed, we dashed past the tank. There must have been only one gun firing at the tank and in the time it took the Germans to unload, reload and fire, we got past the tank. When we finally got to our area of the beach, we found our Beachmaster, Lt. Fox, wounded; the assistant Beachmaster wounded, our company commander badly burned from the fire, and our doctor was missing. These were tough brave officers and they tried to do their jobs as well as possible considering the circumstances. They told us to do our jobs to the best of our abilities without a doctor, and told us we were more or less on our own. There was no way to evacuate the wounded because no landing craft were coming in and more men would be killed in the attempt to evacuate. I asked if anyone had seen my best buddy, J. B. Shuman, who was a medic like me, and another one of my seaman buddies, Cletus Shoptaw – but no one had seen either of them. As the day wore on, we treated the wounded when we found them. Other soldiers would see our Red Cross arm bands and they would yell, “Hey Doc, there is a wounded guy over here or over there” and we would go treat them. The conditions under which we treated the wounded was brutal. We could treat them, but had no stretchers so those who could not be moved lay where were hit. We had no blankets either, so it’s a good thing that the weather was not real cold. We kept hoping that things would calm down and some landing craft would come in so we could evacuate the wounded; but it turned out to be the third day on the beach before we could get the wounded off the beach. I finally looked at my watch and it was 4:00 P.M. I had the feeling that the day passed in a flash, but still lasted forever.
I suppose that everyone prays when he is in combat. I first prayed that
I would not get killed, then after awhile I prayed that it would be quick when
it happened. When I looked out to the channel, there were ships of every
description for as far as you could see. There was a row of poor guys
who did not make it all along the high water mark along the beach. The
sky was practically clouded over from bombers contrails flying from
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