MEMORIES OF LEO H. SCHEER about the invasion of France, June 6, 1944 World War II, Omaha Beach

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             The third night on the beach was a little more peaceful and it was a big relief to know our wounded were out on ships and getting decent help.

             The fourth day was another fantastic sight to see.  The ships began unloading and all day long was a steady stream of troops, vehicles, and weapons.  They moved right off the beach and up inland to the war.  The beach had not been cleared of mines, and several trucks were blown up when they ran over mines.  This was especially true for the “Ducks” because the went directly from water to land.  The beach looked more like a junk yard every day.  Floating docks were brought onto the beach and a line of old ships

were sunk out a way to make a breakwater.  The Army began to take the wounded directly into the landing craft now, so we were finally left without much to do.

             I don’t remember which day it was, but an Army Hospital came ashore with nurses and we were really glad to see them.

             Sometime during the fourth night we were awakened by the sound of machine gun fire and the roar of aircraft engines.  We were being strafed by a German plane.  About every night there would be an air raid or at least a scare.  There would be such a hail of anti-aircraft fire to go up that some men were getting hit by shrapnel falling back to the ground.  You could hear the pieces hit the ground and it was a good idea to get under something for protection.  My buddy and I built ourselves a dugout in the front yard of a house along the beach, so that when the shrapnel would come back to earth, it was a good place to be.  We made a mattress out of inflatable life vests, so we had pretty good conditions compared to the beginning.

             One day Shuman and I climbed up the hill and rooted through some of the German pill boxes.  We found some souvenirs in one of them; a couple of bottles of wine and some pepperoni like sausage.  To this day, it was the best food and drink I’ve ever had.  When we got back to the beach we were loaded and a photographer took our picture with my German flag, picture of Hitler and my German rifle.

             The next day, we noticed that the fire was out on our Landing Craft; so when the tide was out, we went out and went aboard.  I found my backpack, gas mask and medical packs where I had dropped them on deck.  The fire burned out before it got to them.  We went into the front hold of the craft and found that the first explosion we heard was when we struck a mine.  It opened a 6 to 8 foot hole in the bottom of the ship.  The second explosion was when we were hit by an artillery shell.  It tore a 3 t0 4 foot hole in the side and flipped over one of the gangplanks.  We surmised then from the angle and everything, that it was the 88 in the pill box at the west end of the beach that hit us.

             The cook was right about this landing craft never leaving France.  I sure enjoyed the cans of sardines that he gave me the night before D-Day.  I had stored them in my backpack. I hope the cook survived, but I never saw him again.

             After about a week or so on the beach, another storm came in the channel and the water got really rough.  Small boats began to wash ashore and even a coastal freighter was pushed up on the beach.  A dumb landing craft tried to tie up to the floating dock, broke it in two and it came crashing up on the beach.  All we could do was to try and keep dry from the rain and watch the show.  The beach was really a pile of junk when the storm was over.

             About 10 days or so after D-Day, a group of men came on the beach who were some of the bravest men I have ever seen.  The grave registration detail.  There is no need to describe what happened to some of our men, but these men gathered up the bodies, registered them, took personal things off of them, and buried them.  I knew where some bodies were that they might miss, so I took them around and showed them.  They asked me to help, but I didn’t have what it takes.  They gave the German dead the same care.

             The days were getting pretty easy and boring for us now.  Our doctor was still missing.  We checked the graves and found some people that we thought were missing, but not our doctor.  So one day, we hitched a ride on an Army Jeep to go up into France and see what was going on.  We must have gone 10 or 15 miles inland and pulled into a field surrounded by hedge rows.  We had not even gotten out of the Jeep when all hell broke loose again—machine gun, rifle fire, mortar and artillery fire.  We lay on the grass and tried to be small.  When things calmed down, we helped unload the Jeep.  The driver asked if we were going to stay or go back with him.  We went back. We were not as tough as we thought we were.

             Another incident which happened on D-Day that I just remembered (and I’ll put it in here).  It was probably D-Day afternoon and we were along the garden wall treating wounded and trying to stay alive, when a man came walking down the road like he was on a Sunday stroll.  When he got closer, we saw he was an Army Chaplain.  He stopped and asked us if we were alright, or if we needed him for anything. We said we were alright, and he continued on down the road very calm and serene.  I never saw him again.

             I began to spend most of my days, along with Shuman, scrounging food from the Army as well as something to drink.

             After about two weeks on the beach, we were loaded into trucks and taken to an Army portable shower.  I took my clothes off for the first time in two weeks, had a shower, clean underwear, and really felt great.  It was the best bath I ever had.  The little things are so good when you don’t have them.

             One day a poison gas scare hit the beach and it was comical seeing guys running wildly around trying to find their gas masks.  I wonder now if someone started it on purpose to get the men to carry their gas masks.

             One morning after sleeping a little late, I woke up and crawled out of our dugout; when I looked around, I saw our front yard surrounded with a rope with flags tied to it.  After a few minutes, an Army Captain came up to the rope and told me nastily to get the hell out of there.  I was in a mine field that had not been cleared.  I was not in a very good mood so I told him to go to hell, and if he wanted me out he could come in and try throwing me out.  He gave me some dirty looks, then turned and left.  No one bothered us in that spot after that rope went up.

             Another day, we were sitting along the sea wall watching the show, when we saw a man walking towards us who looked familiar.  When he got closer we realized it was our doctor.  He had the same clothes on that he wore D-Day, but he was all neat and clean.  When we asked where he had been and what had happened to him, he said he was picked up by a small boat after we jumped into the water, they took him out to a ship and then back to England.  He had been all this time trying to get back to us.

             Some of our guys were skeptical; none of us had seen a small boat, but I think his story had to be true.  It was bad enough swimming in with the tide and waves, as opposed to swimming out away from the beach against the tide and waves with all our clothes on.

             In a few days, we heard that Cherbourg was taken or some port city was taken.  We now had a regular port and we were not needed on the beach, so we would be going back to England.  When I realized that I was going to survive this thing, I had an emotional feeling which was new to me.  I was totally depressed and sad.  I wondered how men could do these things to other men.  I wondered why I was alive and not buried with all those other men on the beach.  I crawled into some thick bushes in front of a house and stayed there all day.  My buddy wondered what happened to me that day and I told him I just went for a long walk.

             The day we left France, we were all packed and waiting for a landing craft to come in and pick us up.  When it came in, it was about a mile down the beach and it was a hell of a long walk carrying all my gear, two German rifles, ammunition and other souvenirs.

             We landed on the beach kids and left a lot older in some ways.  Most of us were proud we had done our jobs the best we could and had seen things few men see in their lifetime.

 

  

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