Divisional History
A History of the 90th Division in World War II
6 June 1944
To
9 May 1945
Chapter 8
The Siegfried Line
The Maginot line had been crushed by the irresistible advance of American troops. Germany itself lay only a few kilometers to the east, and in Germany lay the fortifications on which the enemy High Command relied to save the “sacred” soil of the Fatherland. What ingredients were fused to make the Siegfried Line were not known completely. The 90th Divisions was soon to learn.
In the meantime, the 10th Armored Division, which had crossed the Moselle in the wake of the 90th with the mission of probing north toward Sarrburg, had run into a defensive belt running from Nenning on the Moselle east to Merzing on the Saar. This belt, as it developed, was a switch pattern of the Siegfried Line.
Since the nature of the terrain and the quality of defense denied passage of the armor of the 10th, the 358th Infantry was assigned the task of clearing a path in the vicinity of Tettingen and Oberleuken. On Thanksgiving morning, November 23rd, the 358th launched its attack. After making excellent progress initially the assaulting battalions became targets for violent artillery barrages. Pillboxes with well-defended communications trenches located in carefully selected positions provided the enemy with a perfect defense.
Nevertheless, the attacking regiment moved forward in spite of a heavy toll in casualties. For three days the reduced one after another of the German strongpoints, driving north as far as Oberleuken and Butzdorf, capturing prisoners, destroying the Siegfried defenses. Two towns, and part of a third had been taken, 26 pillboxes put out of action, 500 prisoners captured, and the deepest penetration made of the switch that was to be effected during 1944.
These achievements were accomplished, however, at a high cost. At the end of the three days of enemy action and trench foot had reduced the effective rifle strength of one battalion to a mere 100. The serious drain in the Regiment’s strength, plus the grueling period of action it had seen during the preceding two weeks were more than sufficient reasons to effect immediate relief of the exhausted 358th. The XX Corps issued the necessary orders, and the following day the Regiment moved reward for rest and rehabilitation.
Meanwhile, the 357th and the 359th Regiments were pressing east toward the Saar River. The long-awaited promise of an actual physical invasion of German took active form and shape as the 90th moved steadily eastward, out of the soil of France and into the fringes of the enemy homeland itself.
All approaches to the Saar were heavily and ingeniously mined, enemy artillery swept the roads; but town after town was cleared, and mile after mile was gained as the Division moved steadily forward toward the Saar . . . and to the Siegfried Line. At last, on November 29th, 90th Division patrols reached the banks of the Saar River, the first such patrols in the XX Corps to reach the preliminary objective. To the south the 95th Division approached the Saar with the mission of establishing a crossing at Saarlautern. To the north the 10th armored was closing in on Merzing.
Originally the plans called for the seizure of a bridge over the river at Saarlautern by the 95th, and that division was then to swing north and seize the high ground opposite Rehlingen, covering the 90th’s crossing at that point. However, the approach of the American troops set off such intense enemy fire from across the Saar that the German’s intentions to hold firmly became evident. In view of the opposing strength, therefore, the 95th’s plan to swing northward became impracticable. The 90th would make its own bridgehead at Dilligen . . . the most dense, the thickest portion of the entire Siegfried Line.
The date for the crossing was set at December 6th. The few days preceding the assault were devoted to the readjustment of lines, establishing OPs, clearing roads of mines, and reduction by direct fire of those pillboxes on the opposite banks which could be observed.
After having successfully negotiating the flooded Moselle, it might be presumed that there was no further terror in rivers for the 90th. But the Saar presented new problems, some of them seemingly insurmountable. The nature of the terrain offered only a few approaches to the river itself, approaches whose location were well known to the enemy, and therefore subject to whatever artillery he chose to expend on such profitable targets.
High ground to the north provided Germans with ideal observation posts from which to observe all that might occur along the entire length of the river, and to adjust fire accordingly. Mutually supporting pillboxes of great density were seen by observers. How far back from the river they extended no one knew. The flat open ground between the river and the parallel railroad was well and thoroughly covered by the fortifications, and in addition there were entrenchments in the flat ground itself.
An added difficulty, no strange on to the 90th, the Saar, like the Moselle, was in flood stage, its opposite banks were inundated, cross-country movement was extremely difficult if not impossible.
These were the challenges presented to the 90th Division as it prepared to force its crossing of the Saar. The Division made its necessary reconnaissance, surveyed the battlefield, completed its plans, and as usual, accepted the challenge. On December 6th the 90th Division hurled itself into the teeth of the Siegfried Line.
Duplicating the feat performed at the Moselle River less than a month earlier, the 90th moved its assault boats quietly over the Saar in the pre-dawn hours and once again caught the enemy unaware. The 358th was on the right, the 357th on the left, while the 359th maintained a constant hail of fire from the west bank of the river, drawing heavy retaliatory fire in return.
The first day the attacking elements had successfully advanced to a line generally marked by the railroad, but in order to make such gains it was necessary to by-pass many pillboxes. With the enemy-held pillboxes to the rear, the infantry was subjected to harassing fires and it became vital that these boxes be neutralized and cleared before further progress could be expected. Fire from both flanks of the Division zone, while not disastrous, had the effect of slowing the progress of the90th.
In the meantime, bridging operations were meeting difficulties. Here again, as with the Moselle, the Saar river fought on the side of the enemy. Each time the necessary cables were stretched across the river, the current snapped them like a string. The task was further complicated by the enemy’s observation on the crossing site and the consequent artillery fire expertly zeroed in.
Despite such obstacles, however, a footbridge was installed and remained in place for a period sufficient to send more troops across the river. The Germans lashed the site with heavy fire and succeeded in destroying the bridge. And now and again began the old familiar story of supplying the infantry by carrying parties, by utilizing assault boats negotiating the dangerous currents of the river.
No firm line had yet been established along the front. Contact between battalions was either non-existent or insecure. The Germans found it an easy matter to infiltrate between the two, reoccupy the pillboxes from which they had previously been ousted, and engage the Americans from the rear. Again and again, day after day, as the reduction of the highly fortified Dillingen progressed, the infantry found it necessary to take and retake pillboxes which were assumed to be out of action.
Counterattacks and roving German tanks pounded against he doughboys whose only support was the artillery, still emplaced across the river. With no bridge or ferry in operation, the armor remained chafing and impotent on the west side of the Saar. The attack of the enemy increased in intensity as fanatical Nazis, occasionally marching in close order into battle, endeavored desperately to erase the American penetration of the Siegfried Line. Casualties among the Germans were immense. Division artillery, massing its fires to halt the incessant counterattacks, strewed the fields and the streets of Dillingen with dead and wounded Boche.
But the enemy action was also grinding down the strength of the 90th Division. The two regiments across the river, in three days of valiant effort, had succeeded in establishing a precarious bridgehead to which they clung with desperate tenacity. How long they could hang on without help, however, was a serious question. Shortly after midnight on the fourth day, the 359th Regiment was committed to the attack.
Trench foot, too, inflicted more than its share of casualties as the malady hit the 90th with epidemic force. Men limped into battle on senseless swollen feet. Some were carried to their weapons. P-47’s of the XIX Tactical Air Force joined the fight, but not with guns or bombs. They came in low, swooped over the area at tree top level, and dropped their freight with heartening accuracy . . . medical supplies for the wounded and sick.
On the fifth day a ferry and raft were placed in operation. Tanks and jeeps and anti-tank guns began to trickle into the fight on the right sector of the Division zone. In five days of vicious fighting, however, no contact had yet been established between the 358th on the right and the 357th and the 359th on the left and center respectively. A line of fortifications, perpendicular to the river, remained unreduced and prevented all physical contact between the regimental elements. Therefore, since the armor crossed the right zone, it was unable to swing to the support of the center or the left.
The 95th Division was meeting similar resistance in the city of Sarrlautern on the right, and a juncture with that Division was only too far from being realized. Bridging activities continued to be the main business of the Engineers, but all the elements combined to make that job most difficult. Smoke screens, placed to cover the crossing sites, were dissipated by the high and constantly changing winds racing up and down the Saar valley. Even the patience of Job might have been taxed under the circumstances, but the Engineers and the Chemical Warfare units continued their labors in spite of the obstacles.
The seventh day witnessed great improvements in the infantry’s position. A civilian volunteered to induce the defenders of the pillboxes which separated the right form the left sectors to surrender. He succeeded in persuading the occupants to come out, and contact between the regiments was finally obtained. It was now possible to send armor all along the Division front.
December 15th, and the Division fighting along the narrowest zone in its combat history, had made only minor penetrations into the Siegfried Line. Casualties due to wounds, sickness, exposure and trench foot, were wreaking havoc. Therefore, it was determined to storm into Dillingen itself, occupy the city as a stronghold, and then cross the Prims River, turning south to make contact with the 95th Division, still severly engaged in Sarrlautern. The infantry, aided as usual by the effective support of armor and accurate artillery fire, pushed across the railroad tracks and reduced staunchly defended pillboxes which faced them in profusion.
In the fighting that followed, the 90th pushed resolutely into the city of Dillingen, clearing block after block of the enemy. The densest portions of the Siegfried Line had been successfully negotiated, and Dillingen was in process of falling to the 90th. House by house and room by room the 90th pushed through the city. In spite of the fact that no bridge had been built to span the Saar River, the Division had succeeded in crushing one by one the defenses that constituted the “invincible” Siegfried Line. The shadow of the 90th had fallen squarely on the heartland of Germany.
And suddenly the picture changed. In the north, in Luxembourg and Belgium, General von Rundstedt hurled his best division into a final counteroffensive. Before the fury of the attack the American lines bent back. In the Moselle-Saar triangle another enemy assault was in preparation. The spearheads across the Saar were exposed and vulnerable. In view of these rapidly altering developments, the 90th was ordered to disengage, to return its forces to the west bank of the Saar.
Never before in the history of the Division had it disengaged, and its first experience was fraught with difficulty and danger. Only one ferry, one footbridge and few assault boats were available for the maneuver that was to move the entire Division across the river under enemy observation.
On December 19th the withdrawal began. As the troops retired they destroyed all equipment which might possibly be of aid to the enemy, mined the areas they abandoned and moved slowly westward. For three days the operation continued, while the enemy remained in complete ignorance of what was occurring.
Crews, working on the bridge and ferry sites, performed miracles in moving vehicles and armor across the Saar. Roads on the eastern side became impassable, and each vehicle required winching through the mud and over the steep banks. Enemy artillery destroyed the ferry, and with only a few hours remaining in which to complete the withdrawal, 25 armored vehicles remained on the wrong side of the river. In the darkness and in freezing waters, under continuous shelling the men at the river slaved through the night to salvage what they could. Only the wreckage of six vehicles remained as a prize for the Germans when the withdrawal was completed.
And so the crossing of the Saar was successfully accomplished, the Siegfried Line cracked, and another triumph almost with the grasp of the 90th. But the fortunes of war had not entirely erased the Division’s achievements at Dillingen. For now the men of the 90th knew that the Siegfried Line could be broken, and they knew also that if they had done it once they could do it again.
The opportunity lay not far in the future.