mikel

I know the only (as far as I know) living soldier of the battalion, he has a speech by LTC Gottschalk that he was going to let me borrow. Once I have a digital copy of it I'll be posting it to the 285th's website.

Our River experts or information needed! As the historian for my father's WWII 284th Engr. C. Bn. - who served as Infantry at the Our, I've always been curious of the details of this crossing / battle (I feel it is fair enough to call it that) as they're severely lacking. I'm working with a 17th AB veteran (they took the hills), a 249th veteran (they build some bridges here), several 284th veterans (they replaced the 17th AB DIVISION as a BATTALION to guard Skyline Drive) and the 6th AD historian (they build more bridges and the 284th was assigned to). Does anyone else have any photos, information, documents, stories or help???? A book is needed on this subject as information is very very lacking (my end goal of this quest - some day - collaboration / credit is for sure an option). I will be at the Our in 3 or 4 weeks with a 284th veteran to go into the hills to try to find their foxholes and the pillbox they faced 100 yards to the East......

Thank you Frank, I know Doug and he was extremely helpful during our recent trip over to the ETO.

Is that link dead now? A son of the 351st reached out to me so I pointed to this discussion.

Okay, I'm super excited to report that I have exact locations for each of their stops on the trip south from Nuremberg to Marseilles and that tells us where all the rest stops were on the way. I have some of their maps and after carefully reviewing a map of France I discovered that it was actually marked!!!! I edited to add a image of the map cover just in case someone was looking for the exact same map (and I did see one on posted eBay). Hopefully this will also help others who might be researching this topic!

Really really cool information to have Marion! Woot! Did you know that he was an Automotive Mechanic (MOS 014) or was that new information?

Thank you Marion!! This fourth edition has a ton of new "stuff" added to it! New stories, maps, details, photos and somewhere around 30 new soldier photos added to the yearbook style roster! It is amazing to me how my little book about the 284th keeps on growing! NOTE: It is only the paperback that has been updated, I haven't had a chance to update the Kindle version yet.

It is very time consuming, but will be such a blessing the families! Keep up the great work

That map is awesome, I've been meaning to finish up the ones that I have been working on for the 284th. I do have their original maps though but the interactive ones are fun because I can add notes / photos and etc. http://284thcombatengineers.com/map.cfm

Wow, this is wonderful news! Great work and thank you so much for the help! This is thrilling. Marion I can't get to your map link though, access is denied Here are some details about the 284th's trip south from Nuremberg to the Marseilles area.

The 284th Engineer Combat Battalion was also part of the 1111th for a while. (April '45)

Wow, that is very impressive Alsatian! The 284th started out in Luxembourg with General Patton using them as infantry on the Moselle and Our rivers, then into Germany for the Roer crossing, down to Remagen, then to Nuremberg and finally ending up in Landshut to finish the war in the ETO.

I have a bunch of After Action Reports and they all give very specific locations for things that were happening. I'm trying to figure out if there is a way to convert those coordinates into lat/long so I can find those locations. Has anyone had any luck with this? I'm not sure if it is even possible... An example: Dragline 3 wants signs "Danger Mines, road not cleared" at 276863 Thanks for any advice on this!

I forgot to update, the 47th TB and 62nd AIB are now online: http://47thtankbattalion.org http://62ndaib.org

The book on the 125th is downloadable here: http://digicom.bpl.lib.me.us/ww_reg_his/16/ Also, I hope to bring a website online about the 125th soon. Right now though all I have is the book as well as the 14th's history book so if anyone has anything they can share that would be great.

Merry Christmas Marion!

Thanks Marion, I'm honored to do it for the guys and their families. It has been a blessing

I've adopted the 14th AD and have brought many websites online about their individual units. I found a copy of this online via the military library: http://digicom.bpl.lib.me.us/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1016&context=ww_reg_his Download and enjoy. Mikel PS: websites about the 14th so far: http://14thad.org (resurrected, I hope to give it a facelift soon) http://48thtankbattalion.org http://68thaib.org http://501stafa.org Coming soon: 47th Tank Battalion 62nd Armored Infantry Battalion

Great! Thanks!!

Just an FYI that I have brought http://285thcombatengineers.com on line! I'm waiting for some more information from some of the veterans of the unit but it does have some documents and photos. PS - It may take a day or so for DNS to get to everyone!

I just recently received a photo of the CP that was hit by the V-2 on 17 March 1945. It was a three story building and what you see is the building all collasped into the basement. You can see the smoke rising from the bomb just behind the house and in the upper left you can see the guys starting to search for those buried under the rubble. Unreal....

I am in contact with two veterans of the 14th Armored Division. If anyone has any questions for them feel free to ask me and I'll inquire.

I've even seen grave markers wrong due to this confusion

I don't know if any of your 39th folks might be interested in this: Original WW2 US Photographers ARGUS Camera Named to 39th Combat Engineer Soldier http://www.ebay.com/itm/Original-WW2-US-Photographers-ARGUS-Camera-Named-to-39th-Combat-Engineer-Soldier-/251896883117?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3aa63967ad

Oh my, there are some nice 245th photos on ebay but they're pricey. Maybe they'd take a reasonable offer? http://www.ebay.com/itm/WWII-Soldier-Personal-Photograph-Collection-Engineer-Combat-Battalion-/281666036996?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item41949aa504