This is a picture of a schoolhouse that Dad remembers staying in just north of Thionville, close to the Luxembourg border. There were about 75 men staying in the upstairs, no furniture, but they found a couple of bails of straw and used it to pad their bedrolls. It was November 1944, very rainy, lots of mud, and the men were glad to have a dry place to stay for a change. A French family lived downstairs. Their son was gone someplace fighting with the resistance ( Dad said that the 160th often gave rations to the French fighters, let them in their chow lines when they had them, and sometimes gave them clothes ). The family had a special wine stash that they were saving for a celebration when their son returned, but they served it to the men that were staying upstairs instead. Our artillery was a short ways behind the school and they fired all night every night. The gun explosions and screaming shells made it difficult for the 160th to sleep, mostly because the men could not hear the incoming for the noise our own guns made. This made them very nervous, especially after their long stay across from Metz with the shellings they took every day. Dad said they were able to bunk in the school house for two or three weeks. My Dad is the soldier just above the spare tire, the women and child are part of the family downstairs and the other two soldiers are unknown to me, but from the 160th. Notice the hook on the front of the jeep.
Glen Blasingim
