ISU Library Shelley Collection: Box 8, Reel 4

hello wh oh this is your workhorse panel Jack Shelley reporting to you again through an army Rovio transmitter and the British Broadcasting Corporation I'm speaking once more from somewhere in Holland this year's wire days and not the least is the fact that alone most of this planning Western Front no not killing each other and some of the most serenely beautiful country in the world there are many things that become commonplace about war after you've seen it for a while but even the most jaded and battle-hardened men be he soldier our correspondent is in first day after day as he travels along the front areas but the beauty of this land especially in southern Belgium for the Allied attack against the Nazi offensive bulge is underway it's a land of sharply climbing hills and swiftly defending valleys our pastures and dense forests of pine curving steeply graded narrow roads and smell rushing streams cold dark water racing and splashing over rocky beds your jeep happens its way to the top of a lofty Ridge every few minutes and you look out for miles if the weather is good and see a view that makes you catch your breath the valley below cut by the Albany stream a close order drank of neat little field separated by hedgerows rise into the upper sweep of the hills wearing their green models of pine trees so thick they massed together their branches seemed to fuse together then you planted down at the valley and bounced over the stone bridge across the river and whisk through the little towns ask the follow the build houses of brick and native stone crowding right up to the street and strung out along it so that almost every building in the place fronts on the highway past the great church almost all was on the highest ground in town so this spire proudly holds the cross for all the see for miles around and then out of the town past the good stone Chateau there stands where the valleys to rise again like the medieval castle it used to be with its powers and its enormous cold halls and its great fireplace and portraits of its noodle owners on the wall and life is not with American soldiers warming their ship engines before the fireplace these days this is the path ahead and up the heroes to the next view somewhere even their beautiful I'm I need to step to the front where the first time he is attacking the scene was like a venture to some water fairyland small battles the hills and valleys now snow thick hanging heavy on the branches of the pine trees and on the other trees a thick side coating of Faust over the last few days so but everywhere you look the single white welcome only about the dark green almost black are the basis of the plains cabining up the hills think of the most beautiful Christmas cards the aims you ever saw think of the most tranquil snowy white edging with a winter wonderland any artist ever drew there are here here on a road that leads to war I rode the swells with tanks and trucks and fighting men even the air is white for the third that's hung over the battle area ever since the first army attacks begin steel settles in the valleys and creeps on on the sides of hills so that a few hundred yards away the scene begins to fade and then merges into a sack by cloud beautiful the eye is a bitter heartbreaking disappointment to the men who slugged their way forward to the attack this winter wonderland to our first army is perhaps even more of a fool than the Germans who opposed our assault into the Bulge our tanks slipped on the snow and ice and slide off the slippery roads and hillsides our troops have to fight their way through the dense barriers of the pine this and up the steep snips against a murderous fire our planes are kept on the ground by the silent fan so it is that beauty becomes our obstacle in this first army assault as well as Germans we have to hack it giddy and not that aside got at the human pole as you get to the front you see the evidence the pine tree is shattered by shellfire that mutilated trunk standing for noon in the wake of our advance other 3/2 the grown by advancing tanks the tread marks making black lions as they college into the soil beneath the white the snow gashed by foxholes and shell craters the towns where the fighting has passed smashed and burned out only empty stone walls remaining of the cousin Palmer's along the road there's precious little beauty where fighting has been but that is not a loss to mourn about time will pass and new pine trees and new snow will hide the scars even the foxholes the shelters will lose their kashaf lines and blend with surrounding terrain but nothing will replace the loss of a man who died here it'll take more than snow land new pine trees to hide the scars of those who are wounded here there is sadness compelled in this warning and this dying amid such unbelievable beauty there's almost insupportable shocked at the sight of live against that white floor because there's only one way that red stain got there that was the first dispatch by Jack sherry for WH Oh stand by now for the second dispatch and the British Broadcasting Corporation a new operation is underway for example it's taken for granted the enemy knows who all our generals are and if you mention one of them in connection with a certain location the Germans will know what command he has also I have a pretty good idea the way he operates even after their names and broadcast even if you don't get his name every war reporter meets a good bit of generals as I have and as lunch women and talks over the current situations become prism we don't get the third reveal about what we learned quite a while back and all through the meal there was conversation interested when I told him that contrary to the inflection our troops over here with a few maps and I noticed that on a bed wall in one corner of his office whenever he had time to sleep and we talked again mostly about the young veterans of this generation who have gone before the general said that when this thing began and he had his first batch of new draftees to handle he will serve in the current specimens of American young men that were there jitterbugging and other strange habits but these out the wildest was unmanageable where soldiers he'd ever run into mafia is a great surprise and pleasure it was just the other way along they've been the easiest rookies he'd ever handled fuel problems of discipline what's the old mine regular army enlisted men and once they were claimed they became the best soldiers he'd ever commanded he couldn't say enough for them and better courage one of the world to know that they were the people who will win this war and you could tell but while he didn't talk about the attacks scheduled for the next day sending those young men into battle and they're trying to avoid the loss of Missouri Linna mum was always on his mind then there was the general who invited us to lunch the day after his outfit had given the Germans the real thing one thing in which the Nazis not only lost a lot of men but a great deal of equipment as well the general naturally was in good spirits he was proud of the job his men have done but he wasn't all convinced that he knew all the answers we mentioned one point of the operation where he thought he'd taken a risk played ball a stuck his neck out gambling the German was on the one it had worked he told his chief of staff to watch him on that sort of thing and check him if he ever had any doubts about what the general was doing felt that sometimes he might otherwise make the serious mistake today after this victory wasn't ready because something else might called in the direction and he was right a couple of days later I met him or another part of the Father his outfit in action again and the general who called a couple of us in to give us a report on a new operation which had just begun took time to give us a very complete briefing even though he was up to his eyes in what and just as he was about through talking he heard a conversation a nearby room and went to investigate it was a Belgian woman who owned the house in which our troops were quartered and where the general had his command post it seems my mother off that has been in there first some days before and the woman had moved out taking only enough belongings to last a few nights and now she wanted to come back and get as many other things that she might require for longer stay and make an inventory of whatever she left behind this while a military operation was just getting underway direct from that house and the general very busy party fathers own interpreter very politely can settle the matter or a great satisfaction violin do for to check over the plate as great patience was done the general remarks he felt sorry for these people having to move out of that comfortable house to make me for our troops and he didn't want them to be bothered me more than necessary hardly the attitude a german general would take when this troops moved into a town was it but that's the thing I like about every American general I've been over here they're not pushing that I'll try a type holding everyone beneath an iron heel Americans this is actually speaking I return you to Des Moines those two dispatches by Jack Shelley were transmitted through the facilities of the BBC especially for station WH o Des Moines Iowa this is the British Broadcasting Corporation this London Calling North America next in our program it was in two dispatches by Jack sure is whao this is your war for Spanish Jack Shelly speaking to you through some war in Holland once again this report is being relayed to you through an army mobile transmitter and the British Broadcasting Corporation one of the most courageous fights in the series of citrus brothers behold the great German copper offensive in check and the first two pilots with a heavy defeat for an important part of the forces of the Nazi penetration you've heard how one of the best Panzer divisions in the German army was probably a trap and cut to pieces with almost a hundred forty of their vehicles captured by the Americans including 39 tanks most of them in good condition I was in the town where the battle roared to its climax men were taking part in the fight it was Christmas today when I had of the time particular regiment had given us good constructions every man in the outfit have a chance to eat a real honest-to-goodness Christmas dinner I thought down at the table with one battalion commander and thankfully the turkey myself he walk on gum stick yes we had our Thanksgiving spoiled because we were in a fight but by golly we took care to get this battle over in time for Christmas dinner it had been a heart and a savage fight with a margin between defeat and victory extremely close for a while the regiment had moved up at night and it was to get in front of the onrushing tanks so they're not the division the colonel dead and colder the jerries are coming down the road we'll get him they did shut up but not until after establish not the attack drove our forces back within 800 yards of a regimental command post and in various phases of the action more than a hundred rooms including the commander of a Tank Battalion were captured imagine when our forces came to pie it impacted the tongue where they will be infect other German Guard officers of the regiment's give a great deal of credit to a hastily summoned tank battalion which arrived on the scene in times of not much of a generator and this was the first battle these American tank men had taken part in this a lot of the work they conducted it was almost like the juries were stopped and then destroyed in this trouble lay as it always does demonstration of Logansport Indiana and the small group of men under his command good know about one of the many in the pond when a swarm of German shouting Heil Hitler and charging began to the fair position just about 24 hours second right during the attack after another big weapon before they went off the sergeant said and threw him right back the courage and devotion to duty of the targets run it was being removed from the machine on top of him when he had brought the revolver and fired four or five top from it and how he was killed when his comrades found him the gun would spill hot new ten in his round I'm sensing Widener directed the fight for 24 hours but finally mr. Frey of other pens way back to it later North America following days the next day the Yanks assault of the place in force and for good are these ten men to curate until one day after the wounded men or survival hurt they could no longer hold any kind of weapon they managed to get a phone to their ears and relayed orders and reports between the battle town building and the command post at about present work there has already been recommended for the toughest are declaration or heroism anyone earlier action he almost certainly we've got another medal for this one the sergeant says and we decided we make a fight out of it that's the target menu box back home who works at this German offensive for Europe this is Jeff hello picking right I return you to the mall this is the first dispatch by a gesture they've received whao Des Moines the second dispatch follows in ten seconds five and the British don't fasting operation this is an estranged holiday season in the war closer than it's been for weeks even in the city is relatively behind the line efficient observing dictators possible the constant reminder that people did to watch enlisted men of the American army being at her toes especially the Dutch people the town has arranged the hometown of sure for the men by the way besides you don't soon forget through the convolutions of a German dance routine whether you think it's one of our final accomplishment or not the fact is the jitterbug dance is being brought to Europe forever our men go in the liberated countries and in this line of GIS do slow leaves of the kitchen getting cuckoo or wrapping themselves with huge rounds of cookies they came at the palace and soon somebody it organized its own set and we sang the songs with all with fidelity I didn't think of his loved ones across the sea the banner was time to go and the Jew I picked up the rifle again in class all that steel helmet unless they're Dutch coats from the Red Cross girls and went out it is a moonlit night then somebody asked some of the tourists Poland wanted to go to a midnight service at a nearby church and we found the congregation made up almost entirely of American servicemen and women as I said it was a moonless night a good night for German plane and as the service progressed he heard the sound of silence outside and then any aircraft gun firing and finally the rumble of a bomb somewhere in the distance the congregation didn't make a move the priest didn't waver a note in his car the sound of a dullest Android M the dutch pls wheatley an end to his American publication initally but not 5:00 at night he told them I know there must be sorrow in your heart that being away from home on Christmas Eve but I told them nothing could ever take the Christmas spirit away from men of goodwill that if all such men do their duty they will have won a priceless possession for themselves and three men and he told them with the sincerity that impressed every one of his listeners but he pries it next Christmas they could all be back with their families and their loved ones again the next day Christmas Day I went into a fuck lion town from which the Germans had been cleared out all at the previous afternoon shattered buildings were still on fire captured German tank goodness Pete beside the road Americans were still picking up the bodies of dead Germans for burial and on the side of a ruined building trying through all the departments and a happy new year in the yard should a battered Christmas tree I will if you exclude the made ornaments that was affirmed and a few yards away our guns were hammering while overhead American claims to be prevailed as they roared over the bomb the German tanks and troops the manape spirit yes this is very strange running a world war but there's never been a time when men were or could be more where the fighters but others are making but they might be free and in the Holocaust of battle then learns more truly than ever before and I'm touched her German said now the sound of done is right away nothing can ever take the Christmas spirit away from men of goodwill there's a death Shelley speaking from somewhere in Holland I return you to deny this is the British Broadcasting Corporation