- Collection:
- Veterans History Project: Oral History Interviews
- Title:
- Oral history interview of Patrick Edwin "Eddie" Golden
- Creator:
- Palmer, Janet
Golden, Patrick Edwin, 1921-2009 - Date of Original:
- 2004-07-07
- Subject:
- Pontoon bridges
Underwater demolition
Bridges--Design and construction
Booby traps
Explosive ordnance disposal
V-mail
Amphibious assault ships
Operation Neptune
Hürtgen Forest, Battle of, Germany, 1944
Bronze Star Medal (U.S.)
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Golden, John Kern, 1928-2010
Mauretania (Ship : 1938-1965)
Allied Forces. Supreme Headquarters
Louisiana State University (Baton Rouge, La.)
United States. Army. Reserve Officers' Training Corps
United States. Army. Engineer Heavy Ponton Battalion, 551st
United States. Army. Corps of Engineers. District Headquarters, 19th (Taunton, England)
United States. Army. Armored Division, 2nd
United States. Army. Airborne Division, 101st
United States. Army. Infantry Division, 30th
United States. Army. Infantry Division, 29th
United States. Army. Combat Command A
Marseilles (France) - Location:
- Belgium, 50.75, 4.5
Czech Republic, Elbe River, 50.0319222, 15.1943499
France, Île-de-France, Paris, 48.85341, 2.3488
France, Maginot Line, 49.4112748, 6.0834938
France, Marseille, 43.2961743, 5.3699525
France, Saint-Lô, 49.1157004, -1.0906637
France, Versailles, 48.8035403, 2.1266886
Germany, Dusseldorf, 51.2254018, 6.7763137
Germany, Elbe River, 52.4344639, 11.6813919
Germany, Julich, 50.9220931, 6.3611015
Germany, Magdeburg, 52.1315889, 11.6399609
Germany, Siegfried Line, 50.9113244, 14.2503823
Netherlands, Rhine River, 51.97198, 5.91545
Roer River, 48.6961101, 7.5470504
United Kingdom, England, Slapton Sands, 50.28694655, -3.64439646931766
United Kingdom, England, Southampton, 50.9025349, -1.404189
United Kingdom, England, Torquay, 50.4652392, -3.5211361
United States, Georgia, 32.75042, -83.50018
United States, Georgia, Atlanta Metropolitan Area, 33.8498, 84.4383
United States, Georgia, Chattahoochee County, Fort Benning, 32.35237, -84.96882
United States, Georgia, Richmond County, Fort Gordon, 33.42097, -82.16206
United States, Louisiana, East Baton Rouge Parish, Baton Rouge, Harding Field
United States, Louisiana, Orleans Parish, New Orleans, 29.95465, -90.07507
United States, Mississippi, Forrest County, Camp Shelby, 31.19834, -89.21106
United States, Missouri, Pulaski County, Fort Leonard Wood, 37.70573, -92.15717
United States, New York, Chenango County, 42.49351, -75.61158
United States, Tennessee, 35.75035, -86.25027
United States, Virginia, Hampton County, Hampton Roads, 36.97515, -76.34967
United States, Virginia, Warwick County, Camp Patrick Henry - Medium:
- video recordings (physical artifacts)
mini-dv - Type:
- MovingImage
- Format:
- video/quicktime
- Description:
- In this interview, Eddie Golden describes his experiences as an Army Engineer in Europe during World War II. He recalls his training and transportation to Europe. His duties in England involved the investigation of airfield sites for their suitability for the U.S. Army Air Corps, including footage, beds and "johns." Due to a shortage of barracks, he was quartered with a local English family, the Trenshaws. Mr. Trenshaw was the local postmaster, and Golden recalls many of the English customs he learned, as well as their correspondence through the years. After he left the Trenshaws, he didn't sleep in a real bed again until he arrived back in the United States years later. His unit began training in competition with several other engineering battalions, ostensibly to see who would be selected for a special mission, which involved, among other operations, mine clearing. His unit landed in the evening of D-Day and was attached to two other units as American troops pushed across Normandy. He describes mine clearing procedures, including using German POWs to probe for mines. Because of stormy weather, boats could not land supplies, so all they had to eat were K-rations; they eventually killed a cow and were forced to reimburse the farmer for it. He describes what hedgerow country was like and how the French people hung American flags out when he passed by. He also worked as a reconnaissance officer in spotter planes to select sites for building bridges and describes the process of building a pontoon bridge. Other missions included checking for mines in buildings and blowing up pillboxes. He describes meeting up with the Russians in eastern Germany and recalls the relations between the allies. He discusses living conditions and the end of the war in Europe. He had enough points to go home but his skills were needed for the invasion of Japan, so he was on a transport to ship out when V-J day occurred.
Eddie Golden was an Army engineer in Europe during World War II.
JANET PALMER: Today is July 7th, 2004. My name is Janet Palmer, and I'm interviewing Mr. Patrick Edwin Golden, who goes by the name Eddie, for the Veterans History Project at the Atlanta History Center. Mr. Golden, will you please spell your name and give me your birth date. PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: My name is Eddie Golden, G-O-L-D-E-N. My birth date is March 19, 1921. JANET PALMER: And what is your address? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: 6900 Brandon Mill Road, Atlanta 30328. JANET PALMER: And what branch of the service were you in? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: United States Army. JANET PALMER: And what rank did you obtain? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: First lieutenant. JANET PALMER: What was your serial number? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: 0470938. JANET PALMER: And where did you serve primarily? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: In the European Theatre. JANET PALMER: Okay. Thank you. First we want to start out just to get a little background about your family life and what you were doing before you went into the service. Where did you grow up, and what did your parents do, and do you have brothers and sisters, and so on? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: I was born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana, grew up in New Orleans. My father was in the sales end of Flint Coat [?] Roofing Company and my mother was a housewife. I have one brother who is seven years younger than I, and he was in school when I was in college. I went to Louisiana State University, which was an ROTC university, and it was there that I had four years of military training plus one summer at Fort Benning where they took all the senior cadets for six or eight weeks military training. And I finished LSU in January of 1943. JANET PALMER: What was your major? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: My major was Petroleum Engineering, and I was allowed to graduate—let me back up and say I received a commission into the Army May of 1942, and I was given one semester deferment to allow me to get a degree, which I did, and then I received orders to report to the Army on February 3rd, 1943. JANET PALMER: And where did you go from LSU? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: My first station was Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, which was an engineer training depot. And I was there approximately two months at which time I was transferred to the 551st Heavy Pontoon Battalion, which was a floating bridge building organization. And they were at Camp Gordon at the time with orders to go on Tennessee maneuvers. So in May of '43 I went on Tennessee maneuvers until August of '43. JANET PALMER: How was that experience? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Well, I guess you could say it was just like field conditions. We did the same thing on maneuvers as we did at Fort Leonard Wood, build bridges, erect gin [?] poles, and assist infantry operations, primarily did the floating bridges on maneuvers with the heavy pontoon battalion. JANET PALMER: Are there any stories you remember from that time, anything that really stands out in your mind about any experiences? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Not on maneuvers. Maneuvers were very cut and dry, almost like a planned, choreographed type of operation. Nothing unusual. JANET PALMER: Did you have any friends from school that went into service at the same time that you did? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Yes, I did, but they were—most of my friends that went in at that time were in the infantry. LSU had three branches of service. They had the infantry, corps of engineers, and field artillery, so various seniors were called to service at different times. But primarily most of them had finished their degrees in the June period of 1942 and were called into service at that time. In fact, one of the closest friends I had was killed before I went into service, in Italy. That's how fast it was going at that time. JANET PALMER: Do you remember how you felt when you reported for duty? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Oh, I was thrilled. Prior to me reporting for duty I had received these orders to go to Harding Field, which was an Army Air Force base in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, for my physical. So I knew that once I passed the physical it was just a day or two later that I got orders to report to Fort Leonard Wood. And Fort Leonard Wood was training new recruits, so I was a brand new officer, training brand new recruits. But it was a fun time until I went to the 551st and, as I say, we went on Tennessee maneuvers then. And from that point, I guess it was late August of '43, I got orders to report to Shenango, which is the ship out point, debarkation point from New York to go overseas. So I was there for maybe ten days, two weeks waiting for orders to go overseas and I shipped out around the first week of September of '43 to England. I went over on the Mauritania, which was an old four stacker cruise ship. We had pipe berths seven high on that ship, but it was a fast boat and it didn't have any—we didn't go in a convoy. There was no need for that because it was a little faster than the average military ship at that time. So they didn't worry about the submarines. JANET PALMER: How was that? How was life on the ship? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: It was hectic, life on the ship. But it was only about a four or five day trip. We went over and landed in Scotland. I don't recall exactly the number we had on that boat but I would think it was close to 10,000. I'm just guessing here. But handling the mess and the sleeping arrangements, it was just totally packed. JANET PALMER: Did you each have your own bunk, or did you have to share? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: No, it was a pipe berth. If you can picture plumbing pipe made of square rack with a canvass mattress, a one sling mattress and sleeping seven high in there, that was the way we went over. JANET PALMER: And what were your primary duties on the ship? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: I had no duties on the ship. The duties were just exercise, walk, because it was a total replacement type of operation. We were going over as replacement, a pool so to speak. And when I got to England that's when we got, when I got assigned to the 19th District Headquarters, which was located in Taunton. JANET PALMER: Now you said you went into Scotland? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Went into Scotland. JANET PALMER: And then how did—you went to England right from there, or did you stay in Scotland? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: No, we went—I don't think I was in Scotland two days. JANET PALMER: You took the train? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: No, I went by a two and a half ton truck. JANET PALMER: Oh. [LAUGHTER] PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: They trucked us over. JANET PALMER: Oh, okay. PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: And as I say, I was assigned to the 19th District Headquarters to the Office of the Engineer there. And there was a major who was the engineer, and a captain and myself, three officers in the District Engineer's office. And my duty in that office was to investigate all of the air fields that the U.S. Air Force was going to be using, to make sure that they had the right square footage and the right number of johns and the right number of beds—you know, they treat the Air Force like hotels. So that was the kind of duty I drew in the beginning. I had already applied for troop duty when I hit England. But nonetheless, I was assigned to this 19th District Headquarters. And since they had no officer BOQ's or bachelor officer quarters or any barracks, we were assigned to be billeted with English families. And I happened to be billeted with a family by the name of Trentshaw. He was the postmaster of Taunton, and they were a delightful elderly couple. I thoroughly enjoyed staying with them, living with them, and learning various British slogans so to speak. But that was an enjoyable part of being in England. And from that point, I'd have to look in notes to tell you dates, but I would say I was at the headquarters from September of '43 to about March of '44. At which point I was transferred to the 246th Engineer Combat Battalion who had been training in England. And I was assigned to Company C there and made a Platoon Commander there. JANET PALMER: While you were in Taunton when you were staying with these people, is there anything about them that you remember in particular or any types of things they did or stories about them that you remember? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Well, you know, Mrs. Trentshaw used to say “what time do you want me to knock you up in the morning?” I remember that vividly. And it was—and they always had—what do they call it? Light tea. And it was about supper time for us and they had light tea. But other than just normal conversations, delightful conversations, they were very pleasant. It was just a good experience living with an English family like that. And that's about as much as I can tell you on that. JANET PALMER: So then after you left there? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: After I left there I was assigned to the 246th Engineer Combat Battalion and they were in the field—the Trentshaws' was the last bed I saw until I got back to the States. JANET PALMER: Really? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: We lived in the field throughout my time of service in England training for the invasion. And training for the invasion, we were constantly being graded against other engineer battalions to determine, at least we were told to determine, who was going to be selected for what. You know, we were trained on under-water demolitions, we were trained on mine removal, we were trained on booby traps, we were trained on bridge building, all of the functions that an engineering operation performs in support of infantry. And I suppose we were lucky, because we didn't grade too well on under-water demolitions and we didn't get in the first wave, so that was one of the more fortunate points of, I guess, my experience there. But we worked in the Slapton Sands area in Torquay in England, which is a beach resort kind of, and we would go out in boats and come back and practice invasion tactics and this type of thing in addition to doing field exercises and long marches and just good physical training. I got to be in the best shape I was ever in and that's probably what saved a lot of us, by being in good shape. JANET PALMER: Now, while you were over there were you able to get letters and hear from your family pretty regularly? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Yes. Well they had the—what was it called again? It was like a photograph mail. I'm trying to think of the name. JANET PALMER: I know the name myself. PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Anyway, it was a letter about so big, it had been photostatted and sent. But yes, I got packages from my mother. I was single and we communicated regularly. In fact, even when we were jumped off and were in France, after, I guess after about the first two or three weeks they allowed us to write home. But you couldn't say too much other than “I'm in France.” But we sailed out of South Hampton at the invasion on LSTs. JANET PALMER: Now, did you know where you were going at that time? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: No. No, I didn't. I knew, I guess, midway across we knew we were going to hit Omaha Beach. We were on the water, you see, when we got all this and the fighting had already taken the first wave and second wave. So when we went ashore, the 29th Infantry and the 101st Airborne were already in defensive positions maybe a mile and a half inland. JANET PALMER: Do you remember how you felt when you heard . . . PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Heard the first gunfire? Yes, I do, because I went ashore about five o'clock in the evening and it was getting dark, and I had—I was in a command car at that time with about six GIs with me, and I had been given a map prior to debarking from the ship, giving me roughly an assembly area where the unit would assemble. And there were MPs posted to get you through the beach so that you got on a road and then you followed what map you had. And we got to this field that night, it must have been an hour later, six, seven o'clock, and that's when we heard all the artillery fire and realized it wasn't going to be fun and games anymore. I don't know how much sleep we had that night but the next morning I remember a sergeant from the Headquarters Company came rounding people up and saying where we were going to start off, and that's the way everybody got together. I would say, considering all the confusion, which was going on at that time between units, it was pretty well organized. It was well planned. Everything didn't follow the plan but it was—it didn't take you long to get acclimated to the situation. JANET PALMER: How did you feel, like, scared or nervous the whole time, or did you just kind of start going about your business? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: No, I wasn't scared at that point. I've been scared in this war, but at that stage I wasn't scared. I guess I hadn't encountered the real problems that we would see coming down the road, but we filled in—at that time, I guess, we moved about another three or four miles inland and set up a line of defense. It was a railroad track that ran down almost like a culvert, a big deep culvert, and we sat on that until they could build more troops to come into the beachhead. And at that stage there was a lot of stormy weather happening right there in the English Channel and they couldn't get the boats in, and we were on K-rations at that time and had only what ammunition we could carry. So we just sat on that line, I would say almost a week, two weeks. At that time we were with the 101st Airborne, and the 29th Division was right alongside us. And very soon they pulled the 101st Airborne back off line and sent them back to England to make another jump sometime. And then we were attached to the 29th Division, which was part of the First Army. And let's see, there was a 29th Division, a 30th Division and 2nd Armored, corps troops. 19th Corps was with First Army. So we worked with those three divisions throughout the French Campaign. And I guess you've heard about hedgerow country. This part of France was all hedgerow country. I mean it was—and a hedgerow is an earth mound that acted like a fence around a farmer's field. So the movement to get an army to advance, they had complete cover as far as the enemy was concerned, and it was very difficult to advance because they had—they were totally protected and they had open fields of fire. And they had many opportunities and a lot of time to plant mines in strategic crossroad sections and places like that that had to be removed so that the—and this was the beginning as far as I remember it. I guess the first town I remember was Igsigney [?], a little town on the French Coast, and you could see the French people as we came by sticking out American flags on the staffs. JANET PALMER: Did you meet any of the French people? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Not at that time, no. You asked me to talk about a personal—I can tell you this. It's got a little humor to it. As I said earlier, we were on K-rations and in this stage everybody was looking for a change of food. They hadn't brought C-rations in. I don't know if you—K-rations are just a little square box. So one night the captain said—there were some cows in a field, French cows, and we thought we'd go get us a cow. So we went over in a weapons [truck]—we happened to have a GI who was a butcher in civilian life. So, we went and got the cow and cut him up and ate steaks and enjoyed it, even sent some up to battalion. And about two or three days later this British Civil Affairs—he was a major. Most of the British that were in our sector at that time were all Civil Affairs people who were I guess trying to re-establish the French in their own little towns and so forth. So he came in and was asking—wanting to know if we knew anything about killing a cow because the entrails and all that had been left out in the field. Well, we didn't know anything about that. And he finally called the officers into a tent and he left the Frenchmen outside, and he said I'm going to tell you—you see, at this stage all our vehicles were color coded, you know, it didn't have the name of the unit on it. It just had a blue or red or green bar on it that identified us to our own troops. But the enemy couldn't tell what unit they were fighting or where they were from by the color code. So he proceeds to tell us that while we were doing all this with this cow an AAC-AAC unit, anti-aircraft unit who had been accused of doing it had spotted this vehicle of ours and identified it with the color code. And this major said it's going to cost you—I don't know, it was around $360, about $60 a piece. Five officers paid it. That's a remembrance. [LAUGHTER] JANET PALMER: It probably tasted great, though. PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Oh, it was great. It was great. But that's part of the humor of— JANET PALMER: Now you said there were mines out there. Were you involved with clearing the mines? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Oh, yes. Yeah. I can tell you a story—I can't tell you exactly where in France this was, but this was somewhere on the road to Saint Lo and—do you want me to hold this up? JANET PALMER: Yeah. Could you turn—? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Yeah. This was somewhere around Saint Lo. I was sent out to clear a mine field. The tanks had stopped and I had a platoon of men, we went out to clear the—and we had had some prisoners at this stage of the game. So I went out and—these tanks were all buttoned up, I mean, the enemy was all around, although we weren't getting shot at, but I hit my rifle butt on the tank commander's tank to ask him where were the mines that he was talking about, because he had radioed back. And he talked to me through that gun he had on the turret. He said, “Lieutenant, if you want to talk to me, talk to me through here.” This is funny because we're standing out there, nobody is shooting at us at this time. And he said, there's a minefield ahead, and we wanted to make sure. So we started looking to try and identify the pattern of the mine field and when we did this another infantry unit came up with some German prisoners. So we said, “Can we borrow those prisoners for a while?” Because we were going to have to get on our hands and knees and do bayonet probing. Our plan was to probe and identify the locations, and then we would just blow a path for the tanks to go through, not trying to pick up the mines or anything like that, just disintegrate them. But we put the Germans on their hands and knees with our bayonets to do the probing and said, “Look, you must know where these are; go ahead.” So, that's just another point in the war that I remember pretty vividly only because it was so funny with this tank lieutenant. But we cleared it and the only highlight, I guess, was my platoon was sent to the Versailles Palace to de-booby trap the palace before—Ike's headquarters was going to move into this palace. This was right outside of Paris. And we went all through that palace. We didn't find the first booby trap. It was a good assignment because it gave us a chance to sneak into Paris, but the Germans had already vacated the city. But the French were very—we were probably one of the first troops to get into Paris because of this. But the French were all over the Jeep and we had to get out of there. JANET PALMER: Did you get to see much of Paris? Did you have any time to get around? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: When we were in Germany I had a three-day pass to Paris and that's when I got to see a little bit of Paris, but I have since been back to Paris. Of course, I couldn't tell you where I went in Paris when I was in the war. There was no Moulin Rouge or anything like that going on. But they had a hotel, and I don't even recall the name of the hotel, but it was set up for, like officers' R&R, and we just walked around and made most of the bars. JANET PALMER: So where did you go after? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: We went, after France I guess we went into Belgium. Let's see. JANET PALMER: So you mostly went to France, pretty much doing the same types of— PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Pretty much in support of these infantry divisions. At one time—you've read the history of the breakthrough when we finally broke out of the hedgerow country of France, and at the time the First Army was still the front Army of this particular sector. They set up a group called Combat Command A, which comprised a platoon of engineers, which was mine, and a company of cavalry, which was the 113th Cavalry, and a battalion of infantry. And the mission at the time of the breakthrough was to maintain contact with the enemy so that we knew at all times where they were. They kept probing for strength so that they could just determine what tactics our forces would use to either envelop them or [unintelligible]. But we had a couple of serious river crossings that I happened to be participating in. The Roer River crossing, which we crossed at Julich. [looks at maps] The Roer River was a very tough river crossing, and basically we sat on the Roer River for almost a week before attempting to cross, because upstream were these huge dams, and the thinking of our generals was that the minute we started across they would release all the water from these dams which would just wash whatever bridges or floating tank bridges and foot bridges, wash them down. So, after waiting so long they decided that the 30th Infantry and the 29th would jump off. So, I happened to be assigned as a reconnaissance officer and went up in one of these small artillery spotter planes. We had to determine—since my platoon had been assigned building the foot bridges that would cross the infantry. And we had to select the sites, and at that point in time the Germans were just massed on the opposite side of the bank of the river and had just wide open fields of fire. So you couldn't go down and walk around on this side of the river without getting blown up. So, I went up in this artillery spotter plane with this pilot. And we flew up and down the river by Julich to pick out bridge positions where we would launch. And you had to pick a position where you had a good approach like a street section where you could bring troops down quickly and get them across quickly. And these foot bridges have—you assemble them on shore and you attach them and you push them out. It's one section at a time and you just keep pushing it across and pushing it across, and then when it gets to the other side you go and anchor it to the far side. Well, we built this bridge pretty much under fire. JANET PALMER: How long does this take to build a bridge like that? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Across this river? I would say we did it in about an hour. JANET PALMER: Oh, wow. PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Oh, you move. You move. And it wasn't as wide a river as the Rhine. And these things go together pretty fast because you're assembling them behind some protection and you're assembling each section behind some protection. Then you're carrying this up and you're attaching on and another group's assembling and then you attach it on. Once you get it to flow it flows and you just keep moving. And the minute you hit the other side the infantry's starting to come across. And in the meantime, you've got artillery bombarding the far side of the river to chase them out. But the infantry builds that bridgehead as they funnel these men across and open them up and move it out. So then they build the larger floating bridge to bring the tanks over and that's the way you make a river crossing. I should say prior to the foot bridges, you have infantry going across in assault boats. They run them by outboard motors, and that's the first protection you get for building a foot bridge, maybe a platoon or company of infantry across in your particular location. And they're building these all the way down the river. I mean we weren't the only platoon building foot bridges. That was as tough a river crossing, I think, as we had. And we crossed a number of rivers but none with this much fire power as they had against us at that time. And I think that probably was part of my getting the Bronze Star, that action, although the citation doesn't cite this, but I think it helped. I need to take a little drink of water. JANET PALMER: Sure. In fact, it's at 39 minutes so I think I'll just stop this. [pause] This is a resumption of the interview with Mr. Golden. TRANSCRIPTION OF SECOND PART OF INTERVIEW: PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: I'm going to back up and say, prior to the river crossing at Julich, we had to go through the Siegfried Line. The infantry had already cleared the Siegfried Line as far as active pill boxes were concerned. But we had permission to blow these pillboxes, to eliminate them in case of any counterattack, intelligence so I guess we spent several days throwing dynamite in pillboxes in the Siegfried Line. And they were built far, far more effectively and more efficiently than the French… the Maginot Line was the French line of defense, the Siegfried Line was the German line of defense. The Siegfried Line was far superior to the Maginot Line. So after we went and crossed the Julich, the next major river crossing we had was the Rhine. Our company crossed the Rhine a little bit north of Dusseldorf. It was, outside of every day being pretty much the same, the war was, it was the same every day. You just fought it and it was new ground. So we reached the Elbe River at Magdeburg where we met the Russians. I would say that I remember a very tough experience, it was where we in, in the winter in the _____ Forest. And this, the Germans had made a counteroffensive, they had put a big bulge in our line. You've read about the Battle of the Bulge, well, this, this is also when we were attacking to pinch off that bulge so that we could surround the Germans and defeat that army. Well, this was in the heart of winter. Without a doubt it was the most miserable living that I experienced in my time in the European theatre. It was just miserable. You couldn't get warm, you couldn't dig a hole the ground was so frozen and you, you just stayed away from trees because the artillery shells would shatter so much. But that, you talk about experiences, those, those were some of the weird experiences. The only other experience I can tell you about is being assigned, in jumping off over a railroad, my platoon was sent to take care of the explosives that the Germans had placed to use to blow this railroad bridge so that the tanks couldn't cross it. Well, fortunately, the infantry did get across it and was establishing some protection on this railroad bridge and we, I was sent to lead these tanks because of the, they didn't know where they would be detonated. The explosives were there, they were all wired, but nobody knew if they would be detonated remote control or somebody had a wire four or five hundred yards away. Anyway, we went there and found that it didn't look like it was going to be detonated. We couldn't find anything leading away from the bridge and the tanks crossed over. But it was one of those “hairy” incidents. When you say, “Were you ever been scared?” I was real scared, very scared. And, it was…. Q: Where was that? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: That was in Germany. The only other experience that might have some interest is when we met the Russians at Magdeburg, we stopped at the Elbe River, that was our stopping point at the war. The Russians were on the other side of the Elbe River, that was where the armies met. I never dreamed it was such a ragtag army. I mean there were horses and wagons, women, this is the Russian Army! And at this stage, political factions were still ___________, so on our side at Magdeburg, the Russians had control of the electronic, anyway, the generating plants. They had control of the generating plants and wouldn't give us any power on our side. And they wouldn't let us cross over that bridge. So it was, you're meeting an ally but he's not really an ally. So we both posted guards on each side of the river. They couldn't come on our side and we couldn't go on their side. And it stayed like that until they pulled us offline. Q: How long, how long were you there like that? PATRICK EDWIN GOLDEN: Oh, I'd say several weeks. Q: And what did you did do during that time? A: We rested. We cleaned up and rested. You know, all this time you're talking about getting a bath maybe every two or three weeks. Q: How did you sleep? Could you sleep? A: We slept on the ground. Q: Just on the ground. A: You get accustomed to that. Except in the winter. I mean I, until this day, you couldn't take me to snow county. I have no desire to go skiing or, I just, I've seen all of the snow I want to see. And it's had a lasting effect on me, that part, I'm ashamed to say. Q: So, you said you stayed there? A: I stayed there at Magdeburg, and they pulled us back to a town in Germany called Bad Nauheim [?], which was a recuperating type city. And we got clean clothes and we cleaned up. We started drilling again. Q: And when, approximately, was this? A: Must have been August? August of 1945. Cause… July? It's probably on the back on here. Q: OK. A: The date that we went to Bad Neuheim. At this stage in the war they started finding out how many points you had so who would go home first. And, we'd be, the experiences that I had, I had sufficient points to go home. But then they started talking about who was needed for the rest of the year, to go to Japan. And, but my experience throughout all this, they figured that it was more important for me to take an assignment to go to Japan, so I was transferred to a unit in Marseilles, France, to ship out. While I was in Marseilles, I was only there maybe a day before we were going to ship out, or two days before we were going to ship out, VJ Day was declared. Q: You remember where you were when you heard that? How you felt? A: Oh, I felt very good. Very good. Because, as it turned out, we were one of the first troops home. I mean we were there at embarkation point and instead of that boat taking us to Japan, it just took us to the States. And that was, I guess I was in Marseilles two or three weeks, and I bumped into an old buddy of mine from LSU, yeah, we just horsed around. Q: Can you tell me about the Bronze Star medal that you got, and the other… A: I've got a copy of the commendation here, that she has, but I, I think that it was more for general performance. It wasn't a specific action. I think it was, I think it was just a multitude of things that they liked they way I did it. That's as modest as I can say it. Q: So, from Marseilles did you come back to the States then? A: Yes, m'aam, I came back to Hampton Roads, Virginia. Q: You remember seeing the United States? A: Oh, yeah, I remember seeing the United States. And I remember when we got off that boat and they took us to the quarters and to the mess hall, the first thing they did was bring us half gallons of homogenized milk, ice cream, all of the things you dream about. We were treated royally. Q: And then, did you go back home? A: Then I got, they put me on a troop train to Camp Shelby, Mississippi, right outside Hattiesburg, to be discharged. Give you a final physical, make sure you're not bringing any vermin back to the States, you know. And then from Shelby I went home. Caught a bus and went home. Q: What did you do once you got back, once you got out of the service? A: I had 46 days of leave accumulated over time and I started looking for a job. I thought maybe I could be a petroleum engineer somewhere and so that's where I started to look. And I went to work, I got employed by a firm by name of [Wayne? Lane?] Wells, who did gamma ray logging and gun preparations, which means when a hole is drilled and they want to break into oil into the pipe to pump it up, you've got to run a log down this drilling hole and determine the strata, what is oil sand and so forth. And when you determine where the oil sand is you run another bomb down and it's got an armor-piercing bullet, and from this truck, this is a mobile truck, it fires these electronic bullets which pierce the casing of the pipe so that this oil can seep through the perforations and be pumped to the surface. That's what this company did. And, I worked out of New Iberia, Louisiana, that's where the job was. And quite honestly, after living in the field for the better part of three years, the job just didn't appeal to me. I, they would put us on a barge, we were doing a lot of offshore work, put us on a barge out of Morgan City, Louisiana, take you out in the Gulf and you'd sit on an oil rig until they could bring all that pipe out of the hole, which could be two or three days. And then you'd do your job, and before you would get everything loaded up, you'd get a phone call that there's another well getting ready at so and so. And sometimes I'd be out there only with a tooth brush and I'd been back for five days, six days, sometimes two weeks. So, it, I just decided that I wasn't going to do that. So I came back to New Orleans and got a job in a flooring plant, a foreman. And they sent me to Chicago because they bought a tile company to manufacture asphalt tile. And I went up to this company and was taught the manufacturing process, and came back and opened a plant in New Orleans. And I stayed there for two years and I decided I was going to get in sales. So I went to work for a competitor that, in sales, selling asphalt tile, vinyl asbestos tile, flooring materials to contractors. And that's what I did until I got promoted to Atlanta in '56. I've been in Atlanta since '56 until I changed industries and got into the swimming pool line. I went to work for a swimming pool manufacturer. I retired in '87. Q: The family that you met while you were in England, that you stayed with in England, did you keep in touch? A: Yes, I did. We would write, exchange pictures, write letters. Primarily at the Christmas season until they died. Q: Did you ever go back? A: Not while they were alive. Q: But you have been back to Europe since then? A: I went back on a trip with American Express, one of these tour trips, and we went from Atlanta to London, and from London to Germany. Q: Did you go back to Normandy? Any of the places… A: No, I'm sorry we didn't go back to Normandy, although I had friends that it overwhelmed them, the cemeteries. Cause we had a lot of casualties. Q: Are you involved now in any veteran's groups or have you kept in touch with any people that you were in the war with? A: I kept in touch with Joe _________, who was one of the lieutenants in this picture. And he came to Atlanta one time. We've never had a so-called company reunion or battalion reunion. McElhenny, who was captain of this company, was out of Fairbanks, Alaska, and I got a Christmas card from Mac, I guess a couple of years, and then people just scattered. That's the only way I can explain it. Q: Is there anything that we didn't talk about in your experiences that you would like to go back to? A: I only wish my memory was better. No, I think that's about a feeling of what I did, my experiences. Q: How do you feel? Do you feel like it had an effect on the rest of your life? A: Oh, yes, I think it had an effect on the rest of my life. I don't mind paying taxes. You know, you just don't appreciate where you live and how you live until you experience this type of life. But I wouldn't swap it, I think it made a man of me, pretty quickly, I believe, over there. And I think you grow up pretty quickly. You know, I was 21 years old and a lieutenant over there. Had about 40 men, telling them what to do. You just grab a hold of yourself real quick. And I think that training and that background with people has helped me throughout my business career. You get where you know how to organize people, you know how to treat people, and I think that's, I think the Army knows how to educate people. It might sound strange, but their methods are very structurally sound, teaching you what they want you to learn, and I think they do an excellent job. I think any young man that serves in the Army will get something out of it. On the positive side. That's my personal feeling. Q: Well, thank you very much. A: You're quite welcome. I enjoyed it. - Metadata URL:
- http://album.atlantahistorycenter.com/cdm/ref/collection/VHPohr/id/178
- Additional Rights Information:
- This material is protected by copyright law. (Title 17, U.S. Code) Permission for use must be cleared through the Kenan Research Center at the Atlanta History Center. Licensing agreement may be required.
- Extent:
- 1:01:02
- Original Collection:
- Veterans History Project oral history recordings
Veterans History Project collection, MSS 1010, Kenan Research Center, Atlanta History Center - Contributing Institution:
- Atlanta History Center
- Rights:
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