Later, Malarkey led another patrol in another attempt to get information on the enemy. On this patrol Private Sheehy, at the point, moved up next to a hedgerow. Malarkey joined him there, but as he moved forward he stepped on a tree limb, breaking it. Immediately a German helmet raised up right across the hedgerow. Sheehy got him full in the face with a blast from his tommy-gun.
Seeing more Germans, Malarkey pulled the patrol back at a full run. Rob Bain, carrying a 300 radio, had trouble keeping up. After they had gotten back safely, Bain's comment was, "Apparently patrols are quite necessary, but it appears to me to be a good way to get your tail shot off."
The next day was relatively quiet. Fat Norman cattle were grazing in the field behind the company's position. Pvt. Woodrow Rob-bins, 1st squad machine-gunner, was dug in about 15 feet from Christenson's foxhole.
"Hey, Chris," he called out, "let's get some of that meat in the field!" Christenson did not want to leave his foxhole, but Bill Howell joined Robbins as he crawled up to a cow and shot her. They butchered the animal, then returned with a hind quarter. Robbins cut up steaks for the whole squad. They fried the meat over open fires in their foxholes. That night, Robbins and Howell tied the remainder of the carcass to a tree to the rear.
They covered it with a poncho,- the squad figured to be eating beef rather than K rations for a few days. What they had not figured on was all the shrapnel flying around from the incessant artillery barrages. It perforated the meat. At the next feast, the men of the squad were continually cutting their gums on shrapnel.
June 23. A sniper fired at Christenson, from 600 meters. Chris ducked behind a hedgerow and shouted to Robbins to spray the area from which the bullet came. Robbins fired fifty rounds at the distant trees. "I could hear a nervous grumbling from the men down the line," Christenson remembered. "Tension always grew when out of complete silence a machine-gun fires that many rounds." In the far distance, the sound of mortars belched, waump, waump, waump, waump. "This nerve-racking sound confirmed that four mortar bombs were heading in our direction. The suspense of waiting is eerie. Indescribable. Miserable. Then 'Boom,' the first one exploded not more than 7 feet in front of Robbins' and Howell's gun."
Howell jumped out of his position and ran to Christenson's foxhole, as the second mortar round exploded almost on top of the first, "so close that you could taste the pungent gun powder." Howell leaped into Christenson's foxhole. "I was all bent over and unable to move," Chris said, "because of my doubled up, cramped position. It was difficult to breathe, yet I was laughing hysterically for Howell's eyes were as big as tea cups. He was muttering things like, 'Christ-sake, oh my God,' at each shell burst. The pressure this big man was putting on me suddenly threw me into a state of panic, for I was suffocating." Fortunately the shelling stopped.
After two weeks on the main line of resistance (MLR), the men of Easy stank. They had not had a bath or shower or an opportunity to shave. Many had dysentery,- all were continually drenched with sweat. Their hair was matted from dirt and dust made worse by the profuse sweating caused by wearing their helmets constantly, and by the impregnated clothes they had been wearing since June 6. They looked like Bill Mauldin's Willy and Joe characters.
On June 29, the 83rd Infantry Division came up to relieve the 101st. "They were so clean looking," Christenson remembered, "with a full complement of men in each unit. Even the paint on their helmets looked as if they had just been unpacked. The impact of seeing such a disheveled motley group as we were was a shock to them."
For Easy, to get off the front line, even if it was only for a few days, was a deliverance. The thought of an uninterrupted full night's sleep, not being harassed by gun fire or being sent out on patrol, to get something hot to eat, to sleep dry, and most of all to get a shower, was good beyond description.
Easy had jumped into Normandy on June 6 with 139 officers and men. Easy was pulled out of the line on June 29 with 74 officers and men present for duty. (The 506th had taken the heaviest casualties of any regiment in the campaign, a total of 983, or about 50 percent). The Easy men killed in action were Lts. Thomas Meehan and Robert Mathews, Sgts. William Evans, Elmer Murray, Murray Robert, Richard Owen, and Carl Riggs, Cpls. Jerry Wentzel, Ralph Wimer, and Hermin Collins, Pvts. Sergio Moya, John Miller, Gerald Snider, William McGonigal, Ernest Oats, Elmer Telstad, George Elliott, and Thomas Warren.
For the 101st, Carentan was the last action of the Normandy campaign. The division was gradually pulled back to a field camp north of Utah Beach, complete with radio, telephone, bulletin board, policing the area, keeping weapons clean, parade ground formations, and a training schedule. To compensate, there were hot showers and nearly unlimited opportunities for scrounging.
Pvt. Alton More was the master scrounger in Easy Company. He found a way to get into the main supply depot near Utah. On his first foray, he returned carrying two cardboard boxes, one of fruit cocktail and the other of pineapple. "It tasted like the best thing you ever ate in your life," Harry Welsh remembered, "and I was never so sick in my life. We weren't used to that food." Thereafter, More brought in a more varied diet from his daily expeditions.
General Taylor stopped by, to congratulate the company on its lonely stand on the far right flank at Carentan. The men wanted to know what about his "give me three days and nights of hard fighting and I'll have you out of here" pre-D-Day promise.
Gen. Omar Bradley appeared for an awards ceremony. Standing on a little platform in the field, he read out the citations for the Distinguished Service Cross for eleven men, including General Taylor, Chaplain Maloney, and Lieutenant Winters. "That was a proud moment," Winters said. He recalled that after the ceremony, Bradley had the troops break formation and gather round him. "Are there any reporters here, any correspondents?" he asked. "If there are, I don't want this recorded.
"What I want to say," he went on, "is that things are going very well, and there is a possibility at this point, as I see it, that we could be in Berlin by Christmas."
Winters thought to himself, God, I can make it till Christmas. Just let me go home for Christmas.
On July 1, Winters received news of his promotion to captain. On July 10, the company moved down to Utah Beach, to prepare to embark for England. "Seeing the beach for the first time," Winters recalled, "with that armada of ships as far as the eye could see in every direction, and seeing the American flag on the beach, left me feeling weak in the knees for a few moments and brought tears to my eyes."
Private More pulled one last raid on that vast supply dump. He broke into the main motor pool and stole a motorcycle, complete with sidecar. He hid it behind a sand dune, then asked Captain Winters if he could put it on the LST and take it back to England. "Up to you," Winters replied.
The next day, as the company marched up the ramp of the gigantic LST, More moved the motorcycle up the inland side of the forward dune. He had arranged with Malarkey for a hand signal when everyone was aboard and it was time to go. Malarkey tipped off the Navy personnel. At the proper moment, standing on the ramp, Malarkey gave the signal and More came roaring over the dune and up the ramp.
On the LST, the skipper said to Welsh, "Lieutenant, what would your men like to have: chicken or steak? ice cream? eggs?" Sailing in convoy, the LST got back to Southampton the night of July 12. The next morning, a train took the men (except More and Malarkey, who rode their motorcycle) to Aldbourne. "It was wonderful to be back," Winters remembered. "Everybody was glad to see us. It was just like home."