A Paratrooper’s Journey in France and Holland - Bill Bladen and the War

Bill, April 1943 - age 17+

I had the privilege of meeting Bill in the spring of 2008, just prior to a family vacation that included Normandy and the D-Day sites. Over dinner, Bill told us stories of his experiences in France and Holland during the war, and in 2008 and 2009 I was able to visit some of the locations he told us about.

Like a lot of young men in 1942, Bill enlisted in the Army - in his case, at the age of 16. He volunteered for the paratroopers, and was trained as a demolitions man.

Bill’s Demolition Section, Nottingham, England, May 1943

Bill was assigned to the Demolitions Section of the Headquarters Company, 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment (known as the Red Devils), which fought as part of the 82nd Airborne Division (The All Americans).


D-Day

Along with thousands of other paratroopers, Bill left England on the night of June 5th, 1944 bound for Normandy aboard a Douglas C-47 like this one:

Douglas C-47, Merville Battery, Normandy

But the aircrews carrying Bill’s regiment, the 508th Parachute Infantry, were inexperienced. They ran into heavy anti-aircraft fire and the planes became scattered, many going much faster than the 125 miles per hour they were supposed to for jumping, and at much higher (or lower) altitudes than the 400 feet called for. The 508th suffered some of the worst scattering of the drop that night; Bill and the other men of his “stick”, or plane-load, landed far away from their designated drop zone.

Bill’s gas mask, strapped to his leg, was shot away by anti-aircraft fire during his descent.

Several men in the stick were missing after the jump and as far as Bill knew, had never been seen again. Their two heavy equipment bags were also lost. The plane had also been going so fast that Bill and the others had actually lost some of the gear strapped to their bodies. This included most of the explosives.

This was a problem because Bill had been assigned to blow up a bridge across the Douve River at Beuzeville-au-Plain, a tiny village along the south edge of the 82nd’s area. The Germans had flooded the countryside - much of which is reclaimed marshland - and it was one of the few ways heavy vehicles could attack across the river from the south. Bill and his fellow soldiers traveled at night, playing hide-and-seek with the Germans who were actively searching for the paratroopers, and finally arrived at their objective on June 9th, D+3, only to find that the Air Corps had destroyed it.

Bridge at Beuzeville-au-Plain, Normandy, July 2008

(Bill couldn’t remember the name of the town when he told us this story, but a bit of research and the phenomenal knowledge of our battlefiled guide, Dale Booth, enabled us to find it.)

Bill’s group then gathered with a larger group of paratroopers under Lt. Colonel Shanley holding Hill 30, a low rise west of the Merderet River. This became a key position protecting the American beachead. They had little cover to protect themselves from German fire, but held until heavier forces could come up from the beaches.

“Hill 30” area near Coquiny, Normandy

He was also involved in some of the fighting near the village of Chef-du-Pont, where still more key bridges were located.

Bridge at Chef-du-Pont, now named for the 508th PIR

Memorial to the paratroopers at Chef-du-Pont,
part of a park funded and maintained by the residents.

During the fighting in Normandy, one of Bill’s friends, Bill Buchanon of Wyoming, was killed by sniper fire while standing next to Bill.

Bill and the rest of the 82nd fought on in Normandy until they were withdrawn to England on July 13th, 1944.


Holland: Operation Market-Garden

In September 1944, British Field Marshal Montgomery proposed a daring plan - laying a “carpet” of airborne troops across Holland, seizing a series of bridges and holding open a corridor through which Montgomery’s XXX Corps would race to the Rhine and beyond. The 82nd was assigned to the middle section of the corridor, with the US 101st Airborne to their south. To their north, at Arnhem on the Rhine, was the British 1st Airborne and the Polish 1st Parachute Brigade.

The 82nd had to capture a number of bridges, all essential to the operation, but the biggest one was the Waal River bridge at Nijmegen.

Waal Bridge, Nijmegen, June 2009

Nijmegen is only a few miles west of the German border, with a large, wooded ridge - the Grossbeek Heights - between the town and Germany. (The ridge has been a key military position for centuries - remains of an old Roman fort lie atop the ridge.) Bill’s unit, the 508th PIR, was assigned a drop zone between the Heights and the German border, in these lush fields:

Drop zone of the 508 PIR, looking west towards the Grossbeek Heights

Looking south-east from the middle of the 508th’s DZ.
The silver object is a marker and memorial to the 508th.

Looking east. Germany is less than a mile away, just past the distant treeline.

The Germans counter-attacked fiercely. Bill’s unit was assigned to a position in the town of Beek, which lays at the northern foot of the Heights. Beek sits right along a main road to Nijmegen, and the Germans pushed hard to reinforce their forces holding the Waal bridge. Bill was wounded in the left leg by a mortar fragment in the fighting for Beek.

The fighting in Beek was very heavy, and not many of the buildings from that time remain.

Surviving period buildings in Beek, Holland, June 2009

Like the French, the Dutch continue to honor their liberators.

Memorial to the 508th PIR, Beek, Holland, June 2009

While the 82nd held it’s ground, and was finally able to capture the Waal Bridge on September 20th, XXX Corps wasn’t able to relieve the British 1st Airborne, and two SS Panzer divisions which had been refitting in the area crushed the British paratroopers.


After Market Garden

With Operation Market-Garden a failure, the 82nd continued to hold Holland until it was withdrawn in December - and was then thrown desperately into the Battle of the Bulge, in Belgium. The 82nd was pulled out of the line in late February, 1945.

The 508th was reassigned from the 82nd Airborne Division and attached directly to the First Allied Airborne Army in April, 1945. Bill and the rest of the regiment prepared to jump into POW camps to rescue Allied prisoners, but the mission was never needed.

The Best Day of Ben's Life (to date, he notes)

... and it ranks right up there for his mom, too!

On Friday, January 13, Ben and I (as well as one of Ben's friends) attended a book signing that confirms my faith in teenagers. Capturing it has taken a few weeks but I hope I still managed to do it justice.

First, a little background.

Over the past year Ben has become a "Nerdfighter," It refers to a group of people (mostly teenagers, but others too) who are nerds that are fighting to "reduce world suck." Their leaders are John and Hank Green, otherwise known as the Vlogbrothers. They post video blogs in a conversation with each other. And really, it would seem, they take turns sharing whatever random things come to mind, from Quarks to Economics to healthcare. John writes books; Hank writes (and sings) songs. And they both remind their legion of followers "Don't Forget to Be Awesome," (DFTBA). Along the way they've raised awareness for children's cancer (raising money for This Star Won't Go Out) and launched the Project For Awesome, a YouTube charity fundraising event that involves Nerdfighters posting and liking videos during a 24 hour period so that they are featured on the YouTube home page. (Ben participated this year, posting and liking throughout the weekend of December 18.)

Ben has been rather consumed with the DFTBA movement since sometime last winter. It has inspired him to rail against the penny and to read "The Great Gatsby," among other things. He has been purchasing DFTBA music (including an amazingly catchy song about the quark) and tee shirts, and reading John Green's books (along with others written by Green's friends and/or recommended by him). He made sure I pre-ordered his copy of John Green's newest book "The Fault in Our Stars" in July, because the first printing was going to be signed. This fall he met a guy at school who recognized his tee shirt by flashing the Nerdfighter greeting (arms crossed over chest, hands in Spock formation), who came to be known as "Nerdfighter Will" in our house. Eventually we found out that Nerdfighter Will is a senior, the band drum major, and a friend to several of the Patriot Players Theatre Company (in which Ben now participates as part of the crew and of which Alexa is an alum). Apparently he's also Ben's timelord double.

But enough Nerdfighter love, onto the book signing.

In early December, Ben sent John and I a link to the schedule for the "Tour de Nerdfighting," also known as the tour for the launch of John's book "The Fault in Our Stars." It included a Bethesda stop sponsored by Politics & Prose, a DC bookseller, and required tickets. Thankfully, I bought tickets right away because it sold out in days. At $27 a pop. This should have been my first clue that this was going to be big.

My ticket order indicated that the doors would open at 6:30 (read: plan to arrive early) and I picked up on this clue at least. We got to Bethesda around 5:15, picked up a to-go dinner at a favorite deli, and walked across the street to the Bethesda Hyatt. I figured we'd walk inside, pick up our tickets and sit in a hallway outside the ballroom with an hour to spare. Not so much.

As we approached the hotel, the boys excitedly spotted "the van," a Sprinter-like van wrapped in blue advertisements for the book with stylized drawings of the Green brothers. I spotted the line, stretching out of the hotel and down the block. There were TONS of people, mostly female and young, happily waiting in the cold on a Friday night for a book signing. Pretty impressive and amazing. Politics and Prose had lots of folks directing us and making sure we all knew where to be, and the line was really calm and pleasant and good-natured. When we reached the hotel door, we thought we were golden, but as we got inside we realized the line snaked into the lobby, up to an atrium, and back down some steps. In all, we waited about an hour and fifteen minutes but had so much fun we hardly noticed!

As we stood in line, it quickly became apparent that this was not your typical crowd. First, there were lots and lots and lots of geeky tee shirts. Many were from DFTBA but there were also literary ones (lots of Great Gatsby, Pride and Prejudice and the like), video-game-related (think Portal), and math jokes (mostly related to pi). The boys amused me by pointing out, under their breath, their favorite shirts: "Mario Brothers at 3 o'clock." And then there was the whole Doctor Who thing - more sonic screwdrivers than you can imagine and plenty of people dressed as their favorite Doctor. Will had a sonic screwdriver app on his phone and occasionally would play it; and then the crowd would look around for the screwdriver until they figured out that the sound was coming from Will's phone. And often folks held up their own screwdrivers, which was really funny. I think the patrons of the Morton's Steakhouse inside the hotel were befuddled.

Eventually we made it downstairs to the ballroom and then it sank in - there were loads of people (900, it turned out, according to the organizers) and at least 70% of them were teenage girls. The boys enjoyed chatting with fellow Nerdfighters, working on the crossword puzzle in the event program, and figuring out which items they would have autographed by the brothers (three items were permitted per person per brother).

The "show" started when a sock puppet appeared - Hanksock - to introduce John. The crowd went wild - shrieking and cheering and standing. Honestly, it was like a rock concert. Instead, out came the author (more screaming and cheering and standing) who began reading a book. When's the last time you saw people screaming for an author? OK, J.K. Rowling, maybe. But while that might match the crowds and dedication, when John started reading and talking the connection between him and his fans was palpable. These people KNOW each other because of the connection established through the video blog. John was inspiring, challenging the audience to think about what it means to be heroic. He quoted the Odyssey and talked about rarely people are remembered for grand, heroic gestures. Instead, he said, it is how we choose to behave and react every day and in every moment that makes us heroic - the acts of being kind to others and making choices for good that truly make the world a better place. So inspiring. And when Hank Green sang, everyone sang along - including the aforementioned song about Quarks and a song about Harry Potter. Incredibly fun.

A bit about the book itself. It is amazing. It is about teenagers with cancer, a topic close to our hearts as Ben's friend Billy passed away from the complications of brain cancer this summer. John Green served as the chaplain at a children's hospital for several years and was inspired by one patient in particular, Esther Grace Earl (in whose memory the This Star Won't Go Out Foundation was founded). Esther was a Nerdfighter who lost her battle to cancer at age 16. The book is an incredible, tender, touching, funny, and gut wrenching glimpse into the lives of young people with cancer. It's also smart and doesn't pander to teen readers and, as I write this, is on its third week at number one on the New York Times best-seller list for teen fiction. I read it in a day and loved every moment and tear.

Perhaps the most amazing part happened after the reading. That's when everyone had a chance to meet the Green brothers and get their items signed. You might think this could get unruly - 900 people, most under 18, and the clock ticking on a Friday night. Instead I witnessed an incredibly orderly and happy crowd who was respectful of others and chatted with strangers and told jokes and generally were awesome. It helped that the Politics and Prose folks had it down to a science - they distributed sticky notes (to put names for signing on) and dismissed rows of chairs to go into the line.

After about three hours, it was Ben and Will's turn to get into the line. The excitement was palpable. Ben had brought a "Harry Potter" broom (made by friends of ours - it's fabulous), plus some CDs and books. Will had a poster and CD and book. And, while they loved the thought of having the signed items as a memento of the night, what really excited them (and seemingly everyone else) was the chance to have a personal interaction with the brothers. There were stuffed animals and cookies and other items fans brought for them strewn about the table. And as each fan left the table, they had identical expressions of pure joy as they gushed to their parents. It was no different for Ben and Will... Ben was so excited to actually talk to them he's still in awe that it happened almost a month later.

Ben and I are still talking about this amazing experience. It was wonderful to see two brothers committed to doing good and being smart and inspiring others to do the same. And it was really incredible to see so many teenagers and young adults (who usually get such a bad rap for being selfish and self-involved) excited by them and their cause. I learned a lot that evening and have a new-found respect for the phenomenon. And the word "awesome" has a whole new meaning now.

Check them out at http://www.youtube.com/user/vlogbrothers . And don't forget to be awesome.