Texas Liberators - Birney "Chick" Havey (May 30, 2012)

[ed. note: A grandfather clock ticks in the background and chimes at regular intervals throughout the interview.]

SLOAN: This is Stephen Sloan. The date is May 30, 2012. We're with Mr. Birney "Chick" Havey at his residence [in] Seabrook, Texas. This is an interview with the Texas Holocaust and Genocide Commission's Texas Liberators Project. Thank you, Mr. Havey, for sitting down with us today. I'd like to go back and get some of your family background. I know you were born in St. Louis, Missouri, but if you could tell me a little bit more about your family and growing up there in St. Louis.

HAVEY: Okay. Do you mean my ancestors or--

SLOAN: Yes, sir. I know you've done some genealogy.

HAVEY: Yes. We have records that my ancestors were Prussian soldiers, and they fought in the Revolutionary War. Their name was Koch, by the way, and they were given, after the war was over, as a gift, a hundred acres of land and a mule in Pennsylvania. They moved--migrated over to Hannibal, Missouri, by the Ohio 00:01:00Valley. And that's where my recent ancestors are from, and that's where my father was born, in Hannibal, Missouri. He met my mother in St. Louis, and they were married. I have three sisters--or had three sisters who lived in North St. Louis, kind of the German area of St. Louis.

SLOAN: So what was your father's profession?

HAVEY: My father was a salesman, and he sold ladies ready-to-wear garments at the in-store level. I got some merchandising value from that because I used to help him with his samples, markups, and materials and things like that.

SLOAN: So he wasn't on the road? He was there at a store in St. Louis?

HAVEY: No, sir. He was a traveling salesman.

SLOAN: Oh, he was?

HAVEY: He traveled in Illinois, Missouri.

SLOAN: So did you get a chance to go with him on the road?

HAVEY: No, I never did. He'd pack up his little Chevrolet with suitcases in the back and head out, not every week, but he'd make trips about once a month to different towns around in his route, right in Missouri and St. Louis(??).

SLOAN: Well, I know you were young, but did he do all right--did the family do all right during the Depression?

HAVEY: We did okay, yes. I remember that bums would come to my mother's back door and knock just for a sandwich. And my mom always had a sandwich for them. She used to laugh, and she said she thought they marked the sidewalk with an X or something because sometimes they were frequent. But people--everybody was poor. We thought we were poor, but we were not that poor.

SLOAN: Did you have any work? Did you take any jobs on when you were younger?

HAVEY: Oh yes. I always had a job cutting lawns. I used to get twenty-five cents to cut a whole lawn. And that's trim, too, with a hand trimmer and a hand push [mower]. On in the winter I shoveled snow and built fires for people. Instead of automatic things, I'd build the fire for them coming home. I had four or five people like that. I saved my little dimes and quarters in a Carondelet Bakery can. (Sloan laughs) Sometimes, my mom would get a little short on Saturdays, and if I'd have somebody over, I'd have to go get a dime's worth of sausage and a loaf of bread for Saturday lunch till my dad got paid.

SLOAN: Well, when you had a little money to keep for yourself, what'd you do with it?

HAVEY: (sighs) That brings me to banking. We had a place in St. Louis called Amum(??) City Bank and Trust Company, and it was on Natural Bridge Road at Taylor. They furnished me with a bank, a little fat barrel bank with a lock on 00:04:00the bottom of it. And I couldn't open it or shake out any money or anything like that, but Saturdays--maybe once a month or every other month or so--I'd go down to that bank teller and he'd hand the key and he'd mark that little deposit, seventy cents or eighty cents in my bank book. And my account grew to about eighteen to twenty dollars. Don't you know, that bank went busted, and I lost my little money. That taught me something about banking.

SLOAN: So the bank run, you didn't get in on the bank run to get your seventeen or eighteen dollars out of there.

HAVEY: They had a run, but after--you know, they just went closed. I don't remember that they did have a run, but it was--at the time, all the banks were closing. That would have been, I guess, in '32 or so.

SLOAN: Well, did you spend any of that on yourself for entertainment?

HAVEY: No, not really. Not ever. Oh yes, I went to a carnival once, yes. Yes, I do remember that.

SLOAN: Well, what are some other memories there in St. Louis? Now, were you in the city?

HAVEY: Yes.

SLOAN: You were in the city growing up?

HAVEY: We were in North St. Louis, uh-huh.

SLOAN: What are some memories that stand out from you?

HAVEY: Well, we lived in apartment flats across from the public school stadium, and we had the facility of a whole baseball park and everything. They would let the kids play there at all times unless they had some activity going on. We enjoyed the sports, and we had teams picked. We hated the Catholic schools because they had two teams and we were just--you know, we would pick teams out and that, play.

SLOAN: But you liked baseball?

HAVEY: Yes, we were only about, oh, maybe twenty blocks from Sportsman's Park in 00:06:00St. Louis. They had a knothole gang after school. School got off about three o'clock, and we'd hurry down to the ballpark and they'd let us in free, and we'd see the end of the game, the Cardinal games. Dizzy Dean and all those old ballplayers.

SLOAN: You got to explain--I know what you mean when you say "knothole gang." What do you mean by that?

HAVEY: Well, it was depicted from little boys peeking through the board fence of a ballpark and peeking through the knothole to see the game where they couldn't get in. That's why they call them the knothole gang. (Sloan laughs) And they issued cards, too.

SLOAN: Well, I know you have talked about, already, your--kind of the family tradition, military tradition in the family. Was your father in the military?

HAVEY: No, my father was not in the military. My uncles and his father and--from the events that I understand, we had people die in the Civil War, the Second 00:07:00World War--or the First World War, and right along the line. My uncle Frank, of course, my dad's brother, was a sailor. But we weren't a military family by any stretch.

SLOAN: Well, I know you decided to enlist in 1942. Can you talk a little bit about that decision?

HAVEY: Yes, I wanted to be a pilot, and we enlisted on the air force reserve. They were taking a long time to go to pilot school. So every Saturday morning we'd go down to the recruiting office down at the [Robert A. Young] Federal Building in downtown St. Louis and see in what position we were, if any. Finally, one sergeant got ahold of me, said, "Well, why don't you join the army 00:08:00unassigned. Then you'll be assigned to the air force, and you'll get to go to pilot's training school." So I took his advice and signed up. The next thing my butt was on a train going to the mule packs in Colorado Springs, Colorado. (laughs)

SLOAN: And that recruiter was nowhere to be seen.

HAVEY: Never. (both laugh)

SLOAN: Well now, what were you doing? I know that was '42, so you were out of high school. What were you doing at that time?

HAVEY: Well, I went to Washington University for a while. I don't want to go back through the people I started with, but some of them never got out of college. But for about the year and a half prior to that, we enjoyed the college life.

SLOAN: What were you studying there?

HAVEY: Business administration.

SLOAN: Okay. Yeah. Well, so the decision to--now one memory I want to--that you 00:09:00probably can remember well is Pearl Harbor, hearing the news of Pearl Harbor. Do you remember where you were and when you heard that news?

HAVEY: Yes, I do. I had three jobs during that summer. One, I sold suits for a tailor, tailor-made suits. The other, I worked in a liquor wholesale house stacking cases. At night, I had a job at the Esquire Theater out in Clayton, Missouri. On that Sunday evening, that's where I learned of Pearl Harbor, in that theater. I remember the janitor. He didn't even know where the Philippine Islands were.

SLOAN: Do you remember what you thought or what you felt?

HAVEY: Not really. It was of news interest, you know, not--but we hadn't come to 00:10:00an anger point or anything like that.

SLOAN: It wasn't personal at that point. Well, what were you doing at the Esquire Theater?

HAVEY: I was an usher. That was cute. We'd have little flashlights, and we'd help people down to their seats in the dark. We had little uniforms.

SLOAN: And the cap.

HAVEY: Yeah.

SLOAN: Had the cap and all. Well, three jobs, huh?

HAVEY: Um-hm. (Sloan laughs) I was making more money than my dad.

SLOAN: Let's go back to you being transported in 1942. You've enlisted, and you're in the service. Where do you go from there?

HAVEY: I went down to Jefferson Barracks to--my folks took me to the pickup point--or my sister and my mother. And from there, I went to Jefferson Barracks 00:11:00in St. Louis. And then from there we boarded trains for Colorado Springs, Colorado, Camp Carson.

SLOAN: And so you did your basic at Camp Carson?

HAVEY: Yes, uh-huh. It was with the Eighty-Ninth Division--Sixty-Ninth Division.

SLOAN: Well, can you tell me a little bit about your introduction to military life?

HAVEY: Yes, we--I kind of got a kick out of the tests that the army gave you. I guess I was more mechanically inclined. I had a fellow sitting next to me, and he copied off of my mechanical test. The joke was that after we ended up, he ended up head of the division motor pool, and he didn't know anything about mechanics. You know, he had copied off of me, (laughs) so. And I ended up at 00:12:00division, too, as a statistician.

SLOAN: So before we get to that, what was basic like?

HAVEY: Basic training was routine. It was okay for a kid. I was strong, and it didn't really bother me.

SLOAN: Well, were they doing accelerated basic at that point?

HAVEY: I hadn't heard of that. It was just standard basic.

SLOAN: (both speaking at same time) Well, it just was--standard basic, yeah. I know later they were doing briefer--you know, they're moving people through quicker, through basic.

HAVEY: No, they had a regular division training course and a program for that.

SLOAN: Now, you said you were assigned as a statistician?

HAVEY: Yes, at division headquarters. I soon got out of that, got with (unintelligible).

SLOAN: What sort of work--did you work in that area very long? What sort of work did they have you doing as a statistician?

HAVEY: Well, we had all the files of every--all the personnel in the division. They had a form. There was about an eight-by-ten form with sticky holes around the side of it. They would plunge a dagger in--or a pointed thing in and pick out certain categories you wanted or they wanted. And you'd try to keep statistics. We made graphs and plans with that.

SLOAN: Exciting work.

HAVEY: Yeah, that was not too good.

SLOAN: (laughs) So you got out of that, and you were reassigned to what?

HAVEY: I went down with the 222nd--let me see--no (pause), no sir. That's when I went to parachute school.

SLOAN: Okay. What are some of your memories from parachute school?

HAVEY: Well, it was a long, rigorous course. Exciting and very interesting and 00:14:00we went through the different stages of jump school: A, B, C, and D. D is the last: jumping. But I enjoyed it. Everything was running. We ran. But we were in marvelous shape.

SLOAN: Do you remember your first jump?

HAVEY: Yes, uh-huh.

SLOAN: Can you take me through that experience?

HAVEY: Yes, I can. I didn't have any particular fear of jumping. All that you wanted to do was hurry out the door and do things right: do the right step and stand at the door and do it correctly. But one of the biggest thrills that I had--and I still have--is after your parachute opens, is seeing that beautiful C-47 fly away in midair with nothing holding it up. If you happen to be turned 00:15:00that way and see that go away, what a feeling that is. And everything is quiet. And you'd talk together as you're going down.

SLOAN: That's as close as you got to the air corps, right?

HAVEY: Yeah, (both laugh) that's it.

SLOAN: So you're in jump school, and you're training through jump school. And then take me--progression from there, if you would?

HAVEY: Yes. Well, I had a lot of trouble with my legs charley-horsing. In fact, I had some muscle breakout in my right ¬¬gastrocnemic muscle, I guess. I finally had to transfer out of that to an infantry school, you know, an infantry outfit. But I wanted to get in the war and get to Europe, and the only way I could do that is when I--with that Forty-Second Division, which was ready to go. So that's when I joined that.

SLOAN: Now, it was around this time that they reconstituted the Forty-Second, right?

HAVEY: It was already a division when I went there, but they were still in basic training. I went through basic training again.

SLOAN: Congratulations.

HAVEY: Well, it was a piece of cake, you know. (both laugh)

SLOAN: Can you share a little bit of the--I know you know the history of the Forty-Second. Can you share a little bit of the history of the Forty-Second?

HAVEY: Yes. It was kind of a political division because General MacArthur had been Chief of Staff under General Pershing, and he was attached with the Forty-Second Division. They kept all records, and there were more eyes watching the division, I guess. They call it the Rainbow one. It was supposedly, in the first war, a conglomeration of all states type of division, an infantry division.

SLOAN: And that's what it ended up being in the second war?

HAVEY: Yes, uh-huh.

SLOAN: It wasn't for any particular location. It was--there were guys in the division from everywhere.

HAVEY: From everywhere, yeah. That was at Camp Gruber, Oklahoma.

SLOAN: Okay, that's where you gathered the Forty-Second.

HAVEY: That's where the division headquarters and the training took place.

SLOAN: Now, this is in--when were you assigned to the Forty-Second?

HAVEY: In 1944.

SLOAN: Nineteen forty-four, okay. And so what sort of exercises or maneuvers are you doing at that point?

HAVEY: They're getting the final touches on any replacements or the people that have come in late. The division is ready to go to Europe, ready to ship out.

SLOAN: Now, at that point, you've been assigned to an antitank company at that point?

HAVEY: Yes, sir.

SLOAN: And so with that, what sort of training or--

HAVEY: Well, at that point, they had thirty-seven millimeter cannons and you learned to shoot them and load them and aim them and, you know, shoot tanks with them, set them up, and do everything with it. But then we--before we went to Europe, we got fifty-seven millimeters, which were much bigger and a better gun.

SLOAN: Now, are you working with--I'm trying to remember the name of the tank destroyer. An M-10, is it an M-10?

HAVEY: I don't recall the numbers, but the tank destroyers were on half-tracks with 155 millimeter artillery.

SLOAN: Okay, yeah. And, of course, you didn't know if you were going to--at that point, if you were going to North Africa or if you were going to Europe?

HAVEY: Not till a certain point, till we got on the trains. We headed for New York and that gave us a little hint.

SLOAN: That was a dead giveaway. (laughs)

HAVEY: It was a little hint.

SLOAN: Take me through that transition to New York.

HAVEY: We rode on Pullman trains, and they--you loaded at Muskogee, Oklahoma, and it was like a two- or three---five-day trip. I don't recall. It was longer than three. We were well-fed and everything. We couldn't get off the train, but when we got to Camp Ru--oh, I can't recall the camp in New York. We were assigned a barracks. And we got passes to visit New York City, and I got to into New York City.

SLOAN: Tell me about that, yeah. That's a long way from St. Louis.

HAVEY: Yeah, well, we just hopped on a train and went there. Then, went down to Times Square and looked around, had a few drinks. We just kind of enjoyed it. 00:20:00Finally, went back home a little dizzy. (both laugh)

SLOAN: I get a feeling there's some details in there you were leaving out a little bit.

HAVEY: There are. (both laugh)

SLOAN: We don't know who's going to watch this at some point. Well, I know that you were finally--you shipped out in December of '44?

HAVEY: I think November.

SLOAN: November. I know you disembarked in December, but you shipped out for France in November of 1944?

HAVEY: Yes, uh-huh.

SLOAN: And how did--talk about the transport over to France.

HAVEY: We went over in a rather large troop ship. It was a captured German ship from the First World War. I was, I don't want to say comfortable, but we all had bunks, some bunks down in the holds. It was crowded, but we kind of enjoyed it. I didn't get too sick, and we just enjoyed the ocean. We went through, close to 00:21:00South America because we went south in the Gulf Stream for quite a while. And the trip was pretty warm. That late in the year, it should have been cold. I learned better coming back.

SLOAN: Um-hm. Was it--pretty peaceful passage over there?

HAVEY: Yeah, we went and landed at Marseille, but we went through the Straits of Gibraltar. And we got to see North Africa and Casablanca, things like that. Then we landed at Marseille.

SLOAN: Tell me about your first impressions of Europe.

HAVEY: When we first got off the ship, we were carrying our baggage, a barracks bag and our packs and our rifles. We were like we were drunk, trying to keep our--you know, on the dock because we'd been rolling around in the ocean so 00:22:00long. We were--it was--then we marched up to our campsite and camped out and dug our holes and got ready and dinner prepared. And they'd go bringing the rest of the equipment in. But we came earlier than the division--er, regiment or something.

SLOAN: So you came in early and waited?

HAVEY: Um-hm. No, we didn't wait. They shoved us right up the Belfort Gap.

SLOAN: The first of many holes you would dig in Europe.

HAVEY: Well, yeah.

SLOAN: Did you have any encounters with the French?

HAVEY: Yes, I got to go to--out of that camp, I went to a village saloon. I remember, I had a--not a bourbon and 7-Up, but I guess it was a brandy and 7-Up. And there was a Senegalese soldier that came in after me, and we're sitting at 00:23:00this little bar. He had a beer with 7-Up in it. I looked at him, and he looked at me. That was it. We bought some of their cheap wine and things like that.

SLOAN: That area was fairly secure though, when you came--

HAVEY: Except for air raids. We were getting some air raids.

SLOAN: You were still getting some air raids? Were those pretty regular?

HAVEY: Yeah, all night.

SLOAN: As you got into Europe, did you realize some things that you hadn't been prepared for as well in your training?

HAVEY: Well, we started up the Belfort Gap through the Rhône Valley. That was right after the Eighth Air Force had been strafing where the Germans were pulling out. And that was a sight to behold because mile after mile after mile 00:24:00of their equipment, horse-drawn, horses and oxen in the field, you know, bloated up. That was the first--just for two hundred miles or a hundred and fifty miles of it, endless.

SLOAN: I know y'all are--at that point, you're moving fairly quickly to catch up.

HAVEY: Yes, they moved us in trucks and then, on December the sixteenth is when the Battle of the Bulge started. That's when it started freezing and getting cold and snow, even up in northern France--what do I want I want to say--up by Reims.

SLOAN: Did you come up with any strategies to deal with the cold?

HAVEY: No, we had our overcoats and regular gloves and our helmets and our 00:25:00little caps to pull down over our ears. One of the things we learned trucking up to the Third Army--we were assigned to Patton's army to relieve the Bulge at that time. We were all riding in trucks, and I--for some reason, we had number ten cans, and I put dirt in, got some gasoline, and we had a little fire in the truck. With it closed, it was pretty comfortable. But the next morning when we got out, we all were black with soot. It was comical.

SLOAN: (laughs) It was probably worth it to stay warm.

HAVEY: Oh yeah.

SLOAN: Well, (phone rings) take me through, if you would, kind of your experience in that December part of the Bulge.

HAVEY: Okay, well, they--we got up to a certain point and we knew we were getting close to the fighting because we could hear artillery rumbling and all. And they tossed us out and we were (phone rings) advancing with tanks, I guess 00:26:00to the--it would have been towards England. But anyhow, we got into some shooting and some ground scrapes there, but that was--it might have been the nineteenth instead of the twentieth. After we relieved the Bulge, after we made contact with the division--I don't remember the division. It was an ad hoc division. But they put us in trucks and took us back to Strasbourg. And that was about a two-day trip. We were up there in the battle of Northern France--the Germans were just attacking across the Rhine at Strasbourg.

SLOAN: I see.

HAVEY: And we got into some of the old French Maginot Line forts. It was amazing.

SLOAN: Yeah, tell me about that, if you would.

HAVEY: They were--it had kind of a tower. You'd go in and go down the stairs, and there were about four flights down. They had a railroad track, a small gauge railroad track running on through it. It was kind of warm. It was comfortable. But we didn't--we found some potatoes in there and cooked some potatoes. Their latrines were funny because they were just a hole in the concrete. They had a place where you'd put your feet, you know. We got a kick out of that. They were rather crude.

SLOAN: Um-hm. So how long are you there in Strasbourg?

HAVEY: Well, if I'm not mistaken, we were there either Christmas night or Christmas Eve. And, as I remember, we were just doing patrol work.

SLOAN: I see.

HAVEY: And I remember we were getting mortar fire then. And I remember digging in the side--I had to dig out cobblestones to dig by this curb. The Olympics or some games were there--big meeting by here not too long ago. What was it, Strasbourg? I remember those cobblestones at that street. But the Germans had blown the bridges across the Rhine. They were attacking up north of us. We got into that later.

SLOAN: So you were dug in there on Christmas Eve?

HAVEY: Yes.

SLOAN: And was there a ceasefire for Christmas Eve?

HAVEY: No. Well, there wasn't anything happening, but there was no known ceasefire, you know. Nobody said, Don't shoot.

SLOAN: Sure. So you were dug in in that position patrolling in Strasbourg? Then, when did you move on from that?

HAVEY: They pulled us right out of there, and we blunted the next German attack north of Strasbourg, by Wingen Sur Moder and there.

SLOAN: Can you describe for me how the antitank companies were working at that time?

HAVEY: Yes, we were mainly attached to our battalion. And each regiment has an antitank company. There are three battalions--three companies for each battalion, and each one has an antitank company in it. We're there to protect against tank attacks, so we're always dug in the side of the road or positioned at crossroad or something where we could get some flat--fire into tanks.

SLOAN: Do you remember encountering--when you encountered live fire for the 00:30:00first time with German tanks?

HAVEY: Yes.

SLOAN: Can you describe that for me?

HAVEY: Yeah. The tank was coming down the road. And they saw us, and they machine-gunned us. But we were dug in. We fired probably four or five rounds. And it wasn't a Tiger tank; it was a lighter tank, Mark IV, whatever. We hit it on the side and they backed up, and they went another way. But the Germans always had infantry with their tanks. They protected them. They never--a tank alone is a dead duck. So that was our first fire.

SLOAN: Did you feel like y'all had pretty good intelligence on German tanks?

HAVEY: No, we had none. None, none. We didn't know--we knew one tank silhouette from the other. The Panther and the Tiger.

SLOAN: But I'm assuming that this is knowledge that developed with each encounter.

HAVEY: Yes, we tried to attack them sideways instead of frontal, yeah.

SLOAN: And what were some other tactics that developed, that you would learn to use?

HAVEY: We had bazookas, and they were just in their--I don't say infancy--we hadn't trained with bazookas in the United States, but the bazooka is a pretty good weapon at that time if you get a side hit. Tanks are blind. They're really dumb. I was never really afraid of a tank, per say, unless it was running over you, but that was it.

SLOAN: Trying to de-track, trying to get the tracks off the tank or de-track a tank.

HAVEY: Our fifty-seven millimeter wasn't really powerful enough to penetrate a frontal German tank at that time. We had to try to side fire if we could, but a 00:32:00lot of times you didn't have that opportunity, nor did we encounter that many times, too.

SLOAN: Sure. Were you--were the antitank companies attached--you weren't attached to a tank battalion, were you?

HAVEY: No. We had--we were attached to our own battalion, our regiment.

SLOAN: All right, so you're moving up in the Bulge. When did you get a sense that things were changing with the Bulge? That the tide was shifting a bit?

HAVEY: Well, at that time, we were just infantry. We didn't have our antitank guns or any trucks or anything with us. We were just infantry. And we made contact with the southern flank shoulder of the attacking division of Patton's army. That was our objective, you know, to close that gap. And they took us up. 00:33:00I remember one thing about it though, is for some reason, that next day we got the assignment to stack bodies, and they had two-and-a-half ton trucks there. They must have brought all the German frozen, you know, stiff. We were throwing them up in the trucks. Oh, there were probably a hundred of them, two, three truckloads of them. We were seeing how far we could throw them back in the truck because they were stiffer than boards. And only probably weighed a hundred and fifty pounds, so two of us would swing them and sling them. But that was just an extracurricular assignment.

SLOAN: What was your--I'll ask that--this for people that were attached to the Third Army at different times. What was your impression of Patton?

HAVEY: I had no impression. I never saw him or anything. I didn't know anything 00:34:00but what we read in the Stars and Stripes. Everybody knew that he didn't care about casualties. He was going to attack no matter what, which was not the worst thing in the world. I got--

SLOAN: Well, I find vets that go either way, you know. So once you're attached to the Third Army, at that point you were getting your equipment--you're getting your supplies and your trucks and things that you needed for the--

HAVEY: Yeah, they were being assembled south of Strasbourg, unbeknownst to me. I didn't know it till later on. Our division was just coming--the rest of it was coming over.

SLOAN: Well, if you could, take me forward from that point once you're attached 00:35:00to the Third Army.

HAVEY: After the Bulge, we were relieved from the Third Army and went with the Seventh Army, which was the army that was facing northward. That's from Strasbourg north. That was General Patch, and that was a different army under him, other divisions with that army. But that's when we went into positions, mainly defensive positions, along the shoulders of the Rhine River above Strasbourg.

SLOAN: And so you were holding those positions? You were taking artillery fire from the other--across the Rhine?

HAVEY: Yeah.

SLOAN: Because I know the Germans were dug in.

HAVEY: Their mortar fire was probably the most frequent.

SLOAN: Did you learn to read the sound of a mortar?

HAVEY: No, you really couldn't--a mortar'd be in on you. But an artillery shell 00:36:00you'd--and a device they called a Screaming Mimi that they fired at--they called a Nebelwerfer or something like that--and you could hear that coming in. You could hear artillery shells come in, generally.

SLOAN: But you were dug in in that position.

HAVEY: Yeah, it didn't--we were under fire constantly, and you got used to it, I guess. And some of them weren't all that--maybe one block or two blocks away or maybe one hundred yards or--you know, not every instant or anything like that, but frequently.

SLOAN: At this point were you--(phone ringing) we had talked early about supply lines. Were you fairly well supplied at this point?

HAVEY: We were--yeah--(phone ringing) really--we were--above the Bulge, above 00:37:00Strasbourg, a lot of times, we were in German barns--Alsatian barn or house and go out and four hours out, four hours in.

SLOAN: Talk to me about that routine of four hours out and four hours in.

HAVEY: Well, a division is set up on the main line of resistance where you have your line. In front of that line are listening posts, where you're dug in in front of it. And you're supposed to hear for an attack and warn the people bel--and usually you have a phone. (phone rings) So it's just a static position. You'd go out when you can. If you're not observed, you're okay. And usually, you have areas to go back to your hole where you won't be observed. And four hours 00:38:00on, four hours off. It was just bitterly cold. Fifteen, seventeen below.

SLOAN: Did your feet do all right?

HAVEY: I had a little problem with them.

SLOAN: That's a--I've talked to veterans that say, if I could just have gotten my feet warm.

HAVEY: Well, we were lucky because we had shoe packs prior to that. Prior to that, they had their regular boots, those strap-type of boots with the galoshes. But the shoe pack was the rubberized modern version of a hunting shoe and it had a felt liner. As long as you had a couple pair of socks on, and you'd keep your toes moving--you know, you're never comfortable, at least you weren't freezing to death.

SLOAN: Well, so you were involved in these four out, four back. You're doing that, holding this position, this defensive position on the other side of the Rhine. Can you take me through the crossing, that crossing when things broke, 00:39:00and you crossed?

HAVEY: Probably the best thing I can tell you about is the action. If you were patrol action--if you were picked for patrols out in front of the lines to locate the enemy, or if it was a prisoner, or attack, or whatever. But that was the kind of stuff going on. Other than that, we were in a pretty--you know, I call it a safe position. But it was every once in a while, there'd be machine gun fire, things like that. But it was kind of a static, winter position until such time as the Germans started that attack. They called it [Operation] Nordwind [ed. note: sometimes Operation Nord Wind], I think. They tried to break through between the French--the French were north of us, their divisions, 00:40:00whatever they were--I never saw them. They tried to break through there, and they attacked through those areas. We lost a lot of men in those attacks, like counterattacks.

SLOAN: Now, were there any British in your--attacks to your group?

HAVEY: No.

SLOAN: I always like to ask opinions of the Brits.

HAVEY: No, I never had--

SLOAN: Never, yeah. Well, so that western side of the Rhine, that western bank of the Rhine during that period was fairly secure. For this defensive, this period of--

HAVEY: Generally inactive, I would say.

SLOAN: Well, take me through when you moved on from that position.

HAVEY: I think, probably that would get us into February. We were ready for a general attack. We were assigned to the point, and we attacked through the Harz 00:41:00Mountains. That was named Bavaria, but it was in Northern France. We lost a lot of men there.

SLOAN: I've had veterans talk about the defensive position the Germans had in the Harz Mountains and how dug in they were. Do you remember work that the antitank company did there?

HAVEY: No, we were all on foot.

SLOAN: You were all on foot at that point.

HAVEY: In fact, they brought some mules up to take our wounded out. We had mule packs with us. I remember, we got a new replacement--one of our officers were killed. We got a new replacement officer, and he was kind of a heavy guy. I don't mean to say fat but heavy. We were attacking at night, and we were going 00:42:00up the side of this hill. He made the mistake of touching one of those mules in the back, and [the] mule kicked him down the hill. He just went up and patted the mule, and he got kicked down. We kind of got a kick out of that. (Sloan laughs)

SLOAN: Well, I know at that point--that's near the Harz Forest. So I know there's a period there where you're kind of in a defensive position again and you're patrolling some. Is that right?

HAVEY: No, we--this was a general attack.

SLOAN: It was a general--

HAVEY: Yeah. And we kept going from then on.

SLOAN: Okay. And I know, in March, you break the Siegfried Line.

HAVEY: Yes.

SLOAN: Yeah, can you take me through that motion from February into March?

HAVEY: Sure. I'd read about the Siegfried Line from the newspapers when I was a 00:43:00kid, when Hitler built them--and the Maginot Line. Little did I imagine I'd ever be attacking through it. And my company commander, Captain Waters, came in, and he said, "Come on, we've got a patrol tonight." So our assignment was--and for some reason why him--to find where two bridges were. And they were just little bridges across an inlet. And that afternoon, we were laying up on top of a bluff overlooking the Siegfried Line. We couldn't really see anything; we were camouflaged and everything. But our 155s, our corps artillery, was constantly firing big shells and they must have been coming close over our heads. So they fired all afternoon and that night was the attack.

But we were--so Waters and I started out along this road, and it was dark. I 00:44:00remember the machine gun fire hitting in the steel posts--all their telegraph posts were steel, you know, not x kind of steel. We got to those--to the bridge, and I was pretty close to him. He used me for a bodyguard throughout the war. And I remember he's got a pistol. We were going through the Siegfried Line, and he's got a pistol. I kind of told him, I said, "Well, you stay back here and--where I know where you are." I slithered up and both of the bridges were there. And we were getting some fire, but most of the fire was coming from our troops, way on our line.

So the next--on patrol action, you get attuned, and you can smell the German 00:45:00tobacco, and you know Germans have either been there, or whatever, when you were getting close to them, because you could smell that tobacco. It's so unlike ours. But that's just one of the assets you gained. So I found the second bridge, went back and got Waters, and the attack had already started. Here comes the lead people down that road, you know, the scouts out in front. We got the word back, but the bridges were okay; they could tank across them later on.

The next morning, they stopped us, our company--and the attack went on through us. And the next morning, we were there kind of--but the sun was out--and there were about four GIs riding low--a road down the other side of that hill. And 00:46:00they were dead, but I don't know--they didn't show any blood or anything. I don't know how they got killed. Then, the engineers came up, and there was a pillbox. We got to look at the pillbox and how they'd go in the side doors and the metal doors and the apertures, and they were about six foot thick. And we were running around with Bangalore torpedoes going to blow them up. So they moved--the engineers came up with a truck. And we were watching, just kind of lollygagging around. And they shot off this--I guess a box of TNT, and it just blew out the doors. Then, they got serious. They brought another truck, and they put maybe--oh, ten boxes of TNT. Then they turned that off and that just, whump. I think that's shown in the Forty-Second--it's just, you know, they just lifted that thing up a little bit, made a lot of smoke.

SLOAN: Still there. So you spent some time, I know, clearing that area, right, after that?

HAVEY: Yeah.

SLOAN: Were you facing organized resistance or just pockets of resistance?

HAVEY: Semi-organized. They were--we were getting a lot of shellfire in, and it was tree bursts. And they usually burst down, you know. They were pretty--they'd wound a lot of people and kill a lot of people. We had some machine-gun fire from a position, and I knew they were down in the valley. And I knew they couldn't hit us. We're waltzing up the side of this hill, and here come four of those Germans. And they gave up. They had a lieutenant with them and three enlisted men. We started getting some artillery fire, and I remember everybody 00:48:00was hiding and rolling around trying to get out of that artillery fire. I noticed this lieutenant was just standing there. He was a tough rascal. So I went over and said hi to him--just--didn't say hi to him. I just went over and looked at him, really. But he was a well-done guy. We lost Lieutenant Westbrook there. He had a piece of shrapnel in the back. He was bleeding through the stretcher.

And I went up to him, and I told him, I said, "Is there anything I can do for you?" He said, "Nope." I told him, I said, "Well, we'll see you later." And I didn't see him again till we met at St. Louis there. I never knew what happened to him. But we continued on, and we crossed that Bitche-Haguenau Highway. Haguenau was our objective. Some German tanks caught us coming down the hill and 00:49:00were firing straight into us. You talk about dig a hole fast.

SLOAN: What--Panthers or Tigers or--

HAVEY: They were Panthers. Medium-weight tank. And they were just--we were coming kind of in a row down the side of that hill. They were firing straight into us.

SLOAN: I know, we talked a little bit about German tanks. I interviewed a tank driver who just talked about how formidable the German tanks were, armor plating and how superior they were.

HAVEY: They really were.

SLOAN: So you moved back across the Rhine. I know you've got several Rhine 00:50:00crossings in your--

HAVEY: Yeah, we've crossed the Rhine at Worms.

SLOAN: Yeah, okay. And that--is that when you captured Wertheim and--that was at the end of March?

HAVEY: Without looking at my chronology, I don't remember the names of the towns too much. I didn't know them then, I don't know them now--(both speaking at same time)

SLOAN: Yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah, I know. It's hard to keep all these things straight. (laughs) Well, in this case where you're under fire from a group of German tanks and you dig into a defensive position--

HAVEY: That was what we did immediately.

SLOAN: Oh, that was immediately.

HAVEY: They weren't there for two or three hours. We were not on the attack.

SLOAN: I see.

HAVEY: And that was the Bitche-Haguenau Highway--or road. They were firing.

SLOAN: So, a key highway.

HAVEY: That was the objective.

SLOAN: Yeah, to secure that highway, yeah. Now, you mentioned taking on prisoners. Did you notice that was becoming more common, taking on German prisoners?

HAVEY: Not yet.

SLOAN: Were you receiving a lot of German prisoners?

HAVEY: Not then.

SLOAN: Not that early, not in March. Now, after securing the highway there, what was your next objective?

HAVEY: I think we got back on tanks, and I think--I don't recall too much right there. I know we got--our tanks came back, and we were riding tanks in.

SLOAN: At that point, had the pace picked up quite a bit?

HAVEY: Generally. We learned to loot.

SLOAN: Or liberate, as a lot of vets call it.

HAVEY: We used to say, A squad is twelve men. Two men shooting, and ten men looting. (both laugh)

SLOAN: So what were you looking for?

HAVEY: Pistols, gold, cameras.

SLOAN: Did you--what were some of the items that you picked up.

HAVEY: Well, people don't realize what war really is. They look at it, oh, taking this or going--we'd kick doors down. Got to be an expert kicking doors down. I remember I had a guy by the name of Rennick. He came as a replacement. He went to Illinois University. And he told me, he said, "Havey, will you teach me how to loot?" I said, "Well, there's nothing to looting. You just go take what you want." So about a month later, we were kicking down doors in a town and 00:53:00searching out, really. And getting under fire. And I went out--they were kind of long, brick houses--and I went out in the backyard and opened the back door and went out in the backyard. I heard yelling and screaming back there. I looked across the fence, and Rennick had these people digging their own grave. He had found a Leica camera lens or something. And he knew they had it hidden in there, and he was trying to torture them into getting it. Not torturing, you know--

SLOAN: Yeah, scare them a little. Get them to hand you--

HAVEY: So I was going to teach him to loot.

SLOAN: Well, I know a lot of this work is moving from little town to little town, this clearing work that you're doing. So what were your interactions with the locals like?

HAVEY: We really didn't have and didn't see a lot of them, because they were hiding. We were in combat. We weren't coming up later on. We didn't see a lot of them, but some occasions, we would find food on the table. We were always looking for food, also. I remember, we attacked this one town. We had some shooting and we went around, cut off the town, and came back through. It must have been a Sunday--we never knew what day it was. These people had a goose in the oven with dressing and potatoes and just the meal was about ready. I remember they had milk, too. We sat down there and ate that goose and drank that milk and just had a good time. But it must have been their Sunday meal.

SLOAN: Well now, I haven't asked you--I know you were wounded. Was that during this period?

HAVEY: No, it was before, I was already back. I was wounded March the first.

SLOAN: Okay, March the first. Can you tell me about--tell me that story?

HAVEY: Yeah, we were attacking through a field and--you hardly ever go through an open field. You see in the movies they're walking across. You don't do that. I happened to have to cut across this field. I heard a machine gun (making machine gun noise) and it knocked--it hit me and knocked my rifle, went through my hand, knocked my rifle, broke my gun and a piece of shrapnel went in my arm. I don't know if it was a piece of wood--it was a piece of metal, because they found a piece of metal in me. And it really didn't hurt too much.

SLOAN: How long did it take for them to get you back to get some--

HAVEY: I walked out.

SLOAN: You walked back.

HAVEY: They already had a medical tent set up--about a mile or so. And they dressed my wound and sent me back to the next place. I stayed there. I didn't go 00:56:00quite--they sewed it up and cleaned it out. Sewed it up, bandaged it.

SLOAN: Give you any trouble?

HAVEY: (pause) Not really. You're aware of it, but you don't--you know, not really.

SLOAN: (pause) Now, Furth I know is one that does stand out as far as--the resistance that the Forty-Second met at Furth. Do you mind telling me about that?

HAVEY: Yeah, Furth is right next to Nuremburg. And Nuremburg was the ball-bearing center, and I guess the Eighth Air Force lost an awful lot of 00:57:00planes there trying to bomb the ball-bearing plants and stop the Germans from machining. We were looking out on a plain and we had a real good panoramic view. We could see maybe for eight, ten miles. We could see some of their eighty-eight positions. We were getting some mortar fire, but there was an air raid occurring. And I think they were A-20s. Our A-20 bombers were attacking. And there were parts of planes coming down, and it was the most amazing thing, just like it'd be in the movies. Not here, but you could see parts of planes. Sometimes you couldn't see them and whatever.

Finally, we attacked Nuremburg that night. And we didn't have too much--had some artillery fire and some mortar fire. We got into the town, and the bridge was 00:58:00blown, but they didn't blow it all the way. They could get a jeep across it. I think there was a picture in there. But they had to help getting across. That was amazing because the Germans pulled out by the time we got across the bridge. And there was a big road with a median in front of it, with nice trees all the way down there, about a mile, I guess we could see. And they had a man hanging from each one of those trees. It was amazing. I guess they were people giving up and the SSers hung them, you know--how long a neck will stretch out of your shoulders. Their necks are out that far. I found a guy that died a natural death in a coffin in one house. And there was a safe in that house, and it had the door open, that safe. And in that safe was a gold coin--or a coin. And I carried 00:59:00that for a long time. I don't know what it was worth or anything like that. It was funny seeing that person die a natural death. They have those real narrow coffins.

SLOAN: Well, how long were you in Nuremburg?

HAVEY: I don't know. We turned through Nuremburg. Furth was right next to Nuremburg, and we didn't really know it was two cities. They were almost together, as far as I was concerned. But we were riding tanks, and we were ordered, I think, to continue on our--there wasn't too much resistance at Nuremburg.

SLOAN: So you weren't able to get tanks across the bridge there at Nuremburg?

HAVEY: They'd already had them across.

SLOAN: Oh, they had.

HAVEY: They bypassed that.

SLOAN: Okay. And so you move on to the Battle at Furth--taking Furth, yeah. Can you take me through that?

HAVEY: You mean Nuremburg?

SLOAN: Yes.

HAVEY: There wasn't any particular battle. It was just mortar fire and sniper fire and things like that. Where we'd have a sniper, we'd get down behind the tanks and go and blow the building out, you know.

SLOAN: But I'm trying to keep it clear, because at Furth, there was more resistance. Yeah, there's pretty heavy resistance at Furth. Can you tell me about that?

HAVEY: It seemed like they were more organized. I guess it was the same group that hung those people. They were more Nazified. They just had more mortar fire and more flat-trajectory fire.

SLOAN: Were you with the tanks then?

HAVEY: Yeah, we were riding tanks.

SLOAN: You were riding tanks then? That was a little different day, wasn't it?

HAVEY: Well, a lot of times, if the tank was fired on, we'd hop off of it and get behind it, and be fairly well protected. Or have to get in the ditches and 01:01:00protect the tank, because the Germans were real clever. At each road, they would have a tank trap where the tank couldn't get off this way, and there was a bluff that way and they'd have a dug tank trap or posts. And they'd always be protected with a heavy artillery piece or a machine gun. They'd take turns, the tanks. We might have had fifteen or twenty of them, and you'd take turns being the lead tank, you know, get your butt shot off. So the minute they'd start firing, we'd hop off the tanks and get in the ditches and attack them. But it was like shooting quail then, because they always had some means to run. And you'd look and if they were--there would always be some place where the woods were close, and they'd make a break for it or go down the road in a bicycle. 01:02:00Man, that was the end of that.

SLOAN: Were these Shermans?

HAVEY: Yes.

SLOAN: What'd you think of the Sherman tanks?

HAVEY: We thought they were swell. But they built a lot of racks on them, put a lot of sandbags on the side, especially around the side turrets to beef them up.

SLOAN: Give them a little more protection?

HAVEY: We'd get--I guess--twelve men up on a tank, almost a squad. We'd carry our pot for cooking off the tailgate.

SLOAN: You'd get a little more heat--could you get heat off the engine of the tanks?

HAVEY: We weren't using that, no. We'd have a fire. We were so organized we'd having one guy looting for eggs and chickens--or two guys. And we'd have one guy getting the fire ready and getting the wood. In a minute we'd stop--we might be there five minutes, we might be there a day. But we'd be getting something ready 01:03:00to eat.

SLOAN: Everybody had their job.

HAVEY: Yes. (Sloan laughs)

SLOAN: Well, take me through the--Furth--Furth, I know, is taken in the middle in April--I think that's what it is. And I think, after that, do you cross--don't you cross the Danube after that, not long after that?

HAVEY: No, we had crossed the Mann River--Main River, M-a-i-n. We had--our division, you're assigned a track on the map. We had four assault crossings across that Main River. And there was a lot of problems.

SLOAN: Can you tell me some of the problems?

HAVEY: Well, probably the worst one was at Würzburg. That happens to be at that 01:04:00Würzburg Castle. The Germans caught us in--there was a railroad tunnel running parallel to the river and down to where we wanted to go. They had the assault boats all ready. We were going through the tunnel, and they caught us in there with the thirty-millimeter antiaircraft gun that was four-mounted gun. They were bouncing them off the wall. We were really backing off there. But finally we got out and made the assault crossing.

Oh, I must tell you a story before that. As we were assembling for the assault, we were way up on top of the bluff at Würzburg Castle, overlooking the city. And Würzburg was not--was a church town they said, but it wasn't, because you 01:05:00could see the military forts, and we were getting plenty of fire from them. And they resisted. Orders came down that night, before the attack, and they pulled us back about eighteen miles. We marched back eighteen miles. The British stream-bombed them. I watched a TV program, and they said they fire-bombed them, but they didn't. They used those two-thousand-pound blockbusters, and they bombed the living hell out of that town. I saw that--you know, we were blamed for burning a church town, but we were getting fire and resistance from them. They wouldn't give up. We had that assault coming. So the next morning, we moved back into position and--because our antitank guns, we were firing across from that castle at picked targets. Very seldom do you ever do that: get to fire at a 01:06:00picked target. The program that I saw, they were chastising the United States or the British for bombing Würzburg, but it was a war town. There were forts there. There were plenty of soldiers. There was resistance. And there was no such thing as fire-bombing, because the town didn't burn, so I don't know where they got that.

SLOAN: Yeah. Did you go through the castle? Was your position there near the castle?

HAVEY: Yeah, we were right up on the castle wall.

SLOAN: Oh, were you? Okay.

HAVEY: Yeah, but we didn't get into the castle, per say. They had a runway or a driveway all the way up. It was really strange.

SLOAN: So the British bombers had done their job? Was the resistance softened up quite a bit?

HAVEY: Yeah. They--yes, in fact, one of the bombs hit on this side by the castle 01:07:00above the bluff, and there were officers' quarters there, nice houses. And those blockbusters would be about two houses wide and a house deep. They were big holes. I mean, they were the biggest I'd ever seen. And they were those British blockbusters. Then we made the assault crossing, and we got some pretty good mortar fire and machine gun fire, but, after we got up the bank, I saw that gun that had caught us in there. They had hit them with light phosphorus because their bodies were burned on the gun position. One guy's skeleton side--and we had some good looting at Würzburg there.

SLOAN: What'd you get in Würzburg?

HAVEY: One the strangest things that ever happened in the war to me was, Monahan 01:08:00and I were on a patrol and we were going up this block, and there was a building like a driveway down, like a parking garage only not real big, and in there was a dead German soldier. And he was on his knee, and he had his hand like that, and he was dead. Not bloody or wounded or blown or anything. And I couldn't figure out--so I knocked him over, but he was just dead stiff. And in his pack, he had a can of sardines. They were from Norway. We got looking around, and there were pieces of meat around. Some guy had blown himself up, evidently. They said his backbone was laying on the ground. It was smelling like crap and 01:09:00everything, and we sat and ate those sardines right there. (laughs) Best treat we had.

SLOAN: I know--I've talked to vets who say it was about trying to find out what the next meal was.

HAVEY: Yeah, you're always eating.

SLOAN: So I know that was satisfying to be able to eat that.

HAVEY: But I've always wondered what killed that guy. Didn't have a mark on him. And the other one, you could see he blew himself up.

SLOAN: So you spent some time clearing Würzburg?

HAVEY: Not too much. We were on the road again because they kept pushing us, you know. They kept the Germans on the run. As long as we had those tanks to ride and they had gas, we were ready.

SLOAN: Now, did you go from there to Munich?

HAVEY: I'd have to look on my list, but it would--it's getting close.

SLOAN: (both speaking at same time) It's around that period, yeah.

HAVEY: Yeah. But we captured Dachau before we captured Munich. I'm sure of that.

SLOAN: Yes, that's right, yeah. If you could, take me through your experience at Dachau, and if you'll begin with anything you may have heard or any knowledge you have had up to that point.

HAVEY: The city of Dachau--the town of Dachau was a small country town. It was in a wedge in the road. I remember when we were riding the lead tank and we got some fire from the right front on the side of a hill. We didn't know it then, but there were some SSers dug in there. So we hopped off the tank, and there was a perfect ditch leading right up that road. We crossed at those trees at--I have 01:11:00a picture of it--and we had flat shooting, right in their holes. We shot them up--there were four to six of them--and killed them all, and we went on about our business, you know. And we stopped. They said, We're going to hold up for the night, dig in.

But we went in this first house, and it was a real nice-looking house. I didn't know it at the time, but that was the doctor out at the camp, at Dachau. And his family--they had a sitting room, a kitchen, a basement, upstairs, and three or four bedrooms downstairs. Real nice farmhouse. The grandmother was there, the grandfather, the daughters--the family. There must have been six or seven of them. So we ran them out of there and let them stay in the basement. They had bacon and everything. They were cooking, frying bacon. I never will forget the 01:12:00German's counterattack. They were firing artillery. But anyhow, I set up a machine gun in that window, in that library. So we went about cooking, and I started frying some bacon. Here comes some artillery in, and you're pretty safe in a house, unless it's big artillery. One of those--piece of shrapnel went right through that frying pan, and the bacon grease caught fire on that stove and ruined our bacon grease for frying potatoes. Have to put the fire out. But later on, we found out that that was the doctor out at that camp. God knows what he pulled. The next morning, we were on the road again, and we came to the camp and the railroad sidings and things like that. You have some of those pictures of that.

SLOAN: So you came up to the camp along the railroad siding?

HAVEY: Yes. And to the right was the railroad and there were marshaling yards. There must have been seven, eight tracks across, and then the warehouses, whole long stretch of warehouses. About a hundred yards of warehouses. And that's where we first broke into the camp. And we weren't getting--we were getting some mortar fire intermittently. There was yelling and carrying on, and people were running. We had a guy that came up with his, and he--I think he was a Hungarian. He must have been a Jew, though. He was with our company for about two days. I remember I got to talk to him a little bit. He was older than me. He carried a machine gun, a Thompson. It was kind of strange. So when we got in that camp, he 01:14:00ran in there and started shooting. He went berserk, but he must have been a Jew assigned to that--we didn't know it, you know. We shot anybody that was fat, any guards or anything like that. So we had four or five occasions. There was a moat there. They were running, and they were killing different people--the prisoners themselves, the ones that tortured them and fed them. You could pick them out because they were usually not fat, but healthier-looking.

SLOAN: So there was some scattered resistance there?

HAVEY: Yes, they dropped some mortars in, you know, just the token resistance.

SLOAN: As you approached their camp, what are--I know you said you noticed the railcars. What are some other things that you noticed right away?

HAVEY: Well, the stink. It's a stench. But that wasn't from the gas ovens; just human stench. Death stench.

SLOAN: Did you go investigate the railcars?

HAVEY: Yeah, there were three hundred--I think on one of those photographs are the amount--there were three hundred railcars full of dead, and they all looked the same. They had their striped suits on, and they just died in there, starved to death. But they opened some of the doors and--our company lieutenant had a camera, and he took pictures of several of those, and I have those original, old, little photographs of them. They may have been enlarged now.

SLOAN: What was the reception like from the prisoners that were in the camp?

HAVEY: Well, those that could walk, they were like walking skeletons. You can't 01:16:00believe that a person can walk that thin. It's just amazing. But the dead and things like that--they weren't embracing us, they were just yelling, and a lot of them were clustered up. Some of them brought some cans that they had gotten out of the German soldiers' canteen or barracks or whatever--you know, like our number-ten cans--and I was--we spent a long time opening those cans. In fact, that bayonet--I wore my hands out cutting cans open. We didn't have can openers or anything. But it was for hours. We'd take turns.

SLOAN: Trying to get them some sort of food. Before you had--before you got to Dachau, had you heard of these sorts of places?

HAVEY: Not one word, not one word, not one word. It was funny how they 01:17:00barracksed them, you know, like meal slots. They're living lengthwise in a hole, four or five of them in a hole. They're all stunk and dying and dead, crapping on themselves. Just--I guess that one day I saw more dead than the whole town of Galveston.

SLOAN: Well, what are some of the other features of the camp that you remember?

HAVEY: Oh, we were only there for--we stayed there that night. We dug in that night. But we went around, and I went and looked at the ovens. The chimneys, big stacks, were there. I looked at the ovens, and they had dead stacked to go in the ovens. They had kind of a roller system. They'd put them on a long kind of stretcher and roll them in. But I read that that was coal fire, and they quit 01:18:00doing that. But I saw the gas jets. That was gas fire. I don't know who said that was coal fire. It might have been both, but I saw the gas jets. When you--there were four ovens that I recall. I guess, if you put ten bodies on a roller--four ovens, that's forty. And if it took an hour to do it, to burn it, I try to think of how many--going twenty-four hours a day--how many people that could die, that'd burn in there. That's a lot. They had a lot stacked, ready to go.

SLOAN: You said there was a moat around the camp?

HAVEY: It wasn't quite around there. It was a lake, and I assumed it was around because it was a long ditch and there were a lot of bodies in there. They were throwing them in there.

SLOAN: I know there's--I think there were seven towers or something like that around the camp. As far as the physical description of the camp, can you tell me what you remember as far as what it looked like?

HAVEY: Yeah, I remember--not--we didn't really inspect the perimeters so much. I know the warehouse because we'd been in there, and the first part of the moat and the fencing. And we saw it, but it just ran down the line. The next morning, we went over to look at the front, and I saw the entrance and things like that and some of their barracks. The officers stayed in one compound, enlisted men, and then the prisoners in the third hole.

SLOAN: Did y'all capture any of the SS there?

HAVEY: There weren't--no--any SS we killed.

SLOAN: They had moved--SS--you killed. Other guards?

HAVEY: We killed a few guards, but by that time, the prisoners had identified them and killed them themselves.

SLOAN: Killed them themselves, yeah.

HAVEY: There were some pretty strong prisoners, but they hadn't been eating good, you know, the rest there. It was just a big mania, groups of insanity, I guess I'd want to call them.

SLOAN: What were the officers' barracks like?

HAVEY: I didn't look at them too good. They were brick buildings as far as I remember.

SLOAN: You said you dug in that night. Where did y'all stay that night?

HAVEY: We dug in alongside the railroad. Always the best place to be.

SLOAN: Why is that the best place to be?

HAVEY: Well, it's usually pretty good digging.

SLOAN: Yeah. (laughs)

HAVEY: We were fortunate. I always say that because Europe was pretty fairly fertile and good digging.

SLOAN: Well, you learned where good digging was and where--

HAVEY: It's an art.

SLOAN: (laughs) An art you would have rather not developed, huh?

HAVEY: Well, it was fun, you know.

SLOAN: It was about depth and speed, right?

HAVEY: Yes, sir.

SLOAN: How deep you could dig and how fast you could dig it.

HAVEY: Well, a lot of times, if you were there for longer than four hours and maybe the next day even, your--GIs are funny. You're always improving. So when you dig that hole, you dig a little shell for your hand grenades or whatever comes out of your pockets, you put a seat in there, you sit down with your head sticking out. It's comic. And smooth the walls nice.

SLOAN: (laughs) Well, I'd like to ask the question because we were talking about it before we interviewed--the things that you carried with you or the things that you kept with you. Can you talk a little bit about that?

HAVEY: Our ammunition or--

SLOAN: You were showing me--

HAVEY: Oh, these bills here are--they had a club they called the Short Snorter. 01:22:00I don't know. It's just a--not a club to join or anything--it was just a trend. You start out with your dollar bill and you have your equal sign it, whoever wants to sign it. Then, each country you come--are in or trade for, you attach that and it becomes a long--this was a roll. I kept it rolled up and I kept it in my pocket all the time.

SLOAN: Kept adding to it.

HAVEY: All through the war, yeah.

SLOAN: Well, as you think about--oh, go ahead.

HAVEY: One of these bills is a five hundred million mark bill. And that was one of the famous bills during the inflation when they were carrying their money with wheelbarrows, you know. But some of them are--I don't suppose any of them are worth any money. But those knives and things we just picked up, kind of, 01:23:00after the war. There's my jump knife, that one with the parallel there. And that group of medals came from that major's house or general's house that I was in, looted in Würzburg before the bombing. By the way, in that same house was that plaque of Hitler, Adolf Hitler, made by Hummel. (looking at plaque) And that was his signature on it, too. I remember it had a celluloid frame, and I kept it at my mother's. I had an office there, and my mom would come and dust and everything. She'd always--I'd come home and that plaque would be down. And I'd say, "Mom, why do you--why do you turn that down?" She said, "I don't want 01:24:00people thinking we're Hitlers." (laughs) My little mother.

SLOAN: (laughs) So you spend the night at Dachau. The next day you're there. What are you doing? I know you're not--I know the rest of the division's moving in at that point.

HAVEY: We loaded out and moved out.

SLOAN: Did you have many interactions with the prisoners that were there?

HAVEY: None. Just, you know, look at them and see them. They stunk, and they were dirty, my God.

SLOAN: I bet, yeah. Did seeing that scene there change maybe how you thought about the war or what you were doing with the war? Or how you thought about the enemy?

HAVEY: Not noticeably, not noticeably, because we were trained to kill. That's 01:25:00all you wanted to do was kill something--kill them. That's all. No shake hands or anything like that, but that's why we were trained.

SLOAN: The objective was the same. That didn't change, yeah. (pause) Now, you left from there and you went to Munich.

HAVEY: Yes.

SLOAN: Moved on from there. Which is not too far--

HAVEY: Yes, it seemed like twelve, fifteen miles.

SLOAN: Can you take me through the rest? I know we're getting towards the V-E Day.

HAVEY: Well, Munich was kind of funny. We were in the attack, and there was--we hardly had any resistance. And we broke into the town, and all the GIs were--they still had their streetcars running. Everybody who could get a car had 01:26:00a car if they had gas, you know. We were riding streetcars, and it was kind of fun in Munich. We were still getting some corps artillery in on us.

I remember we went to the--downtown to the main luftschutzkeller, which is the air-raid shelter. They had a kitchen set up there. Well, this was assigned in our area. They had bean soup on the menu, and they fed the people that would be in the air-raid shelter for any length of time. We had some Germans--I remember three of them ran in this one air-raid shelter, and there were different rooms. They were, oh, like a big nice room with benches in, and they all had metal doors. We were looking for those Germans because they still had their gun. I 01:27:00remember I had a hand grenade, and I pulled the pin out of it, and I thought they had ran in this one room. I had Monahan open this door, and I'm ready to throw that grenade in there. There was about fifty people in there standing with their hands up, you know. I almost let that grenade go. They'll never forget me. They wouldn't have got--but I didn't. I put the pin back, fortunately.

But that night, we stayed in. We didn't dig in that night. We formed a perimeter guard around the luftschutzkeller and the kitchen. Our officer, he shot every pot, shot a hole in every pot. Couldn't cook anything. Davis. He got drunk. 01:28:00(Sloan laughs) The Germans were looting and they had a lot of che--they had a cheese warehouse right in our area. We let them loot and loot, and they're in there hollering. Here comes some guy with a wheelbarrow full of cheese blocks. We let them get up to--we kicked them out and took all this cheese. (laughs) But we did things like that.

SLOAN: I know at that point, it's only really scattered resistance that you're running into.

HAVEY: Yes.

SLOAN: I mean, it was obvious at that point that it was a matter of time--

HAVEY: Right.

SLOAN: Do you remember where you were and when you heard of the German surrender?

HAVEY: You know, I really don't, but I remember we were right at Munich--the 01:29:00autobahn ran through there. And I remember those--we were en route to Vienna. They sent us to Vienna. I remember the Germans marching back. Just steady for ten abreast, their stomp. You could hear them marching and everything.

SLOAN: Marching back down the autobahn?

HAVEY: Yes, uh-huh.

SLOAN: Oh wow.

HAVEY: I don't know where in the hell they were going, but they were going. There were just thousands and thousands of them.

SLOAN: Well, I know the German surrender didn't mean as much to you because you didn't have enough points, right?

HAVEY: Yeah, I did have enough points.

SLOAN: You did you have enough by that point?

HAVEY: Oh yeah.

SLOAN: Yeah, okay.

HAVEY: Because I had been in the United States. I had eighty-five or eighty-seven points, and I had been in longer than most guys.

SLOAN: That's true, since you were in at '42.

HAVEY: And I got the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star, which is five points 01:30:00each. So that was pretty good.

SLOAN: Yeah, that's right. So you knew you weren't going to the Pacific?

HAVEY: We didn't know anything about it at that time. Didn't know anything about points or anything at that time.

SLOAN: Okay. Now, after the surrender, where were you assigned? Where did you go from there?

HAVEY: Well, we were in the mountains in Bavaria, and we were chasing SSers up in the mountains on through July. We had some pretty good shooting. And I remember my mother sent a letter, "Well, I'm glad you're safe, and the war's over." You know, poor mom. But they had a lot of people that hid up way up in the Alps. We had to climb to get them. We were assigned certain areas to--and when we got up there, we shot them. Most of them were SSers.

SLOAN: Is there small groups, small little band? Yeah.

HAVEY: Yes. I remember we climbed for about two days. It was work, but going down is what nearly killed us. Man, the tops of our feet wore off going down. But we always had plenty of food. Didn't know any better.

SLOAN: At that point, you were well supplied.

HAVEY: Yeah, they--we were relaxed.

SLOAN: Well, did you--I didn't ask you this question as far as--did you consider staying in the military?

HAVEY: No. Didn't even think about that. Could I stop, too?

SLOAN: Oh sure. Yeah, sure.

HAVEY: Have a break a minute, please?

pause in recording

SLOAN: Well, I'm going to go back to what we were talking about in just a minute, but I'd asked you off the recording if there was any conflict among the troops.

HAVEY: Not later on in the war, but earlier in the war.

SLOAN: Earlier in the war.

HAVEY: There was a guy by the name of Barney. I hated him. Just like kids, you know. We finally duked it out. Nothing settled, but he got killed. He didn't get back home.

SLOAN: Oh, he got killed later?

HAVEY: Uh-huh.

SLOAN: Well, this work--you said you were doing this work near Innsbruck up until August of '45? Yeah.

HAVEY: Whenever we were moved to Vienna. I don't remember that day.

SLOAN: Of course, August, '45, I think of the Japanese surrender.

HAVEY: Oh yes, yeah, I remember that.

SLOAN: Yeah, tell me about that.

HAVEY: Well, we--they put us in training. We were supposed to go back over to Japan. They put us dummies in training in perimeter defense, you know, that jungle fighting and everything. We ended up using real grenades and all kinds of 01:33:00things. It kind of canceled that out. But we were in a town in the mountains. It was a nice town. We were in a pool house. We had bunks and everything. We were pretty comfortable. Then we went to Vienna.

SLOAN: Well, now--you heard of the surrender. So what was your response to the surrender?

HAVEY: Really, it didn't come like a climatic event. You know, just like a progressive event.

SLOAN: But you knew you were going to get to go home at that point.

HAVEY: No, we were going to get to go to Japan.

SLOAN: Well, once you heard of the Japanese surrender--

HAVEY: Oh.

SLOAN: Yeah, tell me about what you remember about that.

HAVEY: Oh, that was joyous because we knew we're--that was the end of the fighting, and we'd get to go home.

SLOAN: What did--did you know anything about what was going on in the Pacific?

HAVEY: Yeah, we had a company paper--or a paper, regimental or division paper 01:34:00and they called it The Stars and Stripes. It was--it kept us up on the news, and we'd read it. It was--yeah.

SLOAN: Okay, so the surrender happens, war is over, you're transferred to occupation in Vienna?

HAVEY: Yes.

SLOAN: Yes, okay. And so what are you doing in Vienna for the next--

HAVEY: We're doing guard duty and just generally sharing it with the Russians and the British and the French. We're--really, we're playing cards and, kind of, loafing around and going down to the black market and, kind of, exploring Vienna itself.

SLOAN: Did you have much interaction with the Russians?

HAVEY: Yeah, a little bit. They--a carton of cigarettes would cost us fifty cents. And we could buy as many cartons as you wanted. We could sell them to the 01:35:00Russians for ten bucks. The Russians--President Roosevelt had given the Russians our plates, these little blue units here. That's invasion money. And that was currency to us. That's what we'd be paid in and everything. To the Russians, Roosevelt gave them the same plates. They printed money just going out of style. The Russian officers would have briefcases full. They could buy a tank, a jeep, or anything they wanted. We'd sell them old clothes and everything. They'd buy anything. Some of them were pretty well-skilled, but the Russian soldier was just a--they had smocks on, and they had trailings and dirt and everything and food. They were kind of lower like--

SLOAN: They were farmers, right? They were just all farmers.

HAVEY: Cavemen, I think. (laughs)

SLOAN: So what did you think of Vienna? You said you got an opportunity to explore Vienna.

HAVEY: Yeah, we went to the Ring, the popular downtown area. We used to go down to Karlsplatz, which was a park with statues and things, but that's where the main black market was. We would sell things down there.

SLOAN: What were you getting on the black market?

HAVEY: Ten dollars a carton for cigarettes or a pair of shoes or whatever, you know. (both speaking at same time)

SLOAN: Oh okay. That's where you--yeah. I've learned through this you're enterprising.

HAVEY: (laughing) Yeah, well, I've always have been hustling around trying--getting in a buck together.

SLOAN: Ever since you had the bank with the little key at the bottom, you've 01:37:00been hustling it to some--so you said you were there in Vienna until it started to turn cold.

HAVEY: And then, the points took effect, and I was transferred to that Yankee Division, and they were picked to go home. They sent us to France, to one of those cigarette camps, and--a Pall Mall, Lucky Strike, you know. They made these big camps, tent camps, waiting to go. So we could have either gone over to England and gotten on a Queen Mary and been home in, what, five days or something like that or gone down the Mediterranean. So we ended up down in the Mediterranean at sea in the North Atlantic in November, December. It was pretty rough.

SLOAN: Yeah, you said it was a tougher passage back than--

HAVEY: I know it.

SLOAN: Just the cold?

HAVEY: Well, it was a--they cut across the North Atlantic, and it was rougher, 01:38:00much rougher. They couldn't even have movies on, you know. It was storming. We're in a troop--victory ship then, I think, coming back.

SLOAN: You came back to--where did you come back to?

HAVEY: Newport News, because I wanted to go back down to parachute school because I knew some people down there, and I was discharged from there. I spent a couple of weeks fooling around down there. My mother said, "Bud, when are you coming home?" I said, "I'll be home tomorrow," or something like that.

SLOAN: Tell me about the reception back in St. Louis.

HAVEY: Well, our front door was always open. We had a nice residence on a corner. And I opened the door, and I saw my sister. I had on civilian clothes. She said--my sister called to my mother and said, "Mom, Bud doesn't have on his 01:39:00soldier suit." That was my reception. (both laugh)

SLOAN: So you said you had three sisters.

HAVEY: Yes.

SLOAN: Three sisters at the time. So did you take up a job there in St. Louis?

HAVEY: Yes. My one sister Jane, she was in the real estate business and bought her own office and had her own real estate and insurance office. She was doing quite well. I was a real estate salesman for her. I didn't like that very well. We were fooling around then, you know.

SLOAN: Did you go back to Washington University?

HAVEY: Yes. Later on.

SLOAN: Later on you did? On the GI Bill?

HAVEY: Yeah, we fooled--I fooled around--wasn't it thirty dollars for thirty 01:40:00months or something--or three hundred dollars for thirty months or--it lasted for a year that they gave you separation pay. We kind of fooled around becoming acclimated, re-acclimated.

SLOAN: Now, what did you end up making your career as?

HAVEY: My expertise is in design and layout of restaurants. I've sold restaurant equipment for sixty-some years, I guess.

SLOAN: So how'd you come to that?

HAVEY: That's an interesting question. One of my girlfriends' fathers owned a company in St. Louis. It was called Duro Chrome [Corporation], and he manufactured furniture, bar furniture and tables and chairs. I got interested in that. Went from there.

SLOAN: I see. Because you were interested in her?

HAVEY: Yes.

SLOAN: So the profession stayed, but the girl didn't?

HAVEY: Yes, we parted our ways at a later point in time. I went to work for the Macy Company. It was part of our retailing curriculum as sales personnel and buying personnel for Famous and Barr in St. Louis.

SLOAN: But your real love in that was design? You like design more than anything. What is it that you liked about doing design work? Or like. You're continuing to do design work.

HAVEY: Well, I don't know. You attain a certain knowledge, you know. I don't have to refer to books, and I remember dimensions. I do all the engineering for 01:42:00electric outlets and the piping and the things like that. It's simple for me because I don't have to refer to books. And usually, engineering companies will hire me for that, doing that restaurant layout. I did the Astrohall right over here for Burns and Delaten.

SLOAN: And now, how'd you end up in Texas?

HAVEY: I had a company in St. Louis with a partner, and it was called Marcum and Sales. We sold restaurant equipment throughout the Midwest. Then I opened an office in Topeka, Kansas. My partner--we sold out and I had a--my going company in Topeka, and I did business throughout the Midwest there in Nebraska, and Missouri, Oklahoma, and Kansas. I decided at some point that--one of the executives for the Flemming Company that were customers had a place down in Galveston here. We came down to visit it, and became enthralled with the area, 01:43:00and decided to sell my business. And so I reopened business here.

SLOAN: Now, was that in '86?

HAVEY: Yes, exactly.

SLOAN: Yeah, '86. And that's when you came down to Galveston.

HAVEY: October '86.

SLOAN: It was a good move for you.

HAVEY: Yeah, we did good business. I became a millionaire. I remember my banker said, "Well, how does it feel to be a millionaire?" Well, my mother-in-law soon took care of that because we got a divorce. I can't say anything bad about my wife, but it just cost a lot of money. I had to split everything. I had to sell the business, my building, things like that. Our home. My one daughter came to live with me, Jamie. Had a good life.

SLOAN: Now, when did you get up to Seabrook?

HAVEY: I moved here after we sold the house in Galveston.

SLOAN: I see, okay.

HAVEY: But I rented a couple of places. This went on the market, and it was a 01:44:00good bargain, so--Jamie lived with me then. It's a lot bigger than I need. I hardly go in some of the rooms sometimes.

SLOAN: Well, a couple of questions I'd like to go back and ask you--since this project in particular is interested your liberation experience, what has it been like? I know at the time, you didn't really know what was going on. You were just doing your job and trying to survive and get through the war. But as you thought back over the years, what has it meant for you to know that you were involved in liberating a camp like Dachau?

HAVEY: Well, I think--going back fundamentally--I think I was given the--I don't 01:45:00have much fear. And it's a strange thing. My mother always said that, and I didn't realize it. But even in combat, I was never afraid. You know, you'd duck under shell fire. I kind of enjoyed it, but I kind of saw it as outside myself. It was a strange phenomenon. I don't think that really combat affected me. I guess it did, because of the post-traumatic stress now and everything. It just--it was kind of a phenomenon, I think.

SLOAN: Well, I know for some liberators the things that they saw, particularly in the camps--they talk about how it was different than a field of battle.

HAVEY: Well, certainly. But some of the things that you don't realize--it always makes you wonder how could human beings do that to human beings? But worse than 01:46:00killing is the deprivation that he inflicted upon those people by starving them to death. The misery over years and years and years. And that I don't under--I haven't ever come to grips with. The other thing is that each one of those prisoners had a bucket or a can and that was their duty bag. That's what they carried. They ate out of it, they shit in it, they peed in it, and they didn't have any place to wash it. The privation that he inflicted--or they inflicted--not he, they--because there were plenty of people to blame. Because you could--you know, a blind man would see what was going on.

SLOAN: Well, I know that's--I've heard many vets say that, too, because the citizens that they ran into said they didn't know.

HAVEY: Uh-huh. That's--that denial is not appropriate all the time.

SLOAN: And speaking of denial, there are others that would say--and I know you've spoken of this before--those that would deny that whole experience.

HAVEY: Yeah, like Iran. They do that for a reason. It's impossible to deny.

SLOAN: Well Mr. Havey, is there something I should have asked you about that I didn't ask you about? What did we miss?

HAVEY: I can't think of anything right at this time, but I'll probably think of something later.

SLOAN: Okay. Well, if you think of it and you want to get it in, we'll get it in. (both laugh) Robert, do you have any questions you wanted to ask.

DeBOARD: Did you go to the city?

SLOAN: He didn't, yeah.

DeBOARD: Okay, then I'm good.

SLOAN: Okay. Well Mr. Havey, I want to thank you for sitting down with me today, and I want to thank you for your service to our country. It was an honor to get to visit with you today.

HAVEY: Well, thank you.

SLOAN: All right, thank you.

end of interview