I drove for two days to get to Oklahoma City for the 75th Infantry Reunion. The drive was gorgeous at sunset and early in the morning when the golden light lit up the wide open landscapes. Huge hap cylinder shaped hay bales were arranged in neat rows in lush green fields as far as he eye could see.
A registration table was set up in the hotel lobby. Each attendee had a yellow manila envelope with all the events and plans. I met a 75th Infantry historian who is going to arrange for me to swing by the 75th Infantry museum on my drive back to Orlando. The museum is in Texas, so I would just have to take a more southern route to get back to Florida.
The lobby buzzed when Charles Atchley entered in his wheel chair. Charles is 99 years old and is the oldest and only living veteran form the World War II Division.
I sat down with Charles for maybe an hour before the room grew to loud to talk any further. He explained that Germany didn’t have an access to the sea in WWII. They had a lot of Submarines. One submarine went into New York Harbor and sunk one ship. Charles went to Europe on the Queen Elizabeth. They went to Glasgow, Scotland in four and a half days. The USO would have supper and then a show. The troops went on a railroad and went all the way own from Glasco to South Hampton England, where the troops got on three ships to go to France. There were 19,000 in the group. From there they went up to Belgium. All up north, there used to be camo caravans. They would bring food and supplies for Europe. That trail was as wide as a football field. On the American side there was a swamp. The German tanks if the got too gar off would slip into the mud. General Eisenhower had four divisions. The 290th Division was among the four.something else. The Germans had to stop because they were running out of gas. Charles survived the Bulge he said because he was so small. He only weighed 102 pounds. He was also had some incredible luck. The one thing he could not escape was the cold. The troops were not outfitted with winter clothing and it got unbearably cold in the fox holes. Charles had to go to several hospitals to treat his frozen feet.
Charles was in the mortar squad. He had a backpack that two mortars in it. If those got hit by anything, they would explode. There were two men carrying the mortars. Charles learned to run in a zig zag pattern to be sure the mortars were never hit. The army would get the soldiers a hot meal every day which was hot oatmeal with raisins. Charles sill had hot oatmeal with raisins every morning. He had oatmeal in the morning of the reunion.
After the battle of the Bulge the 75th went to the Colmar Pocket which was in Alsase France. The day the 75th got to Colmar, Charles was 19 years old. Charles was in the A-Company. He was one of 10 soldiers to get a blue Combat Infantry badge that day. Audie Murphy was already stationed in Colmar. Audie was 10 days older than Charles and he grew up kn the next town. Audie was from Princeton Texas and Charles was from Lucas which is close to Allen Texas. He never saw Audie when he was in Europe. Audie was in the 3rd Infantry. Audie made a lot of movies. Charles graduated from high school in 1047 with a friend, Charles wanted to join the navy, but you had to be 18 years old.
