ALEX IN WWII
Alex Phelps, born in Vaughan NC but working in Ahoskie, joined the Army Air Force in August 1942 and served until November 1945. He spent approximately 13 months at Keesler Field, Miss., and several months at Indian Springs, NV, with stops of shorter duration at several other bases before departing from New York for Liverpool, England.
After a very short time in England, he crossed the Channel to Europe, and saw duty in France, Belgium, Holland, Luxembourg and Germany. His group was involved in numerous air campaigns, including those around St. Lo in France and Aachen in Germany. and was heavily involved in the Battle of the Bulge, when the Germans made a last major push in December 1944 and temporarily regained a lot of territory the Allies had won during the summer.
Of the days surrounding the Battle of the Bulge, Alex said:
"We lived in tents with no floors, four to six men to a tent, right near the airstrips.
"We were a huge supply depot. We had a tremendous amount of gasoline in dumps around the airfield that the Germans wanted.
"When we found out that the Germans were driving hard for us and that they might not be stopped, we had to 'gas up' the whole supply depot – spread explosives and fuel all around – so we could burn and blow it all up to keep the Germans from getting it if we had to leave.
"We were told that we probably would have to destroy it all and leave in less than 24 hours. The weather was bad and our planes weren't able to fly enough to do much damage to the advancing Germans.
"The day we were expecting to go, the weather cleared, and the U.S. planes came over in droves. The bombers came from England, the fighters from nearby. The sky was full of planes, and we could see where they were dropping their bombs. The whole horizon was one long cloud of fire and smoke where they were hitting the Germans, and the noise was just a continuous, almost unbelievable roar. Every now and then we would see a plane get hit, break apart and fall out of the sky."
The Germans were stopped. Alex said he remembered very clearly the last attacks as the Germans ran out of gas and supplies:
"I remember Jan. 1, 1945. I had grabbed a roll of toilet paper and had gone into a field near the airstrip to 'do my business.' While I was there, I saw this fighter plane diving right out of the sky toward me. Just as it got to me, it pulled up sharply, and as it went by, I saw that big old swastika on the tail. I got up and ran. The German turned around and came down again to strafe our field, and he tore up 14 of our planes."
Alex, a corporal, moved on into Germany with his group. He saw the old city of Nuremburg flattened, as Aachen and St. Lo had been earlier.
Alex had a couple more scary experiences before he got home. One of these, he said, was when the men were riding freight cars back from Germany to France. "We went across this one long trestle, between two mountains – it looked like we were a mile high – it was a little, spindly, old thing, and that little old train was just rattling and shaking. I thought we'd fall for sure."
Another bad time was on the ship that brought him from France back to the States. It was a 13-day trip in all, but the first three days out of France were almost enough for Alex.
"We were hit by the worst storm I ever saw, and it seemed like the ship just stayed down in the troughs between these huge waves, with water on each side of you as high up as you could see. When the ship rolled, if you were on the deck, it would just about come up and hit you in the back. Below deck, when we were getting ready to cook a big steak, the ship took a real big roll – and everything – steak and all – left the stove and hit the floor. But after those first three days, the sea flattened out just as smooth and calm as a fishing pond, and it was a great ride the rest of the way home."
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Alex Phelps
Europe, World War II
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