 We were at Milton Hall headquarters of Milton Hall was at Milton Hall that we were alerted We were given all our equipment We made the trip from Milton Hall to London, which is about 80 miles in a covered truck this time we thought that it was a dry run we thought it was just a Scheme once that we got to London Once that we got into this safe house or briefing house We found out that it was the real McCoy as soon as we were being we started being briefed We found out that our job was to work with SAS in the past we hadn't We hadn't received any training to work with SAS or with OGS or a parachute troops We were trained to work as a team of three a French officer a radio operator either an American or a British officer We resented working with the SAS because They were doing a little different type of work than we were they were doing their work type of work that would we thought give our Position away, and we were trying to work underground while they were working in the open After quite a discussion And they after they called up a couple of English kernels and one English general They asked us if we would please take this job because it was a It was a very important job. So we saw general corny who's our commanding officer who was the commanding officer of the French forces of the interior and He told us that he wanted us to take it so we took it well from there after being briefed We went to the SAS camp the SAS camp We met coming down Budgera who is to be our commanding officer But that is he was a commanding officer of the fourth battalion of SAS the fourth battalion of SAS Was composed of purely Frenchmen And most of the Frenchman were from Brittany and our mission is to go into Brittany to establish two bases One in the northern part of Brittany and one in the southern part, and we were to organize what resistance we could Arm them and attempt to cut Brittany off in the rest of France most of this I said before most of these French parachutists were from Brittany and they were going back into their home country Soon as we got to the SAS camp commanding officer asked to see me. I was the only American there He asked me if I was American. I said yes Told me didn't have a hell of a lot of use for Americans Now I could act accordingly said that he'd had some trouble with Americans Americans had let him down and and North Africa All right, didn't start us off too good, but we took it where we left that night One thing we had a little Little argument with him We wanted to put our packs in baskets because we had been trained to jump with our packs and baskets while SAS We're jumping with their packs and leg bags. We'd never jumped in the pack on the leg bag But he said no you get out of the plane somehow So we just said okay and went up to the airport that night and then bought us into a room When there were a lot of shoots and said okay put on your shoot was the first time we'd put on a shoot because before the dispatcher Would always help us on with our shoot. So we managed to get into a shoot and went out to the plane 24 men get into the plane into every plane I've been 24 men made it pretty crowded They were laying one on top of the other and everything else our trip was quite Uneventful as we went over the coast we picked up quite a lot of slack but we got out of that all right and Everyone seemed to more or less go to sleep on the way out recently came to the field circled the field once the lights were down there and first 12 men stood up and ran down towards the end of the Tail end of the plane as soon as they came to the hole. They just fell through It's not a way that we had been accustomed to jumping We'd been accustomed to jumping in three and sitting right around the edge of the hole and when they would go Action station number one go where we just go and it was very simple. Well, this was something different When we started down, I think I was jumping number 13 We picked up this sack in our hands wait about 80 pounds and Started down towards the tail end of the plane one of the men ahead of us his static line fouled in the rear of the plane Static line to flying around in the plane so we had to we stopped the guy and finally got this straightened up and made another circle over the field and Just ran down towards the tail end of the plane with a bag in our hand just dropped through the hole Well, they seem pretty good to get out of the plane because there's quite a lot of tension in the plane when the shoot open Having this sack and I ended me jerked our arms out of the sockets But we held on to it. All right. We've got about a hundred feet from the ground saw about Look, it's all about 10-15 men were running to the spot. I was going to land It was very uncomfortable feeling because I didn't know it if they were Germans or Frenchmen and I had this sack in my hand I couldn't get my pistol out and the next moment I hit the ground when I hit the ground I sort of rolled up in my parachute and all these Bodies around every jumping on top me trying to get me out of the parachute I didn't know what their intentions were I couldn't get out my pistol finally. I found out that I heard them speaking French so I knew they were Frenchmen and Finally got untangled told him I was American and they started yelling and hooping and one thing another I asked him to sort of keep quiet because In our training we'd been taught to not to make too much noise at a reception tonight Well, I told us there wasn't anything to worry about the Germans were far away And I asked them how far and they said two kilometers And I Didn't think it's very far, but they seemed to think that was all right So then we were brought up into the center of the field Where about 50 men 50 or 60 men standing right in the center of the field first thing I said Don't you think that we should move off to the woods or not stand right here in the field? They said oh, don't worry about it. There's plenty of protection around here Some joker yelled out over in the woods and hey, hey, Joey over there and somebody hurled back Everybody was yelling and every once in a while somebody was shooting off a shotgun So they have a lot of noise around From there after all the patients were grouped together. We were taken down a farmhouse All right, so they were about 300 people at this reception committee men women and children and Soon as they found out on the mark and was there anybody Rushed over and well, they were kissing everybody. They were kissing them and lugging us around on their shoulders. It was a regular circus Girls were lined up fight I've deep to kiss everybody and they had wine champagne Cognac linting and others about three o'clock in the morning and big bouquets of flowers and it's terrific well, we made contact with the with One of the leaders everyone seemed to be a leader But we finally get out the real leader and had him pick up all the containers because each plane that came in had Had brought containers with him So we borrow the containers down to the farm and started opening up containers Well a minute they saw saw these irons everybody was willing to march against this German garrison at three o'clock in the morning About five o'clock in morning. I think we Was about five o'clock in morning. We went to bed. We went up in this hay barn up in the hayloft quite a few Men people sleeping up there in the hayloft So we went up there the radio operator and this French captain myself We undressed and got into a sleeping bag as I get into sleeping bag I just get into my sleeping bag and girl who was sleeping over here. I'm like Right side of you or you're in America. I Come to find out that hey barn was half full of girls everybody was man sleeping here a girl sleeping here To make a long story short we were at this farmhouse From the 7th of June to the 18th Many things happened in the meantime Too numerous to to go into detail about every one the first thing First thing the SAS did upon landing was send men out send SAS men out to blow bridges that very night We brought a lot of explosives in with us And we immediately attacked all communications. We cut rails railroad bridges bridges telephone lines There are no railroads running no telephone lines all communications were cut in our section of Brittany one mistake That they did Was armed some of the FFI immediately and let them go out and attack The Germans that they found in cafes on the road wherever they happen to find them Very next day FFI started coming back with German trucks German motorcycles All sorts of German equipment What they were doing they just take a gun and in walking to a restaurant and there are seven right German sitting around and just walk in and spray him and So you had a truck outside take the truck truck might be filled with flour and bring it back to the filters With any kind of German equipment they bring it back to this farmhouse result. We had all kinds of Trucks and motorcycles and all sorts of German equipment around the camp, but it was also bringing our Attention to this base that we were trying to build up The next morning when we get up we started looking for our radios our radios were dropped in baskets. We couldn't locate them About nine o'clock in the morning plane came over Broad daylight dropped out two packages. They were our radio seems at the dispatcher forget to throw them out that night and Went back to their base scourged our radios were there came back in the broad daylight and threw them out But didn't help matters any since a German garrison is two miles away But by noon most of the containers had been broken open and we'd armed what? FFI that were around the house, so we did have some local security. I don't want to go into too much detail but the answer To our call to arms by the French Patriots Was a stupendous it was was far greater than anyone had dreamed Between the 7th of June and the 18th of June. We had actually armed and trained 5,000 men 5,000 men a lot of men Hold around one front house what we were doing Was arming a battalion of about 500 men and then sending them out Sending them back to where they came from One would be the butcher the other would be the Farmer or whatever he happened to be we'd send him back to his farm or to his Butcher shop or bakery or whatever it is with instructions to hide his arms and To take no offensive action against the Germans until he received further orders from the first day that we were in there Till the 18th of June We were in contact with the enemy that is they kept sending out little patrols to the to the area around this farmhouse And we would kill a few of them and perhaps they would kill a few of us But it was no big attack and the reason that there was no big attack. I believe was that the Germans Didn't realize the force that we had there They thought that they were had a few patriots that were arming up and as long as a lot of patriots were Forming and didn't have the didn't have the weapons or anything. They were not too dangerous and at that moment it was just after D-Day and Just after D-Day the Germans were so jumpy that they didn't they didn't dare to pull any Force such as a regiment or a division out of line to come back and attack us They couldn't afford it. Although there were 13 German divisions in Brittany at this time Many things happened in these last few days. We received agents from Paris agents from London In the meantime, we had contacted all resistance in Brittany all resistant leaders If the leaders and the groups of men were too far from our base For us to arm them. We sent a message to London Asking them to send a jet team to that area and we made the necessary arrangements with that Resistance leader to receive this jet team that way we could arm all of Brittany even though it was quite a ways from our base Well, everything went pretty well until the morning of the 18th, which was Sunday morning That night we had received 30 planes and In these 30 planes we received five jeeps these five jeeps are armed with Twin submachine guns twin machine guns bounding machine guns vickers About six o'clock that morning Two cars full of two cars containing four felt John Downs, which is something like our military police came down the road towards our From they were stopping every once in a while getting out looking around getting back into the car and coming down They came down to our outpost when they get to our first outpost they stopped an SAS man Who was in the ditch there got out of the ditch and stepped into the road with his pistol and was going to take them President one may move to get a hand grenade so he pulled the trigger and discovered that his pistol wasn't loaded So before he could reload his pistol a German threw a hand grenade at it landed a little way from him, but didn't kill him In the meantime FFI stepped out of a ditch and shot three or four of the Germans Well that would have been all right, but there was another outpost about 300 yards away That had a machine gun in it and when this other outpost Notice these two cars up there with the Germans standing around they opened fire on these two cars And the fire was going pretty wild They killed a few of the Germans, but they also wounded the SAS and the FFI Who were attempt who were right there in this road with the Germans and result one of the Germans get away They killed four wounded one took one person and one got away Well, this was only a little incident because it had been happening all the time we were there But about ten o'clock in the morning 250 felt John Downs came back they came into a little town by the name of Saint Marcel and Took about 40 Frenchmen and might the Frenchman ahead of them down towards our Farm, but we couldn't shoot at them without hitting the Frenchman So we just backed up and let them come in until we sucked them into an open field Soon as we sucked them into this open field. We swung up around Their flank with the Jeeps and pretty well cut them up They immediately started yelling rouse and get went back and took a defensive position around this little town Well, they never expected to meet the firepower that they met because they expected to meet some Few patterns on the shotguns and 22s Well quite a little battle took place It was the woods on our right and left and wheat fields up on our left and they shot traces into these woods and into the wheat fields and Started a forest fire result. It was so much smoke that Our vision was limited and we were fighting very close That is when you did see a German and he was generally at 15 and 20 yards away, and he either got you or you got him and This went on for about an hour And then they seem to have they seem to pull out they left a few there just it was purely They did a little defensive fighting, but that was all well What had happened in the meantime was that when they saw our Jeeps They thought that we were an airborne division and they we later found out that they had notified Romel that we were an airborne division so he Sent in some parachute troops on us about two o'clock in the afternoon Parachute troops came they were very bold very aggressive fighters. They They fought like hell they They didn't take advantage of covering anything, but they were so they were so so aggressive that Is that they Soon overran some of our positions, but a great cost of their life if 10 parachutists get killed coming down one lane Well, 20 would run in where 10 get killed and if 20 get killed or 40 would come in they just kept coming from everywhere An example if you took one shot at them and ten of them were in a wheat field Ten of them would stand right up and just start looking for the man who took a shot and you could pick off two or three of them well everything Things were not going so good they They had encircled our position in the meantime we had crawled out all these battalions that had been laying low and everyone instead of Instead of fighting on the outside of the circle everyone came into the center of the circle so that we were holding a radius of about 10 mile 10 miles with Approximately 4,000 men in there at 4 o'clock in the afternoon they had us completely surrounded and pushing us back towards the farmhouse So we went back to the headquarters back to the farmhouse and sent an SOS to London to Plains In two hours and a half. We had about 35 fighter bombers over us They did a pretty good job Bombing transportation German transportation that was coming up, but as far as bombing the troops It's pretty difficult to see what was going on on the ground and they bombed hell out of us Yeah, but it helped I'm now Helped them out of the Patriots because they knew that they hadn't forgot us in London now every one that was inside of this Circle after we were once surrounded I'm sure that he didn't think he was going to get out of there alive He was fighting till death. Therefore if the parachutist did move in they moved in over the FFI dead bodies Because they never wedged an inch Well late by eight o'clock at night. They had driven into about 800 yards from the farmhouse and they were on a hill dominating the farmhouse It's pretty hard to describe the scene the farmhouse About this time because all the it practically every SAS officer was either killer wounded and We only had a very very small first aid station the first aid station Couldn't take care of one-tenth of the wounded. Everyone was laying around the yard Run this barn yard either dying dead or Bleeding and some of them were screaming some of them were not saying anything and it was just terrific The confusion was absolutely terrible There's only one thing to do when they had us at that farmhouse when they were so close was to launch a counterattack So we got the two two remaining jeeps. We had two jeeps left farmhouse and I remember a French officer I Can't think of his name offhand But one of the best officers I've ever seen in my life. He'd been shot through the shoulder and shot in the head He tied himself into a jeep so he wouldn't fall out with another SAS that would that That drove the Jeep he launched. He started off in the counterattack Captain the rod who is my French partner took one group of men numbering about 4500 and I took a group of men numbering about 4500 and launched this counterattack But we drove them back About a thousand yards. We drove them down on the other side of the hill. There's a bloody massacre We must have lost about six or seven hundred men in about an hour and We drove them back a little too far because the Germans that were on our right Drove in on our right flank behind us. So we as a result we had to fight our way back When we get back When I get back to the farmhouse It's pretty hard to control the man because there was so much confusion And so many hedges you couldn't tell you couldn't see exactly where your men were on the other in the next field When I got back to the farmhouse, I tried to locate captain irad and I couldn't find him anywhere and was getting dusk It was about nine half past nine ten o'clock and the Germans are taking taking a little bond a little shed about 300 yards away from the farmhouse where the SAS radio equipment was so The SAS wanted to go up go down and get their radio equipment So I went down and down there with a group of FFI and an SAS lieutenant that hadn't been killed The SAS SAS lieutenant myself were the only one that's come back alive Most of us get most of them get killed when we walked up to the edge of a hedge that was overlooking a wheat field and we're trying to distinguish Germans from FFI on the other side of this field and We'd been there for about five minutes when a machine gun opened up about Ten yards in front of us this German machine gun had been there all the time and hadn't fired and we All the FFI were in one group and they most of them got it in that one group and we were not able to take this shed where their radio equipment was but we Went back for help and bought some more FFI down and kept a quite a large no-man's land there Between one field and another they were on the other side of the field We were on this side of the wheat field. There was no cover that they could advance so we just held them there but Come in there but grand who was this French officer commanding SAS was Was in a pretty tight situation. He had not been wounded He decided that the only thing to do would be break through at the dock So we should orders that as soon as darkness fell that we were to split up in small groups and try to break through the Encirclement as best we could it was more or less every man for himself and those that did get through were to stay in small groups No, but no larger than two or three and were to take no offensive action against the Germans until further orders well Yes, we also made a rendezvous for the next day all the leaders were supposed to meet at a certain spot the next day and Out of those there were five leaders five or six leaders that knew where this rendezvous was and they were to bring no more than three or four of their immediate Subordinates so that everyone wouldn't know where this Rendezvous was therefore. We wouldn't have a whole flock of FFI coming to one spot and in Tracting a lot of attention Well, I finally located captain irad in the radio operator We were supposed to leave in a car so we went back went out back to get into the car. I Can never I can't emphasize enough the situation at this at this point everybody was we had hundreds and hundreds of wounded and Everyone was around the farmhouse everybody everyone was Was asking to be carried out and if a man was shot through a leg or through the through the guts or anything You just couldn't do anything for him. You just left him there and you If you looked at you you just looked away and just didn't say anything some of them never said a word. I Have to come back. I forgot something We had armed 5,000 men But we had also received a store of arms for another 5,000 that hadn't been distributed And we also had about five tons of high explosives And that was the reason why we were holding the farmhouse because it would have been foolish to fight this type of warfare With untrained men against a trained enemy Had there had we had not some objective in jail Well, when we saw it was impossible to to hold we decided to blow up the arms of 5,000 men with the High explosive we had so that was one of the things we were going to do as soon as we leave Soon as we left one of the things that I remember quite clearly was when we decided to blow up the arms There were quite a few SAS men laying around wounded and they didn't want to blow it up by a time pencil Right is they didn't want to put a time fuse on it and let it blow up when the time fuse Expired they didn't want to do that because they figured if the Germans get up there and cut the fuse the Explosive wouldn't go out and they'd have the arms so about Five or six of the wounded men laying around the floors on the tables and one thing another were arguing with one another to see who would blow it up Naturally, it was certain death that they didn't do it with any So they were trying to be brave or anything they just sensibly argued to see who would who'd blow it up I remember one man saying well now don't be foolish Why should you blow it up your only shot through both legs and I'm shot in the chest and the arms and just carry me up there And I'll blow it up myself. Well, anyway We went out to get in this car that was going to take us out Then when we got to the car there were about 50 people trying to get into the car And they were going to shoot it out to see who got in the car because everyone was looking out for his own hide then And it was a survival of the fittest So we decided to let them go rather than get into any trouble So we took off by ourselves. We plotted our asthma to this rendezvous that we were supposed to go to and started out as we started out Five British pilots who we had previously picked up who had been shot down wanted to go with us because they were lost No one was paying any attention to them. So we told them they could come with us So we started out when you medic we joined a company that was going to make a breakthrough as a as one body as a company We broke through our right they lost quite a few men No one in our party was killed soon as we get on the outside of what we considered the outside of the ring We left them and went on by ourselves. It was dark by this time about 11 o'clock Didn't get back until about 11 o'clock because it was in the middle of the summer We had a lot of trouble with the British pilots They were good boys, but they had these British hard-needle shoes on they were making an awful lot of racket at night And they they knew nothing about infantry tactics and they were absolutely terrible We walked for about About two hours and sat down Side a little feel for a little rest. We didn't know it We'd sat down right beside a road and about five minutes after we sat down there German column of paratroopers started maxing up this road and we laid We were about 20 yards away from this road. It took them about 15 minutes to walk by sort of a ticklish situation If I can Give you an idea of what was going on. It wasn't just this easy You see everyone had been trying to break through and everyone had had broken through in small groups broken through this encirclement therefore we had small groups wandering around everywhere and Trying to get away and one small group would run into another that is if an ffi group ran into another ffi group Well, they would just stop firing at one another not knowing that they were ffi because there were German patrols trying to pick up the ffi group to the broke break and broken through and Result everyone was firing at everything that moved they were killing horses and cattle and everything else two o'clock in the morning There's a terrific explosion We were approximately ten miles away Nearly not just to the ground. It was terrific turn right in today. I think of it. I Can't I can't quite describe the explosion, but it was terrific Our ammunition Started going off and went off all night way into the next day This this explosion Certainly confused the Germans By this time they have brought up a little artillery and they started firing artillery out into the dock anywhere it might land The they couldn't understand. It's my opinion my idea that they couldn't understand what this explosion was Well, we kept on Until about five o'clock in the morning five o'clock in the morning. We decided to lay down and get a little rest There were just a very few hedges around no cover. So we decided to lay low in a wheat field We went into a wheat field from different angles, so we wouldn't leave any one path giving our position away We had laid in this wheat field we laid in the semicircle. I think we've laid there until about six o'clock in the morning When we were awakened by Cossacks Russian Cossacks coming by on horseback. It was a pretty good thing that they Walk us up, I guess because we looked around and Discovered that we were within sight of a German radio station So it didn't take us very long to get out of there. We get out of there and continued our journey towards our rendezvous We arrived at our rendezvous We arrived at a rendezvous. I think about 10 o'clock in the morning. Everyone was there One thing I've got to say at this point there was an organization named the BOA sent in by London and this organization was to find Their main job was to find Landing grounds and make reception committees and this one man whose name was tangebury Had on paper all the landing grounds that we were to use in Brittany and later He was captured by the Gestapo Therefore every time we attempted to use one of these grounds. We always had a reception committee of either felt shunned down or Gestapo Well after holding a council of war that day we decided To break up that is coming down border grant with his SAS were to go underground He would he was to get into civilian clothes and lay low and let the heat cool off because at this This is just the next day and everything was boiling around there white white Russians They were Georgian Georgian Russians would come into a house And if there were three men in that house other than one where there was one before they just killed everybody men women and children They were rotten. They were terrible even worse than the Germans. They committed all sorts of atrocities and That day that day that we were there They were writing down through towns shooting men women and children They just write down through they just write down through a town on horseback and just fire into the houses and one thing and other Well, it was impossible to keep the Patriots from firing back We had told them to lay low and not take any offensive action against the Germans But their action was more or less defensive because if a German came in their house to kill his wife Well, naturally the man would would fight and so everyone was fighting for a radius of about 40 or 50 miles around there Something else I've got to tell you now that I forgot Previously we were tacked on Sunday Saturday We had made plans to go to the water in Fetyar, which was the next department. That is Jedburg George had our team Myself Captain iraq now radio operator We're gonna go to the water in Fetyar to try and organize the resistance in the water in Fetyar and on them We had armed 5,000 men and had another 5,000 organized ready to arm So we considered our work done in this Department of the mud beyond we also had to Gestapo agents working for us. We were paying them a high price and we were also we also Promised them that when the Americans got to us that we'd see that they get a fair deal That they would be turned over to us and work with us So that we had previously gone to the Department of the water in Fetyar with these two Gestapo agents in their car We'd sit in the back seat and they'd sit in the front and every time that we were stopped by a German patrol They would just show their identification and everything was all right but Sunday we had been attacked so Monday. We couldn't very well go with them everything that was shot up in the air So we decided to go to the water in Fetyar and leave Bourguin in the mud beyond We were to keep contact with coming down Bourguin through London That is we were sent we were to send a message to London in London would relay our message back to Bourguin Since we didn't have communications direct to him Well, he left and that left us Jed George With two agents known as Otar and function we hadn't slept we hadn't eaten for three or four days About three days. I think it wasn't so we decided to eat supper there at the Chateau du Cadac. We were at a big Chateau It was a count-and-countess at the Chateau The count to land mine and the contested land mine We sat down for supper that night The pressure just came in and said we'll have you'd have to leave immediately if there was a possibility of leaving because we were Surrounded the Germans knew we were there and coming in to take us This old lady who was about 45 years old Said that she would get us out of there so she took us She took us down through this garden and through a hole in the wall It was a big a very big wall surrounding the castle and the Germans hadn't get inside of this wall It was very dark and was raining very hard had been raining all day She took us by the hand down through the woods To a river It was so dark that she actually actually had to meet us by the hand when we get to the river She told us it's from the river and to travel north follow the river north And she also told us that sometime during the night that she would whistle She gave the pre-range whistle and that she would take us to a safe hiding place so we swam across the river and Decided that she was a very nice old lady But a little nuts because no one is going to find us in the middle of the night Raining and everything like that So we started north and she returned to the chateau to clear up any evidence that we'd left around that such as English cigarette But sir coffee cans or anything that might cause them to get in trouble with the Germans Well, the strains may seem four o'clock in the morning. We had the old lady whistling on the other side of the river She we answered her whistle and she jumped into that river and swam across we nearly get drowns from being across the river The river was swollen She'd get across just like nobody's business and then took us to a to a Mill an old mill where we slept for about an hour and a half This time we were living on benzene tablets a tablet that'll give you a lot of False strength as long as you live on them Songs you keep taking them every six hours But the minute that you you relax and you don't take them or then you just you you just can't go any further So we took some more of these tablets and struck off the next morning for a frown house Which was supposed to be a safe house but we get out to this safe house after having a couple of narrow scrapes with With With these Russian Cossacks as these Russian Cossacks were really really raising hell they were doing everything They were committing all sorts of atrocities they took one five-year-old boy they came into this house and Parents weren't the home, but there was a five-year-old boy to home So they took him nailed him to a door when he was alive and then they did him through the belly Took quite a while for him to die They were doing such things as that they caught one of our girls We were using a lot of girls as liaison agents they could get through where a man couldn't get through and They caught this girl. Her name was Mary. She was a very nice looking girl back here and she'd come from Paris She'd bicycled in from Paris. I think it was something like 300 300 or 400 kilometers She bicycled from Paris to where to our headquarters to bring us a message and they caught her and Tied a rope underneath her armpits and tied the rope around the saddle horn of the saddle and dragged it down the road until she Was dead or they were doing things like that. Anyway, we got out to this farmhouse in late low there We picked up quite a few parachutists and Another one wounded that had got through and we had we were keeping them in this house Well, we had no no first aid facilities or anything like that So gangrene was setting in and broken bones men had attempted to to walk with broken legs and the bones were overlapping So we finally made contact with a doctor who? Was willing to come out and take care of Well, we nearly got caught in this farmhouse by thought John down. So we decided to move out away from the farmhouse So we found a With the help of the family we found an old oven that a tackle maker used to use it was a it was a hole in the ground It was very very dark in this hole in the ground. You couldn't see a thing And we literally lived in the ground for five days five days and five nights. It was pretty rugged It doesn't seem like much but 24 hours a day is a long time to just sit in the dock and Not say much because it you can talk for the first 24 hours But then you can't think of anything to talk about and you start getting grouchy at one or the other Jean Pierre was our liaison agent had been set ahead and he had made arrangements for us to stay at the Chateau de la Gaia We went we then went into this Chateau de la Gaia and slept in the library the account sneaked us in and It's the first time we've been in a bed for For about a month Once we get in there We felt pretty good and started talking out loud and he told us it would be a good idea for us to be quiet because He had some roofwrap officers sleeping on the other end of the Chateau. It was a kind of an uncomfortable feeling to begin with but We get used to it in between us and the roofwrap officers were a lot of orphans One the Americans had accidentally bombed an orphanage and they had evacuated the children that were not casualties and they were staying there in this Chateau Up until now we had been living in military clothes, but at this point the count Got us some civilian clothes and we started going with civilian clothes. Well, we finally contacted this underground leader in Anthony and This is what we had decided to do We were going to act as day of myers of the wild inferior They are myer means military chiefs of that department while Folks you know was going to be day a matter of illy villain, which was a department to the north and Otar who was the other agent was going to be a Day a matter of the more beyond so that we can control the three departments They gave us the wild inferior because I think they were afraid to take it themselves It was a very tough Department and no one had been in there to organize it while the illy villain and more beyond had been organized It was a very very difficult to work to a job to organize at the water in Fediara and all the credit goes to the French officer That was with me. He did a splendid job All the underground in the water Fediara was more or less run by the Gestapo that is a Gestapo agents were actually chiefs of the Underground A Gestapo agent and civilian clothes who speaks fluent French is just like any Frenchman and if he's and at that time Frenchman were coming in from everywhere and no one was asking questions because everyone was escaping his forced labor in Germany So a man could come in and if he was an intelligent smile He could sell somebody the idea that he was hated the Germans and one thing another and could easily work himself up to get a group to work for him and he would be an underground man working Against the Germans in the resistance and another thing we ran against ran up against was Several different groups several different organizations underground organizations were active in that a lot of Fediara And while they were not busy fighting the Germans they were busy fighting amongst themselves That is if Joe here had a hundred men under him and Jack had 150 well Jack would be fighting Joe to get his men away and one might be a communist while the other was just an FFI and there was everyone was fighting everyone else. So it was quite a job to take and and weld these Different groups into one the actual men that were enlisted into these groups were very good men It was the leaders that were causing all the trouble So it was it's necessary to take care of the leaders few of the leaders came up missing and to make a long story short everything was welded into one and Captain they arrived By some miracle did it without getting caught because we'd have meetings of 12 leaders one day in the next day They'd be three left because there was a Gestapo agent at the meeting and He had all these men at the meeting picked up. We were not living in one place any length of time We'd stay in one house maybe one day and then we'd move into a hotel the next day and and one day We'd be living as students and perhaps the next day is as old farmers and old Dirty overalls we wouldn't choose and and then the next day We'd be living in a doctor's house or something like that so that we never stayed in one place And we never let anyone know where we were staying the three of us stayed together all the time And when we had made contact with anyone it was true a liaison agent at a certain rendezvous. We The laser laser on agent didn't know where we were staying. We didn't want him to know and he didn't want to know In the event that he would get caught he wouldn't be able to tell where we were Well to make a long story short we organized Water failure we had about 5,000 men organized well up until this time we hadn't Made contact with London that is we hadn't made contact with London since we had been shot up at safari in this Organization took about three weeks and since we hadn't come on the air for three weeks some Joker in in London Thought that we were controlled by the Gestapo He thought the Gestapo had caught us and they were forcing us to to send messages just the same I don't know why he ever thought that because in the event that we're captured by the Gestapo We have a certain number that we change in our code It signifies that we're Being forced to work in the all information that's coming through as far as well We hadn't changed that in our Cypher chief in London kept insisting with the base era Which was a French the French organization that was handling us. He kept insisting that we were not Controlled by the Gestapo, but nevertheless they didn't work with us. Well We used to send four messages a day and some at night begging them Pleading with them to send us any kind of equipment because at that time Patton's army the third army was coming down into Brittany and the Germans were Excaping up the law and we had no arms or anything to stop them with Well, we had the reception committees out on different grounds night and day for about two weeks and After two weeks. Well, they just had lost faith in us It was all right for the first few days, but then we started losing a lot of men on these grounds You you take a group of Frenchmen and put them out on the ground for a reception committee And it'll be all right for the first two days But they talked a little too much and the first thing you know everyone knows about it and the first thing You know that some Gestapo man knows about it and they're all picked up shot or something else so When we went London just wouldn't play with us we lost all hope in it one thing that we that London was interested in And the only thing London was interested in we had a man who was working for us a Frenchman Was an engineer working for the Todd organization and he was working in a g2 in a German g2 office and he was Reproducing plans and every plan that came into this g2 office He would make a duplicate copy in and give us a duplicate copy so that we had the a copy of all the coastal defenses along the water 30 hour and a copy of the plans of U-boat pens at Sainte-Azare and we notified London that we had these plans and they became interested in them and we're going to send Elizander in after them so we said well, that's good if Elizander comes in well if we have to throw the pilot out We'll go back to London ourselves and and straighten this out because They sent us here to do a job and once we get the thing ready. They won't send us any arm Well, they didn't send Elizander and they couldn't send it in and when they couldn't send it in We couldn't get the plans and nothing worked out Well, it came to the point where we had to take the situation into our own hands and not wait for London Because the Germans that by this time are really leaving the Brittany Peninsula So we gave the orders to all these men to strike the enemy in any possible Mean by any possible means they could we get a lot of saws and axes and chopped trees across the roads and did everything we could to hinder hinder their Their escape up to the wire we blew up bridges bridges with gun cottons and for fuses We used to use cigarette lighters and things like that. It was just it wasn't very good And we we armed a few men By actually taking the the weapons away from the Germans Say that two Germans were at a bar in some in some pub well Ten Frenchmen would go in and knock them over the head of the bottle and take two guns and with two guns They shoot four Germans and get four guns and with six guns They'd get ten and that way they they armed themselves, but it was very inadequate But About this time Patton was driving down into the Brittany Peninsula and we Decided these plans were were quite important So we were gonna and since one couldn't send in Eliza and we were going to try to get the plans through to To the Third Army. We're gonna try to infiltrate through if we could Well, it was Saturday. We were eating dinner and this woman came up this liaison agent said that the Americans had made a terrific advance and we're at Chateau Briand, which is about a hundred kilometers away So we decided to try to get the plans through if we could Colonel Vaudel who was the Colonel of the Rodin Ferry Art it all the underground in the Rodin Ferry Art Had centralized under one command and Colonel Vaudel or Colonel Felix was the commanding officer So he and myself and civilian clothes on bicycles were to go down the road along the River wire To contact any Americans that might be coming up the river while the French officer Captain they ride in the radio operator were to come down a back road with the plans in civilian clothes So everything went all right. We came into a little town of Vaudel that is the Colonel and I and from there We held a little council of war and we swapped addresses. That is the pilots and myself and Talked it over and said if anyone does get through this alive well, they could tell the story We all I also told the pilot at this point that they should go out by themselves But as they should break into groups of two and three and try to get through for themselves And not to stick with us because the Gestapo knew who we were ad pictures had all the Information they wanted on us and if they were caught with us well They get the same works that we were going to get While if they were caught by themselves and told her told their true story they might get away as prisoners of war Since they were powered to shut down Well, two of the Americans and one of the British were willing to do that and they took off immediately And they were gone about 50 yards and three of them were killed they ran right into a machine gun So that scared the other two and the other two want to stick with us So they say to us and we struck off in another direction Well, we ran into another machine gun And everybody immediately changed directions and I remember my glasses caught on a twig and were pulled off so I went back to get them and By this time everyone is out of breath and no one I wasn't carrying so much Figure out if I get killed here. I won't get killed some other place. The guy was shooting over my head all the time So I threw a grenade at him and he stopped firing and picked up my glasses and looked around and by this time everybody had left me They'd all got ahead of me. So I uh, I ran to catch up with him and I I soon found that my French captain was waiting for me. So He said well, we're not we're getting nowhere fast if we've been running in circles here We just can't break through this thing. So we might as well lay low. So the radio operator came back in one agent and this British American pilot and at this point, I told the American I told these two pilots to leave us immediately and they they didn't say anything so I pulled a gun on them and told them either leave or I'd shoot them and The American pilot fell on the ground and just just couldn't go He was scared like a rabbit just like a dog when you beat a dog He put his tail between his legs and get down He just couldn't move so there wasn't anything we could do is just leave him with us and if he was caught Well, he'd have to suffer the consequences. So we get into we crawled into some bushes there bushes about Four or five feet high and and laid low. Well, all this had happened in the space of a half an hour So it was now about 6 30 or 7 o'clock Well, here's what happened 300 men Were hit in these in these little woods and the Germans would climb up trees and one German would spot Some people hiding in some bushes over there and would yell and point over to the to the people hiding in the bushes and Three or four Germans would walk down to these bushes and throw in a hand grenade in three or four Franklin would come running out and they just shoot them They didn't have any arms and it was just like shooting quail that went on all day about eight o'clock in the morning They they found this little girl in the cellar and Bayonetta and she screamed for about five or ten minutes before she died It was it was terrible something we never forget it was it was it was terrific and Shooting was going on and killing going on in these woods all day long Yeah, it was a it was a worst day of our life. No doubt about it couldn't be worse See it was it would be different if we were out there fighting if we could she could fight but it was we were hiding we were We were cornered like rats. It was different than we wanted to get out there and fight and either get killed get it over there or Or get out Remember we reviewed the Personally taking out my pocket button going over pictures I had and thinking my whole life through from the day I was born Then the afternoon something that That I remember quite clearly in the afternoon about four o'clock Everyone get the laughing hysterically. I don't know if we were laughing or crying but We couldn't stop laughing and at times the gym and we're walking 20 paces away from this so it was it was Quite dangerous to laugh like that, but we just couldn't help it I can't remember everything that happened that day we just stayed there all the time and and It was just terrible. I Think a French captain kept us together We wanted to get out most of us wanted to get out there and either you need to get it over with Or get through and he said no the best thing to do would be just wait and if they did discover us there that We tried it out then and if they didn't discover us there where we stood a better chance of getting out So about 11 o'clock at night I contacted this pilot who was just a few ways a few yards away from us You see it was it was very the situation is it was terrible We were laying maybe three or four paces from one another and we couldn't move a Bush who couldn't move a muscle if you fell into one position in the morning You had to be in that same position 11 o'clock and I we didn't get a move because the Germans were so close to us They they also had dogs on our trails at the beginning of the morning and that was that was terrible It was a terrible sensation to hear these these dogs on a trail Howling as they were and thinking that maybe they'd come and get you it would better hell We wanted to get out and fight and get it over with but The dogs couldn't follow us because everybody had been running in every direction and it was impossible for them to follow our trail anyway, 11 o'clock at night I Went over and spoke to this American pilot and told him to stay there and that we were going to go out in a Certain direction and if he didn't hear any firing to come out in that same direction about an hour later I gave him a some Frank's I'd had quite a few Frank's I gave him Frank's Or if he did get through and I told him that if he if he ever got through to write to my wife again they have this and We took off everything went pretty well miracle after miracle happened we past centuries about 25 paces away and I Can remember when we had our training in school We used to go through a lot of crazy schemes everybody bits like hell But I thank God that night that we'd had that training because it certainly saved our lives we We it progressed quite a ways until we came by a farmhouse and dogs started barking someone Started shooting someone fired at us in the general direction And then everyone started shooting the whole woods where we had been all the Germans started firing everybody started firing It was I know what they were firing at but certainly Certainly, we're not firing it as anyone. They were just fine because everybody was so on edge But we we ran across in one field and got down by a road It was a German century on this road and we waited until he would walk down turn around and walk back and as he would walk back one of us would skip across the road and That way we kept on the other side of this road without any one of us getting killed once we were on the other side of the road we We Then figured that we were out of out of the encirclement. We figured that we were in the clear And so we felt pretty good. It was a quite a relaxation after that day and But we we've done just a little ways when we heard a German patrol cutting us off They they come over to three hedges and they were coming across another field We couldn't we couldn't see how they possibly knew we were there and still we figured well We must have they must have seen this because here they come and at this point We were through running even though we were in the open we decided we won't run another range We'll we'll fight it out to finish right here. I remember it was a very thick hedge And we waiting for him on the other side of this head We couldn't see them we could hear them running up They ran up the other side of the head and we pulled the pins on grenades We're going to throw the grenades over the other side of the hedge and then lay flat after they went off We were going to spread we were going to Spray the bushes spray this hedge and get out when they came up on the other side of the hedge and Then stopped and one of one of them said in French met the Vuanning Which means get in there in a single file a single line So then we knew the refreshment But we still had to be very careful because even though they were a Frenchman They would shoot at us if we made a noise because they're taking no chances of the same story was repeating itself every every group that it was getting through those that were on we're shooting at one another and and Have a lot of confusion So we said to them in French We're French. We don't know who you are But send a man down to the gate at the other end of this head See there was a head and a gate down to the other end send a man down there and we'll see who you are and So so they sent a man down there, and it was absolutely a miracle The person on the other side of this head was the other agent and he had had the other half of our radio Here it was three miles away from from the farmhouse and And we met this agent he could have gone in any other direction of the compass so then we were all together once more had the radio together and With him was this The leader of this Mackie Yacko, so we sent him out sent him away so that only six of us stayed together that is a Jedburg George two agents and one liaison agent and we told Yacko that We would contact him later and in the meantime to just lay low and so we took off by our cells and walked about five miles that night and then Crawled in some bushes and went to sleep. We stayed there for two days After that we tried to contact Colonel Kingly who was Given to us by London as a chief of Resistance in the water in Fetyard He didn't want to see us. He was afraid he He was no good. He he was afraid to do anything. He hadn't done anything for the resistance The only he was a politician of the first degree and he just uh, just just never did a thing well we're still quite a ways from From organizing anything in the water for you are because everything that we had started had been shot up in the air So we decided to go from there to what I'd which was on there which is a little town right on the river Because we had an address there in that add and we figured that we could make contact with some Some resistance group in that add First 24 hours in the hole wasn't too bad, but five days was too much. We started getting pretty grouchy and started backing on one another So we decided to come out of the hole Came out of the hole one afternoon went down to the farmhouse. We hadn't shaved for five days So we put a little water out of a well started to shave We're half halfway through the process when two men came from the town They you come running they came running in and said the doctor had sent them said the Gestapo knew where we were The Gestapo and felt John down knew where we were and they were going to attack us wait that afternoon didn't take much time to get out of there and This farmer took us down to his brother-in-law We had been traveling north from the place that we had been attacked and what we wanted to do was go Into the the Department of the water very hard which was south so we had to make a sort of a detour to the east So we took off and went down to his to his brother-in-law's from his brother-in-law's we Match for another two hours then it got dark then it got there then it and Don came We could only match for about four or five hours because the nights were very short was in the middle of the summer We laid low there incidentally this The Gestapo did come out of the house. They killed his his wife and his children. They shot the doctor and He returned and they they killed him and at this shot over the Caddox where we were to begin with Where this we were staying with the count the countess the next day they shot the count But they didn't shoot the countess They had found some evidence that the that we had been around there and Chopped account for it. Well, this went on We'd go from one place to another walking about four or five Hours every night we were getting nowhere fast because we had about 150 miles to go every time we crossed the railroad track on our trip at night we'd either tear up a rail or Rip apart communications we came across After we'd been walking for about three days We decided to go into a town to get something to eat We'd watch through towns every night. They were just going at night was all right, but we were not getting anywhere and And we were running great risks every night We'd have to we were walking right straight through the center of towns and Germans would be on the sidewalks And we'd walk through the town to the carbine on our back many times We were caught that caught in the outskirts of a town by Germans And we just never said a word and just walked right straight through and they never said a word a lot if we had made a run for it Or jumped over a head to something they just said something it's a The boulder you were the more you'd get away with if you just didn't give a damn and just went on and Let things take care of themselves. We seem to get by okay Well when we went into this town In the daytime the civilian clothes we by some miracle met a liaison agent that we'd been working with that We had sent to the water fatty iron. He was coming back So once that we were in contact with this liaison agent We sent him ahead to the water fatty iron to bring back a truck. So we're going to try to run this gauntlet in the truck It's just a little while after d-day and all roads are being watched It's pretty hard to circulate unless you have permission from the Germans So he brought back a little covered truck And this man had permission from the Germans to circulate. He was collecting milk for the Germans There's a little covered truck and he had three pigs in the back of the truck So five of us get into the back of the truck and with sub machine guns and we Put the pigs in In the corner by the driver's seat and lift up a little of the flap exposing the pigs And started our trip to the water fatty iron We stopped five times by the Germans. We stopped at every bridge we came to And uh, they just checked the papers looked into the backs all the pigs and let us go Well, we came into this Maki called the Maki of Safari. It was the Maki Or the group of men that we had organized previously remember I said we had gone down there with the the Gestapo with these two Gestapo agents that were working for us And we had given orders to this Leader to organize only 50 men and hold them at this farmhouse and we were going to use those these 50 men as Reception for reception committee only we didn't want to repeat the same thing that had happened in the mud behind We didn't want to uh to have a great Collection of men in no arms or a great collection of men at one point Well, when we got into this Maki, we came in about three o'clock in the afternoon We found about 300 men there with arms for about 20 men and everyone was coming and going at will and uh The situation was uh, literally screwed up So the first thing we did was reorganize their defenses with arms for 20 men And uh decided that the next thing Decided next morning the very first thing we do would be uh Split these men up send them out in groups of five 10 15 all throughout the country Keep them under our control, but not centralized at any one point And then we had supper that night with the leaders of this camp and the man who sat across me was uh Claimed to be one of the leaders of the underground was a Gestapo agent We didn't know it at the time and he left camp that night. We still didn't know didn't know at that night that he had left camp well as a result the next thing We knew it was six o'clock in the morning. We'd been sleeping in the middle of wheat field and this yako who was uh chief of the That little mickey came out woke us up and said I think we've had it. He said the uh We were completely surrounded the every road is is cut off and uh, they're moving in from every direction And we woke up and they were moving in we could hear trucks coming in from every direction It's very uncomfortable feeling We didn't have time to do anything. It's all took place in a fraction of a second We woke up and the sky was filled with with very lights. The Germans had fired up very lights in every direction Uh a radio operator at this time was receiving a message from runder So the only first thought in our mind was let everything go and just get hold of the radio. So we ran down picked up the radio and The minute that these very lights went off Hell started breaking loose That is that they were about 200 yards away and they just started firing machine guns at this farmhouse and There were 300 men at this in and around this farmhouse and as a result everybody started running in object directions and they were just uh getting nowhere fast and men were dropping like flies we uh Made a desperate attempt to organize them and get them started out in three different groups and we did uh At this farmhouse there was a farmer and his wife and a daughter eight-year-old daughter So we stuck the daughter down in a In in the cellar and the fire and the farmer's wife Was with us. I forget to say that they were we found three americans and two british pilots at this farmhouse they'd been shot down over france and and the uh Underground and picked them up from bottom to this mickey and they stuck with us in our group. They were about 40 Well just before we left there was a a brand gun man who was commanding a brand gun who would get killed so I picked up the brand gun and and uh Went over to a head where german trucks pulled up about 15 feet away The three trucks and we had about three four magazines for this brand gun And I just I held it through the gun up onto our heads Captain arrived second the clips and we fired the three clips into these trucks Made the Germans yell a little bit and we threw the gun away because uh, we didn't have any use for the gun we didn't have any shelf for it and um When the 40 of us ran down this head we ran down the head for about a hundred yards And then we met an f of five who came back and said it's impossible to go out that way Germans were coming up He had a stand gun and three clips of ammunition So we told him to go back and fire three clips of ammunition at the Germans whether he hit them or not As long as he fired and then throw his gun away and then beat it and hide the best he could Then we changed our direction and ran into Uh point blank into a machine gun and it got three or four of us And so we changed our direction again and ran into another machine gun And uh third machine gun we ran into we we had lost about 15 men out of our group. None of us had been killed and the farmers white couldn't keep up with us So we stuck in a clump of bushes and she was wearing a white dress. Uh, yes a white dress and uh I remember it was very hard to camouflage her and uh After we had stuck her into these bushes and attempted to camouflage and we could still see her a long ways away I don't know what happened to her. I think she must have been killed The 15 Germans in this town Decided the odds were too great against us. So we thought we'd let them go. We went down the road about three miles and uh met a Jondown down there And we had previously sent the jondowns out to contact the americans and bring them back to this To vat out. I had given them instructions written instructions to bring back any american that he saw Uh, this jondown that came down the road told us that a van had stopped in vat out There's a uh, a german major sitting up front in the van and the back of the van was filled with german soldiers And that there was a frenchman driving the van and that the frenchman Knew that we were down there and was going to stop if we held him up So we waited for the van the van came down the road and stepped out in the road with the cabine Colonel felix laid on the side of the road with the with the grenade uh The german major immediately got out and stuck his hands up in the air so we stuck denny's back told him to to uh Give an order to the germans in the back of the van to get out of the van with their hands behind the head and uh Leave their weapons in the van He was quite surprised because he didn't he didn't think that we knew that the soldiers in the back of the van Well, the soldiers get out we turn them over to the french and the french to their job on And we continued down the road and a few minutes later We contacted the americans first americans as jondam had brought him back The americans were very skeptical at first. They thought they were running into a trap And it took me about an hour to convince him that i was in america Then we took the prisoners and started back for ansony where i was supposed to meet captain erad with the plans I got back to ansony and i met champ yad who came up to me crying He was one of our liaison agents the first time i ever saw him crying my life He came up and kissed me on both cheeks and uh And i finally got him calmed down in his story He told me he told me that captain erad had came down the back road as previously planned But he had put on his uniform For the first time in in three months because he thought the americans in the area well What had happened they came down the road And heard some tanks coming up and thought they were american tanks So waved them down and three german tiger tanks rolled up to a stop and everybody jumped out and uh We're going to kill him there. So he put his hands up in the air and uh And stood there with his hands up in the air and nonchalantly gave the german's hell for taking His weapons away and uh told them they were crazy. They didn't know what they were doing that he was a Mini schian working with them and that he'd been working with them for four years and by some miracle I don't know how it happened. There's no explanation for it. They just left him there Standing there with his hands up walked back to the tanks Get in and drove off and about three minutes later made contact with some american tanks and a quite a battle followed And in the battle this Uh liaison agent thought that captain irate got killed But uh before before they had split up captain irate had given him the plan. So the plans were in our possession so Make a long story short as soon as we showed the plans to Colonel reed who was commanding the uh, uh second cavalry. He immediately took us back to eighth core It took about uh About 24 hours to get back to eighth core as soon as we got back to eighth core I turned the plans over to some general. I forgot his name and g2 who was who was colonel reeves Uh immediately photostatted the the uh The copy of the plans and uh sent me up the third army with the plans I brought the plans up the third army and we're taking them and we're taking the plans to uh general pattern when I met uh Colonel powell who was uh an sfhq detachment Uh attached to third army So he took me in hand and and made all the necessary arrangements to have the plans turned over Well, we stayed there for a couple of days and uh I was I was very much in a hurry to get back To my area since I thought that this time that captain irate had been killed and and I was very much concerned about that Well in the second day general pattern uh Through rip powell asked us how many men we had Down there organized and not armed and we told him five thousand Well, he asked us if we could do a job for him if if he armed us if we could hold his right flank if he swung Towards paris So we told him yes, he immediately armed our men 2,500 of our men and uh And I infiltrated back through the lines And uh found that captain irate was all right radio operator was all right and we uh made necessary arrangements to receive the the armed for 2,500 men and uh make a long story short. We held this flank until uh the 20th of august when we received a cable Uh through messenger from london It was a message sent to us by general coney who wanted us to return to Uh london for a second mission So that we left colonel felix in charge of the troops that were holding the right flank and we went back to london On returning to london. We found out that uh Uh, our second mission was to go into paris, but it was a little too late So on the 7th of september, we were re parachuted into the center of france on another mission Mission called mission chinole. It was a jet Mission, but we also went in with two uh two agents Our mission was to organize all the ffi in the departments that were already organized and those that were not organized That we were to form them into mobile groups and attack the enemy wherever he went. Well We hacked away at this division in the middle of france Until they gave up remember a division gave up to the 83rd division But we were hacking away at the uh lower part of that division when it gave up uh after they had given up And i'm just going over this very briefly this second mission because it's similar to the second one uh after they had given up we um We had to change directions. That is there were no germans in the center of france in our immediate vicinity So we received instructions from london To turn around and come back towards the west coast that is towards san azalea at san azalea There were 27 000 germans holding out and at la ruchelle there were about 20 000 So we organized all we got them all together and moved approximately uh 8 000 ffi from the center of france up south of the river roire at san azalea Then we uh, we um combined our forces with those of the water fed air and we were we had approximately 20 000 about 20 000 ffi holding in 27 000 germans at san azalea and we held them from uh late september until uh The latter part of november Many incidents happened in the meantime. Uh, I don't think I should go into detail about them except for one. I think one is quite interesting uh In the meantime, we had contacted knight's army and we're working under general simpson Uh, he had given us a jeep. We had contacted major shellcross with an sfhq attachment attack ninth army We're working uh with very close connection with very close with the 94th division well We had three machine guns mounted on this jeep and we used to run into a town and shoot up the town Filled with germans and then get out fast and uh, and we always get by with it So one moving from the center of france up to uh, san azalea. We were more or less the advanced Scouts if you want to call it that We were moving we moved up to a little uh town by the name of pornic And uh In quiet if there are any germans in pornic and they said they are frenchmen round there said that there were a few very few uh Germans there so we decided to go down into the town and see what they were and if we ran into any Any germans where we shoot them up and try to get out. Well, unentering the town there's a stretch of road about 500 yards We came down this stretch of road And just as we were entering the town there was a road block And about 100 yards away from this road block Uh, all of a sudden I have nowhere stepped out about 30 or 40 germans armed with machine guns sub machine guns and rifles So that we were caught caught cold We couldn't turn around and make a run for it because we had 500 yards to go and they would have cut us to ribbons If we did that and before we could stop we were about 50 yards from them But I stopped the jeep we got out of the jeep instead looking at one another 50 yards away for about five minutes It was a it was a quite a situation We just stood there looking at one another no one doing any shooting Uh Finally I came to my senses. I guess I had a white uh parachute Piece of a parachute around my neck and I took it out waited a couple of times and uh A gentleman came out from behind the road block with a white handkerchief and I met him halfway and uh And I didn't know what to say so I asked him to surrender the town to us And he said that he couldn't do that without permission from his sergeant So, uh, he went back to get the sergeant and the sergeant was a pretty tough bullet He came down and I was wearing green glasses and he jerked the glasses off my face and uh Ordered us to come over and back in the blockhead. I couldn't speak german He couldn't speak french or english But the I had a french major with me and the major could speak English And he could speak german so he was interpreting for me And I told his french major to tell him that I was an american officer and he'd better watch out And he immediately stood at attention handing my glasses and said he was sorry Uh So I asked him to surrender the town to me to us And um He said he didn't want or he said he wanted to fight and let's fight But we didn't have anything to fight him with there were three of us in about uh Maybe 150 of them all together with what was in town And they had the drop on us. So I asked him to see his commanding officer immediately So he went back to call up his commanding officer Well, he called up his commanding officer Commanding officer was quite a ways away and couldn't be down for It would take about an hour before he could get down So he asked us if we'd wait and so we said okay In the meantime about 80 germans came out two and three at a time Uh, and we had a cotton of cigarettes luckily and we gave them a Cigarette of peace and shook hands and patted each other on the back and talked over the war situation and and uh Tried to talk them out or tried to talk them into surrendering 50 of them when we're willing to give up Well, we didn't have the transportation to take them out. We could uh We talked them out of it pretty easily some of them were Russian some of them pollocks and some of them thorough Germans Uh, we gave them the argument that uh We were just small men in this affair and that uh, we could easily kill one another and it wouldn't amount to anything But the men that were actually causing this war would live afterwards and so on and so on and they agreed with us One thing uh, in particular, they just like us in English. They said if we were English, they would kill us immediately If they had no use for the English and one thing another. Well, anyway, in about an hour and a half Everybody stood at attention and ziged high all and uh A lieutenant colonel came down the road lieutenant colonel and uh, and uh lieutenant noblet uh The old lieutenant uh Spoke fluent english. He was a sort of a wimmy guy. I mean just a little insignificant Fragile-looking man and in perfect english He walked up and said my chief wants to know what you're doing here. Who sent you and uh, what do you intend to do? and so on and so on and I told him that uh general had sent me and uh We wanted we were americans and didn't want to come down and kill him uselessly and he wanted to know if they'd surrender to us tonight And then he the uh old blutton repeated it to uh The colonel the colonel said something to the old blutton the old blutton said to my colonel my chief tells me to tell you to shut up that he doesn't want to hear any of this talk to uh to uh Go back and tell your general to Come down and get him if he wants to that we've been waiting for him for a long time And if he thinks that he can take us we'll come and get us Uh, actually, uh, no general had sent me. I wasn't from a general, but I was pulling that bluff at the time Uh, well make a long story short. We shook hands swapped cigarettes sleuded Firmly legs walked back to the chief And they didn't shoot us or take us prisoners as we get into the chief a Frenchman came up and tell you mr Paul and I said yes, I was going by the name of mr Paul around there and And uh, he said I've got something to tell you but I can't tell you right now So we met him down around the bend and he said look Uh, this old blutton shroider. That was the old blutton's name Uh, he's willing to talk turkey with you, but uh, he couldn't say anything in front of the colonel so, uh I made arrangements to meet this old blutton that night down on the on the seashore down by Labradori And he didn't show up that night, but I met him the next night He came out in civilian clothes and we took him back to our headquarters Uh with his girlfriend. He was going with a french girl and she always acted as uh Is uh His safe girl. That is a she always came out and checked to see that I was alone before he would come out But he came out we brought him back to our headquarters We sat down had a good meal and drank wine one thing another after supper he pulled out plans gave us all complete military information of all his sector down to the machine gun And it checked exactly with the information that we'd got that we had received from our agent So he wasn't giving us fault though Well, this went on for two or three nights and uh Then the frenchman Had come in with me he got scared and figured this man was a super spy playing a double game trying to play a game with us But actually was playing against us Oh, I couldn't quite see it But uh, they said if you go down and pick him up tonight and either kill him or bring him back a prisoner So I went down picked him up at usual and brought him back and uh told him that he was my prisoner If you tell you why we'd have to kill him and they give me a stiff argument This is about nine o'clock at night by four in the morning I had convinced their frenchman that we should give him a chance anyway and try him because he couldn't really do us any harm He didn't know too much about us. He'd come back to our headquarters He knew where it was, but I'm sure that he knew where it was before because uh, some french were playing a double game That is they'd spy for us and spy for the other side. He had to be careful who you were using for agents uh So about four o'clock in the morning after arguing from nine to four, they decided to let him to play ball with him So we we're going to give him a chance to prove himself. So we took him into this room and said, okay, shroyer Uh, we're gonna let you go. He was very happy And said uh, here's what we're going to give you to prove yourself tomorrow You send 10 germans out from Pornick where you're staying to la bernerie and from la bernerie to arton and while they're on that road we'll ambush them somewhere And so three o'clock next afternoon It's just like murder they 10 germans walking down the middle of the road in the columbus twos that we knocked off four of them the first The first shot and the others gave up So then we took the took these prisoners up to general maloney who was uh commanding 94th division and now in the meantime His commanding officer had forced him to send out patrol of 60 men to look for the 10 men who had disappeared in thin air and um We didn't have time to lay an ambush and uh result we didn't get all of them. They killed about uh five of us and and uh, we killed about 20 of them and Got a couple wounded a few and some of them got away um Make a long story short this guy played with us all the time Um one saturday night about six o'clock. I received a letter from him And which he stated that uh six o'clock the next morning. He was going to attack on a depth Of 10 miles but on a On a frontage of 20 miles and occupy the following points and that he himself wasn't actually Going to leave the attack and he wanted us to set out ambushes in certain places and so on and so on And at six o'clock the next morning he came out The germans came out exactly as he said they were down the very roads and we ambushed them and and uh And killed a lot of them and they killed a few of us But they were they were they came out in a very strong force and they did occupy the points that they were uh It's a um They occupied their objectives. Well, here's the reason why this this uh lieutenant was playing this way his father was uh Father was a german And his mother was a south american. I think she came from chili uh He had been he had lived in south america most of his life And had been in the merchant marines for a long time and when war broke out He was in germany and he was forced into the navy and uh given a commission and He had both had been sunk and so all these navy men were on land acting as uh ground troops And what he wanted to do was to get a clear passport back to south america with no strings attached Which i promised him if he played ball with us and that's how we played ball with him now i left I left the area of sanas air uh About two weeks ago And we had a telephone line running from his side of the line to our side of the line So that when he intended to do something a launch an attack. He just called us up and told us about it Sounds quite fantastic. Nevertheless, it's it's true Uh We had uh, well that takes care of his little story. He's as far as I know. He's still working one time we had uh some We had taken some of their prisoners and we swapped them for our prisoners and uh When our when the german prisoners were turned back In the in exchange for for for french prisoners They said that oh blutton and schreider had been working with us some ff i had charlie's mouth off to the prisoners The bragging that one of them was working with us. So put a lot of pressure on him the colonel started watching him So then some of our men were some ffis were captured and they told the general on the other side that the That the lieutenant colonel was playing with us So the general started watching the lieutenant colonel and took the pressure off and the Old blutton and schreider so he could work with us again Or at this time we had about 20,000 ff i holding in these germans at san azair and uh, general de la mineur who is uh general de gold second command was took charge of all the western coast that is of san azair and of la ruchelle and uh shape Through his request shape shape pulled us in from the field And he made a large request to shape four arms to arm all these frenchmen and As far as i know at this moment they're either holding or planning an attack against san azair or la ruchelle Then i returned to return to paris and from paris uh to london where i made a report and uh That's all