title: Infantry Soldier: Holding the Line at the Battle of the Bulge
author:  George W. Neill 
description: The author, a journalist in later life, was a 23-year-old rifleman in the U.S. Army's 99th Division during the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944. The 99th had reached the European front the month before and distinguished itself in anchoring the vital northern flank during that last German counteroffensive. Casualty rates in the front-line infantry companies were extraordinarily high; the battlefield cemetery is a recurrent image. Neill's aim in this work is to preserve a sense of how it was for the front-line soldierAplacing reminiscences of his own and of colleagues on record in context with previous histories. His detailed, eyewitness perspective includes earthy explanations of hardships and remarks on leaders who were variously inspired, inept or uninformed, and usually invisible. Vignettes of heroic virtues, youthful innocence, formative experiences, fateful chance happenings and indiscriminate slaughter are credible and compelling. Neill cites statistics from the Department of Veterans Affairs showing that 36% of the 16.5 million American veterans of World War II are still alive, but that the youngest is 72 years old, and that as a group they are dying at an accelerating rate, above 1,000 per day. "Don't forget," Neill pleads, "vow you'll never forget." Illus. not seen by PW. <br />Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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  [Contents](067131940X_toc.htm)
  
  # Chapter 49:  
  Finale.
  
  THE MPS PUSHED into the deserted trenches with no small amount of trepidation.
  They'd had to leave their vehicle more than a mile away. This place was as
  frightening as hell. . . .
  
  For starters, why was it deserted? Were they going to meet Magh'?
  
  For a second, dealing with drunken Vat-troops on leave in the city was one
  thing. Here in the front lines, they had a private suspicion that Magh' might
  be safer to meet than front-line soldiers. Still, they had their orders.
  
  The sound of voices was a welcome one. It was a party of medics with
  stretchers.
  
  "Halt!" said the Military Police captain.
  
  "Fuck off, redcap. Get out of the way."
  
  "That's an order, soldier!" snapped another MP.
  
  "I'm a medic, asshole. With an injured soldier in my care. Go and look at your
  military law. Now get out of my way before I toss you out of the mine
  corridor."
  
  It was something of a shock to th