Bastogne: The Story of the First Eight Days - US Army Center Of ...

THE CONCENTRATION ON BASTOGNE 9
toward the town in the Belgian Ardennes with whose name their
own fame was to be thereafter inseparably linked. Orders from
12th Army Group were received on the 16th directing the 10th
Armored Division to be temporarily attached to VIII Corps, First
Army, to counter the serious German attempt at a breakthrough. 1B
At 1320 on December 17, in compliance with the order, Combat
Command B, 10th Armored Division, took its first step toward
Bastogne when it moved from a rest area at Remeling,
France, to the vicinity of MerI in Luxembourg. 2 That evening
at 2030 the 10 I st Airborne Division, which was then re-outfitting
in a training area at Camp Mourmelon (near Reims, France, and
roughly 100 miles from Bastogne) received telephone orders
from Headquarters XVIII Airborne Corps that it was to move
north though at that time Bastogne was not the destination
given.s On the following night, December 18 at 1800, the 705th
Tank Destroyer Battalion, then in position at Kohlscheid, Germany
(about 60 miles north of Bastogne) was ordered by the
Ninth Army to march to Bastogne and report to VIII COrpS.4
Bastogne, then the Headquarters of VIII Corps, was the natural
place for rendezvous and for stabilizing the defense. The
town is the hub of the highway net covering the eastern Ardennes
-a countryside that is forbidding to the movement of mechanized
forces except when the. roads are available. By holding at Bastogne
the VIII Corps could unhinge the communications of the
Germans who were striking west toward the line of the River
Meuse. 5
Combat Command B closed into the vicinity of MerI at 2155
on the 17th. On the following morning it was ordered to move
independently of the 10th Armored Division to join VIII Corps.
It took the road through ArIon to Bastogne. 011 the way Colonel
William L. Roberts, the commander (plate 2), received a request
from Major General Norman D. Cota, commanding the 28th
Infantry Division, to support his force at Wiltz by putting Combat
Command B into position south and southeast of the town.
But this Colonel Roberts could not do and comply with his Corps
orders, so he took his column on into Bastogne and reported
there to Major General Middleton at 1600 on the 18th. s