Ed & Ray Hersman in WWII - Robert Marks.org

4.11. SIEGFRIED LINE Ed & Ray Hersman in WWIIin. The trip wire he hit was one with a grenade in a box tied to a tree.Fortunately for us and the German they did not work too well. Because ofthis prisoner we did not have to go after one that night.Finally the day came when we were ordered to set up an O.P. at a differentplace. Since the Germans knew where we were, we were happy to leave.4.10.8 Trip WiresAt dawn I went down to take up the trip wires we had set. To deactivatea grenade the handle must be held down, and the pin be reinserted. I washolding one with the handle down and was trying to insert the pin. Thegrenade was still tied to the trip wire. Suddenly I heard the striker hit andbecause of the wire I could not throw the grenade. 20 I dropped the grenadeon the ground and ran down the hill until I counted three. I threw myself flaton the ground and the grenade fragments all went over me. I just untied thewires, put the lids on the boxes and buried the rest of the grenades withouttrying to get the pins in.4.11 Siegfried LineOur new O.P. was at the edge of a sheer cliff in a forest directly overlookingthe Siegfried Line and Echternach 21 which was in Luxembourg. One steeppath lead up the cliff and it was if front of where we decided to put the O.P.Again we had no security for the O.P.4.11.1 A Stealth O.P.We dug a pit deep enough to hold three men out of solid limestone. We dugdeep enough so that we could put three layers of logs covered with dirt andleaves and still be level with the forest floor. We used a trap doortrap door to20 See Figure 4.9 on page 64.21 See the map in Figure 4.1 on page .63