I left Clayton College for Boys the fall of 1942. I dropped out of high school in October 1942. All the young men were joining the Navy, Army, Marine Corps and Air Force or waiting to get drafted. I volunteered two weeks ahead of time and was inducted into the Army in Denver, Colorado and sent to Ft. Logan (south of Denver) in April 1942.
After a week they sent us to basic training at Toca, Georgia. After basic training they sent us to Fort Benning, Georgia, for one month of parachute training. It was August 1943 and very hot and humid. After making five parachute jumps we were sent to Camp McCall in North Carolina. We received more training until May of 1943.
They sent our outfit of 4,000 men to Naples, Italy on troop ships. The ocean trip was very smooth going over. We camped a week in the foothills outside of Naples and then loaded out landing craft and were sent to the coast.
We climbed the mountains and attacked the mountain top villages to fight the Germans. We captures some of them. The weather was very warm and we had to be careful with our water supply.
At every farm we came to we looked for chickens, fruit, etc. It seemed we were always hungry or thirsty.
Our outfit was relieved in July 1943 and we camped outside of Rome in the foothills.
We received more training in preparation for the invasion of Southern France. On August 7, 1943, our outfit was moved to airports north of Rome to the island of Corsica. It was a four hour ride and it was rough and a lot of the guys were sick to their stomachs.
We finally jumped about 3 a.m. on the 18th of August, 1943. After my parachute opened up all I could see was mist coming up in my face. I thought, “My God, they have dropped us over the ocean.”
I was so scared, I threw away my rifle, helmet, rations and was trying to get my boots off when I hit the ground. I stood up and threw up my supper from the previous night of steak, beer and ice cream.
We crossed the wheat field and gathered up for attacking the French villages. We cut telephone lines, power lines and blew up bridges.
A lot of the paratroopers fell in trees, on housetops, rivers, etc. They [the paratroopers] broke a lot of legs and arms.
An entire regiment was spread across 15 miles of countryside. It took two weeks to get our regiment of 4,000 troops back together. A lot of guys were killed and more were wounded.
We spent a couple of months in the mountains of Southern France attacking villages and looking for Germans. Then they pulled us out and sent us to a camp 90 miles south of Paris for rest and recuperation. We rested up, ate well, drank a lot of wine and looked for French girls. The average age of our soldiers was 19 years old. The officers were in their late 20’s. These were all young guys.
In December, the Germans broke through into Belgium on a 50 mile front. They shipped our entire regiment on a 300 mile nighttime truck convoy into Belgium to help stop the Germans. On the second day the weather turned very cold. The third day it snowed and at night it was freezing. They let the truck engines run all night so that they would not freeze up. We always looked for a warm basement or a farmhouse. We heard that two of our guys froze to death at night in the forest. We couldn’t build a fire at night. From then on every fifth man had to check at night to make sure everyone was awake.
The Battle of the Bulge had very high casualties. After one month our company of 200 men was down to 25 men. I was extremely lucky. I was blown off my feet twice by mortar rounds and shot at many times but never hit. My buddy and I were about captured twice, but we were lucky and escaped at night. After a month of fighting they relieved our regiment and sent us back to France for rest and recuperation.
On the third day of rest and recuperation it was warm in our area and I got up in the morning and had trouble getting my boots on because my feet were swollen. I ended up in an Army hospital for one month and returned to my own outfit. There was a lot of frostbite and trench foot due to the freezing weather.
Out of our company of 200 men, only five were not killed or wounded. I was one of the five who had no Purple Heart medal. I was very lucky; I must have had a guardian angel watching over me.
I spent the next six months in Berlin, Germany. We had a lot of guard duty. We stayed in apartment buildings in Berlin and spent a lot of time in beer gardens in our off hours.
Finally they shipped us back to the U.S. A. I was discharged on Jan. 11, 1946, at Fort McArthur. I returned home to Long Beach, California. I was home at last after three years of Army service. I went in at 18 years old and was out when I was 21 years old.
The regiment I was in was the 517th combat team. We were attached to the 17th airborne, the 101st airborne and the 82nd airborne divisions. While in Italy we were attache’ to the 7th Army in the Italian Campaign.
The average age of our entire combat regiment (including officers) was 19 years old. Anybody 30 years or older was the old man of the outfit.
Raymond C. Lafond
August 25, 2006