The 3d platoon got into a burned-out building and set up a CP. Over the radio came a message, “Friendly armor on the right.”
As Lieutenant Shames and Sergeant Alley got that message, they heard tanks outside the building. Anxious to get the show on the road, Alley told Shames he was going to link up with those tanks. Shames decided to join him. They moved by several burned-out buildings and rounded a corner into the main road. Up ahead, between two buildings, partway out, was the tank they sought.
Alley moved up to the side of the tank. The tank commander was standing in the turret looking the other way, so Alley shouted to him over the roar of the engine to “Come this way.” The tank commander turned, and Alley realized he had mistaken a German tank for an American. The German swore, dropped into his tank, and began traversing the turret toward Alley and Shames.
They said not a word to each other. They took off so fast they were kicking snow in the German’s face. The tank followed. The Americans ran around a corner. Shames saw an open window and dived in head first. Alley ran 3 meters or so past him and jumped into a doorway with his rifle ready for the infantry he was sure would be with the German tank.
The tank turned the corner and drove right past Shames and Alley. It came to the palace where 2d platoon was clearing out buildings, near the burned out Shermans. Lipton and his men dived under the Shermans or ducked behind walls for protection. The German tank stopped and, swiveling its turret, put a shell into each one of the knocked-out Shermans to prevent anyone from using their guns to put a shell into his tank as he drove past. Lipton recalled, “When those shells hit the Shermans, it felt to us under them that they jumped a foot in the air.”
The tank roared out of town, headed north toward safety. A P-47 fighter plane spotted it, strafed it, and dropped a bomb on it, destroying the tank.
Alley went to look for Shames. He heard moaning and cries for help. When he got to the window Shames had dived through, he looked and burst into laughter. He saw his lieutenant tangled up in bedsteads, springs, and furniture in a basement Shames had not realized was there.
Source:
Ambrose, Stephen Edward. “Attack.” Band of Brothers: E Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne from Normandy to Hitler's Eagle's Nest. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2004. 217. Print.
Further Reading:
First Lieutenant Clifford Carwood Lipton
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