[The following takes place as the American E Company is nearing Bastogne, where the fighting there would be part of the greater Battle of the Bulge, a massive German counterattack.]
The columns marched on both sides of the road, toward the front; down the middle of the road came the defeated American troops, fleeing the front in disarray, moblike. Many had thrown away their rifles, their coats, all encumbrances. Some were in a panic, staggering, exhausted, shouting, “Run! Run! They’ll murder you! They’ll kill you! They’ve got everything, tanks, machine-guns, air power, everything!”
”They were just babbling,” Winters recalled. “It was pathetic. We felt ashamed.”
Source:
Ambrose, Stephen Edward. “Resting, Recovering, and Refitting.” Band of Brothers: E Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne from Normandy to Hitler's Eagle's Nest. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2004. 176. Print.
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