Charles Hagan, Theriot:

*picks up on story of battle at St. Lo*

-Hagan went up to the CP and captain at the jeeps the next day to see when they wanted him to cut hair
-Was told once the bombing was over they had marching orders so when dinner was ready he could do it before they leave
-Hagan then went back to his tent by his foxhole to wait and bombs started being dropped and the ground started shaking so he dove into his foxhole
-It was a formation of B-26s with 100 lbs. anti-personnel bombs

-When he came out he heard problems happening all over
-A guy near a halftrack that had been shaving had a bomb dropped 27 ft. from behind him and he ended up in coma later
-People were trying to help others from bleeding out; a radio operator was walking around without an arm and Hagan gave him first aid before sending him to a field hospital
-The captain by the jeep had both legs blown off, one eye was gone and other hanging out but somehow he was still alive and was talking to them, “that shook me up pretty good. That stayed with me for years. If he had been dead, it wouldn’t have been so bad.”

-Once the injured were taken care of and sent away on ambulance, another B-26 formation was seen coming
-So Hagan began looking for a foxhole and leaped into one of the deep German foxholes
-About broke his neck going in head first and then rolling onto his back and cut his nose and leg on a piece of shrapnel—left a scar

(9:55) trying to figure out dates and places where Hagan landed in an invasion; maybe Omaha Beach?
-Then went on to St. Lo that had bad causalities in A and C batteries so both were combined together
-Assigned to the 2nd Armored Division when General Patton went into Brittany and then Failaise
-Attacked at the town Mortain and the Germans were trying to cut them off as the Americans were trying to contain the Germans
-After each battle the British and Americans was gather their dead but the Germans didn’t so when trying to drive on the roads the Allies had to run over the bodies
-If they tried to dodge they might’ve hit a land mine off the road; the stench was terrible and any chance they could they’d try and wash off the halftracks

-Eventually made into Holland after France and Belgium; they were at the Siegfried Line and took part in that siege at Aachen; ordered not to retreat
-Had a group of combat engineers with bazookas so they made booby-traps to take out the German tanks; were given the presidential citation award for their actions
-Made it to Luxembourg when it was Thanksgiving; had a nice party

(21:34) Battle of the Bulge
-Still at Luxembourg when the battle of the Bulge broke out; their division was near the town on Malmady (the Malmady Massacre)
-The 1st Platoon Hagan was in was sent inside the town to stop tanks but were very ill equipped and thankfully never saw any Germans

-One night when it was snowing the Germans were sending down paratroops to booby-trap roads and change post signs to confuse the Allies
-Hagan’s platoon was the last coming out and had the last group with a M-16 and it’s snowing and they had a problem with their fuel line that was dry rotted
-They had to pull into a small town to try and fix the line; was snowing so bad they couldn’t tell when they pulled in that the town was German occupied
-The Germans opened fired on them—somehow made it out

-Was making their way back to Luxembourg to head over to Bastogne to where Patton was at; they were coming to relieve the 101st that were trapped
-Explains their battle tactics and what their guns were able to do
-Went in behind CCA and CCR and the infantry when pushing into Bastogne
-Once the invasion was over Hagan and his outfit was shipped out to Nancy France with the 8th Armored Division

(32:02) Speaking French in France
-Came up into a village that was covered in snow and ice but it wasn’t on the front so the villagers let the men sleep in their homes
-Only knew a little bit of French but enough to get by

-The CP asked Hagan to buy a goose off one of the famers so Hagan when asking realized he had no idea how to say “goose” in French
-The lady had chickens and geese so he couldn’t just say “white bird” or he might have ended up with a chicken (too small)
-So Hagan told her “I want to buy one of those big white birds” and the lady was a bit taken back but he still got a goose
-The Parisian French people were more educated, spoke faster, and used different words than the French words Hagan knew and rural people of France (i.e. airplane)

-Followed the 8th Armored Division into Remagen; goes into a story of when he first met the 8th Armored at Camp Polk
-Their halftrack would conk out on them the whole way there; it was snowing once when the halftrack stopped and they were under fire, had to hide in ditches under the snow
-Eventually made it to their station by a bridge to shoot down anti-aircrafts; stay there about a week

(44:57) Got in trouble at Remagen
-The bridge collapsed after 3 days so they moved upstream to another bridge
-Told to shoot at anything that came down the river or over the bridge—red alert

-They had to have 3 men manning the guns 24/7 in groups of 5 so only 2 got a rest until taking their places
-10 PM one night a jeep driver came up and told Hagan that the captain wanted Hagan to cut his hair
-Told the man he couldn’t leave unless someone could take his place since they were under a red alert
-The driver came back and told Hagan there was no one available to take his place but the captain has now made it an order to come and cut his hair
-So Hagan retorted that the tools he has come from his civilian life and the army did not pay to furnish him or to maintain them
-He had to send them back to the states for his wife to sharpen them when he could
-So unless the captain can maintain and furnish Hagan’s tools then he’s not leaving to cut hair—his tools are going to stay in his halftrack until then
-So the driver and a couple of guards came back and arrested him under court marshal for insubordination
-Locked Hagan up and was guarded 24/7—ironically his guard changed every 2 hours but apparently none could have come and took his place when asked for a haircut the first time

A 2nd Lieutenant in Hagan’s section found out what happened and went to the office of the captain and got in his face for one
-Going over the Lt.’s head with orders for one of his men and secondly, knowing full well that taking a man and not replacing him from red alert jeopardized the mission and the crew
-Then the Lt. threatened to put a court marshal for this captain unless they let Hagan go by 5 PM that night
-After that if anyone wanted/needed a haircut then they had to ask this 2nd Lt. if Hagan was available

(50:10) D-Day
-Hagan’s A Battery was part of the same squad that had the Sergeant Hyman Haas that is credited for knocking out enemy pillboxes on Omaha Beach; sections M-16 and M-17
-Landed that morning between 7:30 and 8 AM; Ernie Pyle interviewed all the men on that halftrack after the battle to release the story; one guy was from New Orleans

-After the war, Hagan went to a few reunions and ran into D Battery twice; Haas (from New York) came to the first one and he and Hagan still write to each other
-They worked together to get a plaque of their names placed on that pillbox but they couldn’t called a battery as the war monument commission only recognized battalions or higher so they’re called the “A Battalion” on the plaque

-Haas had to get all of his actions verified and the war department had to go through the history to document what was done
-Their reports showed that Hagan’s outfit landed at 9 AM (tapes cuts off story continues in TH1-053)

Transcription Begins:

His command jeep and trailer was parked alongside of a hedgerow that ran parallel with the road. There was a halftrack with radio equipment parked right next to him. So at about 11:00 a.m., I went to talk to him to see if he wanted me to give him hair cut. He was sitting on the ground with his back up against the jeep trailer. He had a bunch of maps and everything with him. And he looked at him watch and said, “Well, after this bombing is over, we gonna have marching orders. We’ll have an early chow so let’s wait until then.” So I walked back to my pup tent, which was 150 feet at the most. I got in my tent and pulled out a tablet from my field pack. I was getting ready to write a letter when I heard these bombs coming down. So I dove into my foxhole. These B-26’s were dropping 100-pound anti-personnel bombs. After the formation passed, I heard problems coming from the captain’s jeep, where I had just come from. The driver of the halftrack had been sitting down by the door and shaving when I walked over to my pup tent. An anti-personnel bomb landed approximately 27 feet from where he was shaving. When I got to him, there was crowd around him trying to help him. They were ripping up shirts and everything to try to stop the bleeding. Blood was everywhere. They were telling me different things to get inside of the halftrack to help him. By that time, they had another guy who came walking up with his arm all tore to hell. So I grabbed him and I grabbed a shirt, tore off the sleeve and put a tunicate around his arm. This jeep came driving by and I stopped him. He said there was a field hospital near by, so I said take him and send some ambulances because we got a few people down. But in the meantime, nobody was tending to the captain. You could see that his vehicle was down. So I said, “What about the captain?” They said, “Don’t worry about him, he done had it.” That’s the remark that I remember. When the ambulance came, I walked over to his jeep and he was messed up pretty good. He had no legs; they were all tore to hell. He had a hipbone that sticking out about a foot. He started talking and saying, “Get off my legs! Somebody is on my legs!” But he had no legs. He said, “I want to see my legs.” But he had no legs, and hardly had any face. His eyes were gone and hanging out. That shuck me up pretty good. That stayed with me for years. If he had been dead, it wouldn’t have been so bad.

A funny part of this story was after the ambulance left; here comes another formation of B-26’s. So I start looking for a foxhole. All of those foxholes were deep. I didn’t want to take off running like a coward, but I was walking as fast as most people could run. I heard those bombs coming down and I made one leap into that foxhole, head first. It was only a few feet deep. Man I like about broke my neck. I went over backwards, I was upside down. I had my face in the mud. When I got strait, I had blood coming out of my nose. I caught a piece of shrapnel. I think it tore my pants and cut my leg. It landed in the foxhole with me—a souvenir!

We were then assigned to the 2nd Armored Division after the breakout. Soon after St. Lo, Gen. Patton drove onto Brittany and then to Failaise. But before that, the Germans attacked at a town called Mortain; they were trying to cut off the two peninsulas. They had us in that area of Mortain. We were trying to contain them. It was a seesaw battle. During the battle, we would pull out our dead and wounded, but the Germans didn’t. After the battle, we drove on through that area and we were told to keep on the road. That time of the year it was hot, and there were a lot of dead bodies everywhere and they were blown up and everything. It was terrible. You had to run off of the road to dodge some of them. So you had to just run over and that stench stayed with you. We’d try to find a puddle of mud or water to try to wash off our halftracks.

We followed the 2nd Armored Division all the way to the Seigfried Line and into Holland. We hit the Germans in Aachen and we took part in the siege. We were with a group of combat engineers; they had bazookas. We would booby-trap the Germans and take out their tanks. The Germans were trying to get through with every thing they had. Our unit and that engineer bazooka team got the presidential citation award for action in Aachen.

We went to Luxembourg for Thanksgiving and then came the Battle of the Bulge. We were near Malmady during that time. We were attached to Patton’s 4th Armored Division and drove in support of them to relieve Bastogne. After the siege, we stayed in Bastogne for a few days before heading back to France.

I spoke a little French, so one day they asked to go to this farmhouse near Nancy to buy a goose. I went up there, but I couldn’t think of how in the hell to say “goose” in French. So I went over there and this old women came to door and these geese were big and white, there were chickens too. I couldn’t think of how in the hell to say goose, so when she opened the door I said, “I want to buy one of those big white birds.” So I could get by with my French.

We were with the 8th Armored Division. Before we went overseas, the 8th Armored used to be camp out at Fort Polk. And there weren’t too many soldiers around New Iberia, and these guys would come to here on three-day passes. Our people in this town had sons stationed all over the place, but they didn’t have any stationed close by. So when the town’s people saw somebody who was a soldier, they would treat them like their own son; they’d invite him to their homes to have lunch and they’d treat him to crawfish.

One day when I came back from guard duty on the gun, they told me that there were some people in 8th Armored heard that I was from Louisiana and they wanted to see me. So I walked in there and all these guys are standing around this stove and they said, “Are you the guy from Louisiana.” I said, “Yes.” They said, “What part?” I said, “New Iberia.” They hollered, “Oh! That’s God’s country!”

We followed the 8th Armored into Remagen. We set up our AAA guns to defend that bridge for a week. We shot at everything that flew over and everything that floated down that river. That’s when I got in a little trouble. We were on red alert, and when you are on red alert you need three men on the gun 24-hours a day. We had five men total, so that left only two men to relieve the other three. Well this driver came to me and said that the captain what me to give him a haircut. I asked him if he had somebody to take my place, and he said no. So I told him to go back and tell the captain to send somebody to take my place and I’ll give him a haircut. I said, “We’re on red alert and I can’t just leave.” So he goes back and said that the captain said that there was nobody available. I said, “Tell him when they get somebody available then I’ll come see him.” So he goes back and then comes tell me that the captain said it was an order. So I told to tell the captain that those tools on the back of that halftrack are tools that I bought in civilian life, the Army didn’t furnish them. And when I need to have them sharpened, I have to use my own money to send them back to the States to have my wife sharpen them and send them back to me. So you tell the captain that when the Army is going to furnish the tools and maintain then, then he can give me an order to cut his hair. But other than that, until he sends somebody to take place, my tools are going to stay in the back of that halftrack. So he came back with a couple of guards and they said, “Sorry Hagan, we’ve got to take you in. Your under arrest.” So I come in and I had to report to this captain. First thing that he wanted to know was, did I bring my tools. I told him no. Man he had me down for court marshal, insubordination and I don’t know what else. So they put me in this room and me under guard all day. So this 2nd Lieutenant who was in our unit was a good guy and he found out what had happen. So he went to this captain and got in his face and said that he had taken a man off of a section that he was in charge of and went over his head with him knowing anything about it that could have jeopardized the mission as well as the crew itself. The Lieutenant said if there is going to be a court marshal, he was going to go after bars, not PFC stripes. He said that I had better be back on that jeep by 5:00 that night. Sure enough, I was let out and back on my jeep. From then on, every time somebody wanted a haircut, they would have to talk to him first. Then he’d call me on the radio and said, “Hagan, you feel like cutting some hair today.” If I said yes, then he'd send a man to take my place. If I said no, then he would say that I was not available.

We had two reunions with D Battery. Haas only came to the first one. But he and I continued to correspond. And I can’t remember if suggested the idea to me or not, but since I was the secretary of the battery, I brought up the idea at a reunion about having an plaque placed on the pillbox with our name on it. Those who were in attendance agreed that we should do it. So that’s when I started working on it and we had to fund it ourselves. I wrote the proclamation and send letters to all the members. I was on the committee to collect the funds. Haas, who had knocked out the gun, laid the groundwork by going through the war department to see whether we could get it done through the war monuments commission. We were trying to get it done as a battery, but the War Monuments Commission doesn’t recognize anything less than a battalion for a plaque. So we had to go with the battalion.