PVT Emmert Parmley, a 101st Screaming Eagle

Going on a patrol was still a risky affair while the 101st Screaming Eagles of Fox Company, 502nd PIR, were deployed at the Island in October and November 1944. The fact that PVT Emmert Parmley did not volunteer to go on any patrol was understandable, reading his after action report on how dangerous going on combat patrols could be. 

Featured image: PVT Emmert Parmley, a 101st Screaming Eagle of Fox Company, 502nd PIR (Courtesy of Mark Bando).

A dangerous mission 

“Our mission was to cross the German lines, observe their strength, the type of troops in front of us, and to find out all we could about them. The plan was to lay a barrage on their frontlines at midnight. To cross no man’s land under this barrage, get as close as possible to their lines, then wait for the second barrage which would lift 100 yards in front of us. When the second barrage came, we would run across their lines into small trees, which was actually their frontline. There we would get good positions to observe, for after the second barrage we would send up the flares which would light up everything like daylight.”

The plan fails 

“All went as planned. The first barrage was on time and target. We got almost to their lines. We waited for a second barrage. We heard it coming. We got up, made for their lines but the first shell was in the same place [as the ones of the first barrage]. We thought it was a short round for there is always a short round it seems in a shelling, but they were all short. The barrage did not raise 100 yards in front of us as it was supposed to. We could not make it across their lines and were lying in a field in front of their positions no more than 15 – 20 yards away. Then up went the flares. I knew we were dangerously close to their lines as I saw the glow of a cigarette a German soldier was smoking just moments before the first flare.”

A safe return 

“I then heard a cough or someone clearing their throat and all I could imagine was a German taking a bead on me. I will never know why the four of us were not spotted as the flares lit up the field like daytime. None of us moved. Our only chance was to lay still with the hope the flares would soon cease, which they did. Our officers and men awaiting our return were relieved to see all four of us make it back okay. They were afraid the second barrage had gotten us.”

All’s well that ends well with the safe return of the four F/502,101st Screaming Eagles.