Dawn brought no relief from the cold that caused each and every paratrooper in Company A to shiver, as much from what he knew what was coming as from the cold. Those who could not resist doing so peered over the lip of his foxhole and out across the small clearing toward a tree line not more than fifty yards off that was occupied by the enemy. All night they’d listened as the sound of Germans tanks and halftracks carefully picked their way forward, settling into positions from which they would jump off once the dark leaden grey sky had lightened enough to allow them to launch another attack.

This attack would be heralded as all the others had been by a short but vicious barrage, one the soldiers feared as much as the prospect of facing German tanks, for the enemy shells often detonate long before they reached the ground. These tree bursts were proving far more deadly than the shellings the paratroopers had endured during previous campaigns, for instead of throwing off razor sharp shrapnel in a fan like patter along the ground, the incoming rounds went off high among the trees. The splintered remains of shattered trees were proving to be just as deadly as the chucks of metal that rained down on the hapless paratroopers, tearing at unexposed flesh and bone with all the cold efficiency of a butcher’s cleaver.

Within the confined of the foxhole he’d scrapped out with the help of another medic, Jerald Webb didn’t bother looking across the snow covered field. He was too busy inventorying the merger contents of his aid bag. This didn’t take long, for he’d received no resupply since they’d left Camp Mourmelon in France and headed north into Belgium. Even when he added what he had found in his fellow medic’s aid bag with his after his friend had been struck down in midstride by a stich of machinegun fire while responding to a pitiful cry for help, Webb knew if the attack they were all bracing for was as vicious as the last one, he’d not have enough to help those who would need his attention.

Having done all he could to prepare himself for the coming ordeal, Webb closed up his bag, slung it over his shoulder and eased back against the frozen wall of his foxhole, looking up as he did so at a tangle of tree branches high above him, wondering as he did so what kind of odds he would have of being able to crawl out of his hole if a German shell just happened to go off in their midst. In an effort to keep himself from dwelling on this, Webb pulled a glove stained with the blood of other men off his right hand by clamping down on the tip of the glove’s middle finger with his teeth and pulling his hand out. With his free hand he grasped the glove and tucked it away in a pocket of his field jacket least he lose it.

Bringing his right hand up to his mouth, he blew on fingers that were already growing numb from the bitter cold in a vain effort to warm it. Then, ever so carefully, he reached into his field jacket and fished about until his fingers lit upon the right breast pocket of his fatigue shirt. When he found what he was looking for, he grasped a corner a plastic pouch and pulled it out of his pocket.

Like a child unwrapping the most precious and wonderful Christmas gift he’d ever been given, Webb pealed away the edges of the plastic wrapping he used to protect a photo he’d carried with him into Normandy and throughout the campaign in Holland. Cupping the photo in his hands, he looked down at the image of a young woman wearing an innocent little smile who was shyly returning his gaze.

As it had always done in the past, the memory of the day on which the photo had taken succeeded in taking Jerald Webb back to a time and place that was, for him, filled with nothing but happiness. The hope that he might one day be able to set aside all that he had seen and been trough since that day and once more recapture the beauty of that moment was the only thing that kept him going, enduring the horrors that filled his days and haunted him as he slept.

“You never have told me who she is,” a voice called out, catapulting Webb back to the grim reality of the snow filled Belgium wood.

Craning his head around, Webb saw the company first sergeant crouching down on the edge of his foxhole behind him. Fumbling about like a child who’d been caught by a parent looking at dirty postcards, Webb flipped the photo over in his hand before rewrapping it in the plastic he used to protect it.

“Is she your sister?” the first sergeant asked as he watched the young medic go about returning the photo to his breast pocket, the one closest to his heart.

“No,” was all Webb muttered as he went about pulling the glove he’d stuffed in his pocket out and slipping his right hand into it without bothering to look back over his shoulder at the first sergeant least that man see the blush rising in his cheeks.

“Well if she’s not, whoever she is I expect she will make some man very happy one day,” the first sergeant replied as he slowly rose to his feet.

“She already has,” Webb whispered to himself as he recalled the day his friend had taken the photo for him.

Deciding it would be best not to press the medic on the matter, the first sergeant turned his attention to the reason he’d stopped by Webb’s hole. “I expect you’re going to have one hell of a day,” he opined as he took to scanning once peaceful woods already brutally scared by war. “I hope you’re ready.”

“I am,” Webb replied softly as he patted the spot on his field jacket covering his photo.

"I'll Be Home for Christmas" is a Christmas song recorded in 1943 by Bing Crosby who scored a top ten hit with the song. "I'll Be Home for Christmas" has since gone on to become a Christmas standard.

The song is sung from the point of view of an overseas soldier during WWII, writing a letter to his family. In the message, he tells the family that he will be coming home, and to prepare the holiday for him including requests for "snow", "mistletoe", and "presents on the tree". The song ends on a melancholy note, with the soldier saying "I'll be home for Christmas, if only in my dreams."

On 16 December 1944 the Germans launched a major attack on American forces defending a stretch of the front in the Ardennes Forest. In what would become known as the Battle of the Bulge, 610,00 Americans would participate in the bloodiest battle fought by the United States in World War II, resulting in 19,000 dead and 70,000 wounded. The 101st Airborne Division, pulled form a reserve position, would be surrounded in Bastogne, Belgium from 20 December until 27 December. Of the 11,000 men of the division who went into the fight, more than 2,000 became casualties during those eight days.

Though I did not participate in this battle, there was a photo I carried with me during the Gulf War in 1991. Those who have been there like my fictional character and I will understand.

Nancy Cole
a.k.a. HW Coyle