BY SPECIALIST (T/5) CORPORAL FREDERICK (RICK) CARRIER | I woke up at 5 a.m. and lay wide-awake thinking about where I was and smiled. I was in beautiful Andernach, Germany. I got up and went out on the terrace. I had a wide smile as I filled my lungs ten times with deep breaths of fresh air. The view, worth millions, made me happy. I felt like I was away from war, in Florida, on a paid vacation.
Enough of this shit. We’ve got a war to win here and I’ve a job right now helping to win it. The fast flowing Rhine River is like it has been for days — steady and at the same water level. I made notes. Had my morning coffee, hot black and strong.
I made my regular river elevation report to Jim, a friendly HQ engineer who liked to talk and brought me up to date on the Remagen Bridge. He said the steel patches welded over the bridge made it look like old boxers losing badly, all patched up in a wheel chair.
Staff Sgt. Ragsdale came in and said General Patton will soon be here floating his pontoons across. “By the way,” I asked, “how’s our Opel running? You get new tires?’’
“Yep. From our motor pool. Sgt. Smothers put them on in the night shift.” “That’s great, Rags. Let’s drive to Cologne and stock up on beer.’’
The highway to Cologne was jam-packed. Tanks, troops, refugees moseyed all along. In Cologne we found the brewery and bought two cases of beer and headed home before dark. Bad to drive at night in war zones.
HQ called. They said the Remagen Bridge had fallen and pontoon systems were put across and I was to keep sending reports and Ragsdale was to report back at Headquarters. We sat sunning ourselves on the terrace, told jokes, got loaded on beer and salted pretzels until we couldn’t stand and crashed.
A new sunny dawn and Rags left, and I straightened the crib, took river data, and radioed it to HQ. Went out on the terrace with my German Mauser sniper rifle with a Zeiss High Power Scope and spent the afternoon target shooting at floating river trash and scanning the eastern Rhine hilltops.
I spotted AA guns firing at P51 Mustangs overhead. No hits. That evening, wearing my 1911, 45, I took a beer and sat outside watching the endless march of people and war equipment slowly moving south into our captured territory.
One group got my attention. MPs guarded a section of desolate slow- moving Nazis, in tattered uniforms being hustled by cussing MPs. But the Red Cross woman tagging behind them carrying empty clanking canteens with both hands really caught my eye.
What happened next made me jump. The lead MP stopped the POWs and strolled over to me, made a casual salute, and asked, “Could I get my Red Cross Maiden’s canteens filled out of that water faucet?”
“Sure. Go ahead.”
He waved the Red Cross over. She quickly moved to the faucet and filled her canteens. The MP carried a Schmeisser machine pistol. I asked, “Is it OK for you MPs to carry a German weapon?”
“I’m a cop. No problem as long as it shoots.” He waved the Red Cross Maiden back. Smiling she winked, slowly passing. I felt a deep rustle in my groin.
That night drinking beer and listening to BBC I couldn’t shake the sight of that dynamite looking Red Cross Maiden. Suddenly my ears perked. I heard the distinctive whipping rustle of an 88 swooshing low overhead. Jumping up, I dashed out the front door. It was the blackest black war night outside.
I saw a bright light in a window across the street. Like starlight glowing in total blackness. Shit! That light is what AA gunners on the hill are shooting at. I had to put it out or an 88 could hit my ass. That hole in my roof was made by an 88.
I cussed at some asshole who left that light on, and how now I have to put the dammed light off before I get hit by an 88. Dashing inside I dressed for battle fast. Grabbing my special night flashlight, I hit the bricks and up the stairs of the shack across the street.
Taking no chances that no one was in the room, I became a snake and lied down in dust covering the floor and gently opened the door with the muzzle of my Thompson submachine gun.
WHAMMO!!! All breath gone. Red Cross Maiden stood, with legs wide apart, glaring down at me, spread out on the muddy floor. She had that same smile and wink, only this time instead of canteens her hands gripped the MP’s Schmeisser machine pistol with its muzzle pointing down at my head. Trembling I felt a pancake of soaking wet dust growing very big under my hips. Her voice was like a volcano erupting in my ears. “American soldier, I’m not a Red Cross Maiden, I’m RHINE MAIDEN.”
To be continued in the June 4 edition of Chelsea Now.
Among the first group of soldiers on Utah Beach, Normandy, U.S. Army Combat Engineer Rick Carrier marched through the European Theater of France, Belgium and Germany. While behind enemy lines in 1945 on a mission to obtain strategic supplies, he became the first allied soldier to discover Buchenwald concentration camp — then helped to liberate it, alongside Patton’s Third Army.
After the war, Carrier studied art at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. He co-authored 1955’s “Dive, The Complete Book of Skin Diving,” then was hired personally by Howard Hughes to design underwater rigging for one of the tycoon’s Hollywood publicity stunts. This past summer, the 90-year-old (a longtime member of Chelsea Community Church) was back in Normandy for a ceremony marking the 70th Anniversary of D-Day. In October, the President of France awarded Carrier the insignia of Chevalier of the Legion of Honor — France’s highest honor.
