The 3.FD which had been holding the Moderscheid Mirfeld Amblève line apparently withdrew to the Heppenbach Valender area, a move that was reported by several POWs and civilians. The outposts left in the two towns were captured when our forces took advantage of the withdrawal and attacked, not from the southwest as the enemy expected, but from the northeast. The only enemy reaction to this operation was to move a force of about 50 or 60 personnel north from Heppenbach to Hepscheid, but if he had any idea of an attack it was discouraged by our intense artillery fire. During the next two days, Jan 26 and 27, as the Division attack halted, the enemy activities were confined to further work on his defenses and counter patrolling. On Jan 27, two of our outposts, one about 1000 meters west of Heppenbach and the other on Hill 625 (939008) were pushed back by stronger enemy forces but the latter outpost was retaken after a heavy artillery concentration had driven off the enemy. On Jan 28, however, Hepscheid, Heppenbach, and Valender were cleared of the enemy, and our troops, taking advantage of the enemy’s disorganization, pushed rapidly up the Hepscheid Honsfeld road to Hill 620, about 1500 meters west of Honsfeld. This move apparently caused the enemy to believe his troops in the Reigelsbuch were being encircled; at any rate, the enemy in the area pulled back to the Honsefld area, and when the woods were taken by our forces, only a few stragglers remained.
A total of 257 prisoners were taken during the day’s operation. Hepscheid was held by the remnants of the 1055.Regiment and elements of the 5.FR; the rest of this Regiment held Heppenbach. In both areas, the enemy had taken advantage of the hiatus in the Division’s attack, and well-constructed fortifications were encountered. The flanking position to the north in the Reigelsbuch was held less firmly by the 2/1056.Regiment and a strong position in the patch of woods about 1000 meters west of Heppenbach were out posted by a force of about 40 men from the 8.FR under a Lt Sprenger. In spite of these precautions, however, the fighting in Hepscheid was over as soon as our tanks penetrated the town. Fighting in Heppenbach was more severe; our tanks got stuck in the snow and the initial assault was by infantry alone.
With the taking of Heppenbach, our troops moved along the road to Honsfeld, encountering small resistance, but eventually clearing the enemy as far as Hill 620. Kampfgruppe Sprenger was eliminated when our tanks were able to advance far enough to bring the woods under direct fire. It appeared that the 2/1056.Regiment had pulled back to Honsfeld and was holding the town. To the north, Büllingen, the base of the attack of the 12.SS-Panzer-Division in December, was finally cleared of the enemy after stubborn fighting in the southern and western parts on Jan 29. The town was held by the 3/1056.Regiment, from which more than 200 prisoners were taken. Prisoners said they had no warning of the attack until it had actually closed in, but in spite of this surprise, the elements in the outskirts put up a stiff fight before the added support of our tanks discouraged them. Whatever was left of the 3/1056.Regiment pulled out toward Mürringen. Along the rest of the Division front, the enemy was inactive.
Withdrawal to the Siegfried Line
Mürringen Hünningen and Honsfeld, the last enemy-held towns in front of the German border fell to the 1-ID on Jan 30 after moderate fighting which netted nearly 350 prisoners. The attrition which the enemy had been suffering since the start of the Division attack on Jan 15 was noticeable in his defense of the towns; although he had excellent defensive terrain around the villages, he was unable to round up enough men to defend them to their full capabilities. In Mürringen, were elements of the 1/991.Regiment (277.Div), and also elements of the 1056.Regiment. What was left of the 5.FR (combined under a Kampfgruppe Noeth) defended Honsfeld while Hünningen was held by the discouraged remnants of the 2/1056.Regiment and about 80 men from the 89.Fusilier-Bn. Coordination between the various defending forces was not complete, and the Division attacked with such force and speed that Honsfeld was taken shortly after 0300, Jan 30.
The attack against Hünningen got underway at 0800 under bitter resistance at first, but as the enemy began to withdraw an hour later, he was taken under effective mortar and artillery fire. Coincidentally the attack against Mürringen proceeded with our troops moving in from the east and northeast. The enemy was taken by surprise and by dark our forces had outposts on the high ground well to the east of the town. It was apparent that the enemy had withdrawn a considerable distance to the east. Above the resistance of the enemy, however, was the continued heavy snow and rough going which hampered the Division’s movement. In spite of this obstacle, the Division continued its push to the east, and enemy screening forces were pushed back from the approaches to the high ground northeast of the Holzwache River on Jan 31. The only severe fighting during the day developed around the crossroad (005052), which was eventually taken. The fighting during January marked the grand deflation of the enemy’s ambitious plan of Dec 16, 1944.
At the beginning of the month, though his drive to the east had been bent, he had the intention of holding what he had with infantry divisions, while he regrouped his panzers. At the end of the month, he had been forced to give up even this compromise measure; the divisions which he had left to hold his salient were sacrificed, and his whole attention was devoted to pulling out everything not urgently needed for the comparative safety of the Siegfried Line. The effects of this policy were seen on the Division front. The 3.FD and the 89.VGD, attacked, mauled, and cut to pieces, were not relieved, nor were they reinforced beyond a trickle from Holland. The effect of the Russian advances in the east on the enemy’s policy in the west cannot, of course, be assayed, but it unquestionably forced major changes in the plan of holding west of the Siegfried Line. Prisoners taken by the Division after the Russian offensive had got underway indicated the official German information still controlled the reports from the east, but that grapevine rumor had given the prisoners a fairly accurate knowledge of events. The general attitude in the cage was ‘Why not let the Americans advance? Our real enemies are the Russians’.
In spite of this dispiritedness which was evident in some cases, the enemy put up a bitter, exhausting fight for the ground that he held. At no point did he retreat without pressure, no matter whether he held good or poor defensive terrain. The higher enemy policy of selling every foot of space for a time was evident in the month’s operations, and during the first days of the attack, the enemy had considerable success with his plan, although at shattering cost in personnel and equipment. His losses were indeed severe. By Jan 31, the 3.FD, in its original form, was virtually non-existent outside of scattered battle groups. The same was true of the 89.VGD, and the dissolution of the 277.VGD was in progress. One element which aided the enemy in his delaying defense (though it operated against him by increasing his losses) was the bitter weather. Terrain which would have been a minor problem in supply and evacuation during the summer presented almost insoluble problems under a two-foot cover of snow. The progress of the infantrymen through this obstacle was painfully slow. Points had to be changed every 75 to 100 yards. Machine gunners and mortarmen were barely able to move at all.
Moreover, the temperature added weight to the difficulties. Frostbite and freezing were common. Radio mouthpieces froze; signal wire froze and broke. Laying wire at all was extremely difficult and repairing a break almost impossible. A wire crew from the 16th Infantry worked for six hours to locate a break in 1000 meters of wire buried under four feet of snow. Evacuation of the wounded was equally serious when only a Weasel was able to cover the ground. Mines were very hard to locate, and in one case an invaluable Weasel was Destroyed traveling over a cleared road; the snow had been packed down just enough by the traffic to allow the weight of the vehicle to detonate the mine. Since most of the terrain covered by the Division in its advance was open ground, there were no villages or houses to shelter the troops. Many of the advanced companies spent two or three successive days with no more shelter than they could dig for themselves in the frozen ground. Altogether the month’s operations were as difficult as any in the Division’s campaigns.
