PART 6 - FINAL CHAPTER.....

 

I was assigned as gunner to my armored car. Unfortunately, I did not know any of the crew.  They were all replacements and came on board while I was in the hospital.

The next day we crossed the Rhine River and headed east, destination Berlin. It was fighting advance all the way.  Fortunately, for several days we had the advantage of surprise on our side.  We captured the cities of Hamm, Dortmund, and Lippstadt.  At Patterborn, our division joined the 3rd Armored Division.  From there the 1st Army closed the pocket around the industrial Ruhr Valley, the home of the German military equipment manufacturing.  While on a screening mission, we were checking out a roadblock that was too close to the division line of advance.  This we had done all day.  The roadblocks were all unmanned but we found out too late that this one was defended.  The driver whipped the jeep around and we got out of there fast.  I was in the back seat on my knees firing my M-1 rifle at German soldiers manning the roadblock.

A bullet from either a rifle or machine gun struck the fore-end of my rifle in the gas cylinder area. The force of the bullet turned me over backward.  The next thing I knew I was flat on my back looking straight up.  My head was still in my steel helmet and was between the front seats and my feet were where my head had been.  I do not think I passed out immediately for I tried to turn my head but it would not move.  I could move my eyes around and see my feet and looking to the left I could see an army up against the wheel well box with a thumb hanging down.  I tried to move the thumb but it did not move.  Having decided that the thumb was not mine, I decided to try again to move the thumb.  Again no movement, but when I tried to move the fingers they did move, so I decided they belong do me.

In the meantime, I was choking on my own blood in my throat. Not being able to turn my head, I used my tongue too push it out of my mouth.  Not knowing I had a serious wound in the neck and shoulder, I had no pain.  I was practically paralyzed.

By this time, which could have t been move than two or three minutes, we were back with the company column. My favorite platoon medic who had patched me up after both of my previous wounds, said:  “What, not again?”

With that, he administered a shot of morphine. I was never conscious for long at any one time.  Apparently, I was kept heavily sedated because I have no recollection of any pain or discomfort.  Hen awake, I was alert, but wanted to sleep all the time.  My head would not turn, and I couldn’t raise my head.  My chin just sat on my chest and I could not swallow, so I was back to drooling.  It seemed I was always in a sitting position with a German medic sitting by my bed at all times.  I presume I had been living on IV because I remember when they tried to feed me mashed potatoes and gravy.  My prisoner of war medic tried to spoon into me but I could not swallow.  Eventually, some of it ran down my throat.  I do remember that we had an audience of doctors and nurses on hand.  A startling discovery was that I only weighed 16 pounds.  Normally I weighed 175 pounds.

Eventually I was evacuated to England to a general hospital and then by a hospital train to the port of Southampton. There was a troop transport that looked familiar.  As the hospital train backed on to the dock, I realized it was the S.S. Argentina, the same ship that took me to North Africa in 1942.  The ship docked at Newport News, VA, and I was back on American soil.  It had been 31 months since we sailed from New York.

Travelling by hospital train, we arrived in Louisville, KY, assigned to Nichols General Hospital. A temporary skin craft closed the wound on my left hand.  Later I was transferred to Newton D. Baker General Hospital, Martinsburg, W. VA, for additional skin graft surgery.  Surgery was successful, but Newton D. Baker was converted to a Veterans Hospital so another transfer was in order.  This time it was to Valley Forge Gene4ral Hospital, Pheonixville, PA.  There, repair work was completed and I was given many convalescent furloughs only reporting back to the hospital every 30 – 60 days for a checkup.  After it was decided that no additional surgery was required, I was discharged from the army March 18, 1947.

Mr. Perrine worked for the United States Post Office as a clerk and later as Postmaster in Mount Lake Park until his retirement 1979. Since that time he has been active in local town government.

 

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