Veteram accounts from the 272nd

Reestablishment of the 272nd VGD at Döberitz - Action in the Eifel
By Otto Gunke.
We were able to push the enemy back and the resistance wasn't very stiff during the start of our attack. But then they increased their resistance and our attack broke down. We started to make a new line of defense during heavy enemy fire. Our companies had dug in on both sides of the road, uphill from Gey to Kleinhau and Hürtgen.
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Johann Reinecke Account of Kesternich
Suddenly we were surprised by a frightening noise. From the cellar a strange, complaining noise roars, alerting our tender nerves. Now it repeats itself more thinly. It is a cow. It is standing with us in the knee high water of the cellar, and it gawks at us asking for assistance. It is an emaciated skeleton. Heaven knows how it came to be in the cellar.
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The 272 Volksgrenadier Division In Action In The Eifel
By Gunther Schmidt
There was a lot of confusion in the street, horses reared, we heard screams from the men that were hit. Before we could think about what to do, the next round was falling into the moving column. I decided to go around the village on the left side through the fields, which wasn't difficult because of the clear night.
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Grenadier Arnulf Wöstmann, 1st Battalion, Gren.Rgt. 753, 326th VGD
At about 2 p.m, the German artillery fire fell for 30 minutes on the positions of the US soldiers in the village Kesternich, occupied by the GIs. Then came the order to attack: Sprung auf, marsch marsch and we ran into the artillery and machine gun fire of the US soldiers. The earth was light frozen, the fields and meadows on the eastern border of the village - and we ran against the US front line.
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