Cannoncompany
De compagnie, die we uitbeelden is de Cannon company van het 110e Regiment onder leiding van Arthur G Guven (?) . De taak: de infanterie ondersteunen met artillerie. Dit betekent dat in een rustige frontpositie de artillerie altijd op kleine afstand achter de feitelijke frontlinie is gestationeerd.
Het front lag in november ‘42 ten oosten van Munshausen aan de Our. Het 110e infanterieregiment hield onder leiding van Fuller (Clervaux) een frontlinie van bijna 30 km bezet. Deze bestond niet uit een aaneengesloten front, maar uit versterkte posten, meestal gesitueerd om dorpjes.
Een van die dorpjes was Hosingen. De infanterie in dit dorp werd versterkt door de cannon company in Munshausen. Dagrapporten vermelden dat er iedere dag wel geschoten werd: zowel ’s morgens als ’s middags “harrassing fire”.
It will be probably another day as usual for the cannon company: fire a few rounds in the morning, then some in the afternoon, just to let the Germans know that falling asleep is not a good idea. Of course it’s thanksgiving, hopefully not any real trouble…
After breakfast commander Hubert Elliott goes down to HQ, to pick up the orders. The exact targets for today are shown to him on the map on the wall. No big deal this time!
Back to his men he marches them to the cannons. As they have to spit some fire the cannons have to be made ready first. There will be a lot of maintenance to do: the early winter was an unpleasant surprise! Of course they need ammo. A jeep and cart drive down to the armorers to get it. A motor orderly with extra orders from HQ. comes rushing in when they are at work: A patrolunit will be send out to search for Germans in the vicinity of Munshausen. Possibly they have to give supportive fire. They will keep contact by radio.
Time for coffee! They use a jeep to get some from the Luxemburg coffee van.
The rest of the morning and the afternoon they work hard : maintenance of the cannons and optimizing their position.
All of them want to go to lunch the decoration ceremony, but guard duty has to be done, so they make a schedule to take turns.
After lunch and the ceremony they continue their work, seems a quiet day after all. They look forward to the show! One of the men has a magazine with pictures of the singers. That’s going to be a show! Too bad that they have to make yet another schedule who’s on guard then…
A few men have problems with their garands. Could be the cold or the snow. Anyway they go down to the armorer to see what can be done. (13:50)