Interview with Bill Christensen Residence: Salt Lake City, Utah Home Town: Salt Lake City, Utah Service / Duty: Army 10th Mountain Division Apennine Mountains, Italy Rank: Staff Sergeant

THIS INTERVIEW IS NOT EDITED FOR CONTENT, LANGUAGE OR HISTORICAL ACCURACY

Rick: Can you tell us about your early life and up until the time you joined the 10th Mountain Division or joined the Army?

Bill: Well my parents lived on 9th Avenue and "C" Street right between "B" and "C" when I was younger, which was just above LDS Hospital. So as a youth I used to go up on the slopes there just above the Veteran's hospital and ski down on little short boards, I was probably six or seven years old. The skis were short enough and you just kept them on with a rubber band, a big thick one, and all you could do was come straight down the hill. That was my first experience skiing so I've been skiing a long time. We used to go down the streets also on sleighs up in the avenues, there was very little traffic in those days so we'd get on 9th Avenue and go all the way down to 1st Avenue on a sleigh - just zipping down the street!

They used to block off some of those streets didn't they? I remember 7th South used to be a designated sleigh-riding hill when I was young.

Yes, that was fun as a youth to do some of those things.

You graduated from East High School?

No I went to South High and I graduated in 1944 on a Friday night and had a call from the US Army (Uncle Sam) on Saturday morning, so I went in the service.

One day after you graduated from high school?

Yes, the next morning. So I was just barely turning 19 at the time.

Were most kids anxious to go in? Of course, you knew there was a big war on, what were your thoughts?

Well I knew that I would be in the service for sometime and I got that call actually several months before I even graduated. They let me graduate from high school and then go in the service from there. So we went into Fort Douglas and I was probably one of the younger ones, because at that time they were drafting people in their

Where did you go?

I was at Camp Walters, Texas, and that was a 15-week training. At that time just before we was completing training, why I saw a bulletin on the board which said, "We're looking for volunteers that have had any mountain experience or skiing experience to join the 10th Mountain Division." So I wrote a letter to the address and a few days later a reply come back, "we're going to accept you." Right after that I was on furlough so after that furlough I then joined the 10th Mountain Division rather than being assigned someplace else (probably the Pacific) so I was pleased with that. At that time, the 10th Mountain Division had trained at Camp Hale Colorado during the winter months and I joined them about September of '44. And at that time they were training with mules in Texas, just out of Camp Swift Texas and so we went out and trained with mules and such.

Just pack animals?

Just pack animals.

For mountain trails or whatever?

Yes.

How long were you at Camp Hale?

The 10th Mountain Division were at Camp Hale for about two years and it was unique because the army had never done anything with mountain warfare before and so a lot of those troops had never been on skis before, I mean you ask how many were experienced skiers and a lot of them had never been on a pair of skis.

So they needed to learn the basics?

They did, and of course in those days they just had rope tows, no fancy lifts like they have today. But it was all about learning to live in the cold and snow, they had a bivouac where they would just go out and spend several days in little white pup tents and cook their meals and everything right there. So it was a good experience for a lot of them.

How long were you in that Texas training center working with mules?

We were there until December of '44 and then we received orders to go to Virginia and from there to Italy.

So you went over directly from [Bill: Camp Swift] to Italy.

Yes and at the time we went on the USS America, which was their finest cruiser at the time. But they had stripped all of the fancy things out of it and put bunks six or eight high so there were about 5,000 of us on that ship.

No hammocks, just bunks huh?

Just bunks.

Which was the best position, the top or the bottom?

I preferred the bottom. With that many men on board…why they had chow lines that were a couple of blocks long! It just wound around the decks until they got to the kitchen. I've never been seasick and some of them were sick although it was a fairly quiet cruise, it wasn't rough at all. The ship sailed all by itself whereas many ships during that time had escorts but because of the speed of this particular ship why they figured that they could make it on its own without any real problem. So we arrived at Naples, Italy and it was about a six or seven day voyage.

Were all the men on that ship of the 10th Mountain Division?

Yes.

So that was about half of the whole division.

That's right about half of that division was on that one ship. From Naples we got into boxcars and traveled north and went through Rome and up through that part of Italy. It took us a couple of days I guess to do that.

How many men to a boxcar?

25-30.

So you could sit down?

Yes, but it was wintertime, it was December so there was no heat or anything but it wasn't too bad it wasn't like some of the movies you see with the German's treating them poorly. But we camped at Pisa where the leaning tower of Pisa is and they had a large area there which accommodated most of the division so it was just kind of a base camp. And from there we spent 10 days or two weeks something like that, then from there we went right into the Appenini's and bivouacked for sometime. They were just getting the idea or getting information as to where the Germans were located and where they were heavily fortified and just making plans for the battle.

While you were in the Appenini I guess you had a base camp there?

We had just a base camp where we…in order to keep busy we went out and had five mile marches everyday or so and we slept right in the snow in little pup tents. I was different from a lot of the mountain men, a lot of them had sleeping bags but I had two blankets and no sleeping bag. I slept on the snow for probably two weeks.

Were you outfitted with winter clothing and boots and gloves?

That was the interesting thing about the Army, we had the latest winter equipment when we were in Colorado and they took it all away from us and gave us just the regular brown khaki pants and an overcoat but no down jackets, no down sleeping bag, nothing like that. So that was the way we went in.

Well sleeping in the snow with two blankets [Bill: Pretty cruel] it had to be pretty cold at night?

Fortunately there were some farms nearby that had straw stacks, so we got straw and made it about a foot deep and was able to survive that way.

What happened after this?

From there we got in trucks and were taken right into the front lines. By truck we went as near as we could to the positions and then I remember walking several miles over a snow packed road and we had packs on that weighed 50 to 60 pounds and if you lost your balance just a little bit that pack would just flip you right over because you'd lose your footing.

Where were your skis, did you have skis with you?

No, we had no skis with us. They had some equipment on some of the trucks. I was only on skis twice.

During your entire tour of duty? Well tell us about going into the front lines and some of your combat experiences.

The first part of the Appenini was rather interesting because when the war started, we fought against Italy. And as the war progressed, they joined us to fight the Germans and so being in this area where there were some farms in the mountains they had homes, which the people had left, and the homes were brick structures and the lower level was used for the animals and the second story was where the people lived. And a lot of those homes, why the Italian troops had occupied the second story and we got to sleep where the animals did.

So the Italian Army that was an ally of the Germans then turned and fought along side the United States and Britain?

They didn't accomplish too much but they helped with the language problem and they did secure certain posts, you know where they had a certain area where they would cover and protect and so on.

And they were upstairs sleeping in the beds while you guys were down with the animals?

I don't know if they had beds or not but I was sleeping on straw down below. And we had, of course we cooked our own meals and at that time they had a ration called a 10 Ration (10 in 1 Ration) and we had little mountain stoves, little gas stoves that we used to cook and they had powdered eggs and they had Canadian bacon and they had biscuits and different things that you could cook on the little stoves so we managed pretty good that way for several weeks. After that then they went into a major offensive taking in the high positions and one of those mountains was called Mt. Belvedere. Mt. Belvedere was a stronghold of the German Army and the Germans thought that that mountain could never be taken from them because they had it heavily fortified. They had mine fields all around it, they had, you know, artillery and were on top and anyone that wanted to attack it would have to come up the slope this way. So what happened in that case, why they planned a night attack and this is where the mountaineering came into play because some of the specialized troops climbed up a formation that was almost perpendicular and when they got to the top they didn't see any Germans at that time so they established lines, rope lines and so on where they could bring up other troops and equipment. They had pack Howitzers, which is a small 30mm canon, and once they got established on top then we opened up with artillery (which was back five miles from where we were) we just caught the Germans by surprise. They didn't think it would be possible for anyone to invade them and come at them from that position. So that's where the mountaineering really played a big part and where it was most successful.

You didn't have any donkeys over there?

Yeah, they had mules that brought up some of the supplies. Yes they did.

So that helped getting some experience with those pack animals?

Yes. In fact I remember one occasion where we had our Platoon Sergeant who was a staff sergeant and his brother who was a plain Sergeant (the two brothers were together) and one day as these pack mules were moving around through the trees and up through the snow bringing supplies this younger brother was going around one of the pack mules and he had a grenade on his loop over his belt and it hit that mule and pulled the pin on that grenade and just killed him instantly. The other brother, some weeks later, was shot through the head by a sniper so both of those brothers were killed within a couple of weeks.

That's interesting. So you defeated the Germans in that battle?

That's right. At the end, on the second day of that battle I was in a squad and I was the scout. Twelve were in the squad and there was a scout and then there was another position that we call a B.A.R. Man that had an automatic rifle at the time, and then just your rifleman. Anyway, we were given the assignments to go and reconnoiter the position at night to see how many were left up on that hill. So we started out at about nine or 10 o'clock at night and there was about six or eight inches of snow on the ground and we proceeded along a small path where there was a creek and it was a moonlit night, you could see half as well as during the daytime. And we proceeded along this area and then started up a hill to get to the top and I was the first scout and there was a second scout. There was a pack for me and this other fellow was born in Germany and came to the United States when he was about 10 years old and then joined the army, so he could speak perfect German. So as we went up the hill I came across a large tree and as I moved up into the tree there was a rifle sticking out from the tree and I thought, "Well that's crazy." So I smacked it with my rifle and there was a German on the other end of that rifle. So I knocked the rifle out of his hand and this other fellow my second scout who could speak German started asking questions. They were talking back and forth and trying to find out how many soldiers were up on the hill and what kind of weapons they had and all about them; and so they must have talked for a couple of minutes. Then all of a sudden I could hear noise up above and one of the other soldiers up on the hill threw a grenade down and it lit close enough that it blew my helmet off.

One of the German soldiers?

Yeah, one of the German soldiers was up on top. Then they opened up with machine gun fire from the top of the ridge so that was our signal to get out of there. We just turned and ran down the hill and those bullets were at our feet all the way down. But for some reason, luckily, none of our squad was injured! We all got back to the base safely. But we had gathered enough information that we could give to the officers to tell them how many men was up there and what kind of equipment and everything.

Were the Germans better equipped for winter than the US Soldiers?

At that point in the war they were lacking in a lot of things. They were running low on ammunition; they didn't have enough gasoline to keep their trucks and tanks going, and stuff. So I don't know if they were better prepared, at one time they probably were but at that point they were not.

That was near the end of the war?

It was near the end of the war. In fact later on they used some of the farmer's horses to pull their guns and pull their big artillery pieces because they didn't have enough gas to run their cars.

That German soldier behind the tree, I guess if you had gone by he would have shot you if you hadn't noticed him?

Probably, I mean he was just absolutely flabbergasted that there was somebody coming up.

It surprised him?

We just surprised him enough that he didn't shoot.

So you took him prisoner I guess?

No, we didn't have time for that we just ran back down the hill as fast as we could. But we got a lot of information in that two-minute period or however long it was, why we got a lot of information because of this other soldier knowing German.

And the German soldier was willing to talk?

Yes and he was absolutely surprised, you know, that we were there and he had somebody that he could talk to.

Are there any other combat experiences that you'd like to share?

Well there are probably several. When we went through the Appenini's and we went into what they call the 'Po Valley' and that's where it levels out and the Po River, being one of the largest rivers in northern Italy, came through that area and because of the width of the river and because they had blown a lot of the bridges we had to go across the river in small boats. I guess that was part of the...another specialized army division or army unit that had that.

So they acted like ferry boats?

Yeah they were small boats that would hold 15 people or so.

You would go over on the boat and come back?

You had to paddle across. But as we went across this one morning, why we got in the middle of the stream and the Germans opened up with their 88's and aircraft guns and they had shells that exploded about 20 feet above the water. They were firing and fortunately, again in my boat, no one was injured. But we couldn't get close enough to the shore because of the depth of the water, so we jumped out and waded to shore and we had packs on our back with all the ammunition so some of them just sunk right down to the bottom. Hopefully they came to the surface but I didn't wait to see, I just ran. I just got to the bank as soon as possible and went up the hill. But in doing that and because we went in these small boats we were separated from our original group. And so we went along the edge of the river and then came upon some vineyards and as we got toward the vineyards, why the Germans had a machine gun emplacement a block away or so - two blocks. And when they opened up with that machine gun, why everybody ducked down and got into the ravines and then took cover the best they could. So I crawled toward this old barn that was there and the barn had a blank wall and the machine gun nest was over in this area so there's no way that we could see, you know, what the machine gun was doing. So anyway, we found some tools in the barn and knocked a hole in the wall, it wasn't really solid just kind of a crumbly type of wall. But we knocked a small hole into it and on my rifle I had a grenade launcher which was a special adapter that you put on the end of the rifle and you put a blank cartridge in the chamber and then a small explosive. I don't know how powerful, but it would shoot 100 yards or some such. So with that hole knocked in the wall, why I fired one shot toward this machine gun nest and it went way short, so I tried again and the second time it hit right in the middle of that machine gun nest and just killed…

Did you put a grenade in the rifle and then pull the pin and then fire?

No, it was a type of a grenade that would just explode on impact.

I see, so you didn't have any time limit after?

No. And I hadn't used it too many times and just by coincidence I happened to have one on my rifle at the time. But anyway, it took out that machine gun nest and so as a result of that, why the troops were able to move forward a lot faster.

***Tape Interrupt - interview proceeds in progress***

Belvedere Mountain or was it shorter than that? How long did it take?

Probably only seven days, seven to ten days.

When the Germans surrendered Mount Belvedere where were you and what experience did you have?

Well from Mount Belvedere we continued on into the Po Valley. We went across the Po Valley and through some of the larger cities and started up into Lake Garda, which was interesting.

This machine gun incident happened at the Po Valley after the Germans surrender at Mount Belvedere?

Yes.

When you went through the villages were the Italians welcoming you?

Oh yeah, you bet. The people were very anxious to have the Germans evacuate and one other incident happened as we started across the Po Valley. Again I had been separated from my particular company for several weeks. I was riding in a little jeep and going along the road and in front of us were two or three trucks and I thought 'well maybe we can just go past these trucks'. So as we started to go past them we could see German soldiers up in the trucks and they were retreating as fast as we were going forward. So we put our rifles on them and said, "Get out of the trucks". So we took three truck loads of German soldiers, it must have been 30 prisoners and they were so surprised, you know, they couldn't believe that we were up there right equal with them while we were going forward and they were retreating.

And were they kind of happy to surrender or did they put up any resistance?

No they didn't put up any, no resistance at all, no they didn't. And at that particular point they had run out of gas so they didn't have any gas for their tanks and they were pulling their big artillery pieces with horses.

Because they had no gasoline to run their equipment?

No, no they didn't. So they took the horses from the farmers and used their horses.

So they pretty well knew that their number was up didn't they?

They did.

What happened after that until VE-Day?

Well from that point on we were going into Northern Italy which is really beautiful - to the Lake Garda and Lake Como area and one of our regiments was over on Lake Como and we were at Lake Garda and as we were going around the roadway they had to put tunnels going through the mountain because at some area of the roads the mountain came right down to the water. Not long tunnels, but you know several hundred feet and they had blown up the one tunnel and so we were trying to go around and in doing so why again we caught up with the Germans fast enough that they were surrendering. We had hundreds of Germans that were just in a single line walking along the road.

When they surrendered did they just give up their weapons?

Yes, yes at that point they were anxious to surrender because, you know, we treated them good and we put them in small groups under guard but still none of them tried to cause any trouble.

Did you share your food supply with them?

I'm sure they did. I continued forward so I don't know what happened.

Well then where were you when VE-Day occurred and what was it like?

So it was just a couple of days after we had gone into this Lake Garda area that the war ended and so after that we just made a camp on one of the small rivers in a little town called 'El Natazoni'(?).

Where were you when you heard that the war ended and how did you hear it?

I think that was at the time when we were at Lake Garda and as we went into the small town. The word had gotten around that the Germans had surrendered and so the people were waving their arms and hanging out of windows and were just joyous!

How about the GI's, where they doing any celebrating?

Oh they were happy, you bet! After that first day of the surrender, some Italian people offered to let us sleep in their house, so I actually slept in a bed with a mattress on it after several months.

How about taking a bath? Did they let you do that or did they have plumbing in those places?

No, occasionally the army itself had set up areas where you could go and take a shower so you had a shower every two or three weeks.

Well then how long before you were headed home?

We stayed in this little town from May until about August and at that time the army had given us chances to go on three-day trips. So I went up into the Alps and I had a trip down into Rome and I went to Trieste.

How would you travel?

By truck; and went over into the edge of Yugoslavia even 'Udine'.

Where would you stay when you went to these places?

They had nice places for us. They had good places to stay and rest and good food. So that occupation is a nice part of the army.

You were there for three months and then what happened?

So about August we received orders again to evacuate our particular area and we were going to go back to the states and retrain or something (well they didn't know) but we surmised that we'd be retrained for the Pacific area.

So that was on everybody's mind I guess when you were headed back?

Yes. And going back we had nice boxcars, I mean nice passenger trains, you know, with bunks and everything.

While you were still in Italy?

Yes just before it ended. So instead of boxcars we had nice passenger trains with seats and bunks.

Well that's pretty nice. And then you got on the ship heading back to New York?

Yes, we boarded ship again at Naples and about the forth or fifth day out from Naples why word came over the PA system on the ship, and we were all out on the deck sunning ourselves and having a good time, but anyway word came over the loud speakers that the war had ended with Japan. They had surrendered and so everybody was happy and celebrated. So when we got back to the states why they had changed the orders again and they were thinking about dissolving the Tenth Mountain Division.

Let me ask you about that ship going back, was it similar to the one coming over?

It wasn't a big luxury liner like before.

So it was actually worse than what you experienced coming over?

Um, it wasn't a luxury liner but it was a nice ship, I'm trying to think of the…we had good quarters, yeah. Good food. I think there were far less men on the boat than going over.

Alright, sorry to interrupt; then you were…

After my furlough at home then I had orders to report to Camp Carson Colorado. There they were reassigning, you know, the men who were not eligible for discharge and they did dissolve some of the regiments as I remember.

Where did you land? Did you land right in New York Harbor when you came back to the US?

No we came back to Virginia - Newport News Virginia. It was interesting because as we came into the harbor why there were… everybody with a small pleasure craft were running around the harbor and yelling and honking their horns and greeting the troops as they came into the harbor.

Were any loved ones of people on your ship there to greet you and waving?

No, I doubt that they knew that, no I don't think so. It was just people you know that were wanting to welcome the troops back.

So then you went on a leave back to your home in Utah then reported back again to Camp Carson?

Yep.

And then you were discharged after that or did you stay in?

No, I still had some months to go before my time was up so I was reassigned to the Presidio in San Francisco and that's another experience. After there we were given the assignment to interview the ships and the troops as they came back from the Pacific. I was stationed there in San Francisco, then I was later transferred up to a camp called 'Camp Stoneman' which was on the Bay about forty miles. From Camp Stoneman we rode a bus into town and met the ships and then the troops got off the ship and got on a ferry and went up the sound…the river up to Camp Carson and from there they got on trains and were dispersed throughout the United States. But we interviewed them and made up reports and that was a good part of that army experience.

Elizabeth: Did you hear about the atomic bombs?

Bill: I don't remember specific details about hearing about the atomic bomb but there must have been some word.

Rick: So in your mind they just announced that the Japanese had surrendered and you had a big celebration?

So we were all taken by surprise.

Rick: It seems to me that it would be a big feeling of relief that instead of training to go back and fight in the Pacific, you were going to be going home instead.

Exactly, we were very happy that we didn't have to go into the Pacific area after Italy.

Going back to your training, it sounds like you got the bypass sort of mountain training.

I did. The mountain training was all finished when they left Camp Carson and as I mentioned they took away all the equipment, you know, all the mountain equipment. The troops over there, you know, they had white uniforms and special shoes and boots and gloves and they took all of those.

And gave you the regular khaki stuff?

They gave us the regular khaki uniforms.

Now you said that you skied two times during your service over there, was that in combat?

Yeah, when we were on Mount Belvedere we were given an assignment to send a patrol out and the snow was deep enough that we did use skis to travel several miles.

Did you go downhill and then cross-country?

Yeah, kind of a cross-country type skiing. But that was the only time and we didn't meet any resistance or any German troops.

A gentleman we talked to earlier said that they were lucky that they didn't meet any German ski patrols because they felt the Germans were better skiers and better equipped. Did you have that same feeling?

Well as I say we didn't even have skis. They only had a few pair which they used on patrol. But the terrain was such that you couldn't ski anyway. I mean it was very steep and so the mountain type warfare for the climbers and all of those experts came in much more handy or much better than the skiing. But again I skied all my life and so had I had a chance to ski I could've done it.

So when you see the movies and stuff about all the skiing…

That was all at Camp Hale.

In other words up in Colorado they were filming the movies?

In Colorado is where they made all those movies of the Tenth Mountain Division.

So most of these companies didn't ski like you didn't ski?

That's right. Most of them did not ski, no it was the type of warfare that…and the snow wasn't that deep you know they had a light winter that year.

So you got there towards the end of the war. The Germans infrastructure was gone, they had no gasoline and they were more inclined to surrender than fight during those times I would think.

They wanted to put up as much resistance as possible of course because of their officers but they were ready to surrender. On some occasions…I remember once there was really no snow on the ground but it was cold and we were going up a roadway and there was a ditch on the one side and we could hear noises and so on and some of the men went down into the ditch and you could hear a few shots being fired and then I could hear motorcycles in the distance being warmed up and they just took off up the road. So there were probably only four of five German soldiers in that area. So you know if they could use motorcycles and so on you didn't need skis.

Right, I don't mean to minimize, a bullets a bullet regardless where it comes from whether it comes from a scared German or whatever it can still kill.

Absolutely so you just…I was just very fortunate being a scout I was always in front of my 12 men.

You were Sergeant I guess?

No, no I was just a Private.

A Private even though you were a Squad Leader?

I wasn't a Squad Leader I was just a Scout. As a Scout I was always in front. That was my position to be the front person and many times as we continued on some of those patrols, when the Germans opened up artillery they fired test rounds. The first round is short, the second round is long and then they fire 'zero' in the middle and many times I could hear those shells going over my head "ffoo, ffoo, ffoo" and landing in back of me. Two or three of the men in the patrol were injured because of that. The bad position being a scout was the rifles and the machine guns but I was able to…

That was your position all the time? Cause it seems like that would be more dangerous than anywhere else.

That was my assignment the whole time. It was, yes it was dangerous and on another occasion I remember we had just taken another hill other than Mount Belvedere and as the forward Scout I was given orders to go and dig a foxhole on the forward side of the hill and then observe what was happening. So I went, another fellow and I went and dug a foxhole and put our packs up on top and toward evening the Germans started firing their artillery shells and they would just go over the hill and land on the backside of the hill where the main part of our troops were. We even had a kitchen set up back there to feed the men. But there were two or three men that were killed that particular night with those shells going over and so the Germans had binoculars, I didn't have any binoculars but while we were digging that foxhole they evidentially picked up our spot and so they started firing shells into my position and a couple of them hit close enough that they just tore up my pack. Shredded my knapsack and my pack. But I was deep enough in the hole and I was again protected and they didn't bother me. So I've been very blessed by the Lord.

Before Pearl Harbor can you give us a sense of what the guys were thinking about the European war?

Well during that period of time because of the draft and because of everyone being patriotic, why everyone was anxious to join in the Army or Navy or whatever. All my friends went in the service.

Especially after Pearl Harbor I would think.

Oh sure, after Pearl Harbor.

As a high school student were there different factions that were for getting into war with the Germans or were they against getting into war with the Germans? Or where there both sides? Was there even much thought of that?

It wasn't thought of a great deal. I was probably one of the older seniors in high school so I went in the Army and a lot of them never did get drafted.

So there wasn't an eminent feeling that they were going to have to go serve in war until after December 7th of course. I'm curious about the high school mind that in the country there was a big division of pro war and pro helping Europe verses the Isolationists that didn't want to go and I just wondered if at South High there was any kind of thought either way.

No they were all very patriotic and those that were of age went in the Army or the Navy without any problems at all, sure. They all went in basic training.

Do you remember hearing about Pearl Harbor?

Oh yes! Lets see, that was on a Sunday morning and I remember hearing about it and in the afternoon two or three of my friends went out and picked apples on somebody's orchard, I mean you just remember Pearl Harbor day!

Well thanks very much for sharing your experiences we really appreciate it.