Medical Support and Evacuation for the
112th Infantry Regiment, 28th Infantry Division,
in the Battle for Schmidt

The attack of the 28^th Infantry Division on the town of Schmidt in the Hürtgen Forest in early November 1944 occupies a special place in the history of the U.S. Army’s operations against Nazi Germany in World War II. Fought under awful weather conditions over very difficult and heavily-forested terrain along the Kall River on the German-Belgian border south of Aachen, Germany, the Battle of Schmidt was one of the bloodiest and most wasteful American operations of the war in Europe. The 109^th, 110^th, and 112^th Infantry Regiments of the 28^th Infantry Division and attached units were all engaged in these operations. However, the 112^th Infantry bore the brunt of the fighting and casualties in the towns of Vossenack, Kommerscheidt, and Schmidt and along the Kall River Trail that connected Vossenack with Kommerscheidt and Schmidt to the east of the Kall River.

Map of the Kall Trail
click to enlarge

Within days, medical personnel of the 112^th Infantry completed these reports which provide a graphic picture of the challenges that regimental and battalion medical personnel faced in caring for and evacuating the wounded and sick soldiers under such appalling conditions. Capts. John S. Howe and William J. Fox, 2d Information and Historical Service, European Theater of Operations, subsequently interviewed many members of the 28^th Infantry Division who had participated in these operations. They did not, however, apparently interview any of the medical personnel. They did collect a number of reports that medical personnel had already submitted to the 112^th Regimental Surgeon and division surgeon. These documents are part of the larger collection of 28^th Infantry Division interviews and draft historical reports that were compiled by the 2d Information and Historical Service for use of the ETO historian’s office. These documents were later used in writing the official history of the U.S. Army in World War II, specifically in Charles B. MacDonald’s, The Siegfried Line Campaign, and his chapter on Schmidt in Three Battles: Arnaville, Altuzzo, and Schmidt. Now entitled Combat Interviews 75 and 76, 28^th Infantry Division in the Hürtgen Forest, today these documents reside in the Record Group 407, Box 24032, National Archives and Records Administration, at College Park, MD.

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