Chapter 25: Darkness Falls

Lieutenant Herman Schmidt was delighted to learn that there was a heavy artillery emplacement that had heard the gunfight between the old dead Frenchman and his troops.

They had radioed down to find out what was happening, and Schmidt discovered that they were positioned at the opposite end of this section of woods. He ordered that they send several men in from their position.

At first the commanding officer of that unit questioned him, saying that if attacked, his group wouldn’t be efficient without each of the men there to do their jobs.

Schmidt outranked him and assured him that, first, the man’s commanding officer would agree with Schmidt that this was necessary, and second, it wasn’t like the enemy was going to be attacking on this very night anyway.

The Nazis had been expecting an invasion somewhere at some point for years and nothing of any real significance had happened yet.