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HomeMy WebLinkAbout Fred Nabors, Brazos Valley Heroes yc * _ — ... 9 „ J .AE ,+. r . t * ..44 .A. ,. a t- i [ y ,x . ,a'.i- 'A.i:sYk,.. One in a series of tributes to members of 'The Greatest Generation" who served our country during World War 11 tv tz Fred , E x m, 4 , Na bors w PART 1 OF 2 significantly outnumbered and outgunned, Fred L. Nabors decided early in his education that he wanted to be an engineer. He just didn't think his first job as "My main memories of Trois Pont are of a beautiful blonde an engineer would be as a combat engineer. French girl that I was trying to talk into a kiss just before someone said, 'Here they come.' I guess I had momentarily . Nabors grew up in Arlington, Texas, graduating from Arlington forgotten I was engaged. The other memory is of the mine High in 1938. He enrolled at Arlington State College where field I had set up on the high ground above Trois Pont and ;' he played basketball for two years before enrolling at A &M, the way we defended it. The Germans were never able to ;: where he also played basketball for two years. cross my mine field." ;' "When the war started, I received my draft notice in the After five days of fierce fighting, the 600 men of the 51st spring of 1942.1 asked if I could finish my degree. They said Battalion, now down to less than 500, had held. They 4 yes if I promised to enlist. I graduated at the end of May with were relieved by five divisions, including the 82nd Airborne , a petroleum engineering degree and true to my promise, Division. enlisted on June 2, 1942." a "I was sure glad to see the 82nd show up. I had served Nabors went to officers' candidate school and went to with them before and they were the best. I sure didn't mind , Ft. Belvoir, Va., for training as a combat engineer. He was leaving Trois Pont. Bastogne, which everyone has heard • ¢y' commissioned as a 2nd lieutenant and sent to Plattsburg of, was the anchor point at the south end of the Battle of Barracks, N.Y., as one of the original members of the 51st the Bulge and Trois Pont was the anchor point at the north Combat Engineer Battalion. end. We didn't have any reporters with. us, which they did at Bastogne." "Most units received their people from training camps. We trained our own men, who were mostly from Texas and New The 51st received a Presidential Citation for their performance Mexico. I was in the same company with the same men of duty, which is the highest citation a military unit can from the beginning to the end of the war. Not many people receive. It reads in part: ,.; can claim that." "By their determination and devotion to duty, regardless of Nabors was to be sent to India to help rebuild the Burma the odds, the battalion denied the enemy important avenues Road, but was diverted to England to train for the invasion of advance...When German tanks attacked repeatedly, fierce 'of France. His unit was deployed a couple of weeks after the fire from rocket launchers destroyed them, infantry attacks D Day invasion, landing at Omaha Beach. supported by intense artillery barrage were met by a hail of small arms fire with heavy losses on enemy ranks, when ;' "Before I left for France, I mailed an engagement ring to my bridges could no longer be held, they were demolished at wife. I had tried to talk her into marriage before I left America, the last possible moment... but she wouldn't agree. I finally talked her into it through the , mail. The diamond on that ring was so small it almost took a "Throughout the five -day period, the enemy was never able magnifying glass to see it, but she accepted it anyway." to penetrate the defenses manned by the officers and men of the 51st Engineer Combat Battalion. This is the highest !, Nabors' unit was used for road and bridge repair or any honor the United States Government can confer upon a unit other task the Army encountered. for extraordinary heroism in a war against an armed enemy." "In 1944 the Army needed lumber, so we were scattered "My wife and I have visited Trois Pont since the war. The throughout the Ardennes Forest operating sawmills when Belgians remember what we did and are still appreciative the Battle of the Bulge broke out. We were ordered today. I have since learned that the tactics we employed at into defensive positions and in less then 24 hours we Trois Pont are being taught today at West Point." reassembled and moved 50 miles to Trois Pont, Belgium . ('Three Bridges' in French) to set up a defensive position. (Continued next week) "We set charges to blow the bridges in case we weren't able Fred L. Nabors' name can be found on the Brazos Valley to hold them. The biggest weapons we had were .50- caliber Veteran's Memorial. For more information, to make machine guns. We set up barricades and mine fields on a contribution, or if you know a World War 11 Veteran -' the roads and where we could. Opposing us was the 1st whose story needs to be told, contact the BWM at www. Panzer Division, the best the German Army had. We were veteransmemorial.org or Bill Youngkin at (979) 260 -7030. The E gle Here when Ilbu need us. World World War II veteran Holly Rees of Bryan will be the guest on "Veterans of the Valley" Friday at 8:30 pm on KAMU -TV: Veterans of the Valley, hosted by WTAW's Tom Turbiville, can be seen la'" — Fridays at 8:30 p.m. and Saturdays and Sundays at 6:30 p.m. KAMUtamu.edu Channel 15/cox cable4 �'r .. '" , , E a ' . '; ', 4 -:D'. 1 . � mr c "i', wiz „ t ;, One in a series of tributes to members of "The Greatest Generation" who served our country during World War II PART 2 OF2 Most of the time you don't realize or understand the impact your actions had on others. Fred Nabors came to understand, but that understanding occurred more than 50 years after the event. Nabors, as a member of the 51 51 Engineer Combat Battalion, survived the onslaught of the 1st Panzer Division during the Battle of the Bulge at Trois Pont, Belgium, holding out for five days until being relieved by five divisions. ~ After we were relieved, we were sent to Marche, Belgium, where we rested. for several days. The 82nd and the other divisions that relieved us at Trois Pont soon had the Germans on the run and we moved out in support of them shortly after Christmas Day. . "As we followed them, we repaired roads and bridges until we arrived at the Rhine River at a place called Remagan." With the Americans approaching the German border, most of the bridges crossing the Rhine had been blown up by either the retreating Germans or by the Allies trying to prevent the retreat. The Ludendorf Bridge, located at Remagan, Germany, was stili standing. Mhough tt had been detonated and bcmbad by the Germans, enough of the railroad bridge was intact to allow foot soldiers and some equipment to cross. Rernagan became the primary route of the Allied forces into Germany. It was also the first crossing of the Rhine by foreign troops since the days of Caesar. When the first of the American infantry crossed and secured the area on the German side, the bridge came under even greater fire from German artillery and bombers, to the point that n was no longer usable to get the men and equipment across that were needed to continue the push into Germany. That is where Nabors and the 51st Engineers again proved their value as a unn. "With the bombed-out Ludendorf Bridge unusable, we proceaded to build two pcntoon bridges across the Rhine, one on the downstream side of the bridge and one on the upstream side. The bridges spanned 967 feet before reaching the German side. AJI- the while we were constructing the pontoon bridges, we were under constant fire from small arms, artillery and st,;,fing and bcmbing by German planes." On the German side of the river was Bob Gallery, one of the first Americans across the Ludendorf Bridge and whose story appeared several weeks ago. "We had managad to get across, but we neaded help and plenty of it if we were to be able to continue to hold our position. We could see the engineers attempting to build the bridge and all the time they were, the Germans on the mountain above Remagan were giving them hell as well as the German planes strafing and bombing them. Occasionally a German bcmb would blow tt apart. When that happened, the engineers would float another pontoon back in place until they got n built so troops and equipment could come across. Those guys saved our bacon." Fifty years later, Naboo and Gallery, now members of the Businessmen's Bible Class at First Baptist Church of Bryan, in a casual conversation, discovered their connection with the bridges at Remagan. As Gallery said, "I was never able to say thank you to those engineers because we moved out as soon as we started getting our troops across their bridge. But I thanked Fred. He and his men saved my life." It was also at Remagan that Nabors was awarded the Bronze Star for actions he under took while under fire from enemy forces. The war ended for Nabors at another bridge further inside Germany when an artillery shell landed nearby, sending shrapnel into his foot. "I was shippad to a hcspttal in England for treatment. I found out that with the war ending in Europe, my unn was being shipped home for training for the invasion of Japan. I had started the war with them and I wanted to finish wnh them. So I checked out of the hcspital and Mchhikad rides until I caught up with them in Rheems, France. ~ Nabors and the men of the 51st arrived home in November 1945 and were discharged with the surrender of Japan. After the war, Nabors was employed by Amoco Petroleum for the next 36 years, serving on four continents before retiring in London in 1981. "We returned to College Station, where we have lived since. It was more than 50 years after the war when Bob and I discovered our connection at Remagan. I knew that what we did at Remagan helped at the time. But now I know it from a personal perspective. ~ Fred Nabors' name can be found on the Brazos Valley Veterans Memorial. For more information, to make a contribution, or if you know a Wor1d War II veteran whose story needs to be told, contact the BWM at www. veteransmemorial.org or Bill Youngkin at (979) 260-7030. -- - - .' -. .