[continued from previous page] The day was spent mostly at maintenance, which invariably precedes a move. I, as usual, found time for my customary jaunt through the woods. The one item of interest was furnished by a rather old and very truculent individual, who stood at some distance from our position and tossed a verbal barrage of hysterical vituperation at us. We finally made out that he was the owner of the land which we occupied and that he was going to sue us for ruining his property. We finally had enough of his jabber and bundled him off to our S-2 at Bn. Hqrs. I would have given a lot to have been able to take him through France, Belgium and Luxemburg and shown him how well the Germans treated other peoples property. Whenever we begin to feel a little sorry for some old German, man or woman, it is very easy to recall pictures of unbelievable horrors perpetrated by German soldiers and of which we have personal knowledge. While I have no desire to make Germans suffer needlessly, I will never judge too harshly those who do. I helped bring our situation map up to date and shortly afterward hit the sack. It was 2100.
Tuesday, 10 April [1945] Oberhof, Germany1 Oberhof is a small mountain town and winter sports center in the Schmalkalden-Meiningen district of Thuringia,Germany. See Map, Site #28.
Up at 0600. Another foggy morning but by 1000, it had cleared and the sun was working overtime. We march ordered at 0900 and in as much as we did not leave until 1400, we spent about four hours orienting ourselves with the aspects of the country to which we were moving. Oberhof is a very hot corner and will no doubt give us a little trouble. The hilly nature of the terrain, along with the dense pine forests makes for slow and dangerous progress. We left Stambach at 1400 and after two hours of interesting but uneventful [continued on next page]