On Christmas 1944, Gus Epple was at the wheel of an Army Jeep, stuck in a traffic jam many miles long leading to the German lines. Dysentery forced the 19-year-old to abandon his Jeep every 15 minutes to relieve himself along the side of the road. Each time, he trudged through the snow and wrestled with an overcoat, field jacket, two layers of uniform pants and longjohns worn against the bitter cold. That night, his unit started a fire in their stove, a more compact version of a Coleman, to keep warm. Their folly quickly became apparent.
“You couldn’t believe how brilliant that little gas stove was,” said Epple, now an 88-year-old living in Cape May Court House. “We left it on for five or 10 seconds and shut it down again. It could’ve given away the position of the entire convoy.” Epple was one of an estimated 610,000 Americans who served during the Battle of the Bulge, Adolph Hitler’s last major offensive of World War II. By the end of fighting, which began Dec. 16 and ended Jan. 25, 1945, about 81,000 would die. Germany would surrender just more than four months later. And that year became the “winter without a Christmas” for the soldiers who returned home.
Decades later, however, Epple and a group of local vets have banded together due to their shared experience. Their numbers have dwindled and some are now confined to nursing homes, but a hearty few still unite throughout the year, most poignantly at Christmastime. They are the brothers of the Bulge.
It all started in 1999, when a couple of veterans — both deceased now — organized a luncheon for a local chapter of the national Veterans of the Battle of the Bulge. At the time, the quarterly meetings attracted a group of about 50 said the 88-year-old Army rifleman. “There’s a common bond there that means something to us.” The Cape May Court House resident, who lives near Epple, spent Christmas 1944 south of Bastogne in Belgium. The days run together in memory, but he was probably in a foxhole, hoping German soldiers didn’t stumble upon his position.
When possible, Umbenhauer would try to dig a trench to lie in, but one night it wasn’t possible. Instead, three soldiers huddled together in a snow bank, their warmth and body weight creating a depression in the snow. “I was just lying there in the snow. Several miles away I could hear German Panzer tanks driving back and forth,” he said. “If they decided to come after us, I wouldn’t be here — we were totally unprotected.”
Umbenhauer joined the local group several years after it formed, after reading about it in the newspaper. One of the members mentioned the 8th Armored Division. “Hey—that’s my division,” he said. Many of the members’ experiences intersect. For instance, Ewing Roddy, another survivor, was a machine gunner who flew six missions over the course of the battle. “I like to say they were fighting the Germans on the ground while I was fighting above ground,” Roddy said. The 89-year-old now lives in a Linwood nursing home with his wife, but he tries to make the group’s annual Christmas luncheon — on Wednesday this year — and stays in touch with other veterans, sharing news and remembrances.
Like most groups, Epple said, the Bulge veterans’ numbers have dwindled with time. Today, about five of them still meet regularly, with several more attending when their health or transportation allows.And Umbenhauer said the remaining active members are always on the lookout for new blood. “If they find a veteran from the Battle of the Bulge, they practically drag you to the meeting,” he said, with a laugh. He knows from personal experience, of course.
But a funny thing happened in recent years. Although the ranks of actual veterans have diminished, the group has welcomed relatives of deceased Bulge vets and soldiers from other battles and conflicts. The group’s current president, 70-year-old Ed Steinberg, was a New Jersey Army National Guard reservist — he responded to the Newark riots of 1967 — and the son of a Bulge vet who died in 1992. His own father, Albert, was close-lipped about his experiences, but Steinberg enjoys hearing the experiences of other World War II vets. “I would rather connect and sit down with these guys than people of my own generation,” he said.
Steinberg, who lives in the Rio Grande section of Middle Township, took over when Epple needed a break from the constant scheduling duties. “I was sort of hoping it would just fold and we’d quit,” Epple said. “I didn’t think it would last this long.” But Epple added that there’s real value in continuing the legacy of the Battle of the Bulge, and remembering the Christmas that never was.
During the battle, Epple and the rest of the soldiers were eventually ordered to abandon their overcoats because they could be too cumbersome if they had to run. Most of the Germans kept their coats. Epple remembers one fled as his crew fired mortars around him. “I’d never seen such a sight,” he said. “Trailing out the back of him was the overcoat. He must’ve gone at a pretty good speed.”
Umbenhauer said he likes to tell people that he spent that Christmas in a foxhole singing “I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas.” Of course, that quip doesn’t reflect the reality he and many of his friends lived that day. They already had more than enough snow. “For us, it was another night,” he said. “We couldn’t help but think about Christmas, but for us it was another unpleasant night.”
by Wallace McKelvey, Staff Writer
Atlantic City Press, NJ