Chicopee WWII Vet Walter Kos Earned Silver Star 70 Years Ago
This week marks the 70th anniversary of the costliest battle in terms of casualties in the history the U.S. military.
On Dec. 16, 1944, the German army launched what the Allies called the Ardennes Counteroffensive. The news media called it the Battle of the Bulge because the Allies front line bulged inward on wartime news maps.
The offensive was Adolph Hitlers last desperate gamble on the western front in World War II. Following the failed effort to kill Hitler, the regular German army was now subordinate to the Fuhrers fanatic thugs in Heinrich Himmlers Waffen-SS.
The plan conceived in the dictators muddled brain would send 100 tanks into the American lines with enough gas to get halfway to the coast. His plan was to overrun lightly defended portions of the Allied line in the Ardennes Forest and drive across the River Meuse all the way to the Belgian port of Antwerp.
At this stage of the war, no staff officer dared to tell the truth. While many believed the American leadership was inferior, even the success of Hitlers plan to capture Antwerp, which might split the Allied armies in the west and disrupt supply and troop movements, would only be temporary.
According to Hitler, the western allies might be compelled to sue for peace. His fanatic followers were the only ones who believed him.
The Fuhrer chose the 6th Panzer Army for the German juggernauts most important role. The decisive spearhead was given to a combat group commanded by a young SS fanatic lieutenant colonel named Jochen Peiper.
In the early dawn of Dec. 16, Kamfgruppe Peiper attacked the U.S. Armys 99th Infantry Division. The Americans, outnumbered five-to-one, made the attackers pay dearly.
Historian John S.D. Eisenhower wrote, The action of the 2nd and 99th Divisions on the northern shoulder could be considered the most decisive of the Ardennes campaign.
Later in the day the Germans encountered one of the 99th Divisions rest centers, clogged with confused American troops. They killed many, destroyed a number of American armored units and vehicles and took several dozen prisoners who were murdered by elements of his force.
In his race to the River Meuse at Honsfeld, Belgian, Peiper easily captured the town and 50,000 U.S. gallons of fuel for his machines.
At 12:30 on Dec. 17, Kampfgruppe Peipers columns were halfway between the towns of Malmedy and Ligueuville when they encountered the lightly armed 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion of the U.S. 7th Armored Division.
The 150 captured Americans were marched into an open field and the SS troopers opened fire. Most were shot where they stood, though some managed to flee. Eighty-four unarmed prisoners of war were murdered 70 years ago today near the village of Malmedy.
The commonplace atrocities of the eastern front were now being carried out against unarmed Americans. The news raced through the Allied lines of the Malmedy massacre.
I was recently sitting in the comfortable den of Staff Sgt. Walter Kos in Chicopee Falls. Seventy years ago his outfit, the 30th Infantry Division, was directly in the path of Kampfgruppe Peipers drive west.
Walter Kos grew up with eight brothers and sisters in Chicopee Falls historic China Town tenements. He graduated from St. Stanislaus School and left high school before graduation to go to work with a carpet company.
He was drafted in 1942 and, following basic training, was sent to Camp Campbell in Kentucky for advanced infantry training with the Tennessee National Guards 30th Infantry Division. It was nicknamed the Old Hickory division in honor of President Andrew Jackson.
In the August issue of World War II History magazine, author Josh Quackenbush related the events of Dec. 19, 1944 which took place in the market town of Stoumont on the Ambleve River in Belgium, in part reporting the role of a tough soldier who grew on a Western Massachusetts river.
Staff Sgt. Walter Kos, of 1st Platoon, I Company, received orders from Capt. George D. Rehkoph: Theres somebody out there running around with a lot of tanks and I want you to find them.
Kos and four others traveled by Jeep to an area east of Stoumont. They came upon 30 German tanks, and Kos reported to Captain Rehkoph, who relayed the information up the chain of command. Kos was told to stay in Stoumont to stall the enemys advance. He inherited a leaderless 3rd Platoon.
The magazine reports that the platoon was in front for the delaying action. When German tanks approached the 3rd Platoon position, Kos helped to direct the fire of two Sherman tanks. He gave the signal as the lead German tank was about to come around a corner.
Quackenbush wrote, So the two Shermans fired at the lead tank, knocked the track off of it and damaged the turret, Kos gallantly moving through a murderous hail of machine gun, small arms and tank fire. He continued directing fire that destroyed two enemy half-tracks. The heroic action delayed the enemy long enough for a new defensive line to be established.
The 3rd Platoon was fighting house-to-house when a grenade blast blew Sgt. Kos out of a second-floor window. He somehow got up and dove into a storefront basement. When the platoon surrendered, they knew about the battlefield atrocities. Kos and his squad were interrogated, beaten and finally ordered to line up for execution, only to be saved by Colonel Peiper.
The 6th Panzer Armys way west was halted at Stoumont. The American counterattack rescued Kos and the 3rd Platoon survivors.
Hitlers mad gamble had failed. The Waffen SS, his private Nazi Army, walked back to Germany to be exposed and judged.
Staff Sgt. Walter Kos was awarded the Silver Star, returned to work at the Fisk Tire Co., raised his family and endured several back operations. As I was leaving, he proudly announced the recent arrival of another great-grand child.
Tags: Veterans News
