THE BATTLE OF SAINT-LAURENT

Was a small town in France or Belgium worth dying for? By December of 1944, countless such insignificant villages in the countryside, barely on the map, had claimed many a young life. 

Saint-Laurent was proof of that. It was a small Belgian village of stone houses gathered around a church whose bell had disappeared sometime during the occupation. A narrow road entered from the west, passed a bakery, the church and a collection of houses, then climbed toward wooded hills to the east. There was a school with broken windows, a blacksmith's shop without a blacksmith, and a café whose proprietor had hidden his wine so successfully from the Germans that he could no longer remember where he had put it.

No one in Sean’s platoon had heard of Saint-Laurent before they arrived there. And no one understood its importance to either side of the conflict. Even so, by the following evening, eighteen men would be dead because of it. 

Sean and his older brother Thomas entered the village with their company shortly before dusk. 

The Mercer brothers had been in the same regiment since Normandy, though seldom in the same place for very long. Sean was an infantryman and spent most of his war walking. Thomas, four years older, was a sniper and spent much of his time waiting.

As boys in Pennsylvania, they had hunted deer with their father in the Allegheny foothills. Thomas had always been the better shot, and in fact demonstrated quite a talent for it through the years. The Army discovered the difference between them during training, and gave Thomas a Springfield sniper rifle with a telescopic sight and eight weeks of specialized training. 

Thomas could hit an apple from 500 yards, especially when using his favorite Western Super-X silver tip ammo. 

Their mother felt that placing the two brothers in the same company was evidence of Army incompetence.

“You put brothers together so they can look after each other, not die together,” she had said before they left. 

Their father had looked at her from across the kitchen table. 

“They’re sending them to fight a war, Helen.”

“I know what they’re doing.”

“Then why did you say that?”

“Because I’m their mother and I’m entitled to protect my sons.”

It was one of Sean’s favorite memories of home.

On their first evening in Saint-Laurent, the platoon occupied several houses near the eastern end of the village. Sean found Thomas in what remained of a dining room, checking and cleaning his rifle while sitting beneath a chandelier that hung at an angle from the ceiling.

“Hey, where did you get those silver tips?” Sean asked. 

“I brought several boxes with me from home. I knew they wouldn’t be available here. The other guys were all issued the Springfield .30-06. Those are good, but I like my silver tips.”

“By the way, Collins wants everybody fed before dark.”

“I already ate."

“What?”

Thomas nodded toward an empty tin on the floor. Sean picked it up.

“Peaches? Where the hell did you get peaches?”

“France.”

“France? We left France a week ago.”

“I brought them with me.”

“You’ve been carrying peaches for a hundred miles?”

“I like peaches.”

Sean tossed the tin aside.

“You could have saved me some.”

“True, I could have.”

Outside, someone called Sean’s name.

“That’s Reilly. We’re supposed to check the west road.”

Thomas returned to his rifle. “Have fun.”

“Try not to exhaust yourself sitting here.”

“I’ll do my best.”

Sean started for the doorway.

“Hey, Sean.”

He turned.

Thomas tossed something to him. Sean caught it. 

A tin of peaches.

“Thanks, Tom. I appreciate that.”

There was nothing unusual about the conversation. By then, they had probably had a thousand like it. 

The Nazis attacked at six thirty the next morning.

The artillery came first, an initial barrage to soften up the area. A wave of soldiers was undoubtedly to follow. 

Sean was eating cold beans in the kitchen of a stone house when the first shell landed behind the church. The second hit somewhere near the road. By the fourth shell, everyone was moving. 

The initial barrage lasted twelve minutes.

It was not particularly heavy by the standards Sean had acquired since Normandy, but Saint-Laurent was small and there were few places for shells to land without hitting something. When the firing stopped, one house was burning and the church had acquired another gaping hole.

The German infantry appeared at the edge of the woods.

Sean’s squad held a low stone wall behind a vegetable garden. He fired at movement among the trees and had no idea whether he hit anyone. Return fire ensued. Bullets struck the wall, blasting chips of stone into his face.

Somewhere farther east, from a second story position, Thomas’s rifle fired intermittently. And with each shot, a Nazi soldier went down. 

The German troops withdrew shortly after eight. 

For a while, Saint-Laurent became quiet again. The men smoked, checked their ammunition and waited. The radioman called out on a secure scrambled line to report their position and condition. 

Sean found Thomas shortly before ten near the blacksmith’s shop.

“You hit anything?”

Thomas shrugged.

“How many?”

“I wasn’t counting. A bunch.”

“You always count.”

“Did you hear what Collins said?”

“No.”

“They think that was just a probe.”

“Probably.”

“Which means?”

“They’ll come back."

“That’s what I thought.”

Thomas looked at him.

“Then why ask me?”

“Conversation.”

“You’re terrible at it.”

The brothers laughed. They stood together for a minute. The winter sun had come out, although they didn’t feel much warmth from it. Somewhere inside one of the houses a woman was crying. An American soldier walked past them carrying two German helmets.

“What do you suppose he’s going to do with those?”

“I guess send them home.”

“Why would anyone want a German helmet?”

“Don’t you have a French road sign in your pack?”

“That’s different.”

“How?”

“I stole it personally.”

Thomas smiled.

Lieutenant Collins shouted from across the road.

“Mercer!”

Both brothers turned. Collins pointed at Thomas.

“The other one.”

Sean looked offended.

“I’m the original.”

“You’re the original nuisance.”

Thomas pushed himself away from the wall.

“See you later.”

Sean watched him follow Collins toward the eastern end of the village. 

He never saw Thomas again.

The second attack began shortly after noon. This time the artillery lasted nearly half an hour.

A shell struck the schoolhouse. Another demolished the bakery. The steeple of the church collapsed into the street in an avalanche of stone and timber. 

Then the Germans came out of the woods in greater numbers.

Sean’s squad was ordered two houses east, then back again when the Germans appeared in an orchard to the north. The fighting ceased to have any shape that Sean could identify. He knew only what was happening within fifty yards of him. 

Reilly was beside him. Peterson was somewhere behind. Collins had disappeared. A machine gun was firing from the second floor of a house across the road. 

Sean ran toward a garden wall and dropped behind it. Reilly landed beside him.

“They’re coming around the orchard.”

“What do we do?”

“Shoot them!”

“Excellent plan.”

Sean peeked over the wall for a second. There were German soldiers everywhere. A German soldier ran between two trees. 

Suddenly, there rang out gunshots from behind them. With each shot, a German soldier fell. One after another, every five to ten seconds, another Nazi dropped. 

Sean thought, that has to be Thomas. Just like hunting deer at home. He never missed. 

A mortar round landed somewhere nearby, causing splinters and chunks of metal to batter their position. Sean could hear the German soldiers shouting orders from about 200 yards off. Sean crawled toward the corner of the wall. He looked back toward the village. Smoke obscured most of the eastern buildings. 

As he looked back, he saw one house come under withering fire from a surrounding German position. A Nazi fired an anti-tank rocket into a second story window, and the house erupted in flames. He could hear someone shouting in English for a medic.

Sean turned again to peek out over the stone wall. 

Suddenly, something struck the back of his right calf. His leg collapsed beneath him. Pain tore through his lower leg as if he were smashed by a baseball bat. 

“Damn it, I’m hit!” Sean grimaced.

Reilly crawled over. 

“What?”

“I’m hit.”

“Where?”

“My leg.”

Reilly looked down. 

“You’re bleeding.”

“Yeah, good observation. Thanks for telling me.”

Sean tried to stand, but the leg buckled immediately.

“Sean, stay down!”

Reilly yelled for a medic. 

Sean dragged himself against the wall and looked toward the orchard. 

The medic arrived within a minute.

“Where did the shot come from?”

“I don’t know. Somewhere out there. I heard machine gun fire just prior.”

The medic cut Sean’s pants leg and then pulled it apart. He put direct pressure on the wound while applying a heavy bandage.

“It looks like the bullet went into your calf but there is no exit wound. I think the bullet is still in there. Can you move your foot?”

Sean did.

“Toes?”

He moved them.

“You’re lucky.”

“Lucky? I just got shot.”

“OK, let me rephrase that. You’re lucky you still have your leg attached. Anyway, hang in there for a minute. You’re being evacuated.”

Just then, a military jeep arrived, and the medic and one other soldier supported Sean to the stretcher.

“Wait, I can’t go. Tom is still up there.”

“Who’s Tom?”

“My brother.”

“Then I hope he has better sense than you.”

They lifted Sean into the Jeep.

As the Jeep evacuated Sean toward the western road, he tried to see the eastern end of the village. Smoke covered almost everything. Most of the houses in that area were on fire. 

Within minutes, the sound of battle faded into the distance.

That evening, a military trauma surgeon removed the bullet. Sean was awake for most of it, although the morphine had made the experience seem pleasantly unconnected to him. 

The surgeon examined the wound, made a small incision and worked for several minutes. Then something clicked into a metal tray. 

“There you go.”

“That’s it?”

“Yep, that’s it, in all its glory.”

The surgeon held up the deformed projectile with forceps. 

“You know, you were lucky. The bullet somehow missed the tibia and fibula and all the arteries in your leg. You should heal up quite well. Do you want it as a souvenir?”

“Sure. I’ll take it. By the way, when can I go back to my company?”

“Go back to combat? Sorry, son. You’re going home. No more fighting for you.”

The nurse cleaned the bullet and placed it in a small envelope with Sean’s name on it. 

Sean wanted news from Saint-Laurent. None came that night. None came the next morning. 

On the second day, he learned that the platoon had withdrawn from the eastern half of the village. They had sustained many killed and wounded.

Thomas was missing in action. 

Sean seized upon the word. Missing didn’t mean dead. It could mean separated during withdrawal. It could mean wounded. It could mean captured. 

For three days, Thomas remained missing. 

On the fourth day, Lieutenant Collins appeared beside Sean’s bed. Sean saw his face and knew.

“They found him?”

Collins nodded. 

“Where?”

“At his position. On the second floor of the blue house.”

“Was he alone?"

“Yes, at the end.”

Sean looked down at his hands.

“How long?"

“We don’t know.”

“Did he get any of them?”

Collins hesitated. 

“Yeah. A lot of them. We don’t know how many, but a lot. Probably more than thirty.”

“Was he shot?”

“Probably not. It looks like he got taken out by bazooka fire. His whole floor went up.”

Collins pulled a chair closer. 

“Sean, the position was gone. There wasn’t anything anybody could have done.”

“I could’ve been there.”

“Yes, and you would’ve been killed.”

“You don’t know that.”

“No, but I’ve got a pretty good idea. It was hopeless.”

Sean turned toward the window. Neither man spoke for a while. 

Sean remained in the hospital for several more weeks, as the wound had become infected, requiring additional surgical debridement. 

He arrived in Pennsylvania in April.

His parents met him at the station. Sean noticed immediately that his mother seemed to have aged considerably. 

His father stood several feet behind her. He waited while Helen held Sean, then stepped forward and shook his hand.

For an instant, Sean thought that was all he was going to do. Then his father pulled him close. Neither of them said anything.

Thomas’s room was exactly as he had left it. Sean avoided it for two weeks. His mother had put Thomas’s photo on the mantel. He was wearing his uniform and smiling.

Sean’s rehab proceeded nicely. His calf remained somewhat tight, but gradually loosened up. His gait improved as time went on. 

He also tolerated the many questions his friends and acquaintances had. Yes, France had been beautiful. No, he never did see Paris. Yes, the Army food was terrible. Yes, he had been wounded. No, he didn’t mind talking about it. 

One rainy afternoon in May, Sean was sitting with his father, sorting through his Army memorabilia. His father was cleaning a shotgun at the kitchen table. Sean sat across from him and showed him many of his souvenirs. 

His Army watch. Identification papers. A French coin. A photograph of a beautiful country girl in a village. Several letters.

At the bottom of the box was a small envelope. He opened it. The bullet rolled into his palm. His father looked at it. 

“Is that it?”

Sean nodded.

“From your leg?”

“Yep. The surgeon gave it to me.”

Sean passed it across the table. His father turned it between his thumb and forefinger.

“The doctor said I was lucky.”

“You were.”

His father returned it. Sean placed it on the table. 

His father began to clean his shotgun again, but then looked over at the bullet. 

“Hey, Sean, can I see that again?”

The father held the bullet up to the light for a better look. Much of the nose had been distorted, but a small portion remained intact. There was a silvery gleam beneath the scoring. His father rubbed it with his thumb.

“Sean, where would the Germans get a Western Super-X silver tip bullet from? That’s local ammo.”

Sean looked at the bullet, and then looked up at his father.

“Dad, the Germans didn’t use this type of ammo. This is strictly American. But even our snipers didn’t use it.

"They were issued Springfield .30-06. Only Thomas used it.”

“What?”

“The Western Super-X silver tips. That was Thomas’s favorite round. He even brought several boxes with him.”

Suddenly, Sean remembered the surgeon’s comment that the bullet had neatly missed all his bones and arteries, the only anatomical place that wouldn’t permanently damage or destroy his leg. 

Beyond the backyard, the fields were beginning to turn green. Sean could see the low ridge where he and Thomas had hunted as boys, before either of them had ever heard of Saint-Laurent. And he remembered the tin of peaches that Thomas had kept for him. 

He stared out the window, over the new verdancy of the fields, and held the bullet to his heart.

And he whispered, “Thank you, Thomas.”