Brigadier General Anthony C. McAuliffe before D-Day

(July 2, 1898–August 11, 1975)

Army General

Old Crock” McAuliffe is best remembered for his immortal defense of Bastogne during World War II’s Battle of the Bulge. Surrounded and ordered by the German commander to surrender, he defiantly responded, “Nuts!” His stand is legendary in the annals of American airborne forces.

Anthony Clement McAuliffe was born in Washington, D.C., on July 2, 1898, and he enrolled at the U.S. Military Academy in 1917. He graduated from an accelerated program in November 1918 shortly after World War I ended, and briefly visited Europe to tour various battlefields. Assigned to field artillery, McAuliffe graduated from the Artillery School in 1920 and spent the next 16 years fulfilling the usual peacetime assignments. Promoted to captain in 1935, he was selected to attend the Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, and in June 1940 he also graduated from the Army War College. Just prior to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, he was promoted to temporary lieutenant colonel with the Supply Division of the War Department General Staff. In this capacity, McAuliffe helped oversee development of such novel technology as the jeep and the bazooka.

Following American entry into World War II, McAuliffe transferred as artillery commander of the newly raised 101st Airborne Division at Camp Claiborne, Louisiana. He followed his division overseas to England, where he broke his back during a practice parachute drop in May 1944. Fortunately, McAuliffe recovered sufficiently to make the dramatic midnight assault on Normandy on June 6, 1944. When Gen. Don Pratt was killed, he succeeded him as deputy divisional commander under Gen. Maxwell D. Taylor. McAuliffe quickly consolidated his men into a task force and captured the crossroads town of Carentan, holding it against great odds.

McAuliffe was still in command of the 101st when it jumped during the ill-fated Operation Market Garden of September 18, 1944. This action, conceived by British Field Marshal Bernard L. Montgomery, was an attempt to seize bridges spanning the Rhine River in Holland. German resistance proved stronger than anticipated, and the Allies took heavy casualties. McAuliffe nonetheless led a glider echelon that seized and held the town of Vechtel.

In December 1944, the 101st Airborne was reposing at Reims when the Germans scored a dramatic breakthrough during their Ardennes Offensive, the celebrated Battle of the Bulge. In the absence of Taylor, McAuliffe took command of the division and hastily deployed it around the strategic road junction at Bastogne, Belgium, with orders to hold at all costs. The Americans did precisely that, despite being engulfed by a superior number of German troops and tanks. The outgunned paratroopers fought tenaciously and threw back repeated enemy assaults on the town. When summoned to surrender, McAuliffe responded with his cryptic and celebrated response of “Nuts!” and kept on fighting. His stand ensnared German progress and was a contributing factor to their eventual defeat. Bastogne was finally relieved by elements of the Third Army under Gen. George S. Patton, who personally pinned the Distinguished Service Cross on its commander. The 101st subsequently became the first division to be awarded a Presidential Citation.

In March 1945, McAuliffe gained a promotion to major general and took command of the 103rd Infantry Division. McAuliffe then broke through the Siegfried Line at Alsace, captured Innsbruck, Austria, and linked up with the Fifth Army under Gen. Mark Clark at the Brenner Pass. That summer he briefly commanded the 79th Infantry Division during occupation duties.

After the war, McAuliffe returned to the United States to command the Airborne Center in North Carolina and Fort Bragg in Georgia. In early 1946, he attended Operation Crossroads, the atomic bomb tests at Bikini Atoll, before transferring to the Joint Research and Development Board. After a stint as chief of the Chemical Corps, McAuliffe rose to lieutenant general commanding the Seventh Army in Germany in September 1953. Two years later, he became commander of U.S. Army forces in Europe as a full general. McAuliffe retired in 1956 and accepted several positions in the corporate sector. During 1959–1963, he was also chairman of the New York State Civil Defense Council. McAuliffe died in Washington, D.C., on August 11, 1975, one of the most celebrated paratroopers of World War II.

Bibliography

Bache, William B., “The Hero Syndrome,” Dalhousie Review 55 (1975): 93–102; Breuer, William B., Geronimo! American Paratroopers in World War II, 1989; Koskimaki, George E., The Battling Bastards of Bastogne, 1994; Mackenzie, Fred, The Men of Bastogne, 1968; Morelock, J. D., Generals of the Ardennes: American Leadership in the Battle of the Bulge, 1994.

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Charles P. Grauel writing in the January – February issue was correct. The Dutch Airborne Friends will make any airborne trooper’s visit to the area memorable. Many of us have had the experience he had. Charlie was a wireman in Headquarters Battery, 321st GFA, WWII. He worked out of the forward switchboard which the 321st set up near the headquarters of the regiment which we were supporting. In Normandy it was the 327th and for the remainder of the war, the 506th. The wiremen from the forward switch ran a couple of trunk lines back to our battalion and then lines forward to the liaison officers with the infantry battalions and the forward observers with the rifle companies.

This was a lot of wire to run and then to maintain as it was frequently getting cut. Charlie and his comrades spent a lot of time on the road keeping that wire in. Following their wire down the roads was often a dangerous activity. We forward observers were always happy to see Charlie or another wireman bringing in the line from the forward switch. In a static situation this meant that we could check out of the radio net in order to save on batteries which were short life and heavy. Inasmuch as we had no vehicle we couldn’t carry all the batteries we needed. The wire, while it was in, was a godsend.

Ken McAuliffe’s pieces about General Anthony McAuliffe are always a treat. I hope they mean that he is working on a biography of his uncle. In the event that he is I have a “Tony” McAuliffe story for his consideration. If not – enjoy. Our battalion, the 321st GFA, was in a staging area in Wales waiting to board a ship for Normandy. The day after we arrived Tony came around to see how his artillerymen were doing. As he went down the line asking, everyone said that things were great. Everyone, that is, except the wire corporal, whose name I can’t remember. When Tony asked him how things were he told the general that everything wasn’t so great: there was no hot water for showers. Tony glanced at his aid, Lieutenant Starrett, to make certain that he was making a note of that. The next day Tony’s standing, to say nothing of the standing of the wire corporal, shot up way up with us.. We had our hot water.

We, in the Field Artillery saw little of General McAuliffe. Major General Maxwell Taylor, the division commander, frequently made use of his talents to coordinate the activities of the infantry regiments. Two examples: In the attack on Carentan he coordinated the activities of elements of the 327th, 506th and the 501st. On 22 September 1944 General Taylor assigned him the mission of coordinating the defense of Vechel. Elements of the 327th, 506th, 501st, the81st AA&AT Bn and the 321st GFA were involved in that engagement.

One has to wonder why it took the powers to be in the European Theater seven months to recognize Tony McAuliffe’s talents and give him his own division, the 103rd Infantry Division. Tony was one of the many great leaders that the 101st was blessed with, from corporal to major general. We were fortunate to have them.