| On January 23rd, Brigadier General Jay W. McKelvie assumed
command of the Division, and in March the unit moved to its staging area at
Camp Kilmer, New Jersey. There followed a brief period of final physical
checkups, issue of clothing and supplies and last minute changes. Everything was in readiness on March 22nd,
and on that day the troops entrained for New York City. There, without
delay, they boarded their ships, and on the 23rd, with no fanfare
or ceremony, sailed out of New York Harbor... destination England and points
east. Only the Lady on Bledloe Island waved her hand in farewell. The 90th
waved farewell in reply, and set its course for victory.
By April 9th, the entire Division had arrived in England and was
assigned to billets. The main body of troops was stationed generally north
and east of the cities of Cardiff and Newport, Wales. The 1st and
3rd Battalions of the 359th Infantry Regiment,
however, were attached to the 4th Infantry Division and were
located in Devonshire. These two Battalions were known as Group A.
A period of intensive training followed, consisting of mine detection,
village fighting, assault on fortified positions, hedgerow fighting,
artillery firing problems, road marches and obstacle courses. The rough
edges were polished off, and "coordination" between units became more than a
word, more than a goal, but an accomplished fact.
Through April and May there ran through the world the symptoms of "invasion
fever". D-Day might come at any hour, any day. The course of history hung on
the ability of a group of Americans and British to seize a beach, hold it
and expand it. In Germany, the Wehrmacht confidently awaited der Tag,
knowing full well that they were more than a match for the untried, untested
American Army. They pointed their guns at the sea and predicted a dark and
desperate fate for whomever dared to storm the ramparts of Festung Europa.
In England, Allied armies waited tensely for the signal. Fully armed and
trained, with plans completed and sealed, the doughs and the redlegs and the
engineers and the medics, the tankers, the supply troops, the cooks and the
wiremen, the airmen and the sailors, the Generals and the Privates, all were
alert, all listened and waited. April dragged to its inevitable end, and May
stretched out till it fused with June. And still no word.
The Germans declared it was all a gigantic hoax. There was to be no
invasion, for our Generals had finally realized how impossible such an
attempt would be, how foolhardy and suicidal to brave the armed might of
Hitler's Reich. But the troops in England were not taking their orders from
Germany in June of '44. Instead they waited impatiently.
Among those waiting were the men of the 90th, green, untried and
unknown. On June 6th, the signal came. Americans were swarming
ashore on the beaches of Normandy. |
