Herman Waggle

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White County Veterans Affairs

By FRANCES HART    03/10/2002
Staff Writer, Searcy Daily Citizen

Veteran recalls experiences in WWII

  When World War II Veteran Herman Waggle tries to recall the events of a certain day during the war, he finds that parts of it have faded.
Like many other veterans of the time, it is just easier to forget.
But, as he gets older and his feet bother him more and more, he is reminded of what led to the pain in his feet as he takes each step.
Recently at home with wife, Thelma, he sat down to talk about it.
"It was a nice, pretty day," Waggle said. "The sun was shining and it was a bit cold. We had just moved there and taken position. The Germans had hit artillery at a foxhole just below me. We were always having to look out for artillery."
Waggle was a member of a light machine gun squad of five men.
They loaded, cleaned, maintained, and fired a light machine gun to provide automatic fire against enemy personnel and light armored vehicles.
They estimated ranges and set sights. They also field-stripped weapons to replace worn or damaged parts and determined the speed of moving targets, serving in France, Holland and Germany.
He was a Private First Class and served a total of three years.
Having done his basic training in Texas, he was then shipped overseas for approximately six months. He was on the front lines for a mere 19 days. But that was long enough.
Waggle married Thelma when they were both 17 (He went off to Europe at the age of 22).
In describing the moment they first met, he said, "I wanted to walk her home, but she got lost in a crowd. Then later at a school pie supper, I bought her a pie."
They dated for a while and married on Sept. 4, 1937. This September will be 65 years.
They have led a happy and wonderful life since then. They stated very simply and purely, "church is our main thing."
The Waggles had one child that lived only two days.
Only two months afterward, he was drafted to WWII. Saying goodbye was difficult for each of them.
She added, "I moved back home with mother and daddy. I wrote to him nearly every day."
He added with a smile, "Getting home and seeing her was on my mind all the time."
However, on that slightly cool day in a foxhole near Beeck, Germany, he had something else on his mind.
It was 27 November 1942. "I had to stand in this foxhole that was two feet by five or six feet wide," Waggle said. "I was there with two other guys. We were in it for three or four days. We had to stand, not sit. We dosed off occasionally to sleep."
As he went on with recalling the day, tears filled his eyes.
Waggle decided the three guys needed to build a tunnel around the bottom of their foxhole to stretch out a bit. It took them a while to scrape the ground. But, they did it.
Then he said, "Mortar was going off 300 - 400 yards away. First the Germans hit one foxhole. Then they hit another foxhole closer to us, destroying it. I yelled to the other two - \get in the tunnel!' Then - as usual - the Germans hit the third foxhole which was ours.
"They thought they knocked us out," he continued. "They did. But, they didn't get us." He realized the tunnel saved their lives. Much of their ammunition was destroyed, so was their machine gun, and the M1 Rifle.
It was close. Probably too close. It certainly was not that easy to talk about it either.
Shortly thereafter an Army photographer came by and told him to pick up the M1 Rifle for a photo.
They asked Waggle what his hometown was and the name of the hometown newspaper, he told them The White County Citizen, Searcy, Arkansas.
Sometime, in early December 1944 a photo of Herman Waggle appeared in The White County Citizen.
A copy of the photo was given to Thelma. She has saved it all through the years along with his discharge papers, his WWII Victory Ribbon, Good Conduct Medal and the Bronze Service Star as well as a letter from Harry Truman on White House stationary.
After the destruction of the foxhole by the Germans, Waggle realized he had a problem. Along with a horrific pain in his feet, he couldn't walk.
The two men with him in the foxhole had to carry him to the truck to rest.
Waggle was taken to Holland where he was diagnosed with frost bite. He was in the hospital for months with gangrene and very nearly lost his leg.
Waggle said he never saw or heard from those two Americans he fought the Germans with