Hallo, gentlemen! I would like to share with you this tale I found in a Colombian magazine which I found interesting, althought I cannot believe it entirely. Tell me what you think. It is just the translation:

Everything was dark. Corporal [which is not true, because he has Obergrenadier insignias in his photograph] Hein Severloh could not see any star. He just listened enemy air-craft's engines in Normandy's skies. Some seconds later two explosions were heard. Nobody was death. The Wehrmacht boys still had luck. Severloh and his friends thought that it was just another common and single attack. A drill. But those aeroplanes flying over their heads belonged to the first fleet [?], composed by 329 American bombers B-24 with precise instructions: blow the German artillery up with 13.000 heavy bombs along the 6 kilommetres of Omaha Beach. The other beaches: Utah, Gold, Juno and Sword would receive a similar treatment by the Allied Air Forces. Total: 12.000 aeroplanes attacked 100 kilommetres that morning. Later, with the first light of sunrise, the first landing-crafts were aproaching the beach. Then the Germans shouted: "Sie kommen!" (Here they come!).

Severloh was adjutant to the battery chief. He was inside WN 62, a resistance nest in Omaha Beach in Fox Green sector. Severloh took the binoculars of his chief, liutenant Bernhard Frerking. He could see before Coleville the silloutes of the invader ships. "It can't be! it is a bloody city of steel!" He screamed. Then he got out to his observation site and yelled: "What unsane! Are they going to ashore right here, before our machine guns?!" Yes, they were. He saw the first landing crafts approaching on his left. The struggle was imminent, he looked at his comrades' faces and eyes and fear. He could know that some were not going to survive.

Severloh was not scared. Why? He didn't know. He convinced himself that he was going to make it through. He had joined the army on 23rd July 1942 at 19 and his training had been pretty bad [?]. He had just fired five rounds with a K-98. Then he was made a horse-transports worker. In Russia he did this rear job and never enter into combat. But he had seen the soldiers who did fight and he had listened to thousands oftales which said that it was posible to see on their faces if they were going to survive or die. He remembered all those tales when he saw many landing crafts coming, each one with 40 men each. He and his patners knew the kind of butchery comming... They knew already that Germany could not win the war, because of the materials overwhealming superiority of the enemy and they knew that the invasion could be delayed, but not stopped. They were expecting anything on the 6th of June, but an invasion! Hein prayed briefly and put behind his guardian angel; his MG-42, the German devil for the Americans. The fire-spitting thing which defended the Atlantic.

His position was 20 metres above the beach and could see all the beach. He was waiting for the moment to shoot. He did it when the GIs approached to the beach with water knees-high. Hein saw the first landing-craft comming with the first American soldiers to land. These were from USA's 1st Infantry Division, "The Big Red One". Then, at 6.30 o'clock he opened fire. First he killed all the American right behind the craft's doors, once opened. The terrified Gis were hiding in the hedgehogs and other obstacles in the beaches uselessly. Hein’s feelings were cold. No regret. It was war. “I kept shooting them, anything who moved was shot” says Severloh. The Gis were asking themselves what the hell had happened with the Air Force. They had been told that they would find any resistance because the bombardments would have had smashed all the German positions. But unfortunately it had not been that way. The air-craft had failed in doing its task because of the clouds. All the bombs had exploted in-land or in the sea. All the German artillery and machine gun nests were there, untouched. The situation went worse because more and more landing craft were still arriving with more men, who could not advance; so all the men were shoulder by shoulder there, easier to kill. When the men came they saw the massacre and refused to get out of the crafts. The officers, aiming them with guns forced them to get out. Hundreds of Gis were dying without having fired a shot. The commander of American 1st Army, liutenant general Omar Bradley was told about the situation: a probable disaster. Then he took the most difficult decision; he ordered a naval bombardment above the head of his troops. Many more Gis died, this time, by friendly fire…

From his resistence nest, WN 62, Severloh could saw those men who had survided the fire of his machine gun, so he took his rifle and killed them. “They wanted my head, so I shot like 400 rounds and killed many of them. It was like hunting rabbits”. But as the time went by, the American were getting closer to the bunkers, which had been smashed by the naval artillery. So, the engineers made corridors for the infantry with explosives. They headed to the clifts and bigan a fight man-to-man. The Wehrmacht boys started being killed. “Many of my partners were killed by enemy snipers who climbed up to the bunkers”. Severloh then went out of ammunition and the only ammunition available were night-tracer-rounds. He did not care and used it. Then, the American destroyer USS Frankfort shot Severloh’s some 6-inches-rounds, three kilommetres away. He was wounded, but he fought even harder. Several naval shells threw him away on several ocassions, but he had become a fighting-machine who felt no pain or sorrow. The American had surrounded the bunker and were climbing it. Hein saw a man climbing just in front of him. He blew his head off with his Mauser, piercing his helmet. He stayed there for a few seconds and stared his killer and then fell down over the sand. “Then I realised what I had been doing all that time: killing human beings”. That image recorded in his mind and would torture him for the rest of his life. The beach was full of body-parts and viscera and the sea was red. “The number of casualties had been stablished then: I probably killed 2.000 American soldiers of the 3.000 lost in Omaha. We lost 200-300 casualties” [I do not know if they mean just KIA or casualties]. There was mud and the landings there could not continue, beside, the morale effect of seeing that butchery woud have been devastating.

At three o’clock, Severloh and his friends were just 250 metres from the Americans. They were the only surviving members of the Wehrmacht in Omaha. Liutenant Frerking gave the order to scape. Liutenants Frerking and Grass, corporal Beermann and Severloh scaped. Hein took his MG 42 with him, but he had to drop it because it was very hot and he burnt his hands. He had shoot 12.000 rounds with it…They ran to a hill in St. Laurent 400 metres away. Hein lost the rest of the men and kept running. Hours later he came up with private Kurt Warnecke. He told him that liutenant Frerking had been killed. They kept running and hiding and hid in a barn at night. Unfortunately, they met with some Gis and were wounded in their botts. Even so, Severloh told the other guy to keep running and reach WN 63. Once they did this they told major Lohmann that everybody in the WN 62 had been killed, but all already knew that. They were attended and cure by the doctor in WN 63. At night, major Lohmann ordered all the men in WN 63 to retreat to Colleville. Heins was appointed with another 19 Germans to take care of 4 American POWs. But at mid-night the situation was awful and a Sergeant of 716th Infantry Division offered the four American to accept their surrunder. The four Americans took all the Germans with the rest of the American army, where their weapons were confiscated. The war had finished for Hein Severloh. He spent many years as a POW and was bad treated several times and humilliated. But he returned back to his natal Metzingen in 1947, where he is still living. Now, he is now 79.

Manuel Eráusquin
Renato Bignami
Magazine “Gatopardo”, Bogotá, Colombia.

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Yes, Friedrich ! I thought this sounded very familiar as I read it - and indeed, Severloh's story can be found in 'Invasion - They're Coming !' written by Paul Carell in 1962.

The account continues for several pages, beginning on p.87 with : -

'Lance-Corporal Hein Severloh, a farmer from Metzingen, was standing in the personnel trench of strongpoint WN62......'

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"Stand by to pull me out of the seat if I get hit" - Guy Gibson

Thanks for having his story here Friedrich--I say that the man had an "Interesting time" to say the least.

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Lost are only those, who abandon themselves) Hans-Ulrich Rudel.

that was an interesting story.what i dont get though is the story makes it seem like one man single handedly killed 2000 men.Is that part fiction?Besides that it was really interesting to read.

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adam ressue

Hello Memphisbelleboy & welcome to the Forums !

Good point - I think total US casulties at Omaha that day were around 3,000? What we have here is a classic case of where elements of a veteran's first-hand account have to be 'taken with a pinch of salt', or treated with caution.

Severloh for sure was there, and he was one of the MG42 gunners causing the mayhem seen so unforgettably in 'Saving Private Ryan'. To quote from Carell : -

'Hein Severloh, a lad of twenty-one, was no passionate soldier. He was a farmer. He was the company commander's batman. But now he had to fire a gun. And he fired. The first burst streaked from the muzzle - catching the first wave of Americans....spraying them from end to end '

Who knows if he killed 20, 200, 2000.....? In the shock and excitement of frenzied action, and - maybe - the later regret in reflection, Severloh is convinced that he is responsible for 2,000 deaths.

As a further example, one of the greatest WWI memoirs is Robert Graves 'Goodbye To All That'. Many of the vivid incidents in the book have been 'proved' to be imagined or exaggerated. But, as critics say, that's how Graves felt - that's how the event appeared to him. . exact, precise 'truth' - that's for historians to argue about!

[ 21 July 2002, 02:20 AM: Message edited by: Martin Bull ]

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"Stand by to pull me out of the seat if I get hit" - Guy Gibson

Welcome, Memphis Belle! I hope you enjoy yourself here and we hope to see you around oftenly.

I also do not believe that just one man was responsible of thr 66.666666666666% of the casualties in Omaha beach...

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

B-24's at Omaha Beach ? Ah, wait a minute here....B-26's yes, but 4 engine bombers.....hmmmmmmm

E

That show us the quality of research the two guys did... (I copied it textually)

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Correction on my part.....

yes B-24/B-17 formations dropped over 3200 tons of bombs on the opening day on the beaches. Also over 1500 tons inland and in the area of Caen.

E

Damned , Erich, you confusse me more than I am already!!!

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun