Sgt. Robert Wenke. Company M

"Back from eighteen months overseas in the ETO with the famous 35th Infantry Division- Pres. Truman's old outfit- is Sgt. Bob Wenke, 1393 Kearney Ave. His division landed shortly after D-Day in Normandy to relieve the 29th Division and soon after the 35th smashed the Nazis at St. Lo in the crucial battle of Normandy. Right after that fight, Bob was wounded by shrapnel fragments from German guns and he was awarded his first Purple Heart Medal. Then the 35th hooked up with Patton's Third Army and it held down the left flank of "Blood and Guts" drive through France and into Germany. Nancy, the big French city on the French and Belgian border was liberated by the 35th on its drive. From there, this division battled across the northern part of Belgium and into Holland. When the heroic 101st Airborne Division was beseiged at Bastonge during the fearful days of the powerful German drive into the American lines last December, the 35th was rushed up by Patton to relieve the embattled 101st Airborne that held its positions despite the terrific pounding the Germans gave them. The 35th broke through the Nazis and lifted the seige of Bastonge. It was in this battle that Bob was again hit by shrapnel and he was awarded an oak leaf cluster to his Purple Heart. After Bastonge his outfit was assigned to the Ninth Army and it then drove to the Rhine River. Here the Ninth anf Fifteenth Armies joined forces and they battered the Germans back to the Elbe River where they stopped to await the Russian drive coming from the East. After a well-earned Thirty-day furlough, Bob reports to Fort Dix and expects a discharge."