He prayed often for the war to end, so he could go home to his wife, whom he married just days before he was drafted. My sergeant used to say I prayed with my Rosary so much that I had to dip it into a canteen to cool it off. When he reached the beachead, Adler was amazed by what he saw. He saw what remained of the pillboxes, the barbed wire, the obstacles sticking up from the ground. These poor son of guns that went in.
Nobody can believe what a sacrifice it was.
Allied troops picked through the bodies, sorting them out according to nationality. The dead U.S. soldiers were wrapped in canvas bags, with their dog tags hung on the outside. No one in the world realized how many died. There were 22,000 Allied soldiers killed in the first three days. It was the most critical battle of the war.