The Hardin tribune-herald. [volume] (Hardin, Mont.) 1925-1973, 1944-11-09

line infantryman. It's harder on
man at that age.
AS Clayton himself says, 'Wher
you pass that 30 mark you begin t.
slow up a little"
It's harder for you to take thu
hard ground and the rain and thu
sleeplessness and the unendinl
wracking of it all. And yet at 8
he elected to go back.
The ways of an invasion turned
out to be all very new to Tommy
Clayton.
1t was new to thousands Of other:
also. for they hadn't been trained
in hedgerow fighting. So they hac
to learn it the way a dog learns t.
swim. They learned.
This Tommy Clayton, the mild
est of men, has killed four of the
enemy for sure. and probably doz
ems of Unseen ones. He wears ar
expert rifleman's badge and soon
will have the proud badge Of com
bat infantryman. worn only by those
who have been through the mill.
Three Of his four victims he
got in n long blast of his
Browning automatic rife. He
was stationed in the bushes at
a bend in a gravel road, cover
ing a crossroad about so yards
ahead of him.
Suddenly three German SOL
diers came out a side road and
foolishly stopped to talk right in
the middle of the crossroads.
The B. A. R. has 20 bullets in a
clip. Clayton held her down for
the whole clip. The three Ger
man. went down, never to get
up.
His fourth one he thought was a
Jap when he killed him. In the early
days of the invasion lots of soldiers
thought they were fighting Japs,
scattered in with the German
troops. They were actually Mon
golian Russians. with strong Orien'
tai features. who resembled Japs tc
the untraveled Americans.
On this fourth killing, Clayton was
covering an infantry squad as il
worked forward along a hedgerow
There were snipers in the trees If
front. Clayton spotted one anc
sprayed the tree with his automatic
rifle, and out tumbled this man hi
thought was a Jap.
To show how little anyone who
hasn't been through war can know
about lido you want to know how
Clayton located his sniper?
Here's how
When a bullet passes smack over
your head it doesn't zing; it pops
he same as a rifle when it goes off.
That's because the bullets rapic
passage creates a vacuum behind it
and the air rushes back with such
force to fill this vacuum that il
collides with itself, and makes a re,
sounding pop"
Clayton didn't know what caused
this, and I tried to explain.
You know what a vacuum is"
said. I'VE learned that in high
school,"
And Tommy said, Ernie, I never
went past the third grade"
But Tommy is intelligent and his
sensitivities are fine. You don't have
to know the reasons in war, yol
only have to know what things indi
cate when they happen.
Well, Clayton had learned that
the pop of a bullet over his head
preceded the actual rifle report
by a fraction of a second, be-
the sound of the rifle ex-
plosion had to travel some dis
lance before hitting his ear. So
the pop" became his warning
signal to listen for the crack of
sniper's rife a moment later.
Through much practice he hac
learned to gauge the direction of the
sound almost exactly. And so out O
this animal-like system Of hunting
he had the knowledge to shoot int
the right tree-and out tumbled hi.
Jap sniper.
In a long drive an infantry com
pany may go for a couple of day!
without letting up. Ammunition i.
carried up to it by hand, and occa
sionally by jeep. The soldiers some
times eat only n X ration a day
They may run clear out of water
Their strength is gradually whitfield
down by wounds. exhaustion case!
and struggling.
Finally they will get an order t,
sit where they are and dig in.