Vossenack

146th Combat Engineer Battalion recipients of Bronze Star awards received for meritorious achievements against the enemy  during 6th - 11th November 1944  ( Vossenack ).  Note :  Front left.   Engineer wearing  the famous   rubber mud boots  that the Germans  nicknamed the 146th Engineers fighting as infantry  in Vossenack with ' The Boot Battalion Commandos.
146th  Engineer recipients of Bronze Star awards received for meritorious achievements against the enemy during  November 1944 .  Left to Right .  Lt. Col. Carl  J. Isley  Battalion C.O.   Captain John K. Howard. C.O. B.  Major  Willard B. Baker . S-3 

The 146th became known as the 'Boot Battalion Commandos' from there adversaries as the engineers were still wearing rubber boots and raincoats that they were in while doing road repairs no time to do anything else  but grab their rifles and head to the frontline in a town called Vossenack.

Three Engineers from Company C.  146th Combat Engineer Combat Battalion   spent the night on the second floor at the west end of Vossenack church while a number of Germans occupied the east end.   Grenades were tossed by both sides,  Edward L. Bishop was killed.    Following day at the steps to the  front door of the church  several Engineers including an Officer noticed  a radio operator in an American uniform  smoking  American cigarettes,  they come to find out they had no radio operator in that location,  turned out he was a German Soldier  in G.I. uniform after being captured.  The 146th Engineers cleared out the eastern end of Vossenack  on the 7th November  at the cost of 150 enemy casualties.  For their action in Vossenack  the 146th Engineer Battalion received a citation from  General Norman D. Cota.  the Commander of the 28th Infantry Division.