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In The Great War you sometimes had to go over the top even when you knew you wouldn't make it back because some idiot of a officer would blow their whistle. Usualy some over confident luitenant. Even a general's plan of a breakthrough that would end the war usualy wound up getting many men killed. But twenty five years later the same thing could happen even if you did all the things right. That is the lesson us men in platoon 5 found out the hard way. Our captain, a short, balding man with bars on his shoulder straps was a pompous man who thought he knew everything. He only cared about himself and got his ripe deserves when we were ordered to take out an entrenched german town in north France by the name of Freznosaire. The entire city was surrounded by trenches, Mg-42s, panzers and 88s. We and eight other platoons in ours and one other company were going to slear them out.
It started a normal routine, working our way through the hedgerows untill we were just outside town, our tanks began shelling the buildings as well as artillery when over head came this god awful roar. We didn't have time to realize it was the sound of dive-bombers, or asskickers as we called them. I was standing by a tank when it was hit square with a bomb, my hearing is still not the same. I was lucky, all the explosion did was throw me and deafen me. One GI was cut in half by a piece of armor plating flying through the air. We saw him laying there, looking like a gutted pig before we pushed through a line of hedge. We had to plant TNT to get through, and when we did we were ripped apart by sandbagged machine guns. A panzer from the german side of the battle hit a large old birch tree, effectively blocking the entrance. A couple sherman tanks were able to push it forward so we could hide behind it. The captain was screaming at us to be real men and run ahead when he tripped and was run over by an advancing stuart. We supposed it was justice, but we didn't have time to think about it later. Being the only sergeant left in my platoon, I had command.
My first order was for the men with garands to open up on the MGs. While they were busy doing that I made my way over to a sherman, a tank with a strong main turret and heavy cannon. The comander stuck his head out to hear what I said. "We need help heah, we can't advance through these damn machine guns and 88s, mind taking out a few MGs?" My southern drawl seemed to have a few problems here and there, but when he spoke I understood why. "Well, I'll try, stay where you ah, sos you don't get hoit." His boston accent nearly swallowed the vowels my own voice drawled out.
I had to leap clear just to not get run over like the captain. I yelled for my men to keep their heads down. I barely had time to scurry behind the tree when the sherman and a few other tanks opened up on the machine guns that were giving us so much hell. 88s were not the only problems for the tanks. Mines, mortars and fanatics with grenades and satchel charges and bottles of gasoline caused serious trouble for the tank crews. My men gave them severe suppressive fire when we saw a man with a grenade or a mortar. We crushed over the trneches, firing openly at any germans we saw. Once or twice I saw a man step on a mine or get hit by a mortar.
The city was heavily ravaged from the germans and our own artillery and tanks. Once or twice I was thrown around by mortars or artillery.
I stepped around a corner and found myself staring face first into the barrel of a panzer II tank. I don't even remember unpinning a grenade or even throwing it inside an open hatch before i was laying against a wall, blood running from my lips.
During the 1918 influenza epidemic my teeth were damaged by the disease. They eseentualy rotted in my head, so I ended up having two complete sets of false teeth set into my gums.
When my mind cleared I reached into my mouth to make sure the plates weren't damaged. In the fall i had bitten my lip, so my mouth was full of the iron taste of blood. The heavy weight of my thompson was reassuring as I staggered to my feet. About that time my squad, consisting of eight men came running up. The medic checked me over and told me I was alright. After a few seconds of trying to catch my breathe an anti tank round ripped through a wall and into a soldier's steel pot. His head looked like a shattered watermelon, and alot less mouth watering as well. We didn't have time to mourn since we were getting shot at by an anti tank artillery piece. Without my order the men began to suppress. I heard some one yelling in german at the end of the street, but ignored it. I grabbed a man who was holding a grease gun and pulled him along, crawling over rubble and through shattered buildings until we were right beside the german artillery crew. I held up three fingers and moved them down till my fist was closed and we both popped through opposite windows and tore through the germans with full automatic sub machine guns. As I stepped out from the building I noticed a stg 44 laying on the ground near my foot. I picked it up, and after a little scrounging I came up with a half dozen clips. The went in with my normal ammo and the gun went across my back. We headed along the street, leaving the empty gun sitting where iut was. Our engineers following along would take care of it.
I had seen mortar fire on training courses and on the beaches of normandy, but never had I seen what a mortar could do to a human being. Several hours after we had taken out the 88, it was about two in the afternoon. We were sitting in an abandoned house, talking about what we would do when we got home. Desomes told us about how he would go back to new york and return to making pizzas. Smith would go to california to pick his oranges. Jonesy was a loud, rough swaering bean-pole from somewhere in Chicago. He went on about how he had a long legged, big breasted blonde waiting at home for him, and how she could tie a ribbon with her tongue. We all groaned and rolled our eyes. When it came to my turn I was choked and couldn't speak. "I guess I'll go home to georgia and help my pa make boats again. I...I had a girl I was sweet on back there, but I don't rightly know if she 'members me no more. Likely y'all have as much chance with her as I will." I was going to say more but my speech was cut off by the incoming scream of a 'screaming meemie.' It came down directly against the crumbled wall that Smith and Jonesy were leaning against. Jonesy was down and rolling on the floor, screaming about how his leg hurt and how he hoped he still had his balls. "Smith, shut him up, you're the medic!" Smith nodded and The rest of us, the ones who weren't too inclined to talk, ran out through the wall and door towards where the mortar had come from.
Diving into fox holes and hiding behind burnt out tanks was how we moved along the crumbled street. One team would stand up and cover the other. When we were about three hundred yards from Jonesy and Smith we ran into the mortar team. One of them was holding the tube braced against his him and dropping the shells down the barrel; sending them straight towards us. Somebody got off a lucky shot that hit the tube, ricocheting inside and blowing him and the other jerries straight to hell. We went back to the house we were in only to find Smith sitting outside, puffing away at a cigarrette. I bumbed one off him and leaned in for a light. He told me that the femeral artery was severed and that Jonesy was bleeding to dead. He had clamped the artery but he was going to die anyway. So it was up to me to calm him and give him last rights.
"Hey Jones, how y'all feeling'?" I gave him a forced smile and a pat of the shoulder. 'Well, i'm not feeling to swell...it's cold in here...am I gonna make it home?" When I looked at him I saw tears in his eyes. "You're gonna be alright, promise." He nodded and I went back otuside, holding a death letter he wanted sent to a woman named barbara who live in chicago. "Let's get moving." And I stuffed it into my duffel, slammed a new mag into the receiver and cocked the action.

The action we saw earlier in the day was just the beginning......my name is Sergeant John Hollis.

Um...please try to make your criticism constructive. If you think it is too long...say so. If you just don't wanna read it. Then don't.


Now as for criticism....Very nice piece...yeah...I have to agree it is kinda intimidating to read...but once you start you are glad you are reading it. Other than a few spelling errors it is good. 3nodding

I'm not quite sure how to write a critique, so I'm just going to do my best at a short one. Is this just a stand-alone piece, or were you thinking of this as a possible intro to a story/book or something? That alone will change what I say in this critique.

You have a lot of technical knowledge of what weapons/artillery is being used - very impressive. Remember, though, that your audience doesn't necessarily have that luxury. If this is supposed to be part of a larger work, you may want to describe more what the weapons are.

You have a very gritty way of writing - sort of unpolished, and that kind of matches the piece. One thought with the flow, though. If you're going to be writing this from one person's point of view, it should be written as if he's thinking/dictating it. When he actually speaks, his words are MUCH different from how the rest of the piece is written. I'd either change it into 3rd person ABOUT him, or change some of the wording to make it sound more like him.

This would be a great short story with some additions, elaborations, and minor technical changes. I really liked it - it was well-ordered, fast-paced, and kept the reader off-balance). It just needs polishing. smile Nice work!

Whoops, sorry! Didn't see you had asked me a question in your response. I just did a quick re-read of the piece, and I think I meant that when he speaks, there's no grammar errors (for the most part). I'm not mocking you for errors in the rest of the story, so don't think that; I'm just saying that in the rest of the story, there's some unpolished edges and grammar errors that seem as if they should translate into his speech pattern. He speaks like a polished southern gentlemen, but the rest of the writing seems like he's more of an uneducated type (not uneducated in the "sit on my porch and shoot people who walk by" kind of uneducated, mind. More of the "didn't finish high school and enrolled in the army early" type of uneducated.). So if I were going to change something, I'd either polish up the whole story (hard way) or simply throw in a few grammar errors/southern dialectic words (easy way) to make it flow a little better. Also, if you say he speaks in a southern accent, you don't need to spell "heah" wrong. If you don't spell it "heah" in the rest of the story, then don't spell it "heah" in the dialogue.

Again, I'm not trying to be mean or harsh. sweatdrop I'm just trying to help with minor changes.

So you're an omniscient narrator (I love that term biggrin )and not the main character we're following in the story? That would work well for a story like this except for the fact that you use the word "I" in the normal story flow. If you are the narrator, then the word "I" would not occur in reference to a character unless the character was thinking or saying it.