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Trek North

The 129th AAA Gun Battalion (Mobile) were sent nearly 250 miles north and well beyond six hours on the road to Chapet, a suburb west of Paris, the city which had been liberated by French and American forces only six days before. As the German forces had fled eastward, Chapet was occupied by the Allies with no resistance. The battalion set up for anti-aircraft defense, but saw no action, and was even able to visit the Paris during this time.


A glimpse of Chapet, France.

A farm field in Chapet where the 129th AAA Gun Battalion likely set up and bivouacked for nine days, apparently seeing no action here, either.

Valenciennes city center.

The liberation of Belgium was conducted primarily by the UK and Canadian allied forces, who came up through France as well as from the sea after capturing the port at Antwerp. The liberation was swift, the operation beginning 2 SEP 1944, and the Belgian government returning to power on 8 SEP. (The complete liberation, however, was not achieved until 4 FEB 1945, when the last German troops fled into Germany from Krewinkel, Belgium.)

From Valenciennes, Dad's unit was sent to Sint-Truiden, Belgium. The diary doesn't mention any action there, instead indicating they had moved on to Oupeye on 14 SEP 1944. The Allies captured the airfield in Sint-Truiden from German forces on 15 SEP 1944. As Oupeye is a short drive from Sint-Truiden, I would have assume the 129th AAA had provided some kind of support, but they saw no action there, either.

Sint-Truiden, Belgium

Oupeye, Belgium

A randomly chosen, potential site for an anti-aircraft battalion set-up in Oupeye, Belgium.

Maastricht

A mere 25 miles from Aachen, Germany, the city of Maastricht, in the Netherlands, was home to the 129th for six weeks during autumn of 1944. The battle for Aachen had begun around 12 SEP 1944, and the 129th was called to provide support for the advancing troops. Germany shifted their V-1 and V-2 attacks from London and the south of England to the port of Antwerp, Belgium, which had been seized in late August, as well as Maastricht. The V-1, basically a huge bomb with a pulse-jet engine and wings strapped to it, flew very loudly and had a fairly short range but with a tremendous impact when it fell to the ground, was relatively easy for AAA units to shoot down. The V-2 was the world's first ballistic missile, which was supersonic, highly accurate for its time, and nearly impossible to defend against as the Allies hadn't developed technology to fight it. The V-1 and V-2 were finally silenced by Allied forces overrunning the launch sites and manufacturing facilities from late 1944 through spring of 1945, only one month before Berlin fell.

The Battle of Aachen