FREDERICKTOWN — Harold Bechtel, 91, is a highly decorated World War II veteran who participated in the invasions of North Africa, Sicily and Normandy.
Bechtel, born May 13, 1915, has been a lifelong resident of Knox County in the Ankenytown-North Liberty area. He attended Morgan School on Mishey Road through the eighth grade, and then, with a work permit, left school to begin work on the family farm.
Bechtel was drafted at age 26, on Dec. 10, 1941, three days after Pearl Harbor.
“There were about 25 of us from the county who went to Fort Hayes in Columbus for processing and then they sent us to Ft. Bragg, N.C., for basic training,” Bechtel said. “The late Emmett Lybarger was one of the group and we left here at the same time and came back at the same time. After basic in the spring of 1942 they sent us to the 1st Infantry Division at Camp Blanding in Florida. I was assigned to the 7th Field Artillery Battalion.”
After a couple of months, his unit went to Georgia on maneuvers, and following those, went via train to Indiantown Gap, Pa. According to Bechtel, the unit’s equipment went on to New York for shipment overseas. The troops went to New York, boarded the Queen Mary and set sail for Scotland. According to Bechtel, the whole division was aboard the ship and the trip took 3 1/2 days. Because of the number of troops, they alternated days sleeping in a bunk or on the floor.
The unit was there from August to November of 1942. When they left, the troops loaded aboard ship and joined other ships out at sea. That fleet then headed south down into the Mediterranean Sea, and on Nov. 8 landed in Oran, Algeria, where Bechtel participated in the North African Campaign.
The unit had in inauspicious start as it was thrown into the Kasserine Pass battle, where it was beaten back by Rommel’s German Forces. However, the troops reorganized and the 1st Inf. Div., with Bechtel’s 7th FA Bn, proceeded to drive Rommel out of Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco. The 7th FA Bn’s motto was “Never broken by hardship or battle.”
In July 1943 Bechtel’s unit left North Africa to participate in the invasion of Sicily, coming ashore at Gela. From July to October the unit battled its way up the steep cliffs to Troina at the base on Mount Etna. Bechtel’s unit left Sicily in October via ships and went to Liverpool, England, where it reorganized and prepared for the invasion of Europe at Normandy.
“We were at Maiden Newton, about 17 miles north of Weymouth, along a railroad line, for about five months,” Bechtel said. “During our training we had a full-dress invasion rehearsal at Slapton Sands in southwest England. We found out after the practice that a German submarine had sunk one of the ships and we lost around 700 to 800 men.”
Bechtel and the 7th FA Bn, as a part of the 16th Infantry Regimental Combat Team, 1st Inf. Div., waded ashore with the first wave at Omaha Beach on D-day. Bechtel was in a forward observer team for Battery B, Company E of the 7th. Second Lt. Lawrence Johnson Jr. was Bechtel’s FO team commander, and was a replacement for his previous FO team commander, Lt. Dut from Columbus, who was killed during action in Sicily. Bechtel’s FO team observed for the first artillery fire mission on Normandy at about 4:15 p.m. on D-day, June 6, 1944. During the 39-day battle of Omaha Beach, the 7th had 609 fire missions, expending 13,662 rounds of artillery ammunition, according to the unit history written by Robert F. Gallivan.
“During the invasion we came ashore unscathed,” Bechtel said. “Emmett Lybarger, who was in another battery of the 7th at that time, had to wade ashore empty-handed when his landing craft was sunk and all the equipment lost. He made it, though.”
Bechtel and his unit fought their way through the hedgerows from Normandy to Germany, and finally to Victory in Europe Day in Czechoslovakia. In November 1944 Bechtel received a battlefield commission, going from the rank of Staff Sgt. to Second Lt. On Jan. 1, 1945, he was promoted to 1st Lt.
Bechtel was highly decorated for his Word War II service, receiving the Silver Star Medal for his actions in Sicily, a Bronze Star Medal, the European-Africa-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal with three Battle stars and the Bronze Arrowhead, and the French Croix de Guerre Citation.
Bechtel, however, can be categorized as a reluctant hero, preferring to refer to himself as having been lucky rather than heroic. He cited as examples of being lucky such events as coming through the war unscathed while others very close by him were killed.
In Sicily, for example, as he and others were making their way through a wadi, one of the soldiers in front tripped a “Bouncing Betty” mine that fortunately popped up about three feet in the air as designed, but didn’t detonate. When everyone in the group threw themselves to the ground when the mine popped up, his officer, Lt. Dut, who was about 10 feet in front of Bechtel, landed on top of another mine and was killed. Bechtel assumed command, regrouped the men, and led them out of the minefield and safely back to rejoin the rest of the battery. He later learned those actions resulted in his being awarded the Silver Star.
In another example, another FO next to him was killed by a sniper who fled the scene after the one shot. Bechtel noted he just as easily could have been the target the sniper picked out.
A major example he cited was the fact that at one point in Europe his unit had been on the front lines for over 30 days and was ordered back to the rear echelon to rest and recuperate. They were pulled back the day before the German tanks counterattacked at the Battle of the Bulge. Two days later Bechtel and his battery were back on the front lines.
Following the end of the war in 1945, Bechtel returned to the United States and was discharged at Indiantown Gap Military Reservation, Pa., on Nov. 3, 1945. From there he returned to the family farm in Knox County.
He married Genevieve Butcher on Sept. 1, 1946, in the Brandon Methodist Church, and this year they celebrated their 60th anniversary. Bechtel was a Pike Township Trustee for about 25 years and has served as a former supervisor for the Knox Soil & Water Conservation District.
The Bechtels reside at 16056 Mishey Road in Pike Township.