Battle of the Bulge Law
January 3rd, 2025 by admin
25 December 1944
In the frigid winter of 1944, when the outcome of WWII was still far from certain, the Allied forces were in the battle of their lives. They were making their way toward Berlin to end the devastating WWII in the European Theatre. The German Army surprised the Allied forces in mid-December 1944 in the densely forested Ardennes region between Belgium and Luxembourg. The Allied forces, comprised of soldiers from all parts of our country and elsewhere, were bogged down in the worst winter storm of a generation, completely neutralizing the superior Allied air forces in the last major German offensive on the Western front.
General George Patton, the Allied general in command and a deeply religious man, ordered the chaplain to deliver a prayer for clearer skies. The skies did clear, dramatically, in fact. The superior Allied air power enabled the Allied forces to break the stalemate. Eventually, the Allied forces marched to Berlin by late summer, 1945 and victory in the European Theatre.
It remains one of the most remarkable turns in battle in recorded history.
The press back home gave credit to “Patton’s Prayer,” as it became known. So much so the Allied forces ordered that a reprint of the prayer be given to every soldier who fought in the Battle of the Bulge.
One of those soldiers was Private C C “Buddy “Graham of Floyd, Virginia, my father-in-law. He and his three brothers enlisted in what came to be known by many at the time as The Great War. They served in the European and Pacific-Asian Theatres of WW II. One was shot down over France, and he was a POW in a German prison camp until the end of WW II. But they all survived the war.
Toward the end of the war, the United States Congress passed the first phase of the G I Bill. Over the next five years nine million veterans received financial aid to go to college and to buy a home. Most of them were the first of their generation to go to college or to buy a home. Provided to them by a grateful nation to give a chance to those who gave our nation and democracy a chance.
Like most all the soldiers who fought in that defining battle, Buddy Graham carried his copy of Patton’s Prayer in his wallet for the rest of his life.
Their copy of that prayer kept them close to the challenge of those times. A regular reminder that they made it through. And it kept that sense of gratitude close, that Dame Chance and more gave her sweet smile to their cause in those times of uncertainty.
“Gratitude is the memory of the heart,” says an old proverb which remains fresh when it is applied. It is this profound and humble sense of gratitude which is the indelible marking of the Greatest Generation.
Nearly all those brave soldiers are gone now, eighty years later. Those in the know, and we know, the days of those who still survive are narrowing. The news of the passing of the last one will soon come to us, and their bravery and courage will be forever cast to the silent shore of memory.
Historians, those of science, and the families of most people we know tell us that struggles, hardships, and other challenges often carry with them the markings of character, too. A through line to a life of the heart, spirit, faith, and substance as well. And we are wise to be on the lookout for their residuary but lasting value. As a memory of those who gave us a chance, and as an example of character to give ourselves a chance, too.
An insight, too, maybe, which helps us see more clearly what matters, and what matters most. Those values and experiences which, in time, make us all free, as that enduring song of another great war instructs. How grateful we all should be.
R. Michael Wells
Postscript.
After Buddy Graham passed away, Janet made a copy of her dad’s “Patton’s Prayer.” She gave our children a copy of the Prayer that Christmas, their grandfather’s last gift to them.
RMW
Posted in: WS Journal Articles