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Jan 25th Journal Entry-Official end of the Battle of the Bulge


Jan 25 Stayed in-cleaned up.



Cliff Hope: The official end of the Battle of the Bulge was 25 January, the day when the American lines were restored to approximately the same position they were on 16 December. Of course, we didn't know this at the time. Our party didn't go out, so I chopped wood, washed and shaved for the first time in three days, bringing water from the pump at the mess hall about a quarter of a mile away. Spots in front of my eyes, probably from the snow, made reading impossible. The man and woman in the house where we stayed said the Germans stole all their food, looted their household possessions, and burned what they didn't take. They also killed good livestock and shipped it to Germany. From various reports, this apparently occurred everywhere in the Bulge as a matter of policy.


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