thedrifter
11-05-08, 03:11 PM
Remembering The Armistice, Through The Eyes Of A Harwich Marine
by Alan Pollock
HARWICH — It was 90 years ago Tuesday that the Armistice was signed, bringing the Great War to an end. For Pvt. Ove Mortensen, a young U.S. Marine who survived the ordeal and went on to live a long, peaceful civilian life in Harwich Port, it was unlike any experience he had before. But for years, Ove kept his wartime experiences a secret, revealing only to his wife that he was still beset by nightmares decades later.
It was Ove’s grandson, Mark Mortensen, who recently took an interest in his grandfather’s past. A North Carolina resident, Mark traveled to Winchester, Mass., to research his grandfather’s career as a talented high school basketball player. Mark said he asked the librarian for some of the old basketball scores from the local paper, “and she said, gee, we have a letter here that he sent back from France.”
And so Mark started researching his grandfather’s career as a Marine. Ove was born in Denmark in 1890 and came to the U.S. at an early age; when war broke out, he enlisted in the Marines at age 28, and gained a reputation as a skilled sharpshooter. He ended up in the historic 1st Battalion, 4th Brigade, 2nd Division. Before he signed on, his unit had earned distinction in the defensive battle of Belleau Wood.
In just his second battle, Ove found himself in the Meuse Argonne battle of Blanc Mont, when the U.S. Marines were under the control of the French. Oct. 4, 1918, saw a bitter, bloody battle; Ove’s company started with seven officers and 250 men, and when the fighting was done, it was reduced to one officer and 22 men.
By Nov. 10, the day before the Armistice was signed, the Germans destroyed the bridges crossing the Meuse River, and American engineers built a temporary pontoon bridge. At 10:30 p.m., the American offensive began, with devastating results.
“I saw a photo of the footbridge. It was only two or three planks wide,” Mark said. Though river fog kept the bridge obscured, it couldn’t protect the Marines from withering enemy fire.
“They knew where the bridges were, and they raked them with machine guns,” Mark said. The American losses were staggering, and all the more difficult to imagine, since they took place just hours before the end of the war. “They really didn’t need to cross,” Mark Mortensen said.
The Americans crossed the river and continued to push east early in the day on Nov. 11, 1918, led by Ove’s 66th Company. When 11 a.m. came, the time that the war officially ended, Ove’s unit hadn’t received any notification through the chain of command. His unit observed a group of German soldiers in one village with no rifles or helmets, but opted not to attack.
“They didn’t learn about the Armistice until two-and-a-half hours after,” Mortensen said.
Mortensen has researched the Meuse River battle carefully, examining accounts posted on the Internet and information compiled by author George B. Clark in his book, “Devil Dogs.” Pointless as it was, the violence continued on the day that the peace was signed, owing partly to poor communication and partly to over-zealous field commanders. Ove’s reconstituted company alone lost 27 men on Nov. 11. Public outrage over the senseless fighting prompted Congressional hearings back in the states after the war, but the damage had already been done.
Remarkably, Ove had emerged from the war completely uninjured, with only a bad case of sore feet from ill-fitting boots.
Ove and the rest of the Marines stayed in Europe to ensure that the peace lasted through the Treaty of Versailles, and in the summer of 1919, he and the rest of his unit sailed home. On Aug. 8, they marched in a victory parade in New York City, and four days later, they marched down Pennsylvania Avenue to receive the thanks of President Woodrow Wilson.
Martha Mortensen Asendorf of Falmouth, Ove’s granddaughter, remembers her grandfather as a quiet man, fond of gardening and fishing, and devoted to his wife, Jeannette. Except for the occasional levity when he’d break out his violin and tell jokes like Victor Borge, Ove was reserved, and content with life’s simple pleasures. Ove and Jeannette spent many happy years at their home on Doane Road, and Ove was a fixture at the filling station down the street, and at the grocery store in Harwich Port, where he worked in the produce department.
Though he never spoke about the war, it wasn’t the sort of challenge her grandfather would’ve shied away from, Martha said.
“Being a child of immigrants, I think he didn’t expect life to be easy,” she said. “He was always grateful for being in this country. They were really big about putting the flag out every morning in front of their house,” she said.
11/6/08
Ellie
by Alan Pollock
HARWICH — It was 90 years ago Tuesday that the Armistice was signed, bringing the Great War to an end. For Pvt. Ove Mortensen, a young U.S. Marine who survived the ordeal and went on to live a long, peaceful civilian life in Harwich Port, it was unlike any experience he had before. But for years, Ove kept his wartime experiences a secret, revealing only to his wife that he was still beset by nightmares decades later.
It was Ove’s grandson, Mark Mortensen, who recently took an interest in his grandfather’s past. A North Carolina resident, Mark traveled to Winchester, Mass., to research his grandfather’s career as a talented high school basketball player. Mark said he asked the librarian for some of the old basketball scores from the local paper, “and she said, gee, we have a letter here that he sent back from France.”
And so Mark started researching his grandfather’s career as a Marine. Ove was born in Denmark in 1890 and came to the U.S. at an early age; when war broke out, he enlisted in the Marines at age 28, and gained a reputation as a skilled sharpshooter. He ended up in the historic 1st Battalion, 4th Brigade, 2nd Division. Before he signed on, his unit had earned distinction in the defensive battle of Belleau Wood.
In just his second battle, Ove found himself in the Meuse Argonne battle of Blanc Mont, when the U.S. Marines were under the control of the French. Oct. 4, 1918, saw a bitter, bloody battle; Ove’s company started with seven officers and 250 men, and when the fighting was done, it was reduced to one officer and 22 men.
By Nov. 10, the day before the Armistice was signed, the Germans destroyed the bridges crossing the Meuse River, and American engineers built a temporary pontoon bridge. At 10:30 p.m., the American offensive began, with devastating results.
“I saw a photo of the footbridge. It was only two or three planks wide,” Mark said. Though river fog kept the bridge obscured, it couldn’t protect the Marines from withering enemy fire.
“They knew where the bridges were, and they raked them with machine guns,” Mark said. The American losses were staggering, and all the more difficult to imagine, since they took place just hours before the end of the war. “They really didn’t need to cross,” Mark Mortensen said.
The Americans crossed the river and continued to push east early in the day on Nov. 11, 1918, led by Ove’s 66th Company. When 11 a.m. came, the time that the war officially ended, Ove’s unit hadn’t received any notification through the chain of command. His unit observed a group of German soldiers in one village with no rifles or helmets, but opted not to attack.
“They didn’t learn about the Armistice until two-and-a-half hours after,” Mortensen said.
Mortensen has researched the Meuse River battle carefully, examining accounts posted on the Internet and information compiled by author George B. Clark in his book, “Devil Dogs.” Pointless as it was, the violence continued on the day that the peace was signed, owing partly to poor communication and partly to over-zealous field commanders. Ove’s reconstituted company alone lost 27 men on Nov. 11. Public outrage over the senseless fighting prompted Congressional hearings back in the states after the war, but the damage had already been done.
Remarkably, Ove had emerged from the war completely uninjured, with only a bad case of sore feet from ill-fitting boots.
Ove and the rest of the Marines stayed in Europe to ensure that the peace lasted through the Treaty of Versailles, and in the summer of 1919, he and the rest of his unit sailed home. On Aug. 8, they marched in a victory parade in New York City, and four days later, they marched down Pennsylvania Avenue to receive the thanks of President Woodrow Wilson.
Martha Mortensen Asendorf of Falmouth, Ove’s granddaughter, remembers her grandfather as a quiet man, fond of gardening and fishing, and devoted to his wife, Jeannette. Except for the occasional levity when he’d break out his violin and tell jokes like Victor Borge, Ove was reserved, and content with life’s simple pleasures. Ove and Jeannette spent many happy years at their home on Doane Road, and Ove was a fixture at the filling station down the street, and at the grocery store in Harwich Port, where he worked in the produce department.
Though he never spoke about the war, it wasn’t the sort of challenge her grandfather would’ve shied away from, Martha said.
“Being a child of immigrants, I think he didn’t expect life to be easy,” she said. “He was always grateful for being in this country. They were really big about putting the flag out every morning in front of their house,” she said.
11/6/08
Ellie