By David Fleet
Editor
In the early morning hours of Dec. 16, 1944, Roy Stacey, a U.S. Army Tech. fourth grade with the134th AAA gun battalion on duty in Bullingen, Belgium was awoken by the sound of enemy shells passing over his head.
‘At midnight on the 16th we got word to move out. We marched at 3 a.m.,? said Stacey. ‘At the time we did’nt realize the extent of the attack from the Germans comming toward us– but we knew it was not a great situation.?
Twenty-year old Stacey was unaware the mid-December commotion was the early hours of the Battle of the Bulge, the final major battle before the conclusion of WWII.
Following the allied invasion of France in June 1944, troops were pushing across Europe toward Germany with general success. However, just nine days before Christmas during one of the coldest and snowiest winters in history, three powerful German armies turned on allied troops entrenched in the forested Ardennes region of eastern Belgium and northern Luxembourg. Before it was completed more than 1 million troops–500,000 German, 600,000 Americans and 55,000 British would engage in the worst battles–in terms of losses to the American forces in WWII.
Stacey’s trek to the frozen Belgium countryside in the teeth of the Nazi resurgence started nearly two years earlier in the small northern Lapeer County village of North Branch.
Born in 1924, Stacey graduated from North Branch High School in 1942. He was drafted into the US Army in April 1943 and sent to Fort Custer near Battle Creek. He was trained on 90 mm antiaircraft guns in several locations including: Camp Wallace, Texas, Fort Sheridan, Ill., and Ft. Bliss, Texas. His unit also practiced in remote areas of Louisiana.
During the summer of 1944 Stacey boarded a troop ship in Boston Harbor bound for Glasgow, Scotland and the war in Europe.
‘We were part of a big convoy of about 50 ships. Distoryers ships went along with us across the Atlantic. A troop ship is a lousy place to be–there’s a lot of sea sickness. You’ll be eating and someone will throw up on you. The troops are all packed in this ship, bunks are stacked four high.?
In Europe, Stacey’s battalion moved from Scotland to Folkstone, England on the English Channel. In early September 1944 his group then headed across France to Bullingen, Belgium with the allied troops heading toward Germany.
The relatively quiet march across Europe for Stacey and other troops ended on the bitter cold December morning.
‘We retreated several miles back from Bullingen to Eupen, Belgium. During the retreat we past thousands of infantry along the road. It was very cold. The region was a desolate area like northern Michigan lots of scrub brush, forests and many small villages.?
‘As soon as the battle started it seemed to snow everyday. It was absolutely miserable, we did not have galoshes–just shoes. You would get wet–a lot of men suffered from frostbite. There was mass confusion and a great deal of anxiety–you could hear machine guns firing all the time.?
Gun batteries from Stacey’s gun battalion stayed in contact with the Germans and used their 90 mm guns for shooting at Nazi tanks and field artillery. The headquarters and Stacey moved back to an abandon school house in Eupen.
‘I was very fortunate to have a place to stay–men were freezing to death out there. It was very overcast. The weather added to the problem–no allied planes could get into the area of the battle. Supplies, including food and ammunition were running very low.?
‘But on Christmas morning the skies cleared after weeks of clouds and all of a sudden waves of allied planes starting flying over–we now had some hope. It was a good sight to see. Your spirits really picked up when all those planes came over.?
The battle ended on Jan. 25, 1945 and Stacey would return home to North Branch in January 1946. He would enroll at Michigan State College and study school administration and education. In 1951 Stacey was hired by the Goodrich School District as a social studies teacher. Two years later he became high school principal where he served for 23 years. He also was middle school principal for 10 years until his retirement in 1986.