Читать книгу Remembering D-day: Personal Histories of Everyday Heroes - Martin Bowman - Страница 76

German soldier who commanded a patrol of ten men, cut the parachute lines with his pocket knife to release Private John ‘Buck’ Steele, F Company, 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division, so he could be taken captive.

‘On the evening of 5 June my friends and I were enjoying ourselves trying to break a cycle speed record around the church at Ste-Mère-Eglise, just to kill time. At 10 p.m. I resumed my post in the steeple – a telephone at my side. Around midnight (2 a.m. British time) I heard planes passing overhead and saw “objects” falling from the sky. During this period a house began to burn. It was the light from this fire that made it possible for me to see hundreds of parachutes falling from the sky as the airplane motors droned on. They fell on the roofs, in the streets and even in the trees of the church square. The sky was studded with parachutes.

‘Suddenly everything in the steeple became dark. Through an opening I saw that a parachutist had fallen on the steeple, hanging by the ropes. He appeared to be dead, but after a moment I heard his voice. There were two of us on duty at the post, and my companion wanted to shoot him. “Are you crazy?” I said. “If you shoot we’ll be discovered.”’