Parker's Crossroads / Baraque de Fraiture

 monument, battlefield, road junction

Site of the "Alamo Defense" by the 589th Field Artillery, Maj. Arthur C. Parker III, commanding. Battle of the Bulge, 20 December to 23 December 1944. Elements of the 106th Infantry Division and other American small units versus the 2nd SS Panzer Division.
A World War II vintage 105mm howitzer is now displayed here at Baraque de Fraiture, marking the place where fewer than 400 U.S. troops resisted a German Panzer division for three crucial days during the first phase of the Battle of the Bulge.

Here a skeleton headquarters and a bob-tailed, three gun battery of light howitzers, the forlorn remnant of a once potent 589th Field Artillery Battalion, chugged wearily up to the junction under the command of Major Arthur C. Parker III. The battalion's mission was to organize and defend the crossroads when a great wave of Nazi armor and infantry had cracked the Allied Front, reaching north-westward toward the crossings of the Meuse River and the vital port of Antwerp. A dangerous split between the British and American armies was a real possibility.

For three 105mm howitzers to hold the outpost line is not a conventional assignment for a divisional battery, but they represented all that was left of a 12 gun battalion in direct support to the 422nd Infantry Regiment (of the 106th "Golden Lion" Infantry Division.) Their misfortune was to have been at the point of a great enemy offensive less than one week after arriving from training camps in England.

The Golden Lions had moved directly into foxholes and trenches vacated by the veteran 2nd Infantry Division. The relief went smoothly, but the division commander, Maj. Gen. Alan W. Jones, was concerned about the exposed positions of his regiments and the extreme length of the line they were to occupy (nearly 22 miles.)

Higher headquarters had called it a "Ghost Front" with little or no enemy activity expected, but on 16 December, Hitler's tanks rolled, and the Battle of the Bulge was on.
In a three day nightmare, Jones' division was swamped and broken by powerful armor and infantry thrusts, and two of his three line regiments were surrounded and forced to surrender. The remainder felt lucky to be able to pull back to more defensible lines around St. Vith.

During the withdrawal, the 589th Field Artillery was ambushed and cut off, and most of the battalion, including its commander was captured. Only a handful from Headquarters Battery and the first three howitzers of A Battery escaped.

These were the guns that Major Parker (formerly battalion S3, but by then acting commander) led into position around Baraque de Fraiture. He meant to make a fight of it, a last stand if need be, and his actions later became known in history as the "Alamo Defense."
Although the historical precedent is obvious, this tactic is defined here as the rigid defense of a key position carried out to the utter destruction of the command with the objective of forcing the enemy to expend significant amounts of men, material and especially time, thereby enabling other friendly forces to regroup and fight elsewhere to better advantage. (The fight at the Alamo could, in turn, be called "Thermopylae Defense," in reference to the 300 Spartans in 480 B.C.)

Major Parker's small command was a mixed force. In addition to his own 589th Artillery, he found or was sent some half-tracks with .50 caliber quad mounts, a few Armored Field Artillery observers, a tank destroyer platoon, one parachute infantry rifle squad, a cavalry reconnaissance section and, later one glider borne rifle company - less than 300 soldiers.

Parker realized that he stood on critical terrain. Baraque de Fraiture stands at the crossing of the main north-south road from Bastogne through Houffalize to Liège with a good paved road westward from Vielsalm through La Roche. Moreover, the Liège road was the exact boundary between the flank divisions of two corps, neither one able to hold the road in strength. Loss of the junction would permit the Germans to move in either of three directions to flank or penetrate the First Army line. It would mean disaster for the Allies.
Thus, at about 4:00 p.m. on 20 December, Parker's forces went into position following what he considered to be competent orders from a higher authority to organize a strong-point and fire on approaching enemy forces. Initial supplies of rations, fuel and ammunition had been drawn at Vielsalm. Parker's force seemed ready for action, but after several successful fire missions, Parker was ordered to displace northward to Bra. (The junction's importance also was initially overlooked by both the 3rd Armored and 82nd Airborne Divisions sharing that boundary. Only later, after much action, did it gain its tactical title of "Parker's Crossroads.")

The Major's decision to ignore the order (or, more subtly, to delay until execution became impossible) has come to be seen as action "above and beyond the call of duty."
He seems to have reached the decision alone.

Parker knew what a powerful enemy armored and mechanized infantry force lay four miles west at Samree, for he had laid observed fire on it that morning. More armored noises were approaching up the road from the south, and his supply route through Regne to Vielsalm, some 11 miles east, was bare of support traffic. They were at the end of a very long limb.
The terrain around the crossroads is deceptively flat (though it stands on one of the highest elevations in the Ardennes) with broad open fields of fire in almost all directions, but two large stands of evergreen woods afforded easily infiltrated, concealed routes of approach nearly down to the junction. Once an enemy cut the road north to Manhay only four miles to the rear, the crossroads would become a trap.

Escape on foot through snow would have been extremely difficult and by vehicle on the road an impossibility. Parker meant to stay. On the other hand, the deep snow and trees tended to canalize German movements, and the three howitzers were laid for direct fire down the three roads: the roads to Samree, Houffalize and Vielsalm. Captain Brown had rejoined the battalion at Vielsalm and was put in charge of the guns.

(The present day monument has a 105mm gun in the exact position of Cpl. John Gratens field piece as position by Parker.) The perimeter was dug in, howitzers and machine guns emplaced, mines laid in the road and observers and outposts linked to battalion headquarters in a stone barn about 100 meters from the junction. Not satisfied with this, Parker had gone to the hamlet of Fraiture, about a mile northeast, to request help from the glidermen holding the right (western) flank of the 82nd Airborne's thin line.
He was given one rifle company and none too soon. The enemy were already feeling out his position and were quite aware of its basic weakness. During the next two days, two company sized attacks were repulsed with significant losses while the Germans built up their fuel and forces.

By sunrise on 23 December, parties of Volksgrenadiers had worked around both flanks and threatened the lifeline from Manhay. In the predawn darkness, an enemy patrol had been hit by the quad-50's, its officer and an NCO taken prisoner. They were from the 2nd Panzer Division just coming up from Houffalize, scouting for an attack position. During the previous day's hasty attacks, Maj. Parker had been wounded by mortar shell fragments, lost consciousness and was evacuated. Maj. Elliot Goldstein, the original battalion XO (but actually junior to Parker) took command.

Until the final, coördinated attack of two rifle battalions supported by tanks and preceded by a fierce artillery preparation, the Germans couldn't manage to breach the perimeter.
The Alamo Defense was a splendid success, holding firm for two days.

The over-stretched 82nd Airborne Division stretched some more, swung back and covered the gap. The 3rd Armored Division was given time to form another tank-infantry delaying force just south of Manhay.

Although German armor took Manhay crossroads after a bitter fight, they got no further north. The 4th Panzer Grenadiers had lost heavily, particularly in officers, during the fight for Baraque de Fraiture.

With elements of the Americans' 75th Infantry Division solidly in place before them, the frustrated Germans turned west again in a futile lunge for the Meuse crossings they never came close to reaching.

The 589th was effectively destroyed. A few officers and men fought or slipped through to friendly lines, but the guns, tank destroyers, armored cars and AAA half-tracks were lost. Of the 116 man glider rifle company, only 44 rejoined their parent unit. In June 1945, the battered 106th Division was reconstituted, and Parker returned to command the new 589th.

Summation: On December 19, 1944 a group of about 100 men of the 589th Field Artillery Battalion (106th Infantry Division) under command of Maj. Parker, received reinforcements of several units. They were:
• a few men of 87th Reconnaissance Squadron (7th Armored Division)
• a small outfit of 203rd Anti-Aircraft Artillery AW Battalion (7th Armored Division)
• a few tanks of 3rd Armored Division.
• a few 76mm guns of 643rd Tank-Destroyer Battalion.
• a small outfit of the 509th Parachute Infantry Battalion.
• "F" Company of the 325th Glider Infantry Regiment (82nd Airborne.

From December 20 through December 23, about these 300 men resisted the assault of the German 560th Volksgrenadiere Division and later the German 2nd SS Panzer Division ("Das Reich".)

On 23 December around 5:00 p.m., after a heavy artillery shelling, the 4th Grenadier Regiment overwhelmed the position and forced Americans to surrender. Most of the defenders were taken prisoners and about only 50 American troops managed to escape.