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Overcast Monument unveiled
New marker pays tribute to seminal Battle of the Bulge
The bullets flew and mortars whistled before choking off into explosions. But what David Marshall remembers most about the Battle of the Bulge was the cold.
“For those six weeks, I couldn’t tell you what happened,” the 91-year-old veteran from Baldwin recalled. “We had to scrounge as much as possible to stay warm. You couldn’t light fires; that was a no-no.
“We were trying to stay warm,” Marshall added. “That was a fight, too, in addition to fighting the enemy. In a sense, we were fighting two wars, the weather and the Germans.”
The battle became, in fact, the fiercest the U.S. Army had faced up to that time. But since it ended in 1945, there has been no permanent recognition of the event locally.
Until now.
Late last month, Nassau County officials and local veterans, including Marshall, unveiled the newest monument at the Veterans Memorial Plaza in Eisenhower Park, in East Meadow. Dedicated to preserving the memory and emphasizing the significance of the Battle of the Bulge, the new stone reads simply: “In memory of the Battle of the Bulge, Ardennes Campaign, World War II, Dec. 16, 1944-Jan. 25, 1945.”
The name of a group to which Marshall belongs, Veterans of the Battle of the Bulge, Long Island chapter, is inscribed at the bottom.
Before the dedication ceremony, a visibly moved Marshall said, “I can’t tell you what it means. It’s all welling up in here,” he added, pounding his chest.
Marshall spearheaded the effort to get the monument erected at the park after he noticed that there was no marker commemorating the battle. “A few times I was there [at the park],” he recalled. “I noticed there was no monument to the Battle of the Bulge. I spoke with our commanding officer. I said, ‘How about if I see if I could do it?’”
He attributed the monument’s establishment to veterans groups and the county Parks Department. “I’m quite proud and pleased that it came about,” he said.
At the dedication ceremony on Dec. 23, Marshall spoke movingly about that seminal event in World War II. “There were three elements to the battle,” he said, citing the enemy, the snow and the cold. “Take your choice as to which was worse.” He noted that the Americans weren’t adequately clothed for the weather, and that tending to equipment was a major hardship for the troops.
