First hand accounts of pre-war preparations in the United States, training in the United Kingdom, battlefield action in North Africa, Sicily, Normandy, Germany and Czechoslovakia by members of the U.S. Army's 1st Division, the Big Red 1.

Includes index.

Prologue -- Preparing for war. Subway soldiers -- "Are you, sir, a member of the Army?" -- "The ladies will be down in a minute" -- "Now we will get you down in the grease pits" -- Thrilling days for a young soldier -- "We are not going to get involved in this war" -- In for the duration -- "What happens when you have four balls?" -- Campaign in North Africa. Egyptian adventure -- Invasion -- "Colonel, there is no rank in a whorehouse" -- Into Tunisia -- Kasserine Pass -- Gafsa to El Guettar -- Moment of glory -- "They said they weren't mad at us" -- "You may be all right at the front, but you're not so hot back here" -- Sicily. Gela -- Across Sicily -- Sanctimonious old bastard -- D-Day. "They just wanted to get the war over and go home" -- "Being in that first wave was like committing suicide" -- "It was a pretty good killing zone in there" -- "These things do happen in wartime" -- Aftermath -- Normandy to Czechoslovakia. The bodies that moved -- Aachen -- Hürtgen Forest and the Ardennes -- Prisoner of war -- "Panzerwagen, hell!" -- Rhine crossing -- "We're in this thing together" -- "I always stood at attention as the body went by" -- Journeys home -- Conclusion : "Do you want to be a good soldier?" -- Apothegm -- Men of the First -- Appendix: 1st Infantry Division chronology, May 1942 to May 1945.