By DEBORAH McQUAID
Morning News staff reporter
And the band played on.
Whether or not the Allied forces had stormed the beaches at Normandy, members of Erie's 112th Infantry Regiment Band still had a job to do - play music for the troops.
News of the invasion
trickled in, and Norman Plumb of Erie and the other band members continued to practice shooting and their music.
""I don't think any of the band fellows thought they'd ever have to be in combat. We did
have one fella that did want to be in combat, and he quit the band and went up front with the infantry,'' Plumb recalled.
Come December, the band would find itself in the middle of combat during the Battle of the
Bulge. They were captured during the fall of Wiltz, Luxembourg.
But on June 6, 1944, life for the band went on pretty much as usual.
""We kept on with our daily routine, which was band rehearsals and some
days we were playing for concerts or playing for the troops in the camp and we just kept doing our thing until it was time to move out,'' Plumb said.
They arrived in Normandy in July.
On D-Day, they were in Swinden, England, playing for the troops.
""There was a bandstand and the troops would come around and listen to us in the evenings. That night, we had a commotion outside. One of our
band fellows had been up the street and heard that the troops had landed in France.
""That was quite a startling moment then, so the news spread pretty fast,'' Plumb said.
""We thought,
"Well, this is the beginning.' We just hoped that everything went well. We didn't hear much for a couple of days, what was going on. Mum was the word. They weren't telling anything.
""I remember there
were a couple of fellas came back, I guess for medical reasons. They had been on one of those troop ships and came back and had some real stories to tell,'' Plumb said.
""There was quite a lot of things going on.''
A month later, the band moved to Weymouth and they were shipped to France from there.
Plumb remembered that earlier in 1944, Gen. Dwight Eisenhower visited
every Army division in England and Wales. ""I think they were making preparations to decide who to send in on D-Day. The 28th was in line to go. But when Eisenhower visited us in Wales, he took particular
notice of our general.
""He was a nervous wreck. He chain-smoked and everything. He was certainly not the type to take troops in on D-Day. I think Eisenhower was a little turned off when he met with him, so
they decided to take the 29th Division instead and they went in on D-Day.''
The 29th landed at omaha Beach and took heavy casualties.
Plumb said all the soldiers were concerned about the invasion. ""We
were listening for every bit of news we could about it,'' Plumb said.
Meanwhile, they did target practice and rehearsed their music.
""I know we rehearsed that one song so many times, it was called
"Jesus, Joy of Man's Desiring,' over and over and over until we got fed up to there with it.
""We had kind of a strange band director. That was his favorite song and so we just kept playing it every day
and every day. He played it to suit him,'' Plumb said.
There was also a dance band that rehearsed separately and played the popular songs of the day.
""We would go to the range and do target shooting
and so on. We did do some night hiking, too.
""It was nothing major. We weren't involved with doing a lot of rigorous training like the troops were.''
Later on, when they were ambushed by German troops,
the band members suffered for that lack of combat training, having to learn on the spot how to operate flame throwers and machine guns. They held their own for three days before the town of Wiltz was surrounded and they
were all captured.
