Fort Eben Emael WIA ID booklet

Hello,

This weekend I added this ID booklet to my collection.
It is a "livret militaire", a Belgian army ID booklet, kind of a mix between a Soldbuch and a Wehrpass.
I want to show you all this livret militaire because it is one of a soldier that was part of the fort Eben-Emael garrison and who was WIA during the famous Fj assult on the fort on May 10 1940.
This is the ID booklet of René Noel, a farmer from Wanne (a small village near Liege), he started his military service in 1929 in fort Chaudefontaine, in April 1939 he is transfered to fort Eben-Emael.
His task in the forts garrison is that of telephone operator in casemate "Maastricht 2" also known as "MA2".
Maastricht 2 is a priority target for the Fj assult engineers of the Sturmgruppe Granit, Ma 2 is the target for Trupp 1 (glider 1), troop leader is Feldwebel Niedermeier, the glider is flown by Fdw Raschke, the other members of the assult team are: Lt delica, Fj's List, Drucks, Kramer, Graef & Stucke.
This assult team lands exactly as planned and they inmediately attack the casemate and its observation dome.
First the observation dome gets blown up, the two observers in it are KIA, then the Fj's exploded a 12.50 Kg hollow charge on the left 75mm canon, the explosion is so powerful that the canon is blown out of his ankers and thrown back inside, three gunners are KIA inmediately and the telephone operators Noel and Petit are locked up in their small telephone box by the lose canon.
They both suffer from gas inhalation, René Noel is also wounded on his shoulder, they were only rescued from their difficult possition after the fort capitulated, 36 houres after the initial assult.
René Noel spend 5 years in a German POW camp and he passed away in 1978.

Enjoy watching the images

A plan of the fort and a plan of casemate Ma2, #27 is the telephone box.

Ma2 like it looked this year.
And a close up of one of the 75mm canon of fort Eben Emael.

Some pictures of how such a 75mm rapid fire canon looks on the inside of the casemate.
- pictures taken from the book "der überfall".

Wow Peter , you post the most interesting things!! It is great to get to the individual level and see how these men lived/died . Thanks for your postings.

Fantastic docs and history Peter! Really interesting stuff that makes history and these items personal. Pic stickied for ref.

I just want to jack up this thread.
A buddy of me went to the Belgian army archives and he found out that Noel's POW file was kept their.
Besides that we now have a wartime image of him we know more details about his injury, he got a piece of shrapnel in his left upper arm, this kept him in hospital until July 7 1940.

Fascinating, thank you Peter.

KJ

Another great read Peter. Thank you.

Exactly 75 years after the assault on Fort Eben-Emael, I bought this "Livret Militaire" of a crewmember of the fort that was KIA.

Emile Gillet (°1909) from Spa-Francochamp, was just like René Noel a soldier that belonged to the class of 1929, the oldest militia class mobilized in August 1939, thus they were the oldest soldiers in the mobilized Belgian army of 1939/40.
He also served initially in the small pre WW1 fort of Chaudefontaine and was transferred to the modern Fort Eben-Emael in early 1939.
He entered the fort for the first time on April 13 1939; in April and May 1939 he spend short periods in the forts garrison and then finally joined them again on August 28 1939, two days after the big mobilization in Europe.
On May 10 1940, the day of the German surprise attack on Belgium, Emile Gillet was on duty in the fort as a member of the offensive battery under command of Cmdt Vamecq.
After the initial assault by the Fj's on the major gun emplacements the fortress officers fear that the Germans will try to penetrate the lower levels of the fort and the decision is made to seal off the lost gun emplacements like written down in the procedure for this type of event.
At the bottom of the staircase and the ammo elevator the steal beams are placed in position and before the thick armoured door is locked the hole between them is filled up with sandbags.
As an extra measure, extra sandbag wall are erected in the corridors and the soldiers of the lost gun emplacements are formed in to small combat teams armed with rifles and a small MG to guard these entry points.
Emile Gillet belongs to a six men team under command of sergeant Corombelle that guards the entrance to gun emplacement "Maastricht 1"; 30 years old he is the oldest member of the team, the four other soldiers belong to the youngest class of the army (1940) and are 19 or 20 years old.
For hours it stays calm in the middle level of the fort, the reason for this is simple, the Fj's don't have orders to penetrate the lower levels of the fort, they just have the task to knock out the guns, with a priority level to those that can fire north, and to wait until they are relieved by the engineers of Pi51.
Just after 08.00 Lt Witzig orders his Fj's to assemble on the northern tip of the fort with their equipment to prepare for their evacuation, the engineers of Pi51 have a strong enough force on the super structure of the fort and they will continue the operation.
Uffz Arent (+ Tunis 1942) team leader of "Trupp 3" and his men are inside Maastricht 1 when they get the assemble order; he doesn't follow the order of his CO, he has one big 50KG hollow charge leftover and instead of humping the heavy thing back to the assembly area and perhaps further, he decides to detonated it against the steal beam wall at the bottom of the staircase.
Together with Müller and List he descents down the +/- 130 steps of the staircase, they set the hollow charge with the longest fuse they have and run back up.
Just in time they are out of the bunker, the explosion has a devastating effect!
After the smoke has cleared up they enter the bunker again; inside the gun emplacement, a dislodged 75mm kanon is knocked over and the place is a total mess, the staircase with ammo elevator is gone and a possible entrance point to the middle level of the fort is now well seal off.
At the bottom the damage is even worse!
The steal beams, sandbags and armoured door couldn't stand the explosion and are destroyed.
The team guarding the entrance are all killed.
The noise is deafening and big flame flashes through the corridor, burning several soldiers.
Also the electrical lightning goes down for a while, and a panic breaks out amongst the soldiers in this level of the fort.
This panic, the garrison feels it is trapped and will be blown up with the fort, is the mean reason why the fort capitulated without military honours a few hours later.
It was Sturmgruppe Granit that took most of the guns of Fort Eben-Emael out of action but it was because Uffz Arent ignored a direct order and decided to act on his own, that the fort capitulated.

Uffz Arent, the man that killed Emile Gillet and his buddies on the morning of May 11 1940.

A picture of the remaining armoured door at the bottom of Maastricht 1 I took myself some years ago.
Look at the damage, and this wasn't even the door the charge was placed against.

The History Channel made a documentary about the attack on Fort Eben-Emael.
It is available on You-Tube in five 10 minute episodes; the story of how the doors of Maastricht 1 were blown up is told at the end of episode 4 and continues in episode 5.

Episode 1:

Episode 2.

Episode 3.

Episode 4.

Episode 5.

Pvt Schmidt wasn't the drunk FJ but it was Grechza, the makers of this program mixed up the names.
You can see an image from Grechza in epsiode five at +/- 2:45, he is the small Fj with the bandage around his head.
He wasn't WIA, he burned himself while he was drunk with his flamethrower.

Peter, what a great Livret, outstanding and amazing research which puts this all in personal perspective. That is much more interesting to me than 95% of all German soldbuchs one sees for sale. I am going to watch those when I get home from the office. Thanks for posting this