William Henry Cross, Jr., our younger brother,
was born October 7, 1929 in Poughkeepsie, New
York. We were raised in Poughkeepsie and
neighboring towns. My sister, Muriel and our
brother, William, are deceased.
I do not
know when or how Al and Muriel met. They were
19 when they got married. The family and I
never got to know Al and knew so very little
about him. I am certain they knew each other
for a very short period of time, a matter of a
few months, before they married. My family
lived in Poughkeepsie at that time. I was about
16 and still in high school. I remember meeting
him for the first time right after they were
married. They went to the State of Maryland to
get married. New York State, their home of
record, required prospective brides and grooms
to have blood tests before getting married. The
process took time, something they did not want
to wait for. Maryland did not require blood
tests so one could get married quickly there.
Many servicemen desiring to marry quickly before
going overseas went to Maryland to get married.
It has always been my belief and understanding
that they went to Elkton, Maryland to get
married.
Al was due
to go overseas and wanted to get married before
he left for overseas duty. I am not sure where
he was stationed when they got married. After
they married, Muriel continued to live at home
in Poughkeepsie, NY. Al was first reported as
missing in action. Then, she was notified that
he was killed in action in Germany.
That date will always remain in my mind because
it was also the same day that President Franklin
D. Roosevelt died. Roosevelt's home and estate
in Hyde Park, NY are only 6 miles from
Poughkeepsie, New York. After Al's death,
Muriel remained in Poughkeepsie. Years later,
she married a Nicholas DeCandio from
Poughkeepsie. They settled in Cicero, Illinois.
They divorced
and Muriel resumed her name of Muriel Corgan.
She returned to Poughkeepsie and died there in
the late 1980's, May 31st 1989. She had no
children.
As I said, my family knew very little about Al
and met him only a few times. We did like him
very much. What we knew about him came from my
sister, Muriel. He was a farm type young man and
very much in love with his wife. Al came from
Unadilla, New York, the only son of Anson Corgan.
His mother, her first name unknown to me, died
in 1938, one month after a miscarriage. He was
raised by his father. I believe his father was
a farmer. After Al's death, his father came to
visit Muriel and our family in Poughkeepsie. It
was the first time that Muriel and the family
met Al's father. He was a
very lost and lonely man who was trying to
handle the grief and loss of his only child. We
felt he was turning to Muriel as a new found
daughter.
As I said, my family and I never got to know Al
because Al and Muriel weren't married very
long. He came home on several weekend passes
from the Army and stayed at our home. He was
shipped overseas to Germany shortly after their
marriage and was killed about 9 or 10 months
later."
Later she also
wrote:
"I think they married in the Summer of 1944,
having known each other but a few months. He
was shipped overseas in August 1944, several
months after their marriage. Our family didn't
have the opportunity to know him. After our
initial meeting, he spent
several weekend leaves at our home before being
shipped overseas. From what we observed, he was
a quiet young man and very much in love with his
wife. Movies were about the only entertainment
they had...TV wasn't in existence at that time.
I don't believe he was the type that visited
bars for entertainment...very quiet. He had no
car. He rode the bus or train from Ft Campbell,
KY to Poughkeepsie, NY. I don't know if they
corresponded. I doubt there was time for that
because of his immediate overseas departure.
Being in a combat zone in Germany didn't leave
him much time to write.
Muriel met Al's father for the first time after
Al's death. He came to
visit her at our home and spent several days
with her. He, too, was a quiet man and so very
lonely. He missed his only child, his son, and
I think he was looking to Muriel to fill the
void in his life...perhaps looking towards her
as a daughter to replace his son. According to
Muriel, his father raised him alone after his
mother's death. I think it is true that Mr.
Corgan's wife was deceased as he came alone to
visit us. That was the first and only time he
visited Muriel. He returned home - Muriel said
he was a farmer."
After
arriving in Europe,
Alfred Corgan came
to A Company after they were relieved from the
fighting in Bastogne. He was assigned to Donald
Burgett’s squad and was with him when they
traveled to Alsace and later when Company A, 506
101st made a company sized patrol across the
Rhine River into Himmelgeist, Germany in the
Ruhr Valley.
The action in
which Alfred was killed is described as follows
in Rendezvous With Destiny(1), the history of the
101st Airborne Division:
At this time, the 101st was stationed on the
west side of the Rhine, in the Ruhr area, just
south of Düsseldorf. This was a time of relative
quiet for the division.
"What fighting there was occurred when the
patrols from the line regiments slipped across
the river at night - the once-thought
impregnable Rhine, now vulnerable to any squad
with a boat- and bumped into still dangerous
defenders.
Map of the
operation in which Pfc Alfred Corgan was
killed
(map from the book
Rendezvous With Destiny)
(...)The other large raid of the campaign was
carried out on the night of April 11-12 by
Company A of the 506th. One Hundred twenty-six
members of the company and four of the 321st
Artillery Battalion crossed the Rhine in sixteen
assault boats just after midnight and attacked
the river-bank village of Himmelgeist. They ran
in to a scattering of small arms fire, killed
two defenders, and entered the town. In
Himmelgeist they captured seven civilians
suspected of having taken part in the defense of
the place and then withdrew, getting back to the
far shore by 0415. The raid cost the company
three killed and four wounded, mostly from small
arms fire, though there was some flat-trajectory
shelling during the withdrawal. Two boats
capsized in midstream under enemy artillery fire
and eight men were missing, believed drowned."
Ray Boscom
was with the same unit. He wrote a letter to the
parents of Robert Morneweck, who was also killed
in this action, when he was at Berchtesgarden,
about what happened :
"The raid Bob
lost his life, he was loaded with extra
ammunition and grenades. The raid we pulled
across the Rhine. It was below Düsseldorf
and about five miles from Nienenhiem.
It was at that
time of the Rhine-pocket, so you see what we
were up against. We started across about
midnight to load in the boats, three 88's
opened up and everybody instantly tried to
hop into the nearest boat to where they
were. As a result, four boats overturned and
we lost 18 men. What few did get out said
that it was impossible to swim in the
current. Our boats picked up some but it was
so dark that we couldn't see over 5 feet in
front."
Three in this
picture were killed on the April 12 river
crossing: Standing: Demkowicz
(KIA), Weckesser, ? , Parrish, Wasburn,
Morneweck (KIA), Barnes. Kneeling: Hanzalik,
Thaler, Caivano (KIA) (picture courtesy of Mr.
Art Morneweck via Marion Chard)
Don Burgett, squad
leader in A company, wrote:
"I was squad
leader of the 2nd squad, 2nd platoon, A Co. at
that time, 12 April 1945; the night President
Roosevelt died. Alex Abercrombie died along with Syer, Santillan and Floyd Roberts by German
artillery fire; all of whom were buried by the
Germans in a common grave. Their bodies were
recovered by a patrol led by Jack Bram a couple
of days later and brought back across the Rhine
River in a rowboat.
Pfc Corgan was in my squad as were two other new
replacements. Corgan was seriously wounded in
both arms (,by the same shell that killed the
four troopers. other troopers were wounded as
well). the medics bandaged him and bound his
arms to his body in an attempt to stop the
bleeding. (The unit held that town as ordered
until the Germans shifted their reserve armor,
then retired to the Allied side of the Rhine as
planned.
On returning they received artillery and tank
fire in the dark all the way back across the
Rhine.) Corgan's boat was overturned by a
close artillery round as we were returning to
the American side of the Rhine from Himmelgeist.
Corgan, along with several other troopers, some
wounded, were drowned.
Their bodies were recovered about three days
later on the river shore about two miles
downstream.
I did receive two new replacements the morning
of 12 April 1945 but didn't have time to get
their names on our roster. Both of them also
drowned as a result of overturned boats in heavy
artillery fire.
Two local
newspapers carried the news when Pfc Corgan was
reported missing.
(picture courtesy
of Rick Mommers)
(picture courtesy
of Rick Mommers)
Pfc Alfred Corgan
is buried at Margraten American Cemetery, Plot D
Row 10 Grave 5.
(Picture courtesy
of Rick Mommers)
Private
First Class