I was strong and brave for about eight days, but then I could no longer take sleeping down in the incredible stench that permeated the lower deck. The journey would normally take no more than five or six days by ship today, but not only were we weathering a stormy North Atlantic in late February, we were also zigzagging every few miles to avoid German U-boats. It also occurred to me that even though the sinkings of Allied ships were getting dramatically lower in early 1945, there was still the bad luck chance of a U-boat deciding to sink our troopship. So I decided to take my chances sleeping on the top deck. With twenty dollars, I bribed a merchant marine sailor to let me put my sleeping bag under a lifeboat, and he was nice enough to give me some all-weather tarps to cover me against the sea spray. It was rough up on deck, but so much better both smell-wise and torpedo-wise than sleeping down below.
Fortunately, I only had to do it for two nights, for on the third night, there it was, the rugged coast of France. Soon we were moored at the port of Le Havre. Even though we were finally on solid land, the earth still seemed to move under my feet with every step. I’m grateful to this day to the Salvation Army that met the troopships when they arrived in Europe and served donuts and hot coffee. Nothing ever tasted so good!
So even though I was sent overseas as a radio operator in the field artillery, once again the Army decided that I should be something else. This time it was a combat engineer. The Army moved men to various units as needed. I was transferred with some of my other shipmates to the 1104th Engineer Combat Battalion. We were put on long troop transport vehicles and sent to Normandy for combat engineer training. It was a long trip, made even longer by the fact that I was going crazy.
Every sign I saw was in French. Instead of a grocery store it was épicerie. Instead of a bakery it was boulangerie. Instead of a laundry it was blanchisserie. And the street signs were never streets, but always rues.
I said to my buddy, “If I don’t see something in English soon, I’m gonna blow my top!”
He said, “Well, get ready to blow your top because we’re in France, pal, and they have a habit of making all their signs in French.”
Small groups of men left the truck and were deposited at different villages. Eight men including me got off at a little farmhouse with a sign on the entrance that said MON REPOS. It occurred to me that Mon Repos was a rather grandiose name for maybe the summer home of a retired nobleman. “My repose” is very fancy indeed. But it turned out to be just a simple little country farmhouse with this grand name. It was in the village of Saint-Aubin-sur-Scie. The village was near a larger town called Offranville, not far from the fairly big and busy port of Dieppe on the English Channel.
Mon Repos in Normandy, where I was stationed in February 1945.
We were quartered in the main farmhouse, and the family that owned and occupied the farm was in a smaller house on the property. It wasn’t such a bad deal. They had cows so there was fresh milk and they provided most of the charcuterie for the village. Charcuterie is cured meats like sausage, salami, ham, etc. So like I said, the eats were good. We were not dependent on Army chow. The farmer and his family were very gracious. There was a little kid on a tricycle named Henri; he got to be my pal and kept looking for me. Maybe it was because I gave him chewing gum and chocolate. He’d shout my name, “Private Mel, Private Mel!”
Back at Mon Repos in Normandy with the screenwriters of Brooksfilms production of The Elephant Man, Eric Bergren (right) and Christopher De Vore (left).
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There is more to this story than just being a soldier learning how to be a combat engineer in a little farmhouse in Normandy. Because, if I may digress, some thirty-five years later I had created a company called Brooksfilms and we were busy with David Lynch at the helm making a film called The Elephant Man. The Elephant Man screenplay was written by Eric Bergren and Christopher De Vore, based on the book by Frederick Treves. I was in England, where the sets were in the last stages of construction at Shepperton Studios. It would be ten days or so before we were to start shooting, so I had a brilliant idea. Eric and Chris had done such a wonderful job on the screenplay, and I was thinking of what I could do to give them a little extra something. And then it hit me. Bang! Why not go back to that little village of Saint-Aubin-sur-Scie and show them Mon Repos, the little farmhouse that I had trained in? The writers loved the idea of the trip. So before you could turn around we were on a ferry, then on a train to Paris, and from our hotel in Paris we hired a car for the journey to Normandy.
After a couple of hours we arrived. I got chills seeing that same little sign, MON REPOS, as we entered the property. The farmhouse had been repainted and a few things changed, but it was mostly just like I remembered as a kid in uniform back then. I knocked on the door. It opened to reveal a huge man sporting a big black beard framed in the doorway. I said in halting French, “J’étais un soldat en quarante-cinq stationné ici dans cette chambre à l’étage.” In English, “I was a soldier back in forty-five stationed here in that bedroom upstairs.” His eyes widened, he swallowed hard and shouted, “Mon dieu! Private Mel?”
And I replied, “Petit Henri?” He crushed me in his big bearlike arms. Little Henri was no longer petite.
It was one of the best afternoons I’ve ever spent. Henri showed us around. He took me to the little apple tree on the property that I used to eat green apples from (forgetting my vow at Camp Sussex never to eat little green apples again). It was now a huge tree sporting hundreds of apples. He fêted us with all kinds of charcuterie and fromage (which they were still making) and topped it all off with a toast with the great French apple brandy that Normandy is known for, calvados.
Okay, digression over. Back to being a soldier learning how to be a combat engineer.
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