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Dan McBride

WWII | 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division

Dan McBride recalls his first jump. Once he managed to get through the door, he started enjoying it. After he got his wings, he chose the 101st over the 82nd because he liked the patch better. When the unit headed for South Carolina for more jumps, every chimney in the area was in peril. (4:34)
While on maneuvers after jump school, Dan McBride had a real close call when his chute did not open. He had a new platoon leader who made a great first impression with the men. This is the kind of officer we like! (5:05)
It was an old tub, the ship that Dan McBride boarded to cross the Atlantic. They turned back and docked in Newfoundland because of technical problems and that began a bizarre turn of events that wound up causing them to take longer to cross than did Christopher Columbus. Once they got to England, they discovered a great new hobby, fighting with the Brits. (7:29)
Dan McBride and his buddy were dating a couple of English girls and were lucky enough to be invited over for Christmas dinner. They were sitting around afterwards and he began to feel a rumbling in his belly. His Army diet of beans and Brussels sprouts was about to betray him. (2:19)
His sniper rifle was too long to jump with so the plan was to carry it in a bundle. Dan McBride had successful test jumps in England, so he was confident that it would work on D-Day. As the paratroopers were leaving, they got a surprise visit from General Eisenhower, who spoke to each of them. They took off and as soon as the planes got to the French coast, Murphy's Law began to take over. (6:05)
He landed alone and had lost his compass. Paratrooper Dan McBride was moving slowly in the dark through the hedgerows. He encountered a cow, then a German soldier and then finally someone else from his unit. After joining a small group from another unit and commandeering a car, they finally found a road sign which got them back on track and headed for the intended drop zone. (9:06)
It was constant attacking. Hit and run battles with Germans between the drop on June 6th to around the 12th. Dan McBride was in the thick of it, including a bayonet charge at Carentan. Later, in an encounter with a German soldier, he faced a moment of truth when they both raised their weapons and fired point blank. (11:27)
He was shot in the arm so they gave him some German prisoners to take to the beach. When Dan McBride got down there, the prisoners saw the great armada that had crossed the channel. Definitely disheartening. After a short recovery, when his unit had returned to England, they were given what was called a short, easy mission jumping into Holland. It didn't work out that way. (6:39)
It wasn't the short, easy mission they were promised. It was continuous combat for weeks. Paratrooper Dan McBride had jumped into Operation Market Garden in Holland and right away nearly got killed by a mortar round. During the attack on Best, he got pinned down during a German ambush and had another narrow escape. (6:29)
Paratrooper Dan McBride's account of Operation Market Garden is colorful and exciting. He relates several tales, including the fate of an ill tempered sergeant, the improbable capture of a German unit four times the size of his, the reason you should not stop for tea and how he was injured by his own weapon. (7:25)