Vincent B. Langel

World War II

Vince Langel was born on April 11, 1919, near Templeton to Clem and Anna (Fangman) Langel. Vince was the 13th of 16 children. He attended school at Sacred Heart in Templeton before working on the family farm. He registered for the military draft on October 16, 1940, with his brother Ed. He listed his employer as his mother as his father had died earlier in 1940.

There is an excellent article about Vince’s military experience in the Templeton Quasquicentennial Book issued in 2007. The following will be a summary of that information.

Vince was inducted into the US Army on March 26, 1941, over eight months before the Pearl Harbor attack. He was inducted in Omaha, NE and sent to Fort Riley, KS for basic training. He was assigned serial number 37036624. After completion of basic training, Vince remained at Camp Funston which was within the boundaries of Fort Riley. There he was assigned to Battery C, 3rd Field Artillery Regiment of the 9th Armored Division. Artillery training continued and, by June 2, 1943, Vince had been promoted to Corporal.

The 9th Armored Division was moved to Camp Ibis on the California-Nevada border in July, 1943, for training in desert warfare tactics. However, by October, 1943, the war in North Africa was winding down and the need for desert units had dwindled. It was during this time that Vince was transferred to the 52nd Armored Infantry Regiment (much to his delight). This unit was also part of the 9th Armored Division which then moved to Camp Polk, LA to train for the European battlefield.

On August 20, 1944, the 52nd Armored Infantry Regiment sailed from New York aboard the Queen Mary and landed at Glasgow, Scotland five days later. They then moved to Salisbury, England for additional training. They moved across the English Channel and spent time in southern France. On October 23, 1944, they went into the line on patrol duty at the Luxembourg-Germany border. By mid-December, they found themselves in heavy fighting as the Germans began their offensive known as the Battle of the Bulge.

Vince narrowly avoided capture near Bastogne. He and a few others joined the 101st Airborne troops that were defending Bastogne. After enduring continual German attacks, they were finally relieved by George Patton’s 3rd Army. On January 9, 1945, Vince returned to France where the 9th Armored Division was reorganized. Vince and his unit then moved into Germany and captured the bridge at Remagen intact on March 7. This enabled US troops to move swiftly into the heart of Germany.

On April 11, 1945 (his 26th birthday), the 52nd Armored Infantry was moving toward Leipzig, Germany when they encountered a bridge that had been blown. As they waited for their orders, their column was attacked by German aircraft. Vince was hit by an exploding bomb suffering 32 wounds to the left side of his body. He was operated on at a field hospital but, due to bad weather, had to wait two days to be transferred to England. By the time he arrived at Oxford, England, six days later, infection had set in. Use of the new drug penicillin saved his life. On May 18, 1945, Vince left for the United States arriving at Bushnell General Hospital in Brigham City, UT on May 29. He recovered there and in Templeton before being discharged as a Sergeant on October 19, 1945.

Vince returned to farming and later worked as a hog buyer. He never married. He died in Carroll on November 6, 2010 at age 91. He was buried in Sacred Heart Cemetery in Templeton.