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Compton growled, "If I could get off this tank, I'd kill you."
Other men joined Compton on the backs of the withdrawing tanks. Strohl and Gordon, who had been out on the flank, Strohl with a mortar and Gordon with his machine-gun, had to run across an open field to rejoin the outfit. The weight of their weapons slowed them down. Bullets were kicking up the dirt at their feet. There was a 3-foot-high wooden fence between them and the road. "We hurdled it like two horses," Strohl said. Safely on the other side, they paused to catch their breath.
"That's one thing you and I will never do again," Strohl said.
"I don't think we did it the first time," Gordon replied.
They took off again for the tanks, caught up, and Gordon pulled himself onto the back of one. But Strohl was dead beat. He put his hand up; Gordon grabbed it as Strohl passed out. Gordon hauled him aboard and got him secured.
Randleman, who had been in the van, got hit in the shoulder and cut off from his squad. He ducked into a barn. A German soldier came running in behind him. Randleman bayoneted the man, killed him, and covered his body with hay. Then he covered himself up with hay and hid out.
Once in town, men found shelter in buildings that they used as cover to move around and set up some semblance of a return fire. Easy managed to hold up the Germans but was unable to force them back. Sgt. Chuck Grant got hit, among many others. Pvt. Robert Van Klinken was killed by a machine-gun burst when he tried to run forward with a bazooka. Pvt. James Miller, a nineteen-year-old replacement, was killed when a hand grenade went off on his kidneys.
Pvt. Ray Cobb had the shakes. Webster heard Sergeant Martin comforting him "the way a mother talks to a dream-frightened child: 'That's all right, Cobb, don't worry, we're not going back out there. Just relax, Cobb, take it easy.' "
Martin went over to a Cromwell, hiding behind a building. He pointed out the church steeple and asked the commander to take it out, as the Germans were using it as an observation post.
"So sorry, old man, we can't do it," the commander replied. "We have orders not to destroy too much property. Friendly country, you know."
The Germans kept pressing. Their aim was to get through to the highway leading from Eindhoven to Nijmegen—"Hell's Highway," as the 101st named it—and cut it. But they could not get through Nuenen.
Winters had decided to withdraw under the cover of darkness, but before giving ground he wanted a prisoner for interrogation. He called for volunteers for a patrol. No one volunteered. "Sergeant Toye," he called out. "Yes, sir, I'm here." "I need two volunteers."
Toye selected Cpl. James Campbell and a private and set out. They were tripping over British and American bodies as they made their way to a nearby wood. A German soldier fired at them. Toye told his men to stay put. He crept into the woods, went around the German, got behind him, and gently placed his bayonet against the man's back. The soldier gave Toye no trouble. Pushing the German ahead of him, Toye returned through the woods and delivered his prisoner.