Arthur Seltzer, D-Day 1944
Arthur Seltzer was nineteen years old as he stood in a landing craft approaching Omaha Beach on D-Day, June 6, 1944. Fresh off the streets of Philadelphia, he had been drafted and trained as a U.S. Army radio operator. He held his weapon, personal packet and a 60 pound radio as the German bullets riddled the water around them. The order came to “go over the side” and not out the front of the craft as soldiers were being shot down as they left the craft. Arthur hit the water and went right to the bottom. He lost his weapon and personal gear, but clung his radio. Unable to swim, he was assisted to the beach by others. Once on the beach he moved cautiously under withering German gunfire coming from the bluff above the beach. The only place to hide was behind dead bodies as Foxholes cannot be dug on a beach. In time he was able to reach the safety of a seawall where others were evading the onslaught.
The situation was desperate. They feared that they would be driven back into the sea. The defenses built by German Field Marshall Erwin Rommel had them stopped. The only answer was to get help. The relief came via the radio that Arthur brought ashore. He radioed the Navy ships standing off shore and requested help. Without orders, the captain of a destroyer took immediate action and moved his ship close to the shore and started to blast away at the German embankments above the beach with the ship’s cannons. The gunfire from the bluff abated and the troops on the beach moved carefully to safer ground. The Navy initially wanted to punish the destroyer’s captain for endangering his ship in such shallow waters; but cooler heads prevailed and the Captain and crew were soon recognized for the heroic action that factored into the success of the landing.
Arthur advanced with the army into the difficult “hedge row” fighting that marked the days after the landing. He was united with the sergeant who was with him in the landing craft. Arthur remembered that while they were waiting offshore, he had passed a dollar bill around for everyone to sign. He had put the signed dollar in his uniform pocket. When he showed it to his sergeant he learned that out of the thirty-six men in that landing craft, only he and the sergeant had survived the beach landing.
Arthur Seltzer served as a radio operator through the entire European fighting. He was among the troops that freed the concentration camps. He returned home and took a job working in an Army-Navy surplus retail store. Over the years he studied and obtained advanced degrees; the company expanded to become a large electronic distribution corporation, with Arthur retiring as Vice President for marketing.
