We transmitted to the WAR Receiver site in Southern Maryland. Our receiver site was some five miles from Neuostheim (I can't remember where but it may have been in Feudenheim. I do remember that the WAR transmitter site was in Woodbridge, VA)(Webmaster Note: was the Receiver Site possible at Edingen?). In Campbell Barracks, where the CommCenter was located when I arrived in 1949, we had the "Coke Machines" (I can't find the nomenclature) that were single channel teletypewriter consoles. The CommCenter "tape-apes" would deliver the messages destined for UFPCR to the Code Room. (There was a song popular at the time entitled, "Behind the Green Door" and co-incidentally the door to the Code Room was painted green.)

When the Korean War started, WAR cleared all six channels and warned us that we had Flash traffic on the way, then transmitted the Flash message on all six channels. My Charlie shift happened to be on duty that night and we had practiced for such eventualities. So wed tore off pieces of the tape as it was received, and we had the message deciphered on the CSP-2900s in something like two minutes after official receipt. We were pretty proud of ourselves, but the Staff Message Control facility sat on the message until about 7:00 in the morning, when they finally relayed it to the Constabulary and the 1st Infantry Division, the only two tactical units that we had in USAREUR at that time. I kept calling them every twenty minutes or so, but they didn't want any advice from a Second Lt.

Back to the Transmitter Site. We had smaller transmitters for transmission to the Navy in Morocco and for back up nets within the Theater. Then we had a high speed (maybe 25 wpm!) manual radio net that included the Embassies behind the Iron Curtain. The operators were located in Hammond Barracks (on the third floor), with keying lines out to the Transmitter Site.

Our antenna field was on the old Mannheim Airport (Neu Ostheim). The largest rhombics (to WAR) were on 90-foot poles. Changing the warning lights on those poles was an act of initiation. I went up one pole one time; they were spliced in the middle, which made an exciting transit, and the poles, even though they were guyed, swayed in the slightest wind.

Before we moved the CommCenter from Campbell Barracks, several of the B Co radio operators were billeted at the Transmitter Site. In addition to their dormitory, they had a day room, with ping-pong table and such. When MG Matejka was replaced at EUCOM Chief Signal Officer by BG Rex Van Den Corput, the BG and his wife had to stay in a Heidelberg hotel while waiting for MG Matejka to vacate his quarters. Mrs Corput had a parrot, which they brought with them on the plane, and they couldn't keep the parrot in the hotel. So someone thought it would be a good idea for the parrot to reside at the Transmitter Site in the interim. The guys didn't mind at all; as soon as Mrs Corput left they would let the parrot out of his cage, and they fed him snacks and, so I heard, beer (I am shocked, shocked!). They also taught the bird some nasty words, and the parrot was a quick study. When Mrs Corput came to visit the bird (now safely in his cage, of course, she would take it out and coo to it, and the bird would respond with a f*** you or some similar phrase. The radio operators learned to be absent when she visited.

(2) COMMCENTER MOVE TO NEU OSTHEIM: The CommCenter move was from 26 Nov 1951 to 15 Dec 1951. The only reason I remember the dates is that I have a letter, which I will attach. The move was dictated by several factors. Headquarters always grow, and people were casting envious eyes at our facilities in Campbell Barracks -- Telephone switchboard, Comm Center, Crypto, Manual Radio, and lots of offices and maintenance spaces. Then we were outgrowing the CommCenter. We got all new equipment to replace the Coke Machines. These were banks of teletypewriter equipment, separated into transmitters and receivers (as opposed to the Coke Machines, which had one of each). And we went from asynchronous motors in the Coke Machines to synchronous motors in the new stuff (wish I could find the nomenclature! It was probably an FGC something.)

This turned out to be a mixed blessing -- the asynchronous equipment required periodic maintenance to keep the speed correct. Often the garble wouldn't be noticed, especially if the message was encoded using SIG-TOT, which looked like a garble all the time, and we would have to get retransmissions. But the synchronous motors, all running in phase, introduced standing sound waves in the CommCenter, formerly an airplane hangar. As one walked down the aisles there would be a hum that was often annoying or very uncomfortable. We tried hanging drapes to break up the sound in the area but never did really overcome this. People got used to it, I guess, after a while.

There was another big problem. This new equipment had apparently been improperly stored somewhere. A fibre gear in the T/D (Trasmitter Distributor) console would seize on the shaft and be ground down. Shortly after we cut over, we began experiencing this -- there would suddenly be a shrill sound like a buzz saw or a siren, and then silence. The gears were helical in nature, so that they were difficult to replicate. We had a few spares but they got used up almost immediately. But our mainenance section (mine!) came through. We had some 90 German nationals employed in the section, and some of them were true artists. They were able to laminate some formica to the required thickness, then replicate the gears, although it was supposed to be nearly impossible to make a helical gear on a lathe. Maybe they weren't perfect but they saved our butts.

(3) WHO PERFORMED MAINTENANCE & REPAIR ON THE 7774 SIGNAL EQUIPMENT? We did all our own mantenance and repair. I had one other LT as an assistant, and about 12 EM, including a couple of outstanding sergeants -- I especially remember Sgt Vogel. The rest of the maintenance section consisted of German nationals, several of them very dedicated and very talented.

AND SOME MORE INFORMATION
Hammond Barracks was the 7774 Sig Bn at Seckenheim, while the HQ Sig O was originally in Bldg B of Campbell Barracks in Heidelberg before we moved to Neuostheim. Patton Barracks was where the WAC Co C was located. Perhaps I have it right this time.

There was a Signal Section in EUCOM/USAREUR Hq, and they were also in Campbell Barracks, but not in Bldg B. They didn't interfere much with our operations, but we did have some joint parties and other social events. I don't think there were many Lts there. I visited there on business perhaps only five or six times in the three years I was in the 7774.

The HQ Sig Office was part of the 7774, and all the personnel were members of the Bn. There was only one other Signal Bn in EUCOM at the time, the 97th Sig Sqdrn, part of the Constabulary, located near Stuttgart. The HQ EUCOM switchboard remained in Campbell Barracks when the CommCtr moved to Neuostheim. There were five shifts in the Signal Office, Able through Easy, and we worked six days on, then two off, and we rotated through the shifts. So three shifts were always on duty, the fourth was off, and the fifth shift was in the training area, playing tactical. We lived in tents there and had tactical problems, using field switchboards and radios. Therefore, we spent some two months of the year in the field; almost always in the same training area, and I couldn't tell you where it was located. Once a year or so the entire Battalion went in the field, including the WAC Company, but less the shift on duty, with the personnel being transported back to the Office.

Edingen sounds right for the Receiver Site. (I remember going by Seckenheim from the Transmitter site.) Neuostheim and Edingen were the only radio sites the Bn operated while I was there. Among other duties, the Transmitter Site duty officer had to visit the Receiver Site at least once during each tour, since there was no officer on duty. One night as I drove to the Receiver site I surprised a couple parked in an American car along the side of the road. Thinking they might be in trouble, I got out of the car and was buckling on my pistol belt when they took off in a cloud of dust. I don't think they were terrorists.

My office at Neuostheim was on the second floor, with large windows looking out towards the antenna farm. One morning as I was contemplating my problems (gazing out the window) I was surprised to see one of the 10-ton wreckers from the motor pool driving by just under my window. They were not supposed to be there! The wrecker boom neatly severed each antenna feed line as it drove under it. The poor Motor Officer, Capt Gilbert (sometimes known as "Cylinder Head") was not very happy. We were completely off the air for a couple of hours.

But one morning coming home (I was quartered in Heidelberg) from the Transmitter Site, I came upon a crowd of 20 or 30 people and several stopped cars. I got out (couldn't get by!) and buckled on my pistol again, to find that there was an Air Force Master Sergeant confronting one of the DP (Displaced Person) guards at the PX Warehouse. The DPs wore wool uniforms that had been dyed black. This DP had apparently been in the schnapps, and he had his carbine embedded about one inch in the sergeant's stomach. In my fractured Deutsch I informed the DP that I was the Offizier von Dienst and demanded that he let me inspect his weapon. Actually, I think he was Hungarian or something, but after staggering a bit he handed over the carbine. When I ejected a round from the chamber I thought the Air Force sergeant would faint.

When NATO was formed the Bn sent a small detachment to Paris. A few officers and men from the code room went there, and apparently did a good job establishing a CommCtr and Code Room.

The Wire Branch operated the HQ switchboard, and also a smaller board at Bn HQ in Seckenheim. We used to kid one of the officers, Lt "Demp" Johnson that he must have had a switchboard at the golf course, since he spent so much time there.

I kept track of many of the personnel but over the years have lost contact with most of them. I still correspond with Dick Weber, with whom I worked in the Code Room and who ended up as a Psychiatrist working in a VA Hospital in Minnesota. Buck Weaver, who was a Captain on competitive RA tour (dropping down from his wartime majority) was a BG in Hawaii same time I was stationed there. Al Dennison, a fellow Lt in the CommCenter, was my Operations Officer at DCA-Pac, somehow not having grown any older. I ran into others from time to time, including GG Kent and Greg Darling at the OClub at Ft Myer in Washington. Sgt Herb Vogel was a high-powered civilian employee at DCA HQ when I served there. Maj Leonard Drazen was an officer at my ROTC camp at Cp Woods, Ft Monmouth in 1948, then was in the 7774 same time I was, then was a retired Colonel in Honolulu when I was stationed at Wheeler Field. Bill Leubbert was in charge of the computer section at West Point when I was on the faculty at the Dept of Electricity. Ray Riddle and I attended the Sig O Advanced Course at the same time. There are probably others that I've temporarily forgotten. It HAS been a while.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
I left Hammonds Barracks in August 1956. In August 2006 I had an opportunity to once again be in Germany and visited the facility. I came up the autobahn from Stuttgart headed for Wiesbaden and took the short autobahn from Heidelberg to Mannheim and got off at the Seckenheim exit. From that point on I was lost. All of the fields were now houses and apartment buildings. I went through Seckenheim without knowing I was in it. The middle of town had store fronts much like the US. I finally had to ask directions.

When I got to Hammonds Barracks, it was surrounded by apartment buildings. The front gate was closed and is now just outside the perimeter fence. I finally found the new gate between HQ and B Company. It was Saturday, but I was able to go into the Company B building. The building had been totally redone and is now an office building, as are all of the Hammonds buildings, except for the mess hall (now a barber shop and AAFES shopette). I went up to the second floor of Company B and it is now the broadcasting studios for AFN. The gym that was built around 1955 is still there with its naked cement block, but is now the fitness center. The parade ground is now cut up into parking areas, with a small open area remaining (not enough for the entire battalion). There were two German guards on the gate and those were the only people I saw in my 30 minute visit. How sad not to see any of the people I knew during my 27 months there.

Here are some excerpts from my father's memoir.
The troop ship arrived at the port of debarkation Bemerhaven, Germany on 29 November 1952.  I was assigned to the 337th Signal Radar Maintenance Unit, which was attached to the AAA Battalion located in Worms, Germany.  Again, I went out of channels to get myself released from the 337th and was reassigned to the 315th Signal Construction Battalion, which was located in Worms. Lt. Col. Dutton, the senior Lt. Col. in the entire Signal Corps, was the Commanding Officer of the 315th. 

I was assigned to “B” Company.  A few weeks later I was assigned to Company “A”.  Warrant Officers are not supposed to be assigned positions of command.  However I was given the following duties: Mess Officer, Motor Pool Officer, Supply Officer and Inspection Officer for all the motor vehicle accidents, which involved personnel of the Company. I lived in the Bahnhof Hotel; across the street from the railroad station.  The hotel had been requisitioned by the United States Army to be used as a bachelor officers quarters on the upper floors; and a club for non-commissioned officers on the first floor.

On 17 April 1954, I received a Letter of Appreciation from the commander of the 4th Signal Group.  It was for having compiled and published a 107 page Handbook of Supply Procedures for Signal Units who were organic to the Group.  It was signed by Col. Phillip Rose, the same officer who had recommended me for a direct commission as first lieutenant at Camp Gordon, Georgia.

On 7 February 1955, Col. Rose sent me as his representative to Paris, Orleans, and Cherbourg, France for a seven day period to inspect supply and communications activities of units of the 4th Signal Group. Chief Warrant Officer Holms and I drove the Col. Staff car during the trip.  We had a chance to visit the beaches and the German defense bunkers in Normandy where the D-Day invasion had taken place.  I also visited the Lepraille family at 37 Rue de Lermitage, Cherbourg. They had given me shelter in the house of their relatives during a German air attack in Normandy during the second or third day of the invasion in 1944.

7774 Sig Svc Bn had a HQ Company in Seckenheim (sp). We at pirmasens were CO A. CO B was located in Orleans, France. I don't remember where there were other Companies, if there were any others. I remember being told the Company had been moved there west of the Rhine River, because of the possibility of the Russians. This was COLD WAR time.

The tape relay center consisted of one building -- I believe it was Bldg #4646 -- and was relatively new. As I remember there were some personnel that had been at the previous location (Neuostheim). (Webmaster note: the Tape Relay branch had just been moved from Neuostheim to Pirmasens.)

The three-sectioned building was long and large, and had a simple layout. The left section, would be the snack bar and the control room where all the engineering stuff happened. I never dealt with the control room except to deliver the JANAP weekly changes. The central section was quite large and would have the main bay with the operations room, all the incoming lines, manned by roving people who would recieve and log msgs as they came in on the teletypes, and the comm center area that I worked the last part of my tour. The section on the right would be the Tape Reel Section -- a large room with the reels of tapes that would be the final area before the traffic was transmitted. When a msg was transmitted from us, it went to the tape reel room, and was then transmitted. That way, if the msg was garbled in transit, they would ask for a send over, and the tape would be pulled back and resent.

When I got there, we had a couple weeks training in the operations, how to read the tapes, how to roll them on your hand for quick storage, what to do in case of something, and most important, was what to do with msgs of varying levels of importance. The top two levels of importance, Flash, and Operational Immediate, called OP, were loudly announced as they arrived, and a clerk who did nothing but log and receive them would come to you.

I first worked the floor, generally get the tape off the machine, and passing it on. After several months, I was transferred to the D & A section, duplicating and addressing. A msg would come in from another Primary relay station, and would be readdressed to local area receivers.

My final time was working the comm center, passing traffic to certain outfits and sometimes embassy traffic if the primary line was down. If a unit was sending a message outside our European network, such as to DC, or Red Cross, we would get it and readdress. I can still remember some of the heart breaking traffic that passed back and forth on the Red Cross traffic.

We worked in shifts, 8 hours on, for six days, then off two days, with the shift change from one time slot to another.

Our unit also had a Crypto room, but I never worked it. I would imagine that all of the communication methods of then are long obsolete.

One of my greatest memories was one Christmas, working on the floor, when an announcement came out from the Control Room for Santa, as a group of children were touring the DC installation. There was a voice channel that was available, so I got to make some children happy.

The equipment I trained on at Fort Gordon had been old and clunky, but the Siemens was new and great. I remember we had a crew of military that were there, trained to make on the spot repairs, but I don't ever remember any problems.

I remember a bank of commercial telex machines on the wall under the window showing the control room. When time hung heavy, we would occasionally go and read the news traffic. Needless to say, a large room full of the tape machines, the printers, and general conversation made it a noisy place. Also, it was also interesting, and really heart breaking to see the ARC traffic. I'll never forget some of it.

Another interesting msg I remember was a very low level one that was sending orders to Elvis Presley relating to TDY for a movie appearance. We always laughed at the special privileges he got.

Looking at the circular area, I think it was the main gate, then left to the long buildings, our barracks was the second one on the left. We had the first two floors, the WACs had above us. (The WACs worked side by side with us. I do not know if they were a detachment or a company of the 774th. I remember their CO was a Captain, which was the same rank as our CO.) The office (CO, 1st Sgt, etc.) was in the building. The arms room was in the basement.

The mess hall served the entire post. If you look at the curved barracks, the vertical pictured building above the right end was the mess hall. Entrance on the right. Snack bar was on the other side of the building.

Also, as an aside, I remember BLDG 4612 had the Service Club in it. I remember getting books from the library, and remember they had a darkroom for amateur photographers, like I was.

When I got to Pirmasens, we were still a "brown boot" Army, and when the uniform change came through, my room mates and I sat with steel wool to remove the brown stain, and then put the black polish to them.

On the left side, the back road outside the Post is shown, and I sat in the guard shack at that gate several times.

Thanks for letting me dig up all these memories. Good memories. From my first night on a cold December train ride, sitting for a beer at the Bahnhof, and a really great experience.

We had a Classified Relay manned by the Military with TS clearances, and a Crypto Section. Unclassified Relay Center, manned by Military and German Nationals.

Two Company Commanders: Joe Tayor, and Alan Remington.

It was know as RUFP with Circuits to all Commands in Germany and RUEP in the Pentagon, RUQP in Asmara and other Major Relay Centers including Iran. A Facilities Control, Crypto and Teletype Maintenance Section.

I was a Staff Sergeant in Tape Relay and then in the Crypto Section.