Learning from experience
Infantrymen in the Second World War quickly learned that everything they needed to know to survive in the field was not part of the training curriculum in basic infantry school. The extra socks they needed to carry to protect their feet was one example. Men in the field soon learned to carry as many extras as they could, frequently stuffing them under their shirts and in empty pockets. When marching in heavy snow or mud the terrain pulled at their boots, which was both doubly fatiguing and created friction between skin and boots, leading to blisters which needed to be attended to as quickly as possible to prevent infection.
They also learned to never forgo any opportunity to rest. Stops on the march of more than a few minutes were to be used to grab any sleep they could. The future being unknown, the possibility of hours of sleeplessness was always present, and catnaps were a necessary precaution against hours of exhausting activity. Sleep was not a luxury but a necessity. So was the need to stay nourished, and despite the idea of eating unappetizing rations cold, due to the necessity of avoiding using cooking fires, it was better than nothing. Whenever and wherever possible, infantrymen in France traded with the civilians for food such as eggs and vegetables.
The most common trade items were cigarettes and chocolate, both of which Americans were amply supplied with, and the French civilians were not. In some instances, American troops received a type of chocolate which had been made for use in the tropical climate of the South Pacific, and which due to a typical Army error in administration ended up in Europe. Made by the Hershey Company, the chocolate was laced with paraffin, which helped keep it from melting in the tropical heat. In France, the bars were as hard as the frozen soil. The men couldn’t eat them anyway, so they made excellent trade items with the candy-starved French.
Infantrymen frequently found that their unit was transferred to the command of another division, a means of reinforcing units which had been engaged with the Germans and weakened as a result, or which needed additional men for a counteroffensive. Although the men were usually informed of such a move, their immediate officers and non-coms remained in place, as seldom was a transfer of less than company strength. Usually, these transfers led to the men being ordered to remove the insignia identifying their division from their uniforms, to deny the information to the Germans. Occasionally the men were transferred piecemeal.
When men were transferred out of their unit to join another division they were placed under the command of a different squad leader. Each was an unknown quantity to the other. This was both damaging to morale and weakened the reliability of the unit, and was avoided as much as possible, but became necessary during the rush to contain the German counteroffensive in the Ardennes in 1944. As usual, the average infantryman had little knowledge of the overall situation and why such transfers were necessary. In the absence of hard information, speculation and rumors spread, and the experienced infantryman learned to ignore the rumors and keep his mind on his job.