WORLD WAR II HISTORY MAGAZINE
NOVEMBER, 2004
A collaboration between a father and his son, The Cow Spoke French follows the life of Bill True, a young Nebraska native living in California, from his enlistment in the paratroopers in the summer of 1942, through his return home at the end of the war. A member of F Company of the 506 th Parachute Infantry Regiment, True experienced the rigorous training at Toccoa, Georgia. It was this training that made the 506 th unique, as they were the first airborne regiment to train as paratroopers from basic training.
The Trues take a somewhat unique approach to their writing task, as the senior member of the team writes in first person, while his son fills out the narrative in third person. Their book is also unique, in terms of books about paratroops, in that they include a chapter written from the perspective of the young troop carrier pilots and aircrews who flew the paratroopers into combat. After the war, Bill True became friends with Harold Wayne King, the pilot who dropped the stick on D-Day, of which True was a part. The authors include an account written by King of his experiences with Douglas C-47 #849, from the time he and his crew picked it up at the factory in Fort Wayne, Indiana, until they surrendered it to a ferry crew when their group received Curtis C-46s to replace their war-weary C-47s in early 1945.
The Cow Spoke French is a well-written work that tells an honest tale of the experiences of a paratrooper in the ETO.
VENTURA COUNTY STAR
FEBRUARY 18, 2003
By John Mitchell
Shortly after 1 a.m. on June 6, 1944, Pfc. William True and other paratroopers from the 101 st Airborne Division jumped from a C-47 aircraft into a black Normandy sky lighted by German tracer bullets and exploding artillery shells.
After a short descent, he landed in a pasture and, in the light of a full moon, discovered he was near a cow with huge udders and big soulful eyes. She was placidly chewing her cud.
In the recently published book True authored with his son, Deryck, the moment is described: “In the pasture, True realized he was out in the open and vulnerable – easily seen by any German troops who might be lurking. He struggled to get out of his chute. First, the two buckles of the reserve, then the belly band and then the main harness.
“Looking up, he saw the sky filled with parachutes from horizon to horizon. Streams of machine-gun tracers raked the lines of dangling paratroopers as they floated to earth. The sight made his stomach churn. Glancing in the direction of the cow, he softly muttered a heartfelt, ‘You’re beautiful.’ She did not respond. The cow spoke French.”
And there you have it, the sentence True pounced on for the title of his book, “The Cow Spoke French,” a lively and informative account of his and his comrades’ life-and-death experiences in World War II when they were with the Fox Company, 2 nd Battalion, 506 th Parachute Infantry Regiment.
In putting the book together, Deryck True, a Navy veteran, interviewed his father and some of his father’s buddies and wrote the bulk of the text. It covers his dad’s teenage years, the rigors of basic training in Georgia and Company F’s adventures from Normandy through several fiercely fought campaigns until occupation duty at war’s end.
Dropped in every now and then are first-person italicized narratives by True, 79, as he recalls the details of some of his experiences. They include a night on the town in England before D-Day, a scary night patrol in Normandy, doing reconnaissance with British tanks during Operation Market Garden in Holland, hearing German taunts while freezing in a foxhole at Bastogne in December, 1944, and enjoying “The Life of Riley” in a Berchtesgaden villa at the end of the war.
True recently talked about his book in the ocean-view Port Hueneme home he shares with Jane, his wife of 56 years. The inside of their house is a memorial to World War II and his and Jane’s families, with a lot of photographs, artwork and memorabilia.
On his den wall is a glass frame with his medals, including the Purple Heart; the famous photo of Gen. Dwight Eisenhower talking to paratroopers just before they flew off to Normandy; photos of 101 st Airborne Division reunions, including a picture of True and others with country start Roy Acuff at Nashville in 1980; and a photo of him parachuting from a plane in 1984 in San Diego. That was on the 40 th anniversary of D-Day and it was the first time he had jumped since the war.
“I’d been making notes about the war for a long time, things I could remember clearly,” said True, white-haired and lean enough to fit into his Army uniform. On the wall behind him is a large painting of the English ship Samaria that took him and his outfit to England in 1943.
“I was inspired by Stephen Ambrose, the historian,” he said. “In the early 1980s, I answered an ad where he asked for personal experiences of D-Day. I wrote to him and sent a tape to him. We corresponded many times over the years.”
Ambrose authored the best-selling “Band of Brothers,” which detailed the WWII experiences of Easy Company and was adapted to an award-winning HBO series. True’s F Company fought alongside E Company all the way and mirrored their exploits.
Ambrose died in October, but he had read the Trues’ manuscript and sent back an endorsement, part of which reads, “Keep the copies of what you write coming down to me. I can’t get enough of them.”
“In recent years, my oldest boy, Deryck, said he’d like to help me put my story together,” True said. “Over four years he came to reunions with me and interviewed my buddies.”
“When the manuscript was ready, I got hold of a Writer’s Market and looked for publishers that deal with war stories. I contacted about 100 of them over a couple of years before I got a contract from the Merriam Press in Vermont.”
At his home in Van Nuys, Deryck True said he’s prone to procrastinate on projects and is very happy he stayed with this one.
“I’m so pleased that I put the time in to get the project done in time for my father to revel in his joy of seeing it,” Deryck True said. “If I had missed that opportunity, it would have been such a tragedy.”
“The Cow Spoke French” is a 180-page hardback book illustrated with photographs of William True in WWII, maps and archival documents. It has been published in an 81/2-by-11-inch format.
MILITARY
DECEMBER, 2005
By Col. John H. Roush, Jr., USA (Ret.)
San Rafael, CA
THE COW SPOKE FRENCH – THE STORY OF SGT. WILLIAM TRUE, AMERICAN PARATROOPER IN WWII
By William True and Deryck T. True
Merriam Press, 2002; 180 pages
Sgt. True chose this title because there was a single dairy cow that happened to be alongside his point of landing in Normandy.
This is a father and son book. The son – a more articulate writer working from interviews and research – takes us through the interesting episodes of combat as well as the interludes between. There is only a verisimilitude in brief references to the big picture. The book essentially tells of combat at the squad level.
The tactics of using airborne units called for early insertion in to combat and then, following linkup, replacement to the rear for reconstitution, rest and recovery. As light infantry, they often had heavy casualties. In contrast, conventional divisions engaged in combat in WWII often were committed for lengthy periods of time with little opportunities for rest and rehabilitation. As a member of an infantry division, I was interested to read of the action of the airborne units. They were involved in three segments of the European war: Normandy (Operation Overlord), Holland (Market Garden) and Bastogne ( Battle of the Bulge).
One might have preferred to read more of the action in the three campaigns than of the enterprising search for companionship and titillating sexual exploits. Many readers will wish to skip to Chapter 5 to avoid the preliminary training scenes and preludes to combat action.
Reading the graphic descriptions of the hedgerows of Normandy brought back vivid memories, and I remember the many jet planes parked along the freeways after the war ended.
The book is well illustrated with many maps, and the son has done a remarkable job of tying the story all together.
WORLD WAR II MAGAZINE
NOVEMBER, 2003
By Christopher J. Anderson,
Editor
The world of the combat soldier is a very isolated one. The focus of his memories is often narrow, as during combat he is more concerned with what is over the next hill or behind a nearby building than the movements of regiments or divisions. As a result of this very understandable circumstance, many of the memoirs of soldier-authors suffer. While a particular action or event may loom large in a writer’s memory, it has little meaning to someone unfamiliar with the details of a particular battle, or how a given incident fits into the larger picture of the war
Fortunately, The Cow Spoke French does not suffer from these shortcomings. The book is a wonderful combination of eyewitness testimony as well as a solid overview of the actions of Company F, 506 th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101 st Airborne Division.
Many readers may recognize William True, a masterful storyteller who has frequently spoken of his World War II experiences on television documentaries. In the book, True elaborates on many of these stories and provides a few new ones. In all of his writing, William provides the sort of detail and immediacy that is a huge attraction of first-person accounts.
Around each of these tales, however, is a historical narrative provided by his son, Deryck True. The younger True has spent a good deal of time researching his father’s regiment, and he bridges the gaps in the elder True’s accounts. The result of this father-and-son effort is a book that provides tantalizing insights into the wartime experiences of one American paratrooper while also making the exploits of the 506 th Parachute Infantry Regiment more accessible to a wider range of readers.
THE ATHOL DAILY NEWS, ATHOL, MASSACHUSETTS
APRIL1, 2004
By Pat Doubleday
“The Cow Spoke French.” Just another WW2 war story? Hardly. This is an in-depth memoir of William True, a 1941 graduate of Omaha High School who migrated with his dad in a ’33 Plymouth sedan, to California – the land of opportunity working in the aircraft manufacturing plants. But for young True the civilian work was dull. A trip to the Army recruiting office changes all that when he learns about “a new kind of outfit, the paratroops.”
“The training is awfully tough, though,” the recruiter warns.
“Where do I sign?” was the response.
From these military beginnings in San Diego, it is a grueling step to the 101 st Airborne Division and D-Day. This coffee table book tells one man’s story of the war, but it is one that was shared by many, including one of True’s best buddies: Orange native Robert Stone.
Through the 1 st Platoon, Company F, 2 nd Battalion, 506 th Parachute Infantry Regiment, True – and Bob Stone, nicknamed “Dude Boy Stone” – takes the reader on the training missions, the R&R, to England and ultimately to the D-Day operation. “And leading the whole operation would be the most highly skilled, trained, dedicated, elite troops in all of history: the 506 th Parachute Infantry Regiment, and the rest of the 101 st Airborne Division.”
The final works of Colonel Bob Sink, Regimental Commander of the 506 th, to his men before the operation were, “I just feel sorry as hell for those poor German bastards when YOU get there!” His words were effective, says True: “The men were convinced more than ever that they were indeed the best in the world. They were ready.”
True remembers, “This is my 17 th ride in a C-47, but this time it’s eerily silent here in the darkness. None of the joking, cajoling, or singing that was part of our field practice and war maneuver jumps. This time WE’RE GOING TO WAR! Dude Stone is uncharacteristically quiet . . . “
It was 1:20 in the morning on a bright moonlit night when True landed in the middle of a farm field “next to a Normandy cow with big eyes, a welcome sight indeed . . . Glancing in the direction of the cow he softly muttered a heartfelt ‘You’re beautiful.’” The cow did not respond. Of course. “The cow spoke French,” hence the title of the book.
True’s account continues to Holland and Belgian Ardennes and onward to the end of the war.
What makes this book different from so many others is the vulnerability of the troopers – it puts the reader in the middle of the action, whether it’s training, carousing in their off duty hours, or combat. It’s a vivid account of World War II in the European Theater through the eyes of one who lived it and is willing to share his story.
Ever the parachutist, a photo at the end of the book shows true in full WW2 uniform in Los Angeles after he returned from a parachute jump in Orange on May 6, 1984. In the photo he is holding mementos of the Orange jump.
Sgt True co-authored the book with his son, Deryck True.