For Survivors of a Dark Chapter of World War II, an Epilogue

They were young Army soldiers, some barely out of high school, most not old enough to take their first legal drink, when their ship was sunk by a German torpedo on Christmas Eve 1944.

Those who survived the sinking of the Leopoldville have reunited over the years, swapping war stories and remembering the attack that killed so many of their buddies. But a reunion this weekend in Dana Point will probably be their last.

The youngest of the bunch are now 76. Many of the survivors of Company I have died. Others have lost their sight or their hearing or are too frail to make the trip.

“I do think this might be the last hurrah,” said George Reisteter, 76, a Bethlehem, Pa., resident who will attend tonight’s reunion dinner at the Marbella Country Club in San Juan Capistrano.

Reisteter had hoped to see his old staff sergeant, George Chun Fat. But the short trip from his San Diego home would be too much for Chun Fat, now 92 and suffering from hearing loss and the beginning stages of Alzheimer’s disease.

“He used to love to go to these reunions,” said his brother Frank, also a World War II veteran. “He always used to talk about them. But he told me that he’s too old now.”

Like other groups of veterans who lived through the battles of World War II, the soldiers who survived the sinking of the Leopoldville have fewer and fewer to share stories with at their reunions. Once there were 180 men in Company I, but nearly half of them died in the war. This year, only 15 of the old soldiers will attend the reunion.

The sinking of the Leopoldville was one of the chapters of the war that the military kept secret, fearing it would boost the morale of the Germans. Details of the sinking remained confidential, and the military didn’t officially acknowledge the maritime incident until the early 1990s.

But at the reunions, the stories come back to life.

Reisteter said the night before boarding the Leopoldville, Chun Fat, a husky, jovial native of Hawaii, was unusually solemn. He had a premonition.

“He was sitting on his bunk and saying the rosary,” Reisteter said. “I went over and put my arm around him and said, ‘Something’s bothering you. What is it?’ And he said, ‘Tomorrow night, we won’t all be together anymore.’”

Reisteter and Chun Fat were among some 2,200 66th Infantry Division soldiers who boarded the Belgian troopship on a cold, damp Christmas Eve morning. They crossed the English Channel to Cherbourg, France, where they were to spend two nights before being moved to the front line to fight in what became known as the Battle of the Bulge.

Walter Beran, 19 at the time, recalled falling asleep in a hammock aboard the ship, a copy of the New Testament in his shirt pocket. When the torpedo hit, he thought it was a drill. But when he opened his eyes, he saw the air was heavy with smoke. He smelled fuel. And he saw water rushing in.

Squad Sgt. Donald Goble, 20 at the time, said he was also below deck, stretched out on the floor beside his buddy. He said he was jolted awake by the explosion. He reached over for his friend, but all he felt was water.

“He was gone. He just disappeared,” Goble said. “I never saw him again.”

Reisteter said he remembers hearing people groaning and realizing they were trapped in the wreckage. The blast had knocked out the stairwell leading to the deck, and Reisteter said the water was rising quickly. He reached into a pocket and pulled out his rosary beads.

“All I know is I said my last prayers,” Reisteter said.

He said someone--he never found out who--pulled him onto the deck, where he could see the lights of Cherbourg. He recalled some of the soldiers sang Christmas carols as the wreckage of their ship bobbed in the ocean, 51/2 miles off the coast.

Goble said he crawled onto the deck of the listing ship and waited for an advancing tugboat to carry him to safety. Reisteter was left to figure out how to board a British destroyer that had pulled alongside the sinking Leopoldville in the rough sea.

“The British sailors were telling us, ‘Jump, mate, jump,’” Reisteter said. “If you didn’t jump right, you would have fallen in between the ships and gotten crushed.”

Beran was with a group of soldiers on the other side of the ship. There was no tugboat, no destroyer to rescue them. Just the waiting ocean.

“A commander finally said, ‘Let’s hit the water. This ship’s going down,’” Beran said.

Beran said he was sucked under the water by the sheer force of the sinking Leopoldville.

“I remember thinking that my mother would be terribly pained that I, the youngest and the last to go to war, would be killed first,” Beran said, who had three older brothers.

His life vest shot him to the surface after a few seconds. He said he saw a fishing boat in the distance and began swimming in its direction. The rest is black, until he woke up in a military hospital.

In all, 802 men died that night--75 from Company I. For years, the military kept documents detailing the incident secret. Reisteter said he kept the memory buried for 25 years. It wasn’t until he attended the first Company I reunion in 1969 that he found himself talking openly.

“We went through an experience that you couldn’t really describe to somebody else,” Reisteter said. “I don’t think I ever even told my family about it. It was a part of my life that was tucked away in a corner of my mind, and when I got there, that’s when it all came out.”

Though there are 54 Company I soldiers still alive, only 15 will attend this year’s reunion, including Goble, who is driving from his home in Arizona, and Beran, of Marina del Rey.

Beran is matter-of-fact about the dwindling number of soldiers who attend the reunions.

“We’re all just getting old. “