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Contact Info
Home Town Fort Douglas, UT
Last Address Fort Douglas, UT
Date of Passing Sep 12, 1969
Location of Interment Fort Bliss National Cemetery (VA) - Fort Bliss, Texas
Major General Terry de la Mesa Allen, Sr. (April 1, 1888 - September 12, 1969) was a United States Army officer who was featured on the cover of Time magazine during World War II. He was a World War I veteran who during World War II was the commanding general of the First Infantry Division in North Africa and Sicily, and later the commander of the 104th Infantry Division.
Early years
Allen was born in Fort Douglas, Utah to Col. Samuel Allen and Consuelo "Conchita" Alvarez de la Mesa. Allen's family had a long line of military tradition. Besides his father, Allen's maternal grandfather was Colonel Carlos de la Mesa, a Spanish national who fought at Gettysburg for the Union Army in the Spanish Company of the "Garibaldi Guard" of the 39th New York State Volunteers, during the American Civil War. Allen grew up in various military bases because of his father's military career and in 1907, received an appointment to the United States Military Academy (West Point) in New York.
Military career
There were certain factors which affected Allen's performance at West Point and which would led up to his eventual dismissal from said military institution. One of them was that he began to stutter and soon fell behind in his classes. Another was that he was held back a grade in his second year because he failed mathematics. Finally, he failed an ordnance and gunnery course.
Allen enrolled and attended the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. and earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1912. He joined the Army once more and after passing the competitive Army officers exam, was commissioned a Second Lieutenant and assigned to Fort Meyer in Virginia. In 1913, he was reassigned to the 14th Cavalry at Eagle Pass, Texas and served there until 1917. During this time he pursued and captured ammunition smugglers and served on border duty. He was promoted twice, the first on July 1, 1916, to First Lieutenant and the second on May 15, 1917 when he was promoted to Captain.
World War I
On June 7, 1918, a year and two months after the United States declared war against Germany and entered World War I, Allen was sent to France and assigned to the 315th Ammunition Train. Allen showed up at a school for infantry officers the day before a class graduation. When the commandant of the school began to hand out certificates to the graduates, Allen lined up with them. When confronted with him the commandant said "I don't remember you in this class." "I'm Allen-why don't you?" was the reply. Without further due, Allen was given the certificate and became a temporary major.
Allen was assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 358th Infantry Regiment, 90th Division which he led into battle at St. Mihiel and Aincreville. During one battle Allen received a bullet through his jaw and mouth and as a result of the wound never stuttered again. He was awarded a Silver Star and a Purple Heart for his actions. Allen remained with the American Expeditionary Forces in France until the Armistice with Germany (Compiègne). He then served with the Army of Occupation in Germany until 1920 when he returned to the United States.
Pre World War II
After Allen returned to the United States, his temporary rank of Major was reverted to Captain until July 1, 1920 when he was fully promoted to Major. He served in Camp Travis and later in Fort McIntosh, both located in Texas. In 1922, Allen was assigned to the 61st Cavalry Division, at New York City.
He continued to take military related courses, among them: an advanced course in Cavalry School, Fort Riley, Kansas; a two year program at Fort Leavenworth's Command & General Staff School; a course in the Infantry School at Fort Benning and an interim course in infantry command with other divisions. In 1928, he married Mary Frances Robinson of El Paso, Texas with whom in 1929 he had a son, Terry de la Mesa Allen, Jr. On August 1, 1935, Allen was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel and became an instructor at the Cavalry School at Fort Riley in Kansas. He wrote and published "Reconnaissance by horse cavalry regiments and smaller units" in 1939. On October 1, 1940, General George Marshall promoted him to Brigadier General (without ever holding the rank of Colonel) and in 1942, he was promoted to Major General and given command of the 1st Infantry Division.
World War II
In 1942, the 1st Infantry Division was sent to Britain where they underwent further combat training, which included training in amphibious warfare. The division participated in the invasion of North Africa under the command of General George S. Patton. The division landed in Oran, Algeria on November 8, 1942, as part of Operation Torch. Elements of the division then took part in combat at Maktar, Medjez el Bab, Kasserine Pass, Gafsa, El Guettar, Béja, and Mateur, from January 21, 1943 to May 9, 1943, helping secure Tunisia. In July, 1943, the division supported other units in the invasion of Sicily and took part in Operation Husky.
Allen and his second in command Brigadier General Theodore Roosevelt Jr. (son of former U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt) distinguished themselves as combat leaders. Another associate under his command, was Chief of Staff, Norman Cota, who would later play an important military role in The Invasion of Normandy. In spite the success However, General Patton was critical of both Allen and Roosevelt and asked General Dwight D. Eisenhower permission to relieve both Allen and Roosevelt of their commands on the theory of rotation of command. On August 7, 1943, Allen was relieved of his command by Major General Clarence R. Huebner.
Allen, who was featured on the cover of Time Magazine on August 9, 1943, was reassigned to command the 104th Infantry Division, known as the Timberwolf Division. Some 34,000 men served with the division under Allen's command and fought for 195 consecutive days after landing in France on September 7, 1944. The division's first action came in October of 1944 during the taking of Achtmaal and Zundert in Holland. It then participated in the Battle of the Bulge, advanced through the Siegfried line and across the Inde River into Cologne, and it helped complete the encirclement of the Ruhr pocket. Finally, it made a 350-mile sweep to the Mulde River in the heart of Germany. The division which became renowned for its night fighting prowess, was deactivated in June 1946 upon its return to the United States at the end of the war.
Later years
Allen retired from the Army on August 31, 1946. For a number of years he served as a representative for various insurance companies in El Paso and was active in civic affairs and in veteran organizations. In October 1967, Allen's son, Lieutenant ColonelTerry de la Mesa Allen, Jr., was killed in the Vietnam War, while commanding the 2nd Battalion, 28th Infantry Regiment (United States) {Aka "Black Lions"}, a unit of the 1st Infantry Division (United States), which his father had commanded in World War II. Major General Terry de la Mesa Allen, Sr., died of natural causes on September 12, 1969, in El Paso, Texas, at the age of 81. He was buried, alongside his son, in the Fort Bliss National Cemetery with full military honors. The United States Military Academy presents the "General Terry de la Mesa Allen Award" to the student with the highest rating in Military Science.
Other Comments:
Foreign Decorations
Honorable Order of the Bath - United Kingdom
French Croix de Guerre with Palm medals - France
St. Mihiel Medal- France
Order of Suvorov Class II (Gold) - USSR
Order of the Bath
WWII - European Theater of Operations/Central Europe Campaign (1945)/Battle of the Ruhr Pocket
From Month/Year
March / 1945
To Month/Year
April / 1945
Description The Ruhr Pocket was a battle of encirclement that took place in late March and early April 1945, near the end of World War II, in the Ruhr Area of Germany. It marked the end of major organized resistance on Nazi Germany's Western Front, as more than 300,000 troops were taken prisoner.
Background
In March 1945, Allied Forces crossed the Rhine river. South of the Ruhr, General Omar Bradley's U.S. 12th Army Group's pursuit of the disintegrating German army resulted in the capture of the Ludendorff Bridge across the Rhine at Remagen by the U.S. First Army. Bradley and his subordinates quickly exploited the crossing made on March 7, 1945, and expanded the bridge head until the bridge collapsed 10 days later.
North of the Ruhr on March 23, 1945, Field Marshal Montgomery's British 21st Army Group launched Operation Plunder and crossed the Rhine at Rees and Wesel.
The battle
Having crossed the Rhine, both Army Groups fanned out into the German hinterland. In the south, while Third Army headed east, the First Army headed northeast and formed the southern pincer of the Ruhr envelopment. In the north, the U.S. Ninth Army, which since the Battle of the Bulge had been assigned to Montgomery's British 21st Army Group, headed southeast forming the northern pincer, while the rest of 21st Army Group went east and northeast.
Facing the Allied armies were the remnants of a shattered Wehrmacht, a few SS training units, and large numbers of Volkssturm (militia units for aging men, including some World War I veterans) and Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth) units, composed of boys as young as 12.
Lead elements of the two Allied pincers met on April 1, 1945, near Lippstadt. By April 4, the encirclement was completed and the Ninth Army reverted to the command of Bradley's 12th Army Group. Within the Ruhr Pocket about 430,000 German soldiers of Army Group B, which comprised 21 divisions of the Wehrmacht, and millions of civilians were trapped in cities heavily damaged by numerous bombings.
While the main operations headed further toward central and northern Germany, American forces concentrated on the pocket, taking it section by section. On April 12, 1945, the U.S. 1st and 9th Armies divided the area coming from the south; the smaller, eastern part surrendered the next day. The western part continued a weak resistance until April 18 and April 21, 1945. Rather than surrender and violate his personal oath to Adolf Hitler that he would fight to the death, the commander, Field Marshal Walter Model, committed suicide in a forest south of the city of Duisburg.
German anti-Nazi resistance groups in Düsseldorf attempted to surrender the city to the Allied armies in the so-called "Aktion Rheinland" in order to spare Düsseldorf from further destruction. However, SS units were able to crush the resistance, and executed a number of those involved. Executions of foreign labourers, political prisoners, etc. by the Gestapo had already been occurring since February. The act of resistance did accomplish a cancellation of further bombings on the city by another 800 bombers, through contact with the Americans. Düsseldorf was captured by Americans on 17 April without any notable fighting.
The surviving 325,000 German soldiers from the Ruhr Pocket, and some civilians, were imprisoned in a complex of temporary prison enclosures known as Rheinwiesenlager (in English, "Rhine meadow camps").
French Croix de Guerre with Palm medals - France
St. Mihiel Medal- France
Order of Suvorov Class II (Gold) - USSR
