This is a typical description in the School of the Soldier section at the end of most chapters.
Sleep – For many an infantryman he is always tired. Really tired; in fact, after the war, a Hürtgen veteran stated: “I saw men die under artillery fire because they were so tired that they were only able to scratch the outline of a foxhole in the dirt.”63 Move here; move there. Carry this; carry that; now carry some more. Dig a foxhole all day; now go out on patrol tonight. Then go back in your foxhole and spend half of the rest of the night awake on security. And tomorrow? Do it all over again.
So, soldiers learn how to sleep in conditions that seem impossible to others. They are ingenious in staying dry enough to fall asleep, when water is dripping from overhanging trees, or oozing up from the wet ground below. Loud noises, causing civilians to wake up startled, are seemingly ignored by soldiers apparently slumbering in infant bliss. Once you get used to a few mortar rounds falling in your general vicinity, you can get used to almost anything. But don’t give in to the urge to sleep in captured bunkers; the straw inside is full of fleas and lice.
s to sleeping surfaces, GIs appear can almost levitate to be comfortable – curling around large rocks, avoiding sharp jutting roots, and steering clear of ground that might appear dry now, but will be damp by morning. Louis Benoist wrote about sleep: “You know you have seen pictures of infantrymen sleeping wherever they hit the ground. It can be done – I do it. After so long a time you have to get used to it. Not so bad when you do. After your hips get tough the ground gets pretty soft.” Some soldiers even claim they can slip into a sleeplike trance while walking – trudging one foot ahead of the other in thousands of repetitions – all the while staying the proper distance behind the trooper in front of him.
After the war, former combat soldiers – now fathers and grandfathers – can seemingly take a short catnap anywhere: the sofa; the ballgame; outside in the backyard, at the beach; listening to the wife, all while the kids and grandkids are running around screaming, crashing into furniture, playing tag, lighting fireworks, and causing general auditory mayhem.