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Company "A", 702nd Tank Battalion, which led the 80th Division counterattack, lost five tanks, but the 80th regained Loisy, Bezaumont, and Ste. Genevieve.  Two companies of the 317th had maintained their hold on Hill 382 throughout the night and at dawn on 13 September counterattacked and drove the enemy off the slopes.  Infantry of the 317th also had repelled a number of sorties made against the outpost position at Landremont, the most advanced point reached the previous day.  The 80th Division counterattack regained contact with these isolated positions and by late afternoon of 13 September had restored the original bridgehead perimeter.

....the infantry had been hit by counterattacks in considerable force on 14 September; every available rifleman was engaged in a bitter struggle to hold the ground already won, and extend the bridgehead line out to the east and onto the last chain of hills, grouped around Mount Toulon and Mount St. Jean.  On 15 September, the situation in the 80th Division bridgehead had deteriorated so markedly that General Eddy ordered the Combat Command "A" commander to release the 1st Battalion of the 318th Infantry, which had been attached to the combat command, and sent it back by truck, to reinforce the 80th.  Colonel Clark dispatched a company of tanks to convoy the truck column, and the following morning, after some sharp skirmishing along the road, the little task force arrived in the bridgehead-just in time to intervene in a fight then raging.

Captured German Photo

On 12 September, the corps commander gave the formal order for XII Corps to "concentrate east of the Moselle River."  No immediate move was made to enter Nancy, although a provisional task force, commanded by Brigadier General Owen Summers, Assistant Division Commander, 80th Infantry Division, was organized from the 134th Infantry and the 319th Infantry for this purpose.  At the same time word was sent to a French intelligence team, operating behind the German lines, under the command of a Major Crinon, that the enemy signal cables leading into the Foret de Haye from the east must be cut.  This task was accomplished on the night of 13 September.  A few hours earlier, however, Blaskowitz had given the First Army commander permission to evacuate Nancy, "except for a small bridgehead garrison in the west part of the city," in order that the 553rd Volks Grenadier Division, already weakened by commitments on the flanks of the Nancy position, might be used in the concentration of forces with which it was hoped to erase the Dieulouard bridgehead. 

On the American side, the situation in the 80th Division bridgehead had called General Summers and part of the 319th Infantry north.  As a result, the Nancy task force was reconstituted under Brigadier General E.B. Sebree, Assistant Division Commander, 35th Infantry Division.  On the night of 14 September new intelligence from the French undercover agents indicated that the enemy had evacuated the Foret de Haye.  Next day, Task Force Sebree, guided by three members of the Nancy FFI, marched down the Toul road and entered the city; one battalion of the 134th Infantry pushed straight through to the east edge, with no opposition.  Nancy was now in the hands of the Third Army; it would become the army headquarters and the chief bridgehead for the main army supply routes leading into the Lorraine.  The decision to isolate this important communications center by envelopment had paid good dividends, but the bulk of the Nancy garrison had escaped and would face the Third Army again.

The 319th Infantry [including "C" Company, 702nd Tank Battalion, Red Devils] was regrouped prior to the advance on Nancy.  The 1st and 3rd Battalions assembled in the Gondreville area and the 3rd Battalion later marched to Nancy.  The 2nd Battalion was left north of the Moselle loop to clear the Germans from the river bluffs along the bend between Liverdun and Pompey.  Here on 14 September, "E" Company engaged in a hot fight with the enemy dug in on the bluffs.  Although this action was subsidiary to the main battles elsewhere-and is hardly mentioned in the records of the 80th Division-it was distinguished by several acts of personal heroism.  The Congressional Medal of Honor was awarded to 2nd Lt. Edgar H. Lloyd for leading his men through a deadly crossfire, knocking out the first German machine gunner he met, with his fist, and killing the crew with a hand grenade.

In this fight, Lieutenant Lloyd personally accounted for five machine guns.  Sgt. William B. Humphrey was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for action that took place at the same time, when he killed numerous German machine gunners with bayonet and grenades.  PFC Edward M. Winterbottom distinguished himself by going forward alone when his squad was stopped by a German machine gun.  His rifle was shot out of his hand and he received a severe wound, but he continued on until he was within fifteen yards of the enemy weapon-then destroyed it with a hand grenade.  He was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross.