The 71st Infantry Division arrived in France in February 1945 and entered combat in March, relieving the 100th Infantry Division before pushing through the West Wall and capturing Pirmasens on March 21. Crossing the Rhine at Oppenheim on March 30, the division was soon diverted to eliminate a German force that had broken out north of Hanau: two regiments compressed the Germans into Büdingen Wald while a third blocked the eastern exits, and the pocket was destroyed with assistance from the 5th Infantry Division by April 4.
Advancing into Thuringia, the division followed the 11th Armored Division in a rapid drive to Coburg on April 10, then fought the Battle for Bayreuth on April 14-16 in heavy urban and close-terrain combat. Moving south, it bypassed strongpoints, pushed to the Danube, and took Regensburg on April 27 after forcing the river under direct fire. The division crossed the Isar on April 30 under direct German fire using stormboats and smoke screens, seized the Inn River dams, and entered Austria on May 2.
On April 29, the division had reached and liberated Gunskirchen, a subcamp of the Mauthausen concentration camp system, where thousands of prisoners were found in desperate condition — one of the defining episodes of the final advance. Contact with Soviet forces east of Linz on May 8 ended the campaign.
(A) = attached
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