Colmar was liberated on February 8, 1945. The city had been under German occupation since 1940 — five years, through which its population had experienced the specific experience of Alsatian territory under German administration: German language instruction in schools, German administrative structures, in some cases German military conscription of Alsatian men. The liberation in February 1945 ended the German presence and returned the city to French administration.
The reduction of the Colmar Pocket closed the last German bridgehead on the west bank of the Rhine. It straightened the Allied line from the North Sea to Switzerland, removed the threat to Allied flanks that the pocket had posed, and positioned the American and French forces for the Rhine crossing operations that followed in March 1945.
The 3rd Infantry Division’s contribution to this outcome was substantial. The division had fought through the most difficult terrain of the pocket — the flat, frozen Alsatian plain with its defensive lines of forests and drainage ditches — for weeks, taking the objectives and holding them while German counterattacks attempted to restore the defensive line.
The specific action at Holtzwihr on January 26 was part of this larger campaign. Its tactical significance was that it held a critical approach to Colmar against a German counterattack that might otherwise have pushed the American forces back and delayed the closure of the pocket. Its operational significance was that it contributed, along with many similar actions across the front, to the cumulative effect that eliminated the pocket.
Murphy received no additional combat decorations after Holtzwihr. The January 26 action was his last major documented individual combat action of the war. After the Colmar Pocket was reduced, the 3rd Division continued east, crossing the Rhine and advancing into Germany. Murphy continued to serve with the division through the end of the war in Europe. He was present for the German surrender in May 1945.