With today being the anniversary of the D-Day landing in Normandy I find myself thinking of my father who died three years ago this coming September. As a 22 year old he was in the Army Corps of Engineers and followed the troops ashore as his division was tasked with building pontoon brides and other structures to allow the troops to continue the push inland. Generally, he did not talk a great deal about the combat he witnessed other than as a kid I do recall watching the old TV show Combat which would get him to occasionally talk about friends lost and things he witnessed. He preferred to think of the better experiences such as being Paris, living off the Champs Elysee, or his time as Fire Marshall for Marseilles after hostilities ceased.
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Many of today's younger generation will never know the experience of hearing first hand accounts of those who were there and the horrors they witnessed and the extreme heroism exhibited by so many. I hope everyone will take a moment today to remember the brave men and women who gave their lives to stop the Nazi regime.
1 comment:
Although I never had the chance to ask my great-uncle Walt who was part of D-Day about his service, my Dad has often told me the story of one of the few things Walt would ever discuss about World War II.
Both Walt and his best friend had come through the invasion and the war with no injuries.
The day after Germany surrended and the war was "over", Walt was standing next to a tank and Walt's best friend rose up out of the hatch of a tank and was shot in the head and killed instantly by a German sniper in a building.
Uncle Walt spoke very little of World War II, I believe we can understand why.
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