Who is your World War 2 heros?

Answer 1

My personal ones would be my father's older brother, and my grandmother's youngest brother. The latter went to enlist the day after Pearl Harbor, but he wanted to join the Army Air Force (the Air Force was still a part of the Army all through WWII), and the recruiter did not have enough forms. Everybody had to come back the next day, and there was a picture in the local paper of the group that returned and signed up. Because he got in so early he was able to complete training to be a rare bird - a sergeant bombardier. Soon after, the brass decided it took an officer to drop bombs, and anybody who hadn't finished the enlisted men's training course was transferred to another specialty. He was assigned to the 381st Bomb Squadron of the 310th Bomb Group (Medium), operating B-25 bombers. His plane went down in the Mediterranean February 8, 1943, returning to his base in Algeria from a raid on Sicily. His body was never recovered. There were two planes lost from his Group that day, with all crew members. One of them was carrying an extra man, so thirteen died. His crew had named their B-25 "The Cobra". One year to the day after they went down, their status was changed from MIA to presumed KIA, and the government, which was usually sensitive about such things in WWII, sent out a form letter to the families of all thirteen men. I suppose they were busy. His mother never gave up hope that somehow it was a mistake and he would return home. His name was Jim, and he was a great jokester. After he enlisted, but before he left home, he bought my mom a little teddy bear for Christmas, and there was a gift tag around its neck, to her from "Uncle Goon". They put that bear on the Christmas tree that year, and we had it on the tree every year while I was growing up. I've still got that bear.

My dad's brother graduated from high school in early June, 1943, and two weeks before that he had gotten his draft notice. He was in basic training less than a month after receiving his diploma. His mom saved every letter, every scrap of correspondence, so I have a good idea what happened. In October 1943 he volunteered to go overseas as a replacement for a unit already in action. At the time he did that he was in the 66th Infantry Division, training in Florida. If he'd stayed put he might be an old man today. The 66th Infantry Division barely made it to France, in time to get in on only that last month or two of the war in Europe. One of the ships carrying them across the Channel from England to the mainland was torpedoed, and 762 men were killed, but that was the worst the 66th ID experienced. Instead, he went as a replacement to C Company, 30th Infantry, of the 3rd Infantry Division. There is little doubt that the 3rd ID was the finest division the US had in the war, Army or Marine. As an example, there were about 435 Medals of Honor awarded during the entire war, among all branches, among all the sixteen million who served. Thirty-seven of those went to soldiers of the 3rd ID - almost one tenth - to a unit that had at full strength not quite 15,000 men. One of the Marine divisions was second on the list, with twenty-one. Two members of my uncle's company earned the MOH, and both lived to get home, which was unusual, as more than half the Medals of Honor were posthumous. A company had only 187 men at full strength. Another "first" for the Third Infantry Division was that it way, way more men killed and wounded than any other US division - over 27,000 wounded, and over 6,600 killed (remember a division had only a bit less than 15,000 men). You can see why the division constantly needed replacements. (The Army's First Infantry Division was "second" on that list, with over 5100 killed). Most of the men killed in the entire war were foot soldiers, riflemen, in the "letter" or "line" companies of the Infantry Divisions, and this was the job my uncle was assigned to do. He was in C Company 30th Infantry for more than a year, and in combat or in the hospital recovering from wounds for thirteen months of that time. He was wounded four times before he was finally killed January 24, 1945, near Colmar, France. So, he was entitled to the Purple Heart with four Oak Leaf Clusters (you only got a medal one time - if you earned it again you got an Oak Leaf Cluster to wear on the ribbon). He also earned a Silver Star, and an Oak Leaf Cluster to that as well. He was awarded the Croix de Guerre by France. He was part of the first army to capture Rome from the south in 2000 years, and he was killed just after his unit fought its way through the Vosges Mountains, which had never been crossed in all recorded history by any army in winter, and had never been crossed at any time of the year by an army faced with opposition. He was promoted from Private First Class directly to Staff Sergeant (skipping two grades) in December, 1944, while in the hospital for the last time, recovering from wounds received in the action for which he was awarded the Croix de Guerre. He also celebrated his twentieth birthday during that hospital stay. Wounded men did not get to go home, unless their wound was severe enough to disqualify them for further combat (the so-called "million dollar wound"). The only way out for a rifleman was victory or death, or a disabling wound. A Staff Sergeant ordinarily led an infantry squad of twelve men. While being a rifleman was far and away THE most dangerous job to have in WWII, within the group of rifleman the most dangerous job was infantry platoon commander, normally a second or first lieutenant. These came and went with great frequency, as getting out in front and leading was a likely way to get killed. When the latest "ninety day wonder" (so-called from the length of the Officer Candidate School course that cranked them out) went down, the senior Staff Sergeant would lead the platoon (an infantry platoon had four squads). My uncle was leading the First Platoon of C Company when he died. They had just begin an operation to "reduce" the "Colmar Pocket", a heavily defended enclave of Germans still holding out on the west bank of the Rhine. They had crossed a small, but swiftly flowing little river, with steep banks, using footbridges stealthily emplaced by the combat engineers in the night. They had then gone down the far bank to "uncover" and capture the far end of the only bridge in the area, which they needed very badly, because tanks could not get across the little river, with its steep banks and swift current. They captured the bridge, but it was not strong enough to hold up the weight of tanks. The engineers called for reinforcing materials, to make the bridge strong enough, but the trucks carrying these materials got stuck in the traffic jam waiting to cross this only bridge in the area. Somebody got impatient. They had used what materials were on hand to reinforce the bridge, but there was a thirty foot gap in the middle not reinforced. The impatient officer decided to try to send across a tank anyway. The tank got to the middle of the Maison Rouge bridge, which then creaked, groaned and crashed down into the river, tank and all. This left the entire First Battalion, 30th Infantry, on the far bank with no direct armor support. They weren't too worried, as they could still call in artillery fire, and they had been in plenty of tight spots before. The Germans probably observed the collapse of the bridge, and the next morning sent out an attack spearheaded by five of the famous, dreaded Tiger tanks, with its fearsome 88mm cannon. My uncle climbed out of his fox hole, probably to direct the platoon bazooka team, and one of the Tigers fired its main gun, the 88mm at him, just like a rifle. The shells from that weapon came at the same velocity as a rifle bullet. He was blown up and instantly killed, and the entire First Battalion was shot up pretty badly. The Army Quartermaster Corps ran a warehouse complex in Kansas City, fourteen acres under the roof. This was where the personal effects of the men killed were processed. If you were killed in Europe, it took about six months for your effects to get back to your family. If you were killed in the Pacific, it took a year. In June, 1945 (a month after the war in Europe ended - my uncle was SO close to getting to the end) my grandmother got a letter from the quartermasters in Kansas City. They had my uncle's personal effects, which were about $22 he had in his pocket (his wristwatch was missing, probably looted by a German when they overran his position after he was killed - a watch was a good thing to have and not everybody did - his mom had sent him that watch in the mail in the autumn of 1944, because he had written home and asked for one). The quartermasters also had my uncle's Combat Infantryman's Badge. The CIB was something new during WWII, created because Army Chief of Staff General Marshall wanted some type of recognition for the riflemen, not all of whom got noticed doing something that got them a medal. My uncle's regiment got their CIBs in the "Pine Grove", their "rest area" in the Anzio beachhead, and they wore them in combat, on their fatigue jackets. The reason the quartermasters wrote my grandmother was that, as they said, the CIB "appeared to have been damaged" when he was killed, and they didn't want to send it, if it was going to upset her. They offered her a new CIB if she preferred, or the one he had on. She wanted the one he was wearing, and I have it today. Its a long rectangular metal badge, about three inches long and maybe a half-inch tall. My uncle's is bent, and has half a dozen tiny splinter holes all the way through it, like tiny bullet holes. Looking at it and knowing he was wearing it on his chest, you can understand he must have been completely peppered with shell splinters. He was buried the first time probably in a temporary divisional cemetery in the area where he was killed. After the war all these temporary cemeteries were emptied and the men removed to the beautiful, permanent cemeteries maintained today by the American Battle Monuments Commission. My uncle was in Epinal Cemetery. In the late 40s the Army wrote to next of kin and offered to bring home the remains of loved ones buried overseas. They wrote my grandmother in 1948, and she opted to have him returned (many did not - there's still over 200,000 buried in the ABMC Cemeteries). She debated having him buried in Arlington, but that was a long way from home, so he is in the cemetery here, working on his third burial. My grandmother wrote to the captain commanding C Company after the war, no doubt having read in the newspaper about the captain receiving the Medal of Honor. He replied, and I've exchanged letters with him too. He is today the oldest living recipient of the Medal of Honor. My grandmother lived another 43 years after her boy was killed, and she never got over it.

These were just two average young American men, who in normal times probably would have lived normal, unremarkable lives. But, because they lived when they did, it fell to them to go do what had to be done. There are hundreds of thousands of stories much like theirs.