I remember the day like it was yesterday. I was a ten-year-old studying for a World War II unit test in the front room. As I struggled to memorize the strange names and places with which I had no associations, I became frustrated. In time, my father heard my complaints and came to my rescue. Taking my sheet of terms, he quizzed me on Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin, even the four beaches assaulted on D-day. Then he asked me where the Battle of the Bulge took place. I was stumped. "I can’t remember it all, Dad," I said feebly.

With an intensity in his eyes that I rarely saw, he said, "You can never forget the Battle of the Bulge! I was there. Very few of my comrades returned home. I was the lucky one. If you forget everything else, never forget the Battle of the Bulge." Suddenly, that battle was real. It was no longer a piece of world history written on the pages of my fourth-grade textbook. My dad was there.

I’ve never forgotten the Battle of the Bulge.

On a recent visit home, my father and I sat together in the living room, talking about the importance of preserving the past. His family now includes six children, twenty grandchildren, and one great-grandchild. Some of his descendants know he is a World War II veteran, but many of the children are too young to understand what that really means. When they begin to understand, my father may not be around to tell them his story of the War.

Like most veterans, my father rarely talked about the War. If it was mentioned in conversation, he wasn’t the one to bring up the subject, and he wouldn’t volunteer his stories. This time, I suggested to him that we sit down together and record his war memories. In this context, he looked at me with the same intensity I had seen in his eyes nearly twenty years earlier and said, "I think that’s a good idea."

We recorded three interviews. I had a notepad, a small tape recorder, and a list of questions, but mostly I just let him talk. Although his voice on the tapes was part of the richness and value of the oral history, my purpose was to transcribe his stories and create a small book for his descendants to read. My hope was that they would begin to understand the events that helped shape the man they simply know as "grandpa."

Before each session, Dad would reread his words from the previous session, which would help him remember details he hadn’t thought about in years. He would recall the name of a river his unit crossed or the full name of a friend with whom he had shared both good and bad times. He found it easy to expand his stories because he had a place to start and an audience he knew was interested. Over the course of several weeks, he also took the time to write down more of his memories. He even located a box of photos and souvenirs he’d brought back from Germany.

I learned many things about my dad during these interviews–some things I had never known before and other things that clarified some misunderstandings about my father’s life. He was a communications sergeant assigned to C company of the 405th Regiment of the 102d Infantry Division. Landing at Sherbourg Port, France in September 1944, he spent most of the war in Belgium and Germany before being mustered out in April 1946. I learned how my father received his "war wound." He told me: "On hot days at Camp Swift, they let us swim in the pools near the barracks. I made a surface dive into a pool that was not deep enough. I came down very fast and threw out my hands to keep from hitting my head, but the intensity of the jolt ruptured a disc in my back." He wasn’t wounded in action.

I also learned about his pre-War interaction with people of different races and ethnicities–something I never expected to learn from a series of oral history interviews about World War II.

Before he was shipped overseas, Dad helped maintain peace in Philadelphia during the 1944 riots. "While we were at Fort Dix, New Jersey, the operators of the transit system in Philadelphia went on strike because they were hiring negroes to be bus and streetcar operators. The all-white union objected to them being hired. I was headed out of the base one day when they stopped me at the gate and told me to go back to my company–all passes were cancelled. They loaded us onto trucks and shipped us to Fairmont Park in Philadelphia, where we set up a military camp.

"In the morning, we reported to the car barns, where we were given short-range ammunition and assigned a streetcar. For several days, we rode the cars with loaded rifles, fixed with bayonets, to ensure the peace in the city. It wasn’t until after the war that negroes were given the opportunity to take the jobs they were qualified for."

Because he grew up in a small western community in Idaho, Dad’s exposure to other races was limited during his youth. The phrases and terminology he used in his story told me a lot about his background.

In the past, as I’ve conducted genealogical research on ancestors who fought in the American Revolutionary War and Civil War, I’ve found myself longing for firsthand accounts of what they saw and felt during their times of service. Were they scared? Did they believe in what they were fighting for? Did they see the horrors of war? I wanted to ask Dad these questions, but in the end, I didn’t have to. As he spoke, he began to open up and let his thoughts flow freely. His stories contained the answers I sought.

"We had a disastrous operation just before Thanksgiving near the village of Beeck. We went on the attack and were dug in on the back side of a hill. There was a German contingent just over the crest of the hill that had a pillbox (concrete bunker) shooting at us. As I passed over the crest of the hill, I passed a fellow calling for a medic because he had a hole blown through the calf of his leg.

"Before we dug in on the hill, we were below the crest taking fire. Our first sergeant was hit, and I held him in my arms until a medic came and evacuated him. We then climbed the hill and dug in for the night. The Germans were lobbing mortars at us. (Mortars have a very high projectory. They come straight down on you without a sound. You don’t hear them coming, unlike an artillery shell.) One exploded near my foxhole and, as I was ducking down, a piece of shrapnel went right across my upper lip. I felt it on my whiskers. The Germans crawled up to the top of the hill and threw grenades at us. It was a scary night."

His stories continued, and I began to understand what he faced on the European front. "We were in a rural area on the Elbe River, south of a bridge at Tangermunde. A Piper Cub was flying reconnaissance up and down the Elbe River. There was a flood plain on the eastern side, and there was a German tank over there. The tank driver came out and started waving at this Piper Cub. It was a German colonel of a Panzer unit, and he wanted to surrender his unit to the Americans instead of the Russians. The Piper Cub pilot brought him over to our side. It was kind of hard because we had no provisions for taking POWs; that was not part of our responsibility. Here was a Panzer commander who wanted to surrender. He did not want his unit captured by the Russians. He was taken back to battalion headquarters to make arrangements.

"We were moved down river to a railroad/highway bridge due west of Berlin. It had been bombed, but it could still be crossed on foot. Our battalion was responsible for that portion of the front. The Germans were fighting the Russians. Those who were wounded or who were not needed to fight the Russians crossed this bridge. We required that anyone surrendering to the Americans had to bring a weapon. When they came across the bridge, they had to throw their weapons over the side. It was about twenty to thirty feet down. They came across in a steady stream for seven to ten days and each one brought a weapon and threw it on the pile. Soon they were throwing the guns on a pile that was above their heads. Some of our guys stood there with baskets and picked up all the pistols from the officers as they crossed. This is where we got all our souvenir pistols. I ended up with a P38, a Luger, and a Browning automatic."

When the war ended in the spring of 1945, Dad continued his service as part of the occupying army. His major responsibilities included guarding POWs (primarily German soldiers).

Since we began discussing his War experiences, Dad has shared photographs of his life in Germany with me–pictures I never knew existed. And the book that I envisioned would tell the story of his life overseas is a work-in-progress.

It took me a long time to get my father to talk about his World War II experiences. I know that talking about the War is a painful thing for veterans. It reminds them of a time and place they’ve worked more than fifty years to forget. But Dad had his seventy-sixth birthday this year, and I was reminded that if I didn’t take the time now, I might lose the opportunity entirely.

I learned a few things along the way about interviewing a person about a sensitive topic. With all the talking we’ve done, Dad is still hesitant to discuss the war with others. I imagine that the book I compile will be his way of telling other people about his experiences. I don’t think he wants people to ask him questions; I think he’ll just hand them the book. (Read one story of the interviewee's experiences in Germany.)

I have also learned a few things about myself through this experience. Since the time I was a young girl, studying for a World War II exam and making my first connections to another time and place, the War has come alive in my mind. I’ve learned that family history is more than just the accumulation of names and dates; it is our attempt to connect ourselves to people we have not known in order to learn more about ourselves. I have gained a more complete sense of who I am through this experience. And I am now focused on recording the life stories of other family members.

Be Sensitive
Most people like to talk about themselves. But if your family member doesn’t want to be interviewed, find out why. He or she may have a family secret to hide or may be embarrassed about excessive memory loss. Always be sensitive. If your relative agrees to an interview, don’t be afraid to ask the tough questions. You never know if you will get the opportunity to ask them again.

Return to the May/June 2001 Table of Contents.