• The KillerFrogs

D-Day - thoughts, stories?

steelfrog

Tier 1
Not D-Day or WW2 but my grandfather served in Korea and he didn’t talk about it much. Selfishly I wish I was older and been able to ask questions but I don’t think the conversation would have got very far. It messed him up mentally pretty good and I’ve heard from my dad a dud grenade landed right beside him. Received shock treatments when he got back and was on/off bipolar medication until he passed. My dad has a view items that I hope to get someday from his dads time in Korea

Steels dad same way; USM first div in Korea. The hills battles, or whatever. Never talked about it til he got Alzheimers approaching his 80s and then he started talking about it. Doesn't know who we are, but occasionally asks, "Did you know I was in the war?"

Asked Steel's mom a few weeks ago if she would marry him...Forgot they been married 60 years.
 

Paradoxotaur

Full Member
Senior year of high school, we were watching the opening scene of Saving Private Ryan in History class. Without question one of the best scenes in movie history. After a half hour or so they finally succeed in taking the beach and the lights come back on. Everyone is sitting in silence, trying to process it all.

Finally breaking the silence, one of the girls in class asks, with complete sincerity, “Are all of those men there to save Private Ryan?”
 

PurplFrawg

Administrator
The parachute drop behind the German lines at Ste-Mere Eglise has been recreated in several films. That's the site where one of the paratroopers landed on the roof of the church where his chute became tangled and he hung there, watching the fighting below, until he was spotted the next morning by the good guys and was rescued. To this day, as a tribute, the citizens have a mannequin in a period correct uniform, hanging from the church roof in a parachute. I think the French people appreciate the sacrifices, it's the Parisians who don't.

St-Mere-Eglise.jpg
 

AroundWorldFrog

Full Member
it's the Parisians who don't.

St-Mere-Eglise.jpg
Legend, folklore or just plain BS.....a soldier that landed on D-Day was going to the 50th anniversary and flew into Paris. As he was going through passport control, he was struggling to find his passport and the French officer was becoming impatient and criticizing the old gent.
"You know you need a passport to come to France, right?"
"Well, son, the last time I came to France I didn't need a passport and there sure as scheiss weren't any Frenchmen on Omaha Beach to check it".
 

Frog DJ

Active Member
My late father-in-law was a medic with 101st, and came ashore on Omaha in the second wave. He never talked about WWII much, but he did tell me that they sent most of the medics in the second wave because they knew the Germans would mow down anyone with a red cross on his helmet.

He wound up in Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge, and they were all thoroughly convinced they were simply dead. He said he absolutely detested bagpipes, but when Montgomery led the British Army in the liberation of Bastogne he said he "danced a jig" to sound of their bagpipes.

A debt that can never be properly repaid...

Go Frogs!
 
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frog-hat

Active Member
if you ever get a chance to take a flight on a b-17 or b-24 I suggest you do it, it will impress upon you even more the bravery of those who flew in them during wii.
 

PurplFrawg

Administrator
Participated in the battle of the Bulge - delivery fuel, ammo, food and supplies to the front. He didn't talk much about that. I know he had friends with him that didn't make it out.

The prayer which broke the bad weather and delivered victory to Patton and the men at Bastogne:

Almighty and most merciful Father, we humbly beseech Thee, of Thy great goodness, to restrain these immoderate rains with which we have had to contend. Grant us fair weather for Battle. Graciously hearken to us as soldiers who call upon Thee that, armed with Thy power, we may advance from victory to victory, and crush the oppression and wickedness of our enemies and establish Thy justice among men and nations.

http://pattonhq.com/prayer.html
 

Eight

Member
I finally figured it out. You’re posting from an Enigma machine, aren’t you?

my father was a cryptographer in the army air corp during world war ii. he was very, very good at math and early in basic was sent somewhere upstate new york to be trained on the american version of the enigma.

he only told three stories about his time at code school. the first was after they had been in school learning about codes for roughly a month they finally got to see one of the machines. it was the last day of the screening process and all they basically got to do was look at the machine.

there were a number of holes on the outside of the machine and one of his classmates asked why the holes. instructor told them in the case where the machine might be captured they were to fire a shot in each hole with their sidearm to destroy the machine. another class mate noted that they had one more round in the side arm than holes in the machine and the instructor calmly told the class that the final round was for them. they could not be captured under any circumstances and if they did not think they could do that they need to withdraw from the class.

with that the group got a weekend pass and on that next monday roughly half the class was gone.

my dad spent the bulk of the war stationed in venezuela listening to german u-boats in the gulf of mexico.
 
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ShreveFrog

Full Member
I recall seeing Saving Private Ryan and as we were filing out there was a lone vet sitting there wiping his eyes. Everyone that walked by put a hand on his shoulder. I heard him tell someone he expected the run of the mill war movie and said he wouldn’t have gone had he known the first 20 minutes was going to be so realistic.

A few years before the movie, I interviewed three D-Day vets in Bakersfield, California on the 50th anniversary. What they described of the landings was exactly what Spielberg put in the movie.
 

MAcFroggy

Active Member
Not D-Day but WW2 related:

My grandfather fought in the war in Europe. I was very young when he died, so I never really had any conversations about it with him. However about 5 years ago, I received a box of things from my grandmother which included a lot of war things (medals, pictures, etc). One thing of note was his bible. I was with my grandmother as I was going through these items, and I opened the bible. A picture of my grandmother fell out. I showed it to her. She had no idea he kept that picture of her in there. It was very emotional going through all that stuff with her. They got married when he came home from the war in January 1946

A year or so ago, my mom found all of the letters my grandfather wrote my grandmother during the war. They had been kept together in a pile with a blue ribbon around them. The letters were found in a box of stuff rather randomly in my great-uncles garage. They must have been at my great grandfathers house when he died, and they were going through all his things. They are not exactly sure how it ended up with my grandma's brother as opposed to my grandmother. They assume it had to do with the fact that my grandmother's father died very shortly after my grandfather died, and they thought it would be too emotional for her to see the letters while she was going through all of that.

Reading those letters with my mom was very emotional. It is crazy how young they were, but how in love they were. Letters mostly spoke about the monotony of the days, hating to dig foxholes, and the fact they would get married when he got back. He also used some of the cliche "The only thing that gets me through a lot of these days is thinking about you" and other stuff like that. Smooth operator.
 
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