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D-Day Remembered

Posted: Mon Jun 06, 2016 7:44 pm
by Tom Ligon
As usual, D-Day is not getting much notice. You can find the stories if you look, but it seems the world would rather forget, just as they forgot that Memorial Day is not National Barbecue Day.

One of my benchmarks is to check the TV listings for movies that help us remember. One might expect to see "The Longest Day", for example. Nothing on PBS. Free has Forrest Gump, an anti-Vietnam-War movie. History has some war stuff on instead of Pawn Stars, sort of ... Last Stand of the 300, Gladiator, and Barbarians Rising. Turner has been the one bright spot in the past, but I'm not seeing any war movie titles today. Nope, evidently the public wants to watch South Park re-runs.

So I'll sit here and remember the 116th Infantry, including a company of National Guardsmen from Bedford, VA who landed in the first wave on Bloody Omaha. 19 of the Bedford Boys were killed in the first few minutes of the landing. The third wave saw them joined by advance components of their artillery support, also formerly National Guard, the 111th Field Artillery. Alas, the 111th went down in history as the field artillery battalion with no field artillery. Eleven of their howitzers wound up on the bottom of the Channel, and the 12th was donated to another unit. So their commander, Lt. Col. Thornton Mullins said "To hell with or field artillery mission, we're infantry now." Wounded twice, Mullins kept getting patched up and making another try to use whatever was at hand to take the high ground. Finally a German sniper stopped his efforts forever.

Mullins and my father served in the 111th prior to the war, but my father was reassigned to a new unit in 1941. But dad did teach the 111th to shoot, all to the Marksman level, and did recreational target shooting with Mullins. I know Mullins could handle a rifle and knew his men could, so his actions are no surprise.

We are all unworthy.

Re: D-Day Remembered

Posted: Mon Jun 06, 2016 8:16 pm
by paperburn1
I remember stories from those that were in WW2 and served
yes without question "We are not worthy"

Re: D-Day Remembered

Posted: Mon Jun 06, 2016 8:54 pm
by ladajo
My dad was career navy. Before U.S. entry into WWII he was a merchant mariner, and told stories of watching tankers get smoked down south on the Eastern Seaboard, and in the Caribbean. During WWII, he drove landing craft for Seabees in the Pacific, then did a stint at Harvard with V-12 program, and then back to the Pacific to ride a Destroyer, which ended up taking a Kamikaze hit during the Okinawa campaign. He told way more stories from WWII than he did Vietnam. To his death, he never forgave the Japanese, given his experiences in the Pacific.
We are indeed, not worthy. These men knew real contribution and sacrifice. They did not get rotations home or real breaks.

Re: D-Day Remembered

Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2016 3:01 am
by Tom Ligon
At least there's YouTube. I don't mind telling you my eyes are wet right now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=faVjvreNHGQ

Re: D-Day Remembered

Posted: Fri Jun 10, 2016 9:38 pm
by krenshala
Unfortunately, I don't know what unit he was in, but I know for sure my grandfather was one part of one of the infantry units trapped in the Battle of the Bulge. He was apparently one of the most decorated veterans in Wyoming County NY, but refused to talk about anything that happened to him in WWII.