Page 65 - Anthology

When I got back home, I didn’t do much for the rest of that year. The next year I farmed, raised a crop
and milked cows.

When I think back on it, the only care I got was from the Germans in their field hospitals. I never got
treatment from an American. The Germans patched me up and even gave me a blood transfusion. If it
hadn’t been for the Germans; I would be in bad shape and I might not be telling you my story. The wound
pretty much healed itself. That shoulder was really sore for a long time. When I tried to pick something
up, I had to use my other arm.

It wasn’t long before President Truman ordered the bombing of Japan. I didn’t think he knew what he
was doing. But that got the war over with, so I guess he did. I was thrilled to death on the day we knew
the war was over. A lot of young men had lost their lives; lots of them, lots of them. You can’t imagine
what it was like on D-Day trying to get that beachhead established. It was crazy.

When I look back; I had a family that was against the war, I didn’t want to go, I was wounded, and only
the Germans and the Red Cross helped us; I came home wounded and wearing a purple heart and a
POW medal; I was thrilled to death to be back. My family and friends thought that I might be gone. They
knew I was a POW, and that I was wounded and in the hospital in Ruins, France, but they didn’t know I
had survived.

Somebody drove down from Lawrenceburg and delivered a message to my parents that I had been
captured. I do know this; the Red Cross woman in Anderson County at that time was real nice to my
family; she really was and I did a bad thing. I came from Louisville to Lawrenceburg on a bus and I didn’t
have no way to get home from there.

I saw a friend that lived close to home and he had room for me, so I was going to ride home with him.
Before we left, I saw that Red Cross woman. She wanted to take me home, but I told her I’d already told
this guy I was going with him, so I best ride along with him. She begged me; she wanted to take me
home. I ought to have let her done it but, I didn’t, I should have, but I didn’t.