The guns fell silent. We set a couple of days, waiting. They got the companies together and told us that the war was over. I had three battle stars.
Rome-Arno North Appennines Po-Valley Go # 33 WD 1945
I have always been thankful that I never shot--and saw and knew---that I killed anyone.
The ’Partisans’ were the political party in Italy who were against the Germans.
They became more powerful at the end of the war, as the Italians turned against the Germans. After the fighting stopped, some of them wanted to retaliate for the wrongs that the Germans had done them. There was squabbling and then fighting, Italians were killing each other. They needed occupation troops to keep the peace. American soldiers were sent to patrol the streets in Astia. It was supposed to be peaceable, we were sent without guns. Some of the troublemakers had guns. Us American soldiers refused to go back and our officers, from the Major on down, stood with us. We did not want to ‘get the tar beat out of us.’ We got permission to carry guns. The first big riot, we got up-wind of them and used tear-gas. Some of them cried for three days. That ended the big problem. The area still had to be patrolled. German prisoners would volunteer for K P,
do washing or clean grounds. Some could speak good English.
We drove our tanks onto ships. They were being taken out into the Mediterranean Sea and being dumped overboard in deep water. The tanks were not worth bringing back.
The last fatality that I saw, was a tank commander, a Staff Sgt in our company. He was taking a tank to the ship. He was standing up, with his head out the hatch, he
was telling the driver which way to go. The tank got to close to a gully and the tank rolled and crushed him. The others in the tank were not hurt. We had gone through the war together, and we were going home and we grieved for him, more than for the others.
He was so close to going home.
After the fighting ended, we were waiting to come home.
We were all in big camps together, blacks and all.
The army tried to control it, but there was always gambling.
Some soldiers made a lot of money, there were always professionals among us.
One black soldier was really lucky---until they caught him.
He had a pair of dice, one of them only had the number 2, on all sides. The other one
had the number 5 on all sides of it. He could roll a 7, any time he wanted to.
He kept a regular pair of dice in his other hand, and he used them most of the time.
That black soldier, he run like a wild pig.
There was a point system set up, as to which soldiers would get to go home first. Time in the army, time in war zone, number of dependants, I had pretty high points.
I come home on a small tanker, there were about 500 or 600 of us on it. It was the fourth time that I had sailed through the Strait of Gibraltar. As we passed through the strait of Gibraltar, a man jumped overboard, off the back. The army wouldn’t let him stay in Italy with his girl friend. He fixed a big pack and thought that he could hang onto it, and that it would float. His friends watched and never saw him come to the surface.
A hurricane come up the Eastern coast. We anchored a long way out from New York for five or six days. Water would come on deck and run in the stairs and doors. Pumps were running to empty the water. It was a scary experience. No one was on deck, they would have been washed off. Nearly everybody got seasick, even some of the crew. I would get sick when the others would ‘erp.’You learned to walk with your legs spread out, and hold onto things.
Then it got calmer and I liked to lay out on the deck, flat of my back. I would see the water on one side of the boat The boat would roll and I would roll my eyes the other way and see the water on the other side. I liked to watch the flying fish that would fly from one wave to the next one. Kinda skipping along on top of the waves, looked like.
Usually there was a big school of them, just playing along together.
There were some big whales. The water would spray up out of the middle of their back.
They got real close to our ship. The ship would turn a little, to miss some of them.
The army moved fast, to get us home.
DISCHARGED October 4,1945 at Fort Fannin, Texas.
Co K 351st infantry Army serial number 18 032 197
Marksman Rifle 2 Dec 1943
Battles and Campaigns
Rome-Arno No. Appennines Po-Valley GO # 33 WD 1945
American Defense Service Medal Good Conduct Medal.
European African Middle Eastern Campaign Medal with 3 Bronze Stars
7 days on the ship going overseas
14 days on the ship, coming back. We had to wait for the bad storm off New York
I rode the Greyhound bus from Camp Fannin to Fort Worth.
I spent the night with Aunt Etta and Vernon and Glenna June, and on the bus the next morning to Breckenridge.
I planned to surprise her, but Aunt Etta sent Louise a telegram, “Meet the 11:11 bus.”
Anne Louise remembers, “I met that bus and we walked two blocks back to Alexander’s Ice Cream Store where I worked. I quit my job.
I had saved all of my ‘allotment money’.
Cars were real scarce. My Uncle Jim had a filling station and a few old cars for sale.
Thel bought a car from Uncle Jim. We drove to Porum to see the folks there.
Then to Aunt Etta and Vernon’s in Fort Worth, to look for a job.
Thel’s first job was as a butcher at Safeway, in south Fort Worth. There was no pre-wrapped or packaged meat. You told the butcher what you wanted, and watched him cut it off and wrap it for you. We found an apartment near there, on the south side. Ever that interest in airplanes, he soon found a job at Meacham Field in far North Fort Worth, working on them.