My name is Richard Meisheimer. Today is
September 30th, 2010. I'm interviewing Mr. John D.
Marshall by telephone. His phone number is area
765-664-8941. His address is 115 East
Peterson Street, Marion, Indiana, 46952. This
interview is in support of the National Pacific
War, Center for Pacific War Studies for the
Presbyterian Orthopedic Formation during World
War II.
John, I want to thank you for taking time to do
this interview today, and I want to
thank you for your service to our country
during World War II.
You're welcome.
Now, the first thing I need to do is read to
you this agreement with the museum.
When I do it in person, let the man read it and
sign it, since this is by phone, let me
read this to you and make sure it's okay with you.
The heading says, The National Museum of the
Pacific War, Texas Historical Mission, Oral
History Project.
The purpose of the National Museum of the
Pacific War Oral History Project is to collect,
preserve, and interpret the stories of World
War II veterans, home front experiences, the
life of Chiefs, the life of Fleet Admiral
Chester W. Nimitz, and the old Nimitz Hotel
by means of the tape-recorded interviews.
Audio recordings of such interviews become part
of the Center for Pacific War Studies,
Archives of the National Museum of the Pacific
War, Texas Historical Commission.
These recordings are made available for
historical and other academic research by
scholars and
members of the family of the interviewee.
We herein assign, have read or heard the above,
and voluntarily offer the National Museum
of the Pacific War full use of the information
contained on audio recordings and or written
text of these oral history research interviews.
In view of the scholarly value of this research
material, we hereby assign rights, title and
of interest pertaining to it to the National
Pacific War Texas
Historical Commission.
Is that OK with you?
That's fine with me. OK.
Now, the next thing I'd need to do
is get an alternative contact.
We find out that sometimes down the road
we try to get back in contact with a veteran.
He's moved or something.
So do you have a son or a daughter or someone
we could contact in case we needed to try to
find you?
I have a son.
OK, what's his first name? Jack.
Jack, OK.
Jack Lee Marshall. OK.
And do you have an address for him?
He lives out on King Road, east of Marion.
OK, King Road, Marion. Yeah.
Do you have a phone number for him?
Yeah, he has a phone number, 662. OK.
Let me get it, make sure it's right.
OK, take your time.
My memory's not the best anymore.
Yep, I'm here.
The, uh, his home phone is 662-3274. 3-2-7-4.
OK, that's what I need. OK.
And that's Mary Ann, Indiana.
Do you happen to have his address there?
Do I?
His address?
I don't know.
It's just North King Road.
What is your birth date?
What's my birth date?
Yes, Sir.
December 29th, 1924.
And where were you born?
I was born at Tangier, Indiana.
What town is that?
Tangier, T-A-N-G-I-E-R, Indiana, Park County.
Oh, OK.
Did you have brothers and sisters?
Yeah, I had three sisters and two brothers.
Were either of your brothers in World War II?
Yeah, my oldest brother was Paul.
He what?
My oldest brother, they're all dead now.
All righty.
Now, you grew up during the Depression.
How did the Depression affect you and your family?
Well, I know it was rough.
We raised our own farm, you know,
and we raised our own beef and horse and
chickens and ducks and stuff.
And I finished the sixth grade of school
And then I had to go to work back in 1940 to
come out with a one-row picker, and I shoveled
corn for a one-row picker.
But when I quit school, I just started the
seventh grade and then quit.
You got along okay during the Depression then?
Well, we got by pretty good.
I mean, it was rough.
I mean, you know.
Everybody had it rough back then.
That's right, that's right. Did you have a milk cow?
Yeah, we had our own cows.
Did you have a garden?
Garden, yeah.
Yeah, so you got a long hairpin to eat then.
We'd grow watermelons.
All kinds of fruits, you know.
Garden stuff.
Yeah, okay.
Now, on December 7, 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor.
Do you recall hearing about that?
I do.
I was playing basketball at my oldest sister's place.
And they come out and told us about 1130.
And we dropped bombs on Pearl Harbor.
And I can remember today better than anything else.
And I joined the service.
After that, my brother went in.
And after he was in about a year or so, I went in.
volunteered to go to draft with my buddy.
We went together to Indianapolis together,
and then he went to the Pacific, and I went to Europe.
What date did you go in?
I went in, I was 17 in 1942. OK.
And my mother signed for me to go to the Army,
and I was drafted April 2nd of 43. Forty-three?
Let's see, you were born in
twenty-four-eighteen, okay.
And what branch did you go into?
What branch?
Yes, Sir.
In the nineties, while we went in, the first
boot camp was the camp around Illinois.
It was a medical outpost.
Was this the Army, though?
Army, yeah.
Did you have any choice of the branch?
Well, they told us, they didn't give us no
choice from the draft board, but afterwards
we shipped out of Camp Grant to El Oso,
Illinois, and they put a sign up on the board
with good
paratroopers or whatever we wanted to, and they
put a sign up for us to sign.
Too many of us signed up and they wouldn't let
none of us go.
It was the-then it was 94th Medical Gas
Treatment Battalion.
The other one from Camp Grant was the 33rd
Medical Battalion.
Okay, so 33rd Medical Battalion.
That's what you wound up in? No.
That was the first basic training.
Went to camp and lived in Tin City.
And after that, about three months or so,
They shipped us to Camp Ellis, Illinois in the cornfields.
We had to march out in the cornfields and stuff.
They didn't even have to have the barracks made,
but sidewalks all over the place.
But we took training there from mustard and Ferricide
fuzzing gases, and had schooling on medical
stuff, too.
Then we moved from there to camp Cyber to Alabama.
And we trained down there in 43, fire part 43,
and had classes on medical stuff and how to
give shots
and this and that and the other. OK.
And we had a gas treatment battalion,
which we trained in there.
We went to Bushnell, Florida, with impregnated clothing
and gas masks and stuff, and the Canadian planes
We dropped bombs on those trees and dripped on us.
Some of us got burned pretty bad, real bad.
One or two of us.
All of us got burned.
I've never been able to collect nothing off of them.
A few of the guys have, but they're not all
dead now.
What kind of gas did they drop on you? Mustard.
Mustard gas, huh? Yeah.
In February of 1944.
And when we got done with that, well, we come
back to base and try to train the other guys.
You know, set up a location like that out in
the woods.
I forget what it's called.
It was just a training for a bidwack, they
called it.
We set up training to show others what to do,
you know, in case of that, and we'd hose
them down like they were in the real stuff.
But other than that, when we got done with
that, it wasn't long until they shipped us
out to New York.
We went to New York, got our shots and
everything, and we were there for about a
couple of weeks,
I'd say.
And then we got one pass into New York and got
to go into town one time, went to Jack
Kemp's bar, if I can remember.
I don't know, and then one long railway, after
we got all our shops and everything, we shipped
out on a big ship to Queen Mary, sister to
Queen Mary, the Yardway.
Where was it?
The Yard Way, after Queen Mary.
They loaded us on that and they sent us to
Liverpool, England.
About what date did you leave, do you know?
Beg your pardon?
About what date did you leave?
Well, it was in the early, early spring.
I know we got over there, set up, they shipped
it to South Wales in little boxcars from Liverpool.
And we set up camp there and trained a little,
and then it wasn't long while we'd done, you
know, drill practice and stuff, you know.
And then after that, well, they finished the
staging area.
And we met there for a week or two.
And then General Patton came out and gave a big speech.
Because the guy, he was a pretty rough character.
I couldn't say the words that he said, but you
guys know damn well who your enemy is.
Right, right.
When he got done with his speech, he had his
pistols on his side. OK.
He was up in front quite a bit, too.
Yeah, OK.
I can't forget the other two generals.
Wheeling was one of them, and Bradley.
We ran with tanks and infantry divisions, and
we had camps set up, too, for aid stations.
Was this in France or was this there in England?
That was in France.
I'm getting ahead of myself.
We landed, we shipped out of there, I couldn't
tell you exactly the date, and then we went
to France, to the big thing, and we had to go
on the whole Utah beach side-by-side.
Which one did you land on?
Hadn't been taken yet.
we had the 101st Airborne drop behind us. They
used to get the clothes off the dead
Americans and they'd try to get into our lines.
They had codes like lucky strikes,
camels, and stuff like that. They'd change the
code every day so they'd know whether
they were real or not.
About when did you cross the Channel to go over
there then?
Do what?
About when did you cross the Channel to go to France?
Uh, I think it was in, uh, let's see, July.
Okay. June 6th was D-Day.
Do what?
June 6th was deemed that it was D-Day.
Yeah, June 6th was D-Day, but we went on afterwards.
They had dropped the 101st Airborne back to the
lines, and we had sunk one of our ships,
or supplies, and we sat inside there in the
hedgerows for about two weeks, living in foxholes
and stuff.
It was about July when you crossed over then?
Yeah, it was July or the first of August,
somewhere right in there.
and I know we had to wait a while.
There's Fort St. Louis, St. Petrie, and then there's...
I can't remember the town that's all of them,
or just a few of them.
Yeah, 94th Medical Gas Treatment Battalion. D.Y.
there? Well, we went on a 25-mile horse field
hike, full field pack. Okay. We trained in
the medical stuff and we had to, they set, set
off the lights and
We'd have to walk into the smoke with our
masks, and we had to tell them what it smelled
like when we'd go back to the table afterwards.
I can't remember just what they did, one of
them was like new Moon hay.
I can't remember. It's been many years. I can't
forget what the other one was.
But that was the first training that we had,
you know.
Did you get infantry training?
Not a whole lot. We did a little hand combat
training and stuff like that.
How about rifle training?
Do what?
Rifle training?
Well, not really a whole lot of that.
We weren't really supposed to have guns.
In Camp Grant?
Yes, Sir.
Pup tents.
Pup tents, okay.
No, no, pup tents. Big tents.
Big, yeah, right.
Camp City, they called it.
Oh, the food was pretty good.
They trained us hard.
He pushed me on and then that sergeant said it
was pretty rough.
They kicked me in the back of the shins,
that he's out of step, and everybody just kept
stabbing him.
Okay. About how long were you there at Camp Grant?
About three months.
Three months, okay. And you went from there to where?
Camp Dallas, Illinois.
Okay, and what did you do there?
Well, we took medical training and stuff,
mostly just medical training, how to use a
shot, what to do, how to wrap bandages, what
type of bandages, they called them, different
figure eights and different stuff, you know.
Been so long I've forgotten what we visited the
whole lot.
Okay. How long were you there?
We were there approximately three months, maybe
just a little over, and then we tripped
out to camp Cybert, Alabama.
Okay, and what did you do in Alabama?
We took medical training in there and set up a
tent, like in combat, and we'd have
It has boot training, where you had to crawl
down through the weeds and under the fire,
you know.
Q. Right.
The infiltration course.
A. What?
Q. That was called the infiltration course?
A. Yeah, well we had that too, where you had to
crawl in the bubble wire and stuff.
They had bombs they set all around you and fire
machine guns over the top of you.
It would have been my elimination, I don't
know, I didn't get up there to flee.
Then I think we were called through drafts and
stuff, because there were quite a few snakes
and stuff.
One of the captains made belts out of them.
Other than that, we went down there to
Bushnell, Florida for training on mustard gas,
Canadian planes there, British there, American, Canadian.
That was in England?
That was in Wales or somewhere?
No, that was in Alabama.
Oh, Alabama, okay.
I remember we went to Alabama to Florida,
Bushnell, Florida, and we trained there.
Then we went back and trained the other guys at
camp there and went through the same thing
that we did there at Bushnell.
It wasn't wise stuff, it was just training the
guys, you know, what to do.
That was in February, the first two weeks of
February, 1944.
We shipped out to New York and learned.
How was that boat trip over?
Do what?
How was that boat trip over to England?
Well, we changed course, Bob, I think it was
about 17 days, 15-17 days going over New York.
They took us out on those boats out to the
island, I forget what they called the island
in New York, and loaded us on the big ship.
Was the ship crowded?
Oh, it was pretty full of guys, yeah.
Was there much sea sickness?
Well, it's quite a few guys do, you have to put
the pills in, it's still dropsy.
I got a little bit, but not too bad.
I understand that time of year the North
Atlantic is pretty rough.
Yeah, well, I know around the coast of Dover,
we went in through there and it was really
rough, nobody could get on the top deck.
Any idea how many people were on that ship?
Oh gosh, I had no idea.
It was around 1150 of our guys.
1150 of yours? Yeah.
Now were you in this 94th Battalion at that point?
Yeah, we were.
There's ninety-fourth of everything till that
camp drain.
It was.
I don't know, it was just a regular ship.
It was a pretty good-sized ship.
We had to climb down into the boat.
One that took you up shore and back down, you know.
I think that's what they called it.
You had to crawl down that cargo net? Yeah.
How was that? Rope.
How was that?
It was a little scary when you first do it.
You get used to it, everybody else does it, you know.
Now what was your rank at that point?
I was a Pratt's first class.
And what was your job considered to be?
Well, as a medic. Medic?
Corpsman or medic? Yeah.
And then, you know, that's about it.
So I had to bring one overseas, and then I
drove the truck,
and then I had to get overseas.
We'll come to that in a minute.
Now, when you landed on the beach there,
Was there much wreckage still around?
Was there what?
Much wreckage still there?
Oh yeah.
You could see a ship, a medical supply ship.
And then they had to make dirigibles up from
the ship and stuff.
So the planes couldn't get in too close straight.
Were they still shelling the beach or anything?
With the what?
Not at the beach at that time. We first got in
that night, that's when I'd sleep on top
of the truck, and another guy was starting to
shoot tracers, every other one was a tracer.
So we've been good folks.
Now who was shooting these, the Germans?
The Germans.
Then what happened?
Well, then we waited about two weeks
and we got our supplies and we could travel
along with the
Third Army, German Passenger Army.
Most of the time.
When was the first time you had to treat wounded?
Well, back in France we had them.
We set up right there.
As soon as you landed?
Okay. Were there quite a few wounded who treated?
Oh, yeah. Yeah.
They had to pull one up. Yeah.
Side to side.
Some of them looked at the top of their head
and through their teeth.
Oh, okay.
There were Americans, some of them Americans.
Yeah, okay.
Did you treat any Germans?
Oh, yeah.
We had three more.
I never got where I could speak it very good, though.
Some of the main things you learn left this,
you know.
Yeah, some days we'd travel fifty miles,
seventy-five miles a day.
With the Third Army.
But no particular division?
No, they busted us up in platoons at times and
sent us with different infantry and the
armored division.
Okay, all right.
Now, were you close to the front lines?
Oh yeah.
Were you the first aid station behind the lines?
Yes, we took some of the first.
And we got to get them ready to ship back, some
of them would come up at night and pick
them up.
Take them back.
Q. Okay.
Now, did you actually go into the front line
with the infantry?
A. We went with them part of the time.
Q. Part of the time.
A. Yeah.
During the balls and stuff.
Q. Yeah.
But you weren't necessarily attached to a
company or a platoon or anything like that?
A. No.
We could go, you could go by platoon back then.
Q. Yeah.
from the company to a platoon.
Uh, probably
I'd say somewhere around a hundred.
Beg your pardon?
Yeah, I'd say it's close to that.
Yeah, there's medics and doctors.
Did you work directly with the doctors? Yeah.
And did you help with operations?
Not really with operations.
They had to, like, barge in, you know.
You know.
Now when a wounded person would come in, what
did you do first?
Well, they had to bring them in on notice.
them down and they'd go around and check them
and see what they needed, if they needed
operation, why they'd put them in and send them
to the doctors and where they operated.
It wasn't a building or nothing.
Had they been treated at all before they got to you?
No. Some of them had, but some of them hadn't.
Yeah, okay. All right. And then what happened next?
Well, we got in pretty well after we started
moving and the German Panzer Division cut us off.
We sat for about two weeks in the edge of the
woods there, regrouping to get gas and supplies
and stuff.
And then they put two guys on a truck, I was on
a truck I guess for probably three months
or so.
It was what we called ammunition and gasoline
and stuff like that, you know, night time.
These old cat eyes, they were called cat eyes.
Now you mentioned the hedgerows earlier. What
were the hedgerows like?
Well they were just like, I don't know, just
like a, you know, some of those farms and
stuff, you know, like in Tennessee and
different places where there's like farmers got
like a hedgerow cut off.
Right, okay.
They were about like that.
Were they quite a problem to get through?
Yeah, some of them were. Some of them were
pretty fine. Yeah.
But they pushed them down to find a place to
get through.
And then the coaches go through the same path,
you know,
about so. OK.
And further up, we had to bypass Paris. OK.
And after that, we run into the, what do you
call them, the Siegfried Line.
Yeah, the Siegfried Line, okay.
The Siegfried Line. Yeah.
And that was concrete in about, oh, I can't
remember, I'd say five or six, you know, I'm in
five or six different rows, you know, of concrete.
And they figured out a way to doze them out
with a tank, big tank, and a bulldozer right on
the front of them.
And the guys in the tank would go through them open.
Now did you say you drove a truck part of the time?
Yeah, I drove a truck about three months or whatever.
And when did that start?
Do what?
When did you start driving the truck?
Well, I don't know, probably, I don't know,
before Paris.
Before Paris, okay.
Before we got to Paris.
I can't, can't remember.
That's a long time ago. Yeah.
Now when you were driving the truck, did you
also treat the wounded? No.
We had a, the plane would come over, it was strapping.
We'd stop the truck, hit the ditch.
We had-well, they had two drivers on them,
can't remember.
That's where they started them.
But the special-I can't think of his name now.
The general of the German tank division. Mm-Hmm.
The one that stopped us.
Passed us out of bed.
Yeah. All right.
Now, when you were driving the truck, what were
you hauling?
We hauled gasoline, ammunition.
Medical supplies.
Move Medicaid stations and stuff up closer, you know.
That kind of stuff.
Do what?
Well, that's all we had.
They put two of us on the truck for security
and safety.
You mentioned the Battle of the Bulge. What
happened there?
Well, it was pretty rough. A lot of snow. Had a
lot of snow.
I don't know. We fought in all the battles
there. About five different ones.
Hard, dense, long winds, you know.
Yeah, okay.
I've got them up here on my ward strings up there.
I got eight medals to get there, and then we
got a meritorious service
award for the company, you know. OK.
Our outstands. Yeah.
Lots of companies, outstands, nice boys. OK.
Everett Federer, I'd stayed up there when I got
snowed in.
He stayed with our outstands. Mm-Hmm.
And I don't know whether you ever heard of him
or not.
He was a newsman in Chicago, and he stayed with
us in the night.
And one of the captains at one of our reunions
wrote this letter and everything that he said
about the Albuquerque.
Who was that now?
One of the captains.
I can't remember which one it is.
No, no.
A captain who lived up around Chicago.
Okay, all right.
Now, you were considered a gas medical battalion,
but you never had any-
Not a gas treatment battalion.
But you never had any gas treatment to do, did you?
Well, they didn't use it, you know.
That's what I'm saying.
But they moved us up there when they cut the,
Germans kind of cut us off,
got some of our planes and stuff there.
They moved us up there.
Like, you know, the front lines. Yeah.
Oh, whoa!
We got a head of them, but they weren't hot.
Oh, okay.
Now, the Battle of the Bulge, I understand that
was awful cold there.
Is that right? Yeah.
A lot of snow, blazing, blowing.
We couldn't get no planes in the air to support us.
So, gee, if it was a good day,
and this guy, Big Black, would clean all day long.
Did you have enough warm clothes?
Well, at first we didn't.
We didn't have any boots.
A lot of guys got their feet froze. Right.
First Airborne didn't want them. Right.
They finally got some boots up there.
A lot of them, it was too late for them, you know.
I understand that Patton's army is the one that
relieved the 101st at Bastogne, is that right?
Were you part of that? Yeah.
I was with them.
You were?
It was the 4th Armored I think went in there,
is that correct? Yeah.
I was with the 4th Armored and the Navy 7th
Infantry Division.
Patton's army, they was in there too.
I can't remember what all those was on what we
were with, you know.
Now, you were pretty close to the front lines, right?
Oh, yeah, the whole thing. Yeah.
Were any of the people in your platoon wounded
or killed?
We had them wounded, yeah. OK.
If someone gets hurt and went too bad,
they took care of us right there.
We'd sort of just ship out. Yeah.
Some of the guys never got to come back to the hospital.
They'd keep us there.
doctor to take care of them, help us along, you know.
It wasn't too bad, we just had to go on back,
you know.
I don't know, it's been so long, it's really
hard to remember just what we did.
Okay, sure
You're doing very well, right
Now I think it met they had an awful lot of
trouble with the thought ports admits. Were you
around there at all?
That's when I got my worst fear
You got what we we were just outside it met
before they started on that morning. Okay
And there were pill boxes right ahead of us,
you could see them, you know.
And they were sleeping in pup tents or sleeping bags.
And I got that string tied around my neck, and
I thought a German had me,
and I think I was about to secure the stuff.
And they started in on Mets, well it was early
in the morning,
just by daybreak. I didn't buy a lot of them. I
didn't just think of the towns. I
was wishing I had one of the maps. I don't have
just the offices, I think, just that mainly.
Now what infantry division did you say you were with?
The 87th Infantry.
Acre Division.
It's got a picture of an acorn on it. Right.
And the others with the 4th Army,
with the V-type budget. Yeah.
Him up there. Yeah.
They were knocked up there by the men down there.
Yeah, okay.
Now you mentioned the Siegfried line.
the Siegfried Line. Was that before or after
the bulge?
That was before the bulge.
Was it? Okay.
Did you all cross the Siegfried Line?
Did I cross it?
Yes, Sir. Yeah.
Back in November, I know we were in
where the war ended during World War I. Uh-huh.
They sort of danced for us when we came back
from the rescue, and they sort of danced there
in Verdun.
That's where the war ended.
Everyone had relatives in the World War and
they got the goods of that.
Then what happened after the Bulge?
Well, we got up around Frankfurt, they stopped
us again, and it happened.
Once everybody stopped, we sat there about two
weeks in Frankfurt, Germany.
I see.
We lived in the best houses we could find.
And they wanted the Russians to get to Berlin
and get there before most of the rest of the Spaniards.
That's what they wanted. OK.
The idea was to stop them in Berlin
and get them to Frankfurt and get there for two
and possibly
could be three weeks.
They wanted the Russians to get in and get most
of our land.
Yeah, OK.
And that was at Frankfurt? Yeah.
And then what happened?
Well, we sat there for about three weeks. OK.
And then what happened?
Well, we started up the rolling again.
Just followed the tanks and stuff.
Pat and I would be up there up front.
They'd have trouble getting across the dead
trees to get the other helpers.
Trying to get them all on the custom carry-on.
Get them moving, you know.
What did you think of Patton?
Do what?
What did you think of Patton?
Well, I think he's a pretty smart guy.
He's rough, I'll say that.
I don't think he's funny when he's rough.
He's a good guy, I like him.
I've got a book and a speech that he's given
for the General of the Air Force.
Did you ever meet him personally?
Oh yeah.
I've seen him, I mean I've never talked to him,
but you know, he's right close by.
We had three jeeps and all three of them ran
together most of the time.
Yeah, okay.
Now wasn't he in the command car part of the time?
He was in the jeep most of the time.
Jeep most of the time, okay.
Most of the time I was being in my prime of
prime anyway.
All right, okay.
All right, then what happened?
Well, after the...
When you were there.
I took Berlin, and we went in, and so far, that
was it.
And then the one moment after that,
they called the end of the battle here. OK.
And that night, I can remember, we
set up, dug on the mountainside,
put a big V in, poured it full of gasoline,
and set that fire up one night.
When we celebrated after we had
signed the peace treaty with Germany.
I think that was May the 8th when Germany surrendered.
Do what?
I think it was May the 8th when Germany surrendered.
I know it's still kind of chilly, but it's been
so long I don't know, you forget all that stuff.
We weren't supposed to talk about it anyway, I
must have gassed, you know.
Yeah, right.
Okay, then after Germany surrendered, then what happened?
Well, after the Germans surrendered, we went to Nuremberg.
And we guarded the SS troops and the prisoners.
We'd have men navigate and have a carbine each. OK.
We had orders that if they got up and run, blow
them down.
We put them pulling grass with our fingers.
So they mowed the grass real short, and we kept
going right over until he kept digging
that down.
Closer to the lawn mower we'd get in.
Now how many people were there guarding them?
We had about 15, 20 Germans at the time.
Two of you, okay.
And these were SS?
Some of them were SS, yeah.
I thought they were still in control at first.
Yeah, I gotta say the SS were pretty tough.
Oh yeah, they got the SS on their muscles,
inside muscles of their left arm.
Yeah, right, okay.
They had their marks on their arm, but no.
Did they try to escape or anything?
The Germans?
Yes, Sir.
No, Sir.
Now they knew they couldn't get too far.
Yeah, okay.
it was over.
Now this was at Nuremberg?
That was at Nuremberg? Yeah.
Where they had the trial.
Yeah, okay.
Of course I was back, we'd come back to state.
I don't know, we went to different camps.
We called them like, named them like the
cigarette camp. Yeah.
Name of cigarette packages.
Like Estrada? Estrada.
The name of the cigarette package, you know.
Lucky Strike, you know.
And we spent there for a while.
And they put us on the ship and sent us back to
the States.
Well, we got back to the States the first month
of August.
We got back and I was home on leave the whole
month of August.
When they dropped, we was on our way to Japan,
they was telling me how to put it back up.
They wanted to discharge it and put it back up full.
Okay, right.
So when they dropped the bomb, we went back to
camp that night.
They started shipping guys all around their
work to get discharged.
Okay, all right.
you get discharged then on the point system.
Mm-Hmm, right.
So like battles you were in, you got a point system.
Each person would get out. Yeah.
When did you get out then?
I got out December the 14th of 1945.
OK, all right.
I went to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Aston Walsh Hospital up there for a while.
I worked there a little while, and then I went
back to camp out at Berrien, and then I worked there.
I got discharged.
Now, what did you do over in Europe from the
time the war was over in May to August when you
came back?
From May to August?
Yes, Sir.
Well, I was more or less just not a hold on anything.
A lot of them got passes back into Paris, back
to the beaches of France.
I kept thinking of the name of where they-
something like one of our big beaches here. Riviera?
Yeah, Riviera.
Some of them got passes there to give to people,
so when it's time to go, you know.
Yeah. Now how long did you guard those Germans
at Nuremberg?
Two weeks.
Oh, it wasn't very long, probably about a month.
Okay, so. Okay.
And then so the rest of the time you didn't
have much to do?
No, after the war we just more or less
just done more or less what you do here in the States.
Yeah, okay.
Did you get up to Berkner's Garden, which was
his big place up in the mountains there?
Uh, Hitler's hideout?
Yes, Sir.
You did, okay. But how was that?
This is side two of tape one with John Marshall.
Okay, now I'd ask you, what was it like up at
Hitler's hideout up there?
Do what?
Well, I didn't go up in the hideout.
Oh, you didn't? Okay.
You could see it from down along the Rhine.
And then you had the U.S. or U.S.S.S. troopers'
barracks down below.
I don't remember too much about Southern, I
know I've seen it and I've seen his hideout before.
Of course he's up in the Alps mountain there too.
You can look down and see a village way down,
looking down the mountainside.
They had a little plain road that wasn't really
a wide road.
You could look right straight down.
If you'd ever have a wreck, you'd be gone.
I don't know.
Did you get to Paris?
Did I get to see Paris?
Yes, Sir.
Yeah, I did.
What was that like?
Well, I sneaked in when we wasn't supposed to.
I told the colonel about one of the army reunions.
We acted like we had trouble with a convoy.
Three truckloads, two of them, six drivers went in.
There's like restrooms all the way in there.
We got down out of the Eisenhower Tower.
The people, we'd stop on the street.
We'd come out and holler at you and hug you and
kiss you.
We'd throw them D-bars and stuff like that, you know.
We didn't stay in there long.
We caught up to the outfit that night.
Well, I don't know. I'm just trying to think.
Let's see.
I had something on my mind there a while ago
and I forgot what it was.
Because they just come and go, you know, that
kind of stuff. Sure.
Oh, we crossed the Rhine, too, one of them.
Easter Sunday, we had church, one of the big officers,
two or three officers' houses.
I'd have cried if we'd crossed the Rhine on Tuesday.
And they had a big barn, and they
We had all kind of World War I hats and stuff
and guns up there
in that barn.
Some of the guys took some of the stuff.
Then we had church that morning, Easter Sunday morning.
I can remember the first jet I ever heard went over
a German jet.
And we had all kind of wine there, like a big
oil tanker.
At this German's house, he had some kind of
Turkey House above him.
We kicked him out, and we took over and shut
him in there.
Oh, OK.
Were you ever bombed by the Germans?
Was I what?
Bombed up or close, yeah.
And how about artillery? Were you...
Oh, yeah, we had stations.
We had a lot of artillery at one time.
But I mean the German artillery.
Did that ever fire on you?
Oh, yeah. That fire was 88.
And they had a big railroad gun on a railroad car.
It was probably a foot in diameter, the gun barrel.
Yeah, right.
Oh, I don't know.
If you remember so much, it doesn't mean you
forget it.
You know, that was fifty-some years and fifty-five.
Right, right.
Did you ever see any dogfights between our
planes and theirs?
Oh, yeah, seen a lot of them.
Yeah, tell me about those.
Well, they'd just go up there and fly around,
trying to knock one another out of the air. Yeah.
They'd just, you know, they'd see where they'd hit,
they'd come down, if it was German or American planes.
Some of the American planes would be shot down,
why, they'd come right to our house, yeah. OK.
And you'd see some, you know, shot down quite a
ways away, but we didn't see them, you know.
We didn't see them go down.
We had to act after them most of the time, too.
Yeah, okay.
Did they shoot down many German planes?
Oh yeah, they did shoot them down.
I've got pictures of quite a few of them.
I got a bunch of pictures. I got pictures of
the concentration camp in Buchenwald.
Oh, okay.
Captain Lowenstein, I was a good friend of his
in Terre Haute.
He took the pictures because the officers could
take them, you know.
Yeah, right.
And we got to go on down there. My folks lived
down there close.
I'd go down there and we'd get together on the
weekends I wanted to go home, go to his house
and have coffee and stuff.
And I'd go down to his doctor's office and tell
him about it.
He's dead now. He died in 87 or 89, I believe
it was.
Did you see any of the concentration camps?
Buchenwald concentration camp.
I've got pictures of it and letters he wrote to
tell me about it.
Were you at Buchenwald yourself?
Yeah, our company was there.
Did you get there and liberate it, or how long
had it been liberated when you got there?
Well, it was just the Germans went out of the
back when we first got there.
And we had just people dead bodies laying all
around the place.
That's when the barracks was there.
It's not there no more because I think Obama
was talking about it.
And they got stone in there now where it was.
And he made his speeches from there.
What was it like to be in Buchenwald?
Do what what was it like to be there at Buchenwald?
Dinkin mess, I'll tell you
And then the people they've all starved to death
They couldn't eat food we had to we set up a camp
big camp
They kept them there for a week or so where
it's good
Get them strolling with it shoving back. Yeah,
did you treat any of them?
Well, our outfit did, yeah.
Well, I didn't really myself.
We done different stuff, you know.
Oh, we have. Yeah.
I've got pictures of you looking and you
couldn't believe it.
I've seen bodies stacked up along the fence river
As high as you could reach.
Half a mile long.
Well, no, we went by...
I can't think of the name of it now.
Yeah, we'd move them on the tank.
They used to make a mess, you know.
That was in Czechoslovakia, wasn't it? Yeah.
And we ended up over in Austria.
My brother was in a field artillery,
and this was after the war.
I went to see him over in Austria.
I was just thinking of the name of the town, so
I've got faith now.
It was in Austria.
I'm trying to think of the name of this town.
No, I don't think so, too. It comes and goes in
my mind.
That's fine, that's fine.
Did you have a nice visit?
Uh, no, I didn't get to see him.
He moved out that morning.
The colonel gave me a driver and a jeep to take
me over to see my brother.
I went up to the colonel and asked him to give
me a commission and a jeep and a driver.
He told me to go over and visit him.
I went over there and we got there that morning.
about noon, and they had moved out that morning.
I talked to the other guys that were with them,
the other artillery out there.
Yeah, okay.
So I didn't get to see him after the war,
and I beat him out of the service.
Oh, okay.
What else happened when you were over there, overseas?
Do what?
Well, we get orders from 12th Army headquarters
ever speak to the German, draw lines and stuff.
Mademoiselle was Wurzburg's girlfriend.
Then they had the free French, you know, France,
I think, and the general came up over there.
There was a tall guy, I forget his name.
De Gaulle?
De Gaulle, yeah.
get to come into the Air Force Base there more
than once in a while.
I don't know if that was a bad way.
I was discharged, you know.
Well, I think probably that time that I thought
that German had me for the neck.
I'd dream about it, I'd kick the wall.
I still think about it, yeah.
I know I'd put a plastic up in the bedroom window
because my kitchen, that's it.
Dream about it, I'd kick the wall.
My windows, that's why I put a quarter-inch plastic.
So it wouldn't kick the window.
Okay, uh, yeah.
I don't know.
What would consider your worst day?
Some of my worst days?
Yes, Sir.
Well, I'd say during the bulge.
The bulge, okay.
What was bad there?
Well, it was cold.
Didn't get too good of food.
Trying to keep warm on this mat and the other.
Like a blue, a lot of the time.
Yeah, okay.
Did you have any close calls?
Take your time.
Uh, yeah, we've had a few.
But, uh, I mean,
I got glass in my head one time.
Right in my head, right around my helmet.
Oh, what happened?
Back in my ear.
They took it out, and
I actually got back here in the States, and
Well, in the fifties it definitely didn't get
it all out, and I had to have an operation on
that down at David's Clinic.
Oh, okay.
They cut that out. Yeah.
Other than that, I mean, you know, we're lucky.
I went through and stopped getting too much.
You know, we're just lucky, I guess.
Did you ever hear of Axis Sally on the radio?
Yeah. You mean Berlin?
Yeah. What did you think of her?
She was something.
Telling these boys how nice it was.
She'd like to meet them with all their smiles.
Sing to them.
You could hear that on the radio.
How about Lord Ha Ha? Who?
Lord Ha Ha.
I don't think I remember him.
I think he was broadcasting more to England itself.
I don't know.
What did you think of the officers you had over you?
My officers?
Yes, Sir.
I think he was a good bunch of boys.
They called their last reunion off this September.
I wasn't able to go. I had cancer cut out.
Oh, okay.
Second of July.
I think in a year, about a year and a half,
possibly four years at the most, came along.
So, I don't know, I just, you know, I worry
about that a lot, too.
Now, when you got out, did you have any trouble
adjusting to civilian life?
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, I come home, I work for a dollar a day.
Oh, okay.
That wasn't very much, but it was a job.
Yeah. What did you do for a dollar a day?
I worked on a farm.
Oh, okay.
I went to a foundry at St. Joe's, Michigan.
I worked there to help build that American bridge.
Oh, okay.
It takes two weeks to get the mold ready and
two weeks for it to cool, that's important.
Oh, okay.
Then I moved from there.
My brother had a brother working up there in
Malibu later. Yeah.
I moved from there and came here to Miriam.
I worked in Malibu here for a while. Alright.
Mold molds and stuff, you know. Alright.
And after that, I went into county highways and
graded roads,
gravel roads and stuff, you know.
I worked that for a couple of years.
And I helped, I worked construction, helped
build Dana and General Motors.
And I worked at a filling station for probably
four years.
And then I went to waterworks in 1965, and I
retired there about 23 years later.
I went to waterworks, and I retired from there.
I was a maintenance foreman, and I worked in
the oil fields.
Other than that, I don't know.
What was the highest rank you got to?
Do what?
Private First Class.
I see, okay.
A lot of the guys didn't want no rank. Yeah.
Did you get home with any souvenirs?
Oh, I did, but I used to drink a lot after I'd
come back.
I'd get drunk and sell them for nothing.
Oh, okay.
I wish I'd kept them. They'd be worth a lot of
money now.
Yeah, right.
Did you ever see any USO shows anywhere?
Any what?
UFO show? Yes, Sir. Oh, yeah, they had them set
up in France and had the girls there.
It's pretty nice.
We come back on two weeks of blaze or
something, you know, rest period. Right.
With these, we were allowed to take a beer a week.
So many cigarettes, you know. Right.
The guys didn't smoke or drink, there was beer,
there was cigarettes, there was beer.
Yeah, okay.
How was the morale in your outfit?
Oh, it was pretty good morale.
I mean, the guys, all of a sudden they enjoyed
being together
and I just had to do it over again with a
Colonel's Jeep driver said he was doing the
dirt with R.L. Fitz and then I said, you know, dog.
Were you ever under friendly fire?
Under what?
Friendly fire. Seventy-five?
You know, some of it. It wasn't all the time.
Yeah, what happened?
Well, you just duck down in that pothole and
take it easy.
Did you have any experience with the Red Cross?
It was served by France.
I can't think of the name of the place it was at.
The Red Cross sold us donuts and coffee and stuff.
They had like a truck set up like the colonels
used to do and stuff, you know.
Red Cross truck.
Do they charge you for the coffee? Yeah.
They did, okay.
They charged me a frame.
Okay, all right.
What did you think of that?
Well, you'd think you'd get older and got it free.
Like a lot of other things during World War II,
we sure didn't get much of nothing. Yeah.
And that when You're-
I got back, I had to have all my teeth pulled
and filled them in with lead filling.
I had to have my teeth pulled out.
I tried to get all the teeth from them.
I couldn't get it.
They'd deny me, deny me.
They're veterans, they're affairs officers,
so you might as well give up on them.
I was involved in about 12 trips with both chiefs.
Oh, OK.
So like this semester's gas retreat,
then I tracked them all the way through to 1990. Yeah.
They told me, the officer told me,
that's the year I got in a little over a month ago.
So you might as well say, you might as well wait,
I'll never forget it, but it's going to take
five years to get you pulled up again.
So I decided to quit.
I got one congressman off to fight and try to
get me something.
I don't know how to do anything.
Now, when you're overseas, could you get your
mail with any regularity?
Yeah, you got it.
Every once in a while, I didn't get too much
mail, but I mean, yeah.
And then they censored your mail, too, you know that.
If you got to where you put it on a card or something,
I forget what they called it now.
V-mail, right. Yeah.
They'd mark out stuff if you didn't have it on there.
That's something you wasn't supposed to let out.
Right, right.
Okay, now what metals and ribbons did you get?
All right
Oh, I don't really know the names of them.
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.
Eight medals there and then a citation.
What is a citation?
I don't know.
I've got, you know, stuff that when we go to
reunions and stuff.
Yeah. Okay.
I've got them somewhere, but I don't know where.
Have you had quite a few reunions? Yeah.
Let me get my glasses on. I've got a fine print here.
Here it says the
son of the government of France
and the country of
Huntington, Indiana, where I went through.
Mints, medals of Jubilee and Liberty, that's a
different one, I guess. Normandy.
Invasion of Normandy.
The period between June 6th and August 44th.
I just don't tell the medals I guess, I've got
five Bronze Stars.
Oh, that's probably Battlestars, okay. Yeah.
Other than I've still got my dog tag.
Okay, right.
Pictures in France and a picture of me
by the German plane that was shot down.
And I got to battle.
The 12th Army had come out.
We wasn't supposed to patronize the Germans.
Uh-huh, okay. Women.
For all I know, I have a friend,
plus my brother-in-law.
I can't think of it now.
I don't know.
Now let me ask you, on February the 12th, 1945,
President Roosevelt died.
Did you all hear about that? Yeah.
And what was the reaction?
Well, I think the guys hate to hear him die.
It was kind of a funny deal, the way I
understood it.
The way I understood it, he was out on a ship somewhere.
I didn't know what the whole deal was.
It's been so long, I forgot. Yeah.
He died out on the ship, I think he said.
Well no, actually he died in uh... in Georgia.
He what? He died in Warm Springs, Georgia.
Was it? Yeah.
I don't know, there was something about it on
my shift.
I remember him talking about that.
Of course, you know, back then when you voted,
you had to vote
to the president.
It's like it was in France or anywhere, it was
one of the votes.
to the President. Yeah.
Now, when they dropped the atomic bomb,
where were you when that happened?
I was home one thirty day later.
And what did you think when you heard that?
Well, it tickled me.
I was glad to hear it.
I was on my way to Japan.
I got back to camp.
Then August the 15th, when Germany,
when Japan surrendered,
did you have a celebration then?
Well, I was home then, and you know, if we had
been together as an army outfit, we would
have dropped in, you know, and everybody was
going to leave that month.
Well, what else do you recall from your time in
the service?
I don't really remember it, you know, so much.
It's been so long, you know. OK.
Well, I think we've covered everything pretty well,
haven't we?
I think so.
I know when we first started having our army reunions,
the guys would get together and tell stories, what
happened to some of them, you know.
How many reunions did you go to?
How many reunions did I go to? Twenty.
Twenty-five reunions.
Around twenty-five, I'd say.
I had to miss this one this year, but they
canceled it because only one guy showed up.
Everybody got cancer or something wrong with
them real bad.
That's right, that's right.
Now I'm really able to travel anymore. Right.
I have to have someone drive me if I go
somewhere other than the town where I lived in.
Yeah, okay.
Well, thanks again for your time today.
I'll see Dean Baird and tell him I said hi.
Will do, will do.
Okay, we'll let him tell him.
Thanks for your time today and for your service
to our country during World War II.
Well, I thank you.
All right, we'll talk again later. Bye.
Bye, thank you.
This is the end of this tape.