Wed, 27 Jul 2005 02:11:02 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/ The Patriot Files :: Dedicated to the preservation of military history en-us http://www.patriotfiles.com/images/logo.gif http://www.patriotfiles.com/ webmaster@patriotfiles.com http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=508 At the breaking out of the war I was a resident of the quiet but patriotic town of Groveland. Sumter had been fired upon and all was excitement. I could not work, and on the 18th of April, 1861, walked to Haverhill with my elder brother and Mark Kimball. We went to the armory of the Hale Guards, who were making active preparations to march, and I returned home that night resolved to go with them if possible. The next day we walked to Haverhill again, and I at once interviewed Captain Messer, but was informed that the company was more than full, so I could not go with it. Wed, 27 Jul 2005 02:11:02 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=506 In 1861, when the war clouds obscured the sky I was a boy of 17, living in Tennessee. In common with all the boys of my age, whether living north or south I had the military spirit and at the first opportunity placed my name upon the rolls as a soldier, volunteering to fight for my native state. On the 21st day of May, 1861, I enlisted in company B, 16th Tennessee Infantry, under Col. Jno. H. Savage, and was sent to Estil Springs, on the N. C. & St. L. railroad, where we stayed a few days, and then went to Camp Trousdale, north of Nashville on the Louisville & Nashville railroad, near the Kentucky line. Wed, 27 Jul 2005 01:45:25 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=505 During May 1942, I was a lieutenant assigned as Executive and Engineer Officer of the USS PC-469 at the George Lawley Shipyard in Neponset, Massachusetts. Three other officers were assigned - Lieutenant Commander Richard Morell as the Commanding Officer with Lieutenant (junior grade) Kenneth Potts and Ensign Richard Young as watch officers. Upon arrival, I became very familiar with the PC design since the ship was in the throes of final outfitting and on the building ways - the keel having been laid on 22 October 1941. Tue, 26 Jul 2005 23:47:28 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=504 The Coast Guard manned and operated about seventy of these rather unusual ships during World War II in both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans - they were unusual in that they had two firerooms generating steam for two large triple-expansion steam engines with all machinery, such a force-draft blowers, anchor engines and steering engines, all of them being single cylinder steam engines - the only variation was the two turbine-driven generators furnishing electric power for ships utilities!! The ships were twin screw with twin rudders making them extremely easy to handle provided you allowed for the high bow, the low stern and the vagaries of the wind. Tue, 26 Jul 2005 23:38:47 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=503 On or about the 6th of March 1944 we crashed our B-17, on fire, on the way to Berlin. I became a POW and I made up my mind that I would have to try to escape. After traveling by boxcar for several days we arrived at Dulag Luft at Frankfort. We went through a very intense interrogation for a few days and then another trip by boxcar to Stalag Luft I at Barth, Germany. That was a trip no one will ever forget. I am certain all Ex-POW's will agree. I still dream about those boxcars. Tue, 26 Jul 2005 23:23:13 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=502 A week or so before the December 31, 1943, mission, my crew, the Mendelsohn crew, was breaking apart. Our navigator, Bill Borellis, was promoted to the exalted position of 91st Bomb Group navigator; our bombardier, Harold Fox, (later to be killed in action over Hamburg) had applied for special training as a navigator and was leaving the crew, and the pilot, Stuart Mendelsohn, had been designated, but not yet officially installed, as the new operations officer of the 324th squadron. And I had just been checked out as first pilot and was about to take over what remained of our original crew. Tue, 26 Jul 2005 23:14:12 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=501 I shall never forget the morning of March 28th, 1918, when I watched our trenches and the familiar landmarks disappear under the intense bombardment of hundreds of minenwerfers - those earthquakes in miniature. I watched and waited in a state of mental numbness or apathy, and at last the bit reserved for me hit me in the head. When I took a further interest in matters I was a prisoner. Tue, 26 Jul 2005 22:51:07 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=500 In April 1918 I volunteered to go to France in response to the urgent call for more surgeons. For twenty years I had been in general practice in a suburb, and did a fair amount of surgery among patients and at the local hospitals. I had also had some war experience as one of the surgeons at the British Red Cross Hospital, Netley, in the first six months of the War, but I had no experience of cases fresh from the battlefield, and the surgical technique which had recently been adopted in dealing with them. Tue, 26 Jul 2005 22:45:04 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=499 The first reaction to the new base at Folkingham was "It's immense"! On this base we had three concrete runways, each 6,000 feet, ample taxiways, a revetment for parking each aircraft, and four hangers. There were innumerable Nissen huts to house us, an Officers Club, an EM Club in the making, a consolidated officers' mess, and a consolidated enlisted men's, mess. We were the first tenants, and parts were still under construction. Sat, 25 Jun 2005 09:16:21 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=498 I was born in Aalborg, Denmark on April 8, 1922 and immigrated to America with my mother and two older brothers Kaj and Poul in 1924. My father, Niels Christian, had come to America the previous year in 1923. After a two week sea and train journey through Ellis Island and Canada, we finally arrived in Chicago where we settled in a Danish neighborhood in the Humboldt Park area. Our family suffered greatly during the depression years but with the help of the Danish community we survived. Wed, 04 May 2005 16:31:03 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=497 On June 25, 1950, the Korean War began. I listened to the news every day and when I heard my old outfit, Baker Company Fifth Marines, was in Korea fighting hard, I decided to re-enlist. Traveling to Kansas City, Missouri, to the Marine recruiting office I hoped to re-up as a sergeant. I was disappointed, for I had been involved in a car wreck and still had some cuts not fully healed. Wed, 04 May 2005 16:13:36 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=496 Before reaching Louvain we bivouacked near a large well-built village, and here we had the wettest and merriest evening in the whole campaign. Some of our battalion water-carriers discovered a wine-cellar in the village. On going into a cellar they noticed a stack of fagots, and guessed that they were put there with a purpose. The fagots were quickly cleared away, and behind them appeared a door. Wed, 04 May 2005 16:05:01 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=495 Our cavalry brigade arrived in Peronne in November 1917, after a long trek up from billets. We had had a fairly easy time during the summer of that year. For a few months we had been dismounted and had been up at Vimy Ridge doing all sorts of work: digging reserve trenches, reinforcing communication trenches and digging new ones - in fact, doing real navvy work, which, on the whole, was enjoyable, as far as anything could be enjoyable in France during the War. The weather was good, rations were plentiful, though the water had a wicked taste. Wed, 04 May 2005 16:00:50 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=494 From her launching in 1942 the Pringle was assigned to convoy duty with the Atlantic Fleet. In late 1943 after a grueling year in the North Atlantic providing antisubmarine protection for supply ships carrying war material to England and Russia the Pringle was assigned to the Pacific Fleet for duty that would lead to her demise. Wed, 04 May 2005 15:54:29 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=492 I had just had breakfast and was looking out a porthole in sick bay when someone said, "What the hell are all those planes doing up there on a Sunday? " Someone else said, "It must be those crazy Marines. They'd be the only ones out maneuvering on a Sunday." When I looked up in the sky I saw five or six planes starting their descent. Then when the first bombs dropped on the hangers at Ford Island, I thought, "Those guys are missing us by a mile." Inasmuch as practice bombing was a daily occurrence to us, it was not too unusual for planes to drop bombs, but the time and place were quite out of line. Wed, 04 May 2005 15:38:08 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=491 It was a normal day. I reported to work, started logging into the computer, checking e-mails, taking phone calls, talking with the office about what was going on. Then someone heard about the happenings at the World Trade Center - the first plane. We were able to watch the live video and started hearing the reports. Then we saw the footage of the second aircraft coming into the second tower. Wed, 04 May 2005 15:32:14 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=490 Friday, 14 September 2001, turned out to be a tough day. We all got to NNMC early in the morning and boarded the buses for the 4-hour ride up to Earl, New Jersey. Eventually, we all got unloaded, checked aboard, got our rooms, unpacked our seabags, and checked into our workstations. Then, within an hour of arriving, there was an announcement that there had been a change in the mission. The hospital ship was going to be used to provide comfort, meaning living spaces, food spaces, and showers for the rescue workers. And except for a very core crew, everybody else was told to pack their seabags to go home. Wed, 04 May 2005 15:26:43 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=489 It was November 1st, 1963, and the pot had been stirring. The feelings against the Diem government were running higher and higher by the day. There were the pro-Diem faction and the anti-Diem faction. It was the Catholics versus the Buddhists. Diem and his family were Catholic and the Buddhist monks were stirring up trouble. You could just sense the tension in Saigon as it was building. You knew something was about to happen. Wed, 04 May 2005 15:19:06 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=488 How does one become a combat field historian? You would think the combat field historian would be an individual who had a great love of history, studied history or was a history major in college. Those would certainly be ideal prerequisites in a peacetime scenario when you were searching for the ideal candidate. Wed, 04 May 2005 15:14:17 -0700 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=486 Rome Ga Nov 10th 1864 During the last two weeks we have been expecting "marching orders". More than a week since we rec'd orders to prepare for a "long arduous & successful campaign". Wed, 16 Feb 2005 12:34:15 -0800 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=485 It has been 36 years since the tet offensive of 1968 broke out. However each year since then I remember my first time under fire, and what a mess I made of it. I arrived in country in September 1967, I was an 11B primary MOS. In Cam Ranh Bay I received orders for a military intelligence unit. Fri, 11 Feb 2005 14:21:38 -0800 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=484 The visit of an English squadron for the Kiel Week in June, 1914, seemed to indicate a desire to give visible expression to the, fact that the political situation had eased. Although we could not suppress a certain feeling of doubt as to the sincerity of their intentions, everyone on our side displayed the greatest readiness to receive the foreign guests with hospitality and comradeship. Mon, 24 Jan 2005 11:40:47 -0800 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=480 In writing this, my object is to try and give some idea of my experiences in France and Belgium. Well, I land at Boulogne on February 2nd 1917. It was then bitter cold and snowing, and went on to St Martin?s Camp for the night and then my first real experience of hardship commenced. Tue, 18 Jan 2005 14:45:34 -0800 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=479 1915 AUSTRALIA BROADMEADOWS -- AT SEA March 17 Left MILDURA for BROADMEADOWS camp. Was in P1 Coy. for 5 weeks thence in signallers of the newly formed 24th Bn. Spent Easter at Wrays GEELONG. Tue, 18 Jan 2005 14:30:20 -0800 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=478 It became known as the "Spearhead Division and I joined it, the Third Armored Division, at Camp Polk, Louisiana in early 1942, less than a year after it was formed. This account is of me telling of my day on the "Spearhead", how I got there, what happened, and how it ended. Tue, 18 Jan 2005 13:38:28 -0800