!.Welcome ceremony at Shreveport airport 2. Victory at Peleliu cut into stone. This is where my Dad was wounded. 3. Bob 'I ain't going to talk about it' Dole. 4. Wide view of the memorial. 5. My Dad. He'll be 84 in a couple of months.
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Pat at So It Goes In Shreveport has a post from a couple of weeks ago that tells about the organization, Louisiana HonorAir. that is taking as many WWII vets as possible to see this new WWII memorial.
2 comments:
Shreveport airport!? Does your dad live where I live? And Peleliu - god! Peleliu was awful.
If you've never read it you MUST read With the Old Breed by Eugene Sledge. It's about his time at Peleliu and Okinawa.
God bless your dad! Give him a hug from me.
My Dad lives in Ruston. I've never read anything about Peleliu. But I have seen some History Channel shows. So I know that it was a meat grinder. My father just will not talk about it. But I figure that he was not there for the worst of it. He was a combat engineer. He helped build an airstrip. But the engineers probably would not have been brought in until the flat part of the island was secured. I know that the Japanese held on to a mountainous corner of the island for a long time. I also know that it was the Marines that did most of the fighting on Peleliu.
A few months ago my father wrote a sort of autobiography. It told some about his parents and grand parents. He also wrote about his younger years that were spent all over California. But his narrative ended with the beginning of WWII. I have repeatedly urged him to continue the story but he has not. It is possible that, having escaped the meat grinder, he would prefer to not relive that hell.
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