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| PART 2 OF MONSTERS AND ANGELS-THE APPLES HAVE BE |
As you can see this is the squel to my previous story. This is also factual and also was published in the newsletter.
THE APPLES HAVE BEEN PAID FOR
A sequel to “Monster or Angels”
I was an 18 –year-old kid from Moncton, New Brunswick. I’ll never forget how quiet we were trying to be, creeping through that forest in Normandy. It was D-Day + 3. Our unit somehow got all split up, and we were scattered all over the place. The darkness was pitch black and we didn’t know friend from foe. The little light we got was from the explosions and gunfire that came from all around us. I was cold and hungry, yet way to scared to eat. All I had was a piece of chocolate and half a can of beans anyways. The few guys who were with me that night were in no better shape than I was.
We decided to bunker down for a few hours, with one man keeping watch at all times. There were only about 7 of us left in our unit. We never had the chance to dig foxholes so we just laid there with whatever brush we could cover ourselves with. It wasn’t fifteen minutes until all hell broke loose. And I mean Hell! The Germans knew we were in the area and started firing mortars on our position. Then the machine gun fire sprayed on us like rain. I recall looking up just in time to see my buddy Danny gets his face blown away.
I’m not sure if I actually screamed or just thought I was screaming, but at that moment I lost it. Everything became “slow motion” to me at that instant. I jumped up and started spraying those Nazis with .45 ACP bullets from my Thompson machine gun. That’s when I blacked out! I remember someone standing over me telling me, “Hang in there, you’ll make it kid”. Thank God for medics. That was in 1944.
It’s now 1969 and I’m confined to a hospital in Saint John, New Brunswick. I have no family left. My parents have since passed and my brother was killed in Italy at the hands of the Nazis. All I have left are my Brothers-In-Arms at this hospital. I now sit here with only one arm, and half of my left leg. Sometimes I feel like some kind of a monster.
That’s when a little boy with a tray full of apples caught my eye. I let out a whistle to call him over. Damn, I felt so bad for him later because that poor little guy must have dropped half of his apples all over the floor. Once he picked up his apples and finally came over to us, I truly don’t know who had more fun. That little boy or us VETS. The more we made the little guy laugh and giggle, the more we old boys laughed and giggled also.
That’s when it hit me! This is reason I lost my arm and leg. For this little boy. After all the hell I went through during the war, I now see why it was so worth it, that little boy selling apples. Hopefully, someday when that little boy grows up and becomes an adult he will remember our little encounter and share what we did with all Canadians and the World
An Unknown Soldier.
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Posted by cap25 on 2009-06-02 02:32:42 | Rating: | Views: 50
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