Is anyone related to a WWII Veteran?

[Polak]

Great grandfather, mothers side- Colonel in the Army, fought in WW1, fought against the bolsheviks in 1920 in the Polish-Soviet war, and finally WW2.
His brother a master chief served in the Navy.

Grand mother, mothers side- Fought in the Home Army during the Warsaw uprising.

Great grandfather, fathers side- Fought in the 27th Home Army Infantry Division against the nationalist ukrainian insurgent army in southeastern occupied Poland.

My father was in the Canadian Army and then the RCAF, doing thirteen "trips" over Germany as a Lancaster navigator. He was wounded over Stettin in early 1944 and then sent to a 1 Group (Bomber Command) OTU as an instructor. He passed away in 1999, I still have his log book and honourable discharge certificate.

My uncle (Dad's youngest brother) was in the RCN mostly on corvettes from 1943 but finishing the war as an Oerlikon gunner on the armed merchant cruiser HMCS Prince Robert. He had lied about his age and enlisted shortly before his seventeenth birthday.

Good Hunting

[Sailor Steve]

My dad was #6 of seven brothers, and turned 13 on December 11, 1941 - the day Germany declared war on the US. He joined up at 19 in 1947, so obviously missed the war. Of his five older brothers, I'm not sure about two of them, but I'm told that three served in the navy during the war, and one of them was at Pearl Harbor. All of them survived the war.

[Kapitan_Phillips]

My grandad was in the Royal Engineers, he landed on Gold Beach and drove several tanks, including flame throwing ones and minesweepers. I always make a point to thank him whenever I see him for what he did for this country and the people of the free world.

[Kapitan_Phillips]

Originally Posted by Schroeder

My grandfather was a "Kanzelwart" (a mechanic for the fuselage if I understood him correctly:hmm for Messerschmitt BF-109 fighter aircrafts in France. He didn't see much combat (except air raids of course). He was then transferred to an area near the German/Italian boarder. While being on the train they were attacked by fighter bombers which destroyed the power line and killed several of his comrades. After being stuck somewhere without transportation his group was "volunteered" to serve as engineers and to build bridges over some river to allow the German forces to retreat from Italy... Unfortunately they were neither trained nor equipped for such tasks and therefore these bridges were never completed. After being send back to France his unit eventually surrendered to the US Army (where he almost starved being a POW).

Well the result for my family was no loss of lives but they lost there home (and all their possessions) twice to air raids. My family came from Stettin which belongs to Poland nowadays and is now called Szczecin, but after becoming a POW he claimed to be from West-Germany to avoid to be send back to Soviet occupied territory when his POW-time ended (He knew already that his family had fled to the west too).




My grandfather died in january 2002 and has never seen his home city again.

Apologies for the double post, but I saw a television documentary a few weeks ago where veterans from the British side and the German side met. Some of them were even shooting at each other. The whole show was very emotional, and there was mutual respect. One German fighter pilot spoke before a whole village and apologised for his actions. I dont think that was appropriate, as he was doing his duty and following orders, but still, to see two veterans of the opposite sides shaking hands and hugging was a very emotional experience for me.

[Oberon]

My great-grandfather on my mothers side served at the front in the First World War, although my great-granduncle on my fathers side I believe was hit by a sniper at Verdun and killed. My great-grandfather and grand-uncle both served in World War Two. My grand-uncle was in the Royal Navy on different ships (he nearly wound up on the Barham on her last voyage but missed his boarding by a stroke of luck so I've been told) and my Great-Grandfather was in the MP I believe, I was evacuated at Dunkirk then sent to Africa, where his troop ship was torpedoed, but he made it out alright and lived up until the 1980s IIRC. I did a big old post in an old thread about Grandfathers in the war Pics and all

Here we are:
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/show...62&postcount=8



EDIT: Reading Kapitans post suddenly made me realise and hang my head in shame, I'd forgotten completely about my Nan, she was in the land army as well, after the war she was sent out to Belgium where apparently somewhere there there's a big statue that all the army men and girls engraved their names into and a soldier lifted her up so she could engrave hers there too. She throughly loved her time in the land girls, and it was when she was out in Singapore working as a telephone exchange operator that she met my grandfather who was stationed out there with 45 Commando. Apparently he used to dial the operator just to talk to her :P Thanks for jogging my memory there Kap!!

[Kapitan]

Grandad on mums side was a sapper in WW2
Grandad on dads side was a royal engineer was at dunkirk
Nan on dads side was in the land army

great grandad served in submarines in WW1 never saw combat he died on HMS K13 1917

nans brother on mums side served on submarines in WW2 he died unknown submarine know little about him

Stepdad served in soviet navy joined just after the 1962 cuban missile crisis left in 1977 to work on ULCC's left 1989 began lorry driving 1989 till 2004 however this was part time he lectured at St petersburg naval institue since 1990 and sometimes still goes to sea despite his age.

[Schroeder]

Originally Posted by Kapitan_Phillips

Apologies for the double post, but I saw a television documentary a few weeks ago where veterans from the British side and the German side met. Some of them were even shooting at each other. The whole show was very emotional, and there was mutual respect. One German fighter pilot spoke before a whole village and apologised for his actions. I dont think that was appropriate, as he was doing his duty and following orders, but still, to see two veterans of the opposite sides shaking hands and hugging was a very emotional experience for me.

I once watched a documentary about D-Day. There some people from different nations described how they experienced the battle at the beaches. One American walked up the beach on which he landed 60 years ago and finally met one of the German MG-gunners who had taken them under fire back then.

They had a long talk and the American eventually said: "You're the best enemy I've ever met." (or something similar to this). It is always nice to see that the wounds of that war are healing.

[kiwi_2005]

Originally Posted by Kapitan_Phillips

Apologies for the double post, but I saw a television documentary a few weeks ago where veterans from the British side and the German side met. Some of them were even shooting at each other. The whole show was very emotional, and there was mutual respect. One German fighter pilot spoke before a whole village and apologised for his actions. I dont think that was appropriate, as he was doing his duty and following orders, but still, to see two veterans of the opposite sides shaking hands and hugging was a very emotional experience for me.

I read about the same kinda thing happening during WW1, one christmas day both sides cease fire and celebrated Christmas - shook hands, traded cigarettes celebrated Christmas together then they ran back to their trenches and started firing at each other again.

[mrbeast]

Originally Posted by kiwi_2005

I read about the same kinda thing happening during WW1, one christmas day both sides cease fire and celebrated Christmas - shook hands, traded cigarettes celebrated Christmas together then they ran back to their trenches and started firing at each other again.

I read about a similar kind of thing happening in France in 1944 to a British airborne sniper.

IIRC, as he was going out for his watch he turned a corner and almost walked into his German equivalent doing the same thing! Both of them were standing there stunned, in a kind of stand off, niether with his weapon ready to shoot; so the Brit whipped out his packet of cigarettes and offered the German one. So for the next 5 minutes or so they had a smoke together and then went on their separate ways.

Was the kind incident that demonstrates the futility of war.

Both grandfathers were in the Winter war fighting for Finland against the Soviets and the Continuation war fighting the Soviets and subsequently driving the Germans out, one as artillery NCO and the other as a message carrier, very demanding task. I guess their brothers were in the war too, haven't really found out if they had any brothers. Maybe I should perform some geneology research.

[FAdmiral]

My father-in-law was in the Battle of the Bulge. He said he got to see some
King Tigers up much closer than he would have liked. He spent nearly 30 days
outside (hard winter) going to Bastogne on foot....

JIM

[Schroeder]

King Tigers a very impressive. I saw one in a museum and it is much larger than all the other WWII tanks they had there (Panzer III/IV, Sherman, T34).

[JHuschke]

-Thanks for posting guys, to the Veterans who survived, tell them I said thank you for what they have done for ours and their country.
-To the men who didn't, I am sorry for your losses, and thanks to them for what they have done as well.

[geetrue]

My father was a US Navy personelman assigned to the Commador in the war against Japan in Alaska. Got some letters my mother had in her keep sake box when she died. They were from him talking about having a knife in case the Japs were to attack in the middle of the night.

Both are dead now ... that's what happens when you get old.