On December 8th 1941....2 Bronx kids Jimmy and Vinny went down to the Marine Corp recrutiment booth and went in on the Buddy system....
Sometime in 1942 my father Jim and his cousin Vinny landed on ‘the canal’....
after that they went to Bougainville...where Dad caught a case of elephantitis from an ‘Axis Mosquito’...and was shipped home to recuperate....
Both were kept in reserve after that but scheduled to fight on the main Japanese Islands in 1945 when Truman Nuked the Japanese...and thank God he did.....
both men made it through the war....neither would ever talk about the combat part of their tour (except to say how horrible war could be).
Quiet Heros......
God bless them. My father-in-law was a paratroop during WWII in the 82nd airborne. He had 2 drops on his wings and stayed in Italy for the remainder of the European campaign. He never talked much about his dealings until one Christmas when we both got pretty much hammered.
He then opened up as we went through his foot locker of memorabilia and photos. War wasn’t a pleasure cruise.
My Uncle was a First Marine Raider during WW2 and never said a word.