I haven't posted much this week because honestly, I haven't really had anything worth posting about. I've been catching up on house stuff and Elin is crawling EVERYWHERE. I've been baby wrangling like crazy, in addition to the crawling, my kid doesn't sleep. She sleeps at night, which I LOVE, but she doesn't nap during the day. A good nap-day will consist of two half hour naps. I'm jealous of those of you with babies that take two or three hour naps at a time. That means you, Ali. :-)
Anyway, I do have something to blog about today because it's Veteran's Day! This is a very important day that I think should get more attention. It's especially meaningful to me because my grandpa, George Graham is a WWII veteran. Recently, my home town newspaper wrote an article about my grandpa that I would like to share on my blog today. It's hard for me to picture the kind, gentle man that I know as my grandpa in a situation as gruesome and ugly as war. But he did it, and our country is better for it.
After the specialized training, Graham and his battalion were loaded on trucks and taken to the railroad station. He found himself speeding along on a train and wound up at Camp Myles Standish near Boston, Mass. Here he was rushed through a mass of inspections, classes and training. Medics were busy sharpening their needles and he was given shots. It was a busy three weeks.
They prepared for port knowing "THIS IS IT." They left Camp Myles Standish on a Railroad Troop Train and after a few hours boarded ship. In August, after D-Day in June 1941, they crossed the English Channel and landed at Omaha Beach at Cherbourg, France. They were put aboard Landing Ship Tanks and dropped in convoys onto the beach. The roar of the battle and artillery was overwhelming.
Graham had been promoted to a scout in forward observation. His duty was to help direct the fire. He spent a lot of time looking through a BC Scope -- a powerful binocular. He carried binoculars which had to be under his field jacket when not in use. A glint of sunlight off the glass made him an instant target for a German gun. He was in the A Battery of the 691st Field Artillery Battalion. There were three gun batteries in a battalion with 4 guns in each battery making 12 howitzers in all. The battalion also included headquarters battery who sent orders to the guns and service battery which provided supplies.
They camped in the hedge rows of France for a few days and regrouped before being moved up to the front lines to fight. The forward observing crew consisted of the scout, radio operator and a lieutenant. Graham said he lost three lieutenants during his time of service. It was a dangerous and stressful time. They supported a lot of divisions, but most of the time was spent with the 84th Infantry Division.
"War is fought day and night. There is no stopping," Grahm said. Tears glinted in Graham's eyes as he remembered. "It was a foxhole war. We crawled on our bellies in combat. Since I was out front of the battery, many days I was hungry because all the food I got was what I could carry and if I couldn't get back to camp, I didn't eat."
When they crossed the Rhine River on a pontoon bridge, they relieved a unit of British commandos. They were assisting the 9th Army at this time. One night, a 50-man combat patrol took all night liberating a city having crawled across a blown-out bridge to get there. They had been up all night getting there, and after the liberation, a man came running to greet them. They were so happy to see Americans and be liberated from the German occupation.
There was a church nearby where Catholic nuns had patients. They made a place for the troops to sleep in the basement and fed them before they left. Next morning it was back to war.
Once they camped in an apple orchard and were terrified when German V-2 rockets came over low. "They buzzed and made a pulsing sound and at night had flames. A horrible sight," Graham said.
The Battle the Bulge began just before Christmas. "I can still hear the roar of guns, tanks, and artillery in my mind -- some noises and images are burned into it. I could feel the concussion of the ground," he said. Their Christmas packages never did catch up with them.
Somehow, Graham's battalion was cut off. The Germans went through the line on their right and cut off supplies. They were firing behind them. They still had some communication and were given orders to destroy the guns if the Germans came. The Germans didn't come, but they were isolated for two weeks without any supplies, food, or ammunition. There was a foot of snow on the ground. They slept in old fox holes, or bombed-out buildings, anything to get a bit of protection. "I went for three or four days without a bite of food. Finally, a British unit showed up and shared food, drinks, crackers."
"I had great admiration for the medics," Graham said. "They showed brave action in the care of the wounded. There was a tent field hospital in the area with a medic. I spent a week in one with frozen feet."
The last big battle Graham remembers was called the Dortmund Pocket. "We had several thousand German troops in a pocket of land and had them surrounded on all sides. Some eventually surrendered, but many chose to fight to the end. It was a tough place to be, but I was just doing my job."
After the war was over, Graham was discharged in 1946. He returned home and married Sibyl Tolman at Rogersville, Mo., June 6, 1948. He graduated from MU in 1949 with a master's degree in dairy production in 1950. He taught veterans at Braymer in 1950-'51 and moved to Nevada in 1964, to become director of the University Extension Center in Vernon County. He retired from the Extension in 1985.
Graham was born and grew up on a farm near Fair Grove, Mo., and learned to milk cows by hand at an early age. Even though that wasn't his favorite job, he preferred it to combat fighting in war. The Grahams have three sons and one daughter and are enjoying retirement in Nevada.
Thank you to Naomi Foreman and the
Nevada Daily Mail for celebrating Grandpa's story. And most importantly, thank you to my Grandpa Graham for being a hero, I'm so proud to be your granddaughter and I don't think any of us can thank you enough. I love you!
So I guess a lot has happened in three weeks. A lot for us, anyways, which might not be saying much. Last week I made my very first Thanksgiving meal. After a million calls home to ask about recipes and turkey roasting, I actually did a pretty good job. It was just a lot of work for dinner for only 3 people. And Matt and I are SICK of turkey. Last night I made “chicken” enchiladas with more leftover turkey, but we just could bare to even call them turkey enchiladas. I made apple salad (which was a staple at every holiday meal growing up), sweet potatoes (Elin’s favorite), mashed potatoes, TWO kinds of stuffing, corn, green beans, gravy, and turkey. All from scratch. My turkey didn’t look pretty (or even close to pretty), but it tasted good (for the first 20 meals or so….). About two hours into the roasting process I checked on it and noticed that the red and white pop-up thermometer was gone. I couldn’t figure it out until I realized that I was cooking the turkey upside down. Matt and I each had a pair of tongs and forks and we got him flipped the right way. So the back side of my turkey was nice and pretty and brown and the front side looked like boiled poultry (because that’s exactly what it was). Regardless of me not knowing which turkey side goes up, it still tasted good. I have a few pictures, notice that the corn isn’t in the pictures. It wasn’t until we were eating that we remembered the corn in the microwave. The Graham family will like that. I swear, we really did forget.
