[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 87 (Wednesday, May 24, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7401-S7403]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
A RETROSPECT OF V-E DAY
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, an issue of the journal entitled
Uniformed Services Journal, May-June 1995, contains an article
entitled, ``World War II Revisited: A Retrospect Of V-E Day and the
Events Leading Up To It.''
The article includes recollections of some of the distinguished
Members of the Congress who participated in World War II, among them
Senator Strom Thurmond, Senator Bob Dole, Senator Daniel Inouye,
Congressmen Tom Bevill, Sam Gibbons, Sonny Montgomery, and others.
It is an excellent reminiscence of their experiences and their views
about the significance of V-E Day and their personal involvement in the
events leading up to that occasion.
I ask unanimous consent that a copy of the article from the Uniformed
Services Journal be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
World War II Revisited: A Retrospect of V-E Day and the Events Leading
Up To It
(By Cathy Lumsden)
World War II (WW II) represents many things to many people.
It represents sacrifice, freedom and hope for a better
tomorrow. The road to freedom was paved with death and
destruction. Many of you are familiar with Jim Pennington's
stories of WW II at retiree recognition programs, chapter
events and in the USJ, some more than once. But these stories
and memories that follow are more than just stories. In
today's climate of historical revisionism and political
correctness, they remain as one of the few accurate eye-
witness accounts of the making of American history in the
Great War that literally saved the world. We cannot forget
why we fought WWII, ``the war to end all wars'' or the men
and women who fought the war. The thoughts and feelings that
follow are real. Take the time to read and understand the
contributions these Americans made in the fight for freedom.
senator strom thurmond
Sen. Thurmond was serving as a Circuit Judge in his home
state when war was declared on Germany. On that day, he
called President Roosevelt and volunteered, even though he
was exempted from service. Approximately a year later in
1943, LTC Thurmond, USA was a member of the 82nd Airborne
Division assigned to First Army Headquarters in Europe. He is
the only Senator still serving in Congress who participated
in the Normandy Invasion on D-Day.
He was one of three men who volunteered to land in Normandy
aboard a glider. The fire was so heavy that his glider was
forced to go north to find a safer spot to land. Instead of
it getting safer, it got worse. The glider landed in an apple
orchard nearby. He was injured in the landing in the
forehead, hand and knee. However, LTC Thurmond still joined
the rest of the forces in the subsequent battles of the
Invasion. LTC Thurmond would have preferred to have jumped
but there wasn't sufficient time to train for the jump. After
the invasion, he returned to Army Headquarters just as his
unit got ready to go into St-Lo and into Paris.
On V-E Day, LTC Thurmond was in Leipzig, Germany when he
learned of the end of [[Page S7402]] the war in Europe. He
and his unit were disappointed that they were not allowed to
take Berlin and had to let the Russians take it. LTC Thurmond
was one of the men who uncovered and helped liberate
Buchenwald Concentration Camp. He paints a grim picture of
what he saw. ``I have never seen anything like it in my life.
Bodies stacked up like cord wood, eight to ten feet high,
those who had died and those who were still living . . . They
killed them in one of three ways; by starving them to death
with one bowl of thin pea soup per day . . . inducing them to
climb a fence to get out, where they were shot . . . or they
(the prisoners) were told to go into a big booth like a
telephone booth and wait until the SS guards came in . . .
they (prisoners) would go into the front of the booth and the
SS Guards would go into the back of the booth and hit them
with a mallet and smash their heads and kill them . . . The
wife of the Commander was particularly cruel, she would take
the skin from anyone who had tatoos to make lamp shades . .
.'' Sen. Thurmond was selected to go on to the Pacific. He
went to Fort Jackson, SC for a month, then by train to
California and then on to the Philippines. LTC Thurmond was
in the Philippines when
the war ended. He captured a number of Japanese troops. He
returned to Fort Bragg, NC and was called back to the
Supreme Court of South Carolina. Sen. Thurmond was awarded
five Battle Stars with the 82nd Airborne Division. For his
military service, he earned 18 decorations, and awards,
including the Legion of Merit with Oak Leaf Cluster,
Purple Heart, Bronze Star for Valor, Belgian Order of the
Crown and the French Croix de Guerre.
senator bob dole (r-ks)
Senator Dole shares his thoughts on WW II and V-E Day, we
should take a moment to remember America's place in the
world. When I witnessed the emotion of those gathered on the
beaches of France last summer, memories came flooding back--
memories of heroism, sacrifice and the pain men and women
suffered. We must never be reluctant about our greatness as a
country--nor ashamed of our national strength. There is one
responsibility only the federal government has, and that is
to protect our freedom. We must stop placing the agenda of
the United Nations before the interest of the United States.
Let us remember that America has been the greatest force for
good the world has ever known. Before visiting France last
year, I was in Northern Italy where I served in the Tenth
Mountain Division 50 years before. While revisiting the
battle sites, I thought about why we had been sent there,
about the America we were risking our lives to protect and
about the hopes for the generations to follow. As we open the
door to another century, we can celebrate the fact that the
world is a safer, freer place because of American leadership.
We must continue to do what we have always done best--leading
by example.
Senator Dole was a Platoon Leader with the legendary Tenth
Mountain Division. Cpt. Dole was injured while serving in
Northern Italy on April 14, 1945. He was awarded two Purple
Hearts and one Bronze Star with Oak Leaf Cluster.
senator daniel inouye (d-hi)
Sen Inouye was awarded a battlefield commission in Italy as
a Second Lieutenant in the United States Army. This occurred
just as his unit, the 442nd Regimental Combat Team left to
rescue ``The Lost Battalion'' of the 141st Infantry. It had
been surrounded and was desperately short of supplies and
ammunition.Two days later he left to join his outfit. By the
time he reached them, the bloody battle of The Lost Battalion
was over. ``My platoon, numbering 20 men when I left, now had
11 capable of carrying a weapon--and that included me.'' Lt.
Inouye considered himself lucky thanks to two silver dollars
that he carried through every campaign. One was bent and the
other cracked almost in two from the impact of a German
bullet in France. (Sen. Inouye served in both France and
Italy.) He carried them in his breast pocket but on the night
of April 20, 1945, lost them. Despite his better judgment, he
could not shake the fear that something was about to happen.
At first light (April 21, 1945), his unit (E Company)
jumped. E Company's objective was Colle Musatello, a high and
heavily defended ridge. Lt. Inouye's Company managed to make
it within 40 yards of the German bunkers then almost at once
three machine guns opened up at them. He took a hit in the
stomach but still continued to fight. Finally he was close
enough to pull the pin on the last grenade. ``As I drew my
arm back, a German stood waist-high in the bunker. He was
aiming a rifle grenade at me from a range of ten yards. And
then as I cocked my arm to throw, he fired, and the grenade
smashed into my right elbow. It exploded and all but tore my
arm off . . . The German was reloading his rifle, but my
grenade blew up in his face. I stumbled to my feet, closing
on the bunker, firing my tommy gun lefthanded, the useless
right arm slapping red and wet against my side . . . a bullet
caught me in the right leg. The German resistance in our
sector ended April 23. Nine days later, the war in Italy was
over, and a week after that the enemy surrendered
unconditionally.'' Senator Inouye was awarded the
Distinguished Service Cross, the Purple Heart with Oak Leaf
Cluster and the Bronze Star.
congressman tom bevill (d-4th-al)
Last year, I participated in the commemoration of the 50th
Anniversary of the D-Day Invasion on the coast of Normandy,
France. The men who participated in that invasion will always
be remembered for their heroism. It brought back many
memories for me, although I was not part of the initial
invasion. As a new Army Second Lieutenant, I was sent to
England in late February of 1944, less than four months
before D-Day. I was in a staging area with the 5th Armored
Division, where I assisted in drilling the troops who were in
the first wave to storm the coast of Normandy. At night we
would load the troops on ships with their rifles and
ammunition and send them out under cover of darkness. They
did not know where they were going. They would land somewhere
along the coast of Normandy. I remember how anxious the
troops were. I realized it was no drill the day we issued
emergency rations to the troops. Suddenly, they were provided
kits with a several days' supply of chocolate bars,
cigarettes and K-rations. We had never done that before. And,
that's how we knew it was the real thing. I will never think
of myself as a war hero. I am not. That honor goes to men
like my colleague, Congressman Sam Gibbons of Florida, who
parachuted behind the German lines on D-Day. That honor goes
to men like the late Congressman Bill Nichols of Alabama who
lost a leg in WW II. That honor goes to Travis Alvis, my
childhood friend from Townley, who was killed in the D-Day
Invasion. That honor goes to many, many others who stormed
the beaches of Normandy in the name of freedom and democracy.
congressman sam gibbons (d-11th-fl)
Congressman Gibbons served in WWII as an Army Captain in
the 501st Parachute Infantry of the 101st Airborne. Gibbons
was a member of the initial assault force which invaded
Normandy on D-Day. He is the only Member of the House of
Representatives serving today who participated in the
Invasion. He chose to remember V-E Day like this:
``V-E Day was a beautiful, sunny day. The weather was warm
where I was in Paris and everyone was absolutely jubliant. I
actually drove my jeep down the Champs-Elysees and weaved in
and out of people dancing there. I saw V-E Day at the best
time, from the best place.''
congressman ``sonny'' montgomery (d-3rd-ms)
I served in the European Theatre during WW II. I was a
Second Lieutenant with the 12th Armored Division which
arrived in France in November, 1944. We were assigned to the
Seventh Army part of the time and with the Third Army part of
the time as we drove through France and Germany. We were in
heavy combat during the fall and winter of 1944 and 1945. The
toughest battle was against well-entrenched German forces at
Herlisheim on January 9-10, 1945. We lost a number of tanks
in the fighting there, but we held back a German
counterattack and finally broke through enemy defenses. The
German resistance began to break up after that and we then
moved at a rapid pace toward the Rhine River. Another
significant event occurred in April when elements of the
Twelfth Armored Division captured the bridge over the Danube
River at Dillingen before German demolition men could wreck
it. Securing that bridge provided a vital artery for Allied
troops to flood into southern Germany and helped speed up our
efforts to end the war.
We helped liberate a number of concentration camps in
Germany as the war neared its end. We drove past hundreds of
freed Jewish prisoners walking and sometimes stumbling, along
the road. The sight of these improverished people in their
tattered clothes is something even the most hardened soldiers
can never forget. I was in southern Germany when I heard the
Armed Forces Radio broadcast that the war in Europe had
ended, but I had little time to celebrate. I got orders a
week later to go to the Pacific theater and prepare for the
invasion of Japan. That invasion, of course, was averted when
we dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
radm eugene b. fluckey (usn-ret.)
Rear Admiral Fluckey, author of Thunder Below was
Commanding Officer of the submarine USS Barb. He received the
Medal of Honor and four Navy Crosses and is a veteran of
eleven war patrols during WW II. RADM Fluckey is credited
with the most tonnage sunk by a U.S. skipper in WW II,
seventeen ships including a carrier, raider-carrier and a
frigate. He is proudest of the fact that no one attached to
the Barb received the Purple Heart and that the sub came back
ready and eager to fight again. In the Atlantic, he chased
German submarines but his biggest contributions were in the
Pacific theatre. His contributions there will be highlighted
in the upcoming V-J issue of the USI.
corporal chase fielding (usa), former pow
CPL Fielding arrived in Normandy on D+7 as part of the 29th
Division going in to replace the 13th Airborne Division. They
made it up to St-Lo which was later leveled by the Air Corps.
Three days later, he was only one of three men remaining in
his platoon, and was taken prisoner on June 30, 1944. Under
American artillery fire, he along with two others were taken
to Stalag XII A on the outskirts of Limsburg. ``We were fed
bread and soup, bread and tea in the morning and water soup
the next two meals. . . . Our meat consisted of worms which
somehow got in the soup.'' We traveled by train for five days
and five nights, forty to fifty men in a small boxcar. We
were let out only twice to [[Page S7403]] perform our
toilets. Ate, slept and excreted in the same place. It was
suffocatingly hot during the day, and with little ventilation
and sometimes without water for thirty-six hours, quite a few
passed out.
Upon arrival in Limsburg, we had our first bath since the
middle of July. We left Stalag XII A on August 24 and arrived
at 4-B (Muhlburg) on August 26 and were put into barracks.
``The camp was like heaven compared to the others. . . . I
met a member of Tito's band, age 15, and (who had been)
wounded twice. There was a kid there, a machine-gunner, who
was only eleven years old. . . . The Russians were treated
horribly. In some Russian barracks cannibalism had occurred.
They were like sticks, and when too weak to move were thrown
in a lime pit. . . . One huge field there was fertilized with
10,000 bodies of Jews.'' On September 14th, CPL Fielding
moved out as part of a working party. He passed through
Dresden on the 15th and entered Sudatenland that night. On
the 16th, the working party was housed at Falkensaw where it
worked in coal mines. CPL Fielding went on his first sick
call on October 6th due to boils. He was treated by a Serbian
doctor in the Russian compound. A week and a half later, he
developed an abscess and underwent surgery. A hole the size
of an egg was left by a French surgeon purposely to keep him
out of the mines for awhile. Mr. Fielding's health worsened
in November because of another abscess, swollen tonsils and
diphtheria.
Later an abscess was removed from the back of his head
simply by cutting his head open without any painkiller. About
a month later, he was returned to the commando and also to
work in the mines. Rumors that Americans were coming closer
began in April. Late in April, CPL Fielding and several other
prisoners escaped and hid in a bomb shelter. He headed due
west. The woods were full of
Germans. Picking up information of SS troop movements, the
group was able to avoid the SS. On April 27th (officially
the 28th) they reached a Yank outpost. CPL Fielding later
learned that those prisoners who stayed behind were the
last to be liberated in Europe and when found were in such
a state that many could hardly walk. A great many had
died.
CAPT FRANK X. RILEY (uscg-ret.)
Captain Riley graduated from the Coast Guard Academy on
June 19, 1942. He was assigned as Executive Officer on LCI
323 which was designated as Task Force Command Ship (TFCS)
and was the first LCI to leave the States. He served aboard
the LCI off the North African, Italian and Sicilian coasts;
as Commanding Officer of the vessel, he participated in the
Normandy Invasion. During the Invasion at Normandy. Captain
Riley remembers that two hundred troops were loaded in the
troop compartment. His ship, a salvage vessel saved the lives
of 1500 Army personnel and salvaged 30 Landing Craft
Personnel Vehicles (LCPV) and 50 larger vessels known as
LCMs. Six New York City fire-fighters were put onboard the
Landing Craft-Infantry (LCI) to control fires. General Omar
Bradley rode the LCI twice, with his second ride being to
Omaha Beach.
CAPT QUENTIN R. WALSH (USCG-RET.)
Captain Walsh graduated from the Coast Guard Academy in
1933. On December 7, 1941, his ship (APA) Joseph Dickman was
part of a secret U.S. Navy convoy ``William Sail 12X''
approaching Cape Town South Africa. His ship returned to the
United States on February 28, 1942 after having been diverted
to India. His ship then became involved in the Battle of the
Atlantic, surviving a torpedo attack May 15, 1942. Captain
Walsh was assigned to the staff of Commander, U.S. Naval
Forces, Europe in the Planning and Logistics Section. He was
assigned to the planning for Operation Overlord and Phase
Neptune and the logistics requirement for Cherbourg and
LeHavre. He organized, trained and commanded U.S. Navy Task
Unit 127.2.8 which landed over Beach Utah attached to the 7th
Corps, U.S. Army. ``My Task Unit 127.2.8 (from June 26--June
29, 1944):
1. Cleaned out the last resistance in the Arsenal.
2. Plotted and delivered the mine fields in the harbor to
the British mine sweepers off the port.
3. Established United States Navy Headquarters, Cherbourg.
We had to have Cherbourg to sustain the invasion (Normandy)
and the Germans knew it.'' Task Unit 127.2.8 entered
Cherbourg by going over the top of Fort duRoule with the 79th
Division on June 26, 1944. Subsequently, he led a heavily-
armed unit, equipped with submachine guns, hand grenades and
bazookas the cleaned out the last resistance in the Cherbourg
Arsenal, established U.S. Navy Headquarters in Cherbourg,
and, by interrogating slave laborers, Free French and German
prisoners, obtained and plotted the mine fields in Cherbourg
harbor. Captain Walsh carried out the reconnaissance of ports
in Brittany from St. Malo to Brest attached to Patton's Third
Army, 8th Corps, until ordered to carry out the
reconnaissance of LeHavre with the First Canadian Army on
September 12, 1944. Captain Walsh considers his three most
important contributions to the Invasion of Normandy as; U.S.
Navy Task Unit 127.2.8, the capture of German mine fields,
Cherbourg and the capture of Fort duHomet.
These are just of few of the brave men who along with women
saved the world. Without them and others like them, democracy
as we know it, would not exist. We thank them for their
heroism and salute them one and all.
____________________