May 29, 2023 • 34 mins
Honoring those who fought and died for our freedom
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:11):
This is a Jesse Kelly show. It is the Jesse
Kelly Show, and we are here. Yes, we will have
some fun, but we are here to honor the fallen
today because it is Memorial Day. And as we always
have done and Lord Willing will always do on the
(00:32):
Jesse Kelly Show, we do a show today. We do
a show that is much different than the normal Jesse
Kelly Show. If you tuned in today to hear anything
political at all, you might want to just turn it
off now because there won't be any of that. There
will be a ton of honoring the fallen. There will
be a ton of history.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
I will read.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
Names of the fallen you have emailed in. We will
go over distinguished Service cross stories and Navy cross stories
and lesion of merits, and we will talk about legends
who gave their life for this country. They will not
be politics. There won't be any soundboard fart sounds either.
We are going to just honor the fallen on this
(01:15):
Memorial Day. Couple disclaimers before we get going. Not disclaimers.
Couple fyis I guess I should say veterans today can
be a very difficult day for you. If you lost
a brother or sister in arms. If you are struggling today,
(01:39):
reach out. There are all kinds of phone lines you
can call if you want to know the Veterans specific line.
If you're struggling today, dial nine to eight eight and
press one.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Reach out.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
You are not alone. You are never alone. If you
are down and out today, reach out.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Okay, that is one. Two.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Remember, just a little reminder to everybody. I hope you
have enjoyed your day. I hope you're enjoying your day.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
That is good.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
That is what the people who gave their lives to
this country, that's what they would want.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
As long as you take a moment to honor them,
they would want you to do that.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
But just the heads up again, today is not Veterans Day.
It's not First Responder's Day, Police Environment Day, and all
those who serve day. This is a day to honor
the fallen and honor the families they left behind.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Now, before we.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Get into the Distinguished Service Cross stuff, the different citations
and things like that, and the history stuff around it,
we're going to read I'm actually gonna do a World
War two, and then a Korea and then a Vietnam.
Let's get to a couple of the names you emailed in,
just because there's some history around some of this stuff.
Matt Spangenberg, Colonel John Luther Aaron Bank, founder of the
(03:00):
Green Berets, Albert Duckett. These are names people have emailed
into the show. People they want honored. This is World
War two, kis these next ones? Tanker John Prizwara said
he died at the Battle of the Bulge. Staff Sergeant
Howard Harlan, he survived Baton and died on a prisoner ship. Actually,
(03:22):
let's pause right there. Let's do a little bit of
history on that before I get into some other stuff
and some other citation histories there the prison ships. I
read a book run time, great book called The Forgotten Highlander,
highly recommended if it's your thing. It takes a little
while to get going. I'll be honest with you. And
(03:45):
because the guy is I believe Scottish, it sounds a
little different. Some of the language uses a little different
in order. But it's a book about a guy who
was serving obviously with the British and was taken captive
in World War Two. And he was taken captive by
the Japanese. And I'll go over the Baton stuff here
(04:06):
in just the moment, we'll do a little history on that.
I hadn't intended to do that, but I figure we
might as well do that today. But anyway, setting the
baton stuff aside, we'll come back to this. This guy
was captured by the Japanese, and in the course of
his capture, he was put on a train when it
was over one hundred degrees out and they stuffed so
many guys in these trains. They would just die of
(04:28):
suffocation inside of the train. They're all sick, very very
very sick with disease and trying to do this as
gently as possible. I mean, coming out the other end sick.
You can't control it. Kind of sick. Now, picture all
the men in a sweaty train car being sick like that.
(04:51):
They're not pulling over for you to use the bathroom.
Just really really horrible. Okay, So he gets to put
on this train car. He gets sent to various prison
camps for various reasons. Remember the Japanese, they were horrible,
the prisoners of war, all of them, and for the
most part, the ones that didn't just let out kill
they just used them all as slave labor. They wanted
(05:11):
new slave labor. Well, one of the things you'll read
about if you ever dig into World War two and
kind of the Pacific area is this railway they were building.
They were trying to build a new railway. Why, well,
they wanted to get supplies and to and fro, that's
what they were trying to do. They were having a
(05:33):
hard time getting supplies to and fro, especially when you
get over into that India jungle area. So in the
Burma area, they'd created something called the Railway of Death
or the Death Railway. Yeah, no, it sounds intense, and
it was horrible. The Japanese would have these slave labor
units and they would make you get up and there
(05:55):
was remember there was no heavy equipment for these guys.
The Japanese would have you sit there if even if
you were so diseased ridden you could hardly walk, they'd
haul you out to the train where everyone else was digging,
and they'd throw big rocks beside you and make you
sit there and sledge hammer the rocks down and break
the rocks down, even though you couldn't stand. It was
it's unbelievable how many people died. Okay, So this forgotten
(06:19):
Highlander guy, he did the train thing, riding on the train.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
Then he built this railway and that.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
So he's been through all these living hells. He's been
tortured so many times. But the thing he said was
the worst thing was the hell ships. They were called
hell ships. They were the Japanese prison ships, and they Honestly,
it seems for me, I don't do that well with claustrophobia.
(06:47):
No I don't freak, but I don't do that well
with it. This sounds like I would rather just die.
I would rather you kill me. They would take ships,
they would not put markings on them showing that there
were prisoners on board. Therefore, our navy and our planes
would routinely sink our own ships with their own guys
in them. Anyway, they would have this gigantic metal hold
(07:10):
in the bottom of the ship. And remember no air
conditioning here, we're talking the South Pacific.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
It's roasting.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
They would stuff all the men down inside and then
close the hatch. So it's one hundred and twenty one
hundred and twenty five degrees. Everyone's disease ridden. It's so
cramped you can't even sit down. Guys are starting to die,
dying of disease a combination of disease and heat stroke.
(07:37):
Guys are routinely losing their minds because picture that environment. Okay,
you're mashed in there, you're hot, you're sick, everyone's sick,
everyone's losing control of themselves. Men would routinely lose their minds.
Men had to kill their friends. Picture this, Your friend
loses his mind and starts trying to hurt everyone in
(07:59):
this hold. You and your other friends have to kill
your friend with your bare hands to stop your friend
from killing other people.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
How does one.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
Ever get over something like that anyway? So these hellships,
that's what it was like in a hellship. This forgotten
Highlander guy said the hellship was worse than everything else, everything,
the train they're building, the railway, worse than everything, which
brings me back to this staff Sergeant Howard Harlan survived
(08:29):
Baton and died on a prisoner ship. Some of the
most heartbreaking stories I've read, and guys that I really
want to honor today are Americans who died on these
hellships because so often they would die. And I don't know,
I don't know if this is wrong of me, but
(08:49):
we all, we all kind of assign levels of importance
or levels of horror or levels of difficulty in our
own way, in our own mind. But in my mind,
I think it's so uniquely horrible to have lived through,
survived a million terrible things during the war, only to
die on a hell ship. And oftentimes, like I mentioned,
(09:13):
oftentimes I don't know this guy's exact circumstance. Oftentimes you
died at American hands or British hands. You survive everything.
This guy survived Baton, which will go over here in
just a moment. You survive everything, and then an American
(09:34):
submarine sees a Japanese ship it'll looked like a merchant
vessel of some kind or a naval vessel, and you
fire a torpedo into its side. You're the American submarine,
and you think you did good, and you find out
later And this happened to guys, they would find out
later on. Yeah remember that ship we sunk last week. Yeah,
there were five hundred American POWs on that ship and
(09:56):
they're all gone.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
Now take a thing of.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
That level of guilt, even though it's not your fault,
you have no way of knowing. Think what that's like.
So these guys to survive all this hell and then
end up on a prisonership and die on a prisonership
like Howard Harlan. I think that's something awesome. So we'll
cover some Baton stuff, read some more names, and then
we have some World War two two in Europe stuff.
(10:20):
There's a I don't know if it's a good story,
a heavy story, but a story about some of our
fallen And yeah, that's gonna be the show today on
the Jesse Kelly Show. All right, hang on, Jesse Kelly, Vaccian.
It is the Jesse Kelly Show on a Memorial Day
where we are doing a different show today, three hours
(10:43):
of remembering the falling and talking about the history around it.
And we're beginning this first hour is gonna kind of
be World War two centric, and the second hour is
gonna be Korea centric, and then the third hour is
gonna be Vietnam centric, and then we're gonna check out
here and go enjoy the rest of our day with
our families while remembering the fallen. Now, before we get
(11:04):
to the European section of World War Two that we're
going to go through today, I'm going to talk a
little bit about these prisonerships in Batan. The of the
Pacific part of the war. I know it's big. It's
never gotten the same amount of attention the European part
(11:24):
of the war has gotten. But more specifically, the prisoner
of war situation in the Pacific never really got the
attention it should get. It's just the main reason behind
it is this. Towards the end of the show, we're
going to read the names of trainees who died while
(11:46):
in military service, because I have always viewed them as
being just as heroic as the guy who charges a
machine gun nest in Vietnam. The prisoner of war portion
doesn't get the love it gets. One because it's not
as sexy as charging the machine gun bunker. And two
(12:07):
because the stories are so sad, and so we tend
to ignore those things. Not that all battle in battlefield
death isn't sad. It's all sad. It's all terrible. It's
a life, a wonderful life that's now gone. But the
prisoner of war stories, you have these brave warriors, and
(12:30):
they're these young, strong, fit guys. They train and they're patriotic,
and they say goodbye to their families, mom, dad, kiss
your wife goodbye, and they go to fight for America.
And yes, you know that they might die, and there's
a chance, you know, the bombs or bullets will get them.
But still you're gonna picture this young, strong guy in
your mind charging a hill. Look at Captain America. Go.
(12:52):
But these Pacific War pow stories end with guys who
are basically stick figures because they've been star to death,
dying of disease. One really, really terrible story that I
will skip most of the details on. I don't want
to make it too graphic. I'm trying to figure out
how appropriate, how appropriate it is to make it real,
(13:14):
but at the same time not getting too graphic about it.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
A guy.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Was visiting his friend in it was a Japanese pow camp,
and his friend was in the hospital if you even
want to call it hospitals. The Japanese did not allow
Americans to have very many medications or anything. The doctors,
the guys who would treat our guys, sometimes they would
just treat them with nothing and help the placebo effect worked.
Sometimes they were digging through trees and roots and leaves
(13:43):
like like it's tribal days. It was. That's that's what
our guys had to resort to. Oftentimes, they had to
perform surgeries on our guys, including amputations, without any anesthesia
because there was no anesthesia. So this is this was
the life in these hospitals anyway. So this guy's visiting
his friend in the hospital, and his friend has a
(14:07):
bag that he's kept with him. If I remember a
picture of his wife and kids. I think his Bible
was in there, just a couple of little personal effects.
And he told his buddy, hey, man, I think I'm
checking out here tonight. I think I'm going to die tonight.
So just make sure you take that for me, please,
and get that back to my family. And the guy
(14:28):
who was watching over his friend then had to roll
his friend over and clean him up because he had
severe stomach issues and disease problems going on. He had
to clean his friend, and as he was cleaning his friend,
his friend passed away right then and there. We don't
like telling those stories. You're probably cringing. Maybe you're crying. Look,
(14:52):
it's all appropriate. We don't pay enough attention to the
pow portion of it, because that's how they died. They
died in terrible ways, ways that you wouldn't want your
parents to find out about. You would tell your buddies, Hey,
please lie, don't don't tell my mom I died like this.
She doesn't need she just need that in her mind.
(15:12):
So these guys who survived Baton, remember we had this
huge military presence in the Philippines, and there were good troops,
there were good guys, but it was considered to be
really the ultimate and cushy assignments, especially if you're a
young man. Not that it's not hot and doesn't rain
in the Philippines, but it was considered kind of a
(15:35):
vacation spot. You can go look at old home videos
of our troops in the Philippines and they're riding bicycles
and playing volleyball and drinking beer and chasing Philippine dimes
around and life's good, and that all of a sudden boom,
a war breaks out and you find yourself essentially behind
enemy lines. They ended up crowded in Baton. It's the peninsula.
(15:57):
The Baton's a peninsula, so they're out and on the peninsula.
Japanese have them cut off on the peninsula. They then
are bombing them the Japanese. Now remember it's not just
that these guys are in this horrific conflict these guys,
I don't want to call them peacetime troops, that's.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Not what I mean.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
But they weren't in this mentality that you're about to
be fighting medieval barbarians. Soon they find themselves capturing monkeys
and snakes because they're starving to death, trying to eat
them in the jungle, with the Japanese infiltrating their lines,
stabbing them at night. They end up starved, racked with disease,
(16:35):
clothes falling off their bodies. Then they surrendered to the Japanese.
But this is at the very beginning of the war,
and we did know some stuff about how the Japanese
were treating POW's, and we certainly knew some stuff about
how they were treating the Chinese, but we had no
idea they were getting ready to march our guys miles
(16:57):
and miles and miles in the heat and then torture them,
and then at the end of that they would die,
oftentimes in the prison camps, die of disease. It was
just a respect for the respect for the Pacific War powts.
All right, let's go to the European portion of this
really quickly got a couple of citations govern more names
(17:17):
to honor on a Memorial Day version of The Jesse
Kelly Show.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
It is the Jesse Kelly.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
Show, a Memorial Day version of The Jesse Kelly Show.
Let's go to the little story. It took place in WinGen.
I'm probably saying that wrong, Wing in France. Wing in France.
This is the story kind of centered around Gerald Soper.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
But it's let me explain, okay.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
So it's nineteen forty five, getting late in the war,
nineteen forty five Germany, and we are busy trying to
root the Germans out. The Germans they are busy trying
to infiltrate us, to keep us on our heels. That's
what the Battle of the Bulge was all about, remember,
(18:03):
try to break through America's lines, which would screw us
all up and push us back. That brings us to
this little place called wing in France. This is a
town we hold. We nineteen forty five hold this town.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
It's our town. The Germans won it back.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
It's got a railway right above it, It's got a
ridge line right above it. The Germans won it back.
The Germans attack, and I need to clarify who was here.
The American troops who were here were very green. There's
a mistake that we all make. I know I make
(18:44):
this mistake whenever we look at American troops in a war,
especially in older war when we weren't in like World
War Two, we think about them being experienced troops. Especially
later in the war. They're all experienced troops, They're all
World War Two veterans. That's not how it works. There's
a constant rotation, a constant rotation, especially with America's troops,
(19:08):
who we would have our guys finish their time and
they would rotate out, and our guys would get killed
or get wounded, and they would rotate out. And so
you were always having if you were an experienced guy
in a unit, you were always having a brand new
batch of totally green guys who just don't know what
they're doing. And you have to on the job train
them before they get you and everyone else killed. And
(19:31):
they do get everyone else killed. We'll do Vietnam in
the last hour. But I was thinking about this story
I was reading the other day about this guy in
Vietnam shows up to his unit completely green. He didn't
know the who's who, the what's what, and they're out
on patrol and he sees something. I believe it was
a soda can on the ground out in the jungle,
(19:51):
which the veterans would know.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
You stay away from something like that.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
That kind of shiny object is the kind of thing
they would booby trap. He walks right up to it
and kicks it like it's a football. They were picking
pieces of him and his friends out of the tree tops.
It was a booby trapped artillery round they had. Again,
that's just what happens with the new guys.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
I just knew. They don't know anyway.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
So we have this town in Wing in France, and
our guys who were there, who had the town, they're
very green. The Germans. The Germans had some units that
were extremely highly trained units. They had some mountain units,
Alpine units, Alpine SS units. These were mountain units that
were trained better than other units were trained. I don't
(20:37):
know if you want to call them special forces, but
they were definitely the toughest of the tough units. Some
of the best troops in Europe were the German SS,
the Alpine SS units. Well, these these Alpine SS guys
do what Alpine SS guys do. They slip in between
our lines and take the town from us. We essentially
had to retreat from the town because they took over
(20:59):
the town. So now the Germans have not only this town,
they have the ridge line above the town. But wait,
it actually gets worse. It's really, really, really a big
deal for strategic purposes that we have this town. We
can't allow the Germans to have it because if they
have it, they'll split our forces. We must take it back.
(21:21):
Now we have a couple things in our favor. Yes,
these are super stud Germans who took the town, but
God was watching out for us. Their radios stop working.
They didn't have any functional radios after they took the town.
Therefore you can't call in artillery. In fact, they didn't
find out their commanders didn't find out till days later
(21:44):
they actually took the town because they couldn't radio back
and say we took the town. So you have these
super stud Germans there, but they are cut off. Now
you have to take them back. In taking them back,
it's a slog. It's a slog for a variety of reasons. One,
like I said, our guys were green. Two, it was
freezing and I mean frigid cold. The Germans were freezing
(22:07):
to death. We were freezing to death. And the bad
luck of combat happens this way. Sometimes. During one of
our assaults to try to take the town back, we
drove up to them with a Sherman tank. Trying to
drive up the road in a Sherman tank. The road
was so iced over. The Sherman tank just simply slid
(22:28):
off the side of the road and off a bridge,
just gone. It's just all of that's not glorious in
bombs and bullets. It's terrible things happen that brings us
to this, mister Gerald Eve Soper, because this is days
and days and days. We're attacking this town and attacking
this town and attacking this town, and guys like Soaper,
(22:49):
what they have to do is house to house fighting.
And as I've explained to you before on the show,
I am the furthest thinging away from an expert on
urban warfare, urban combat. But we did quite a bit
of training on that when I was in the Marine,
so I know a little bit about a little bit,
all right. I know enough to know it's horrible, and
it's horrible with training. It's horrible when you're trained. It's
(23:13):
horrible when you have the necessary equipment, necessary equipment like, oh,
I don't know, flash bang grenades and things like that
where you can throw in. These guys don't have house
to house combat training. They don't They can't do anything
but kick indoors and start shooting and chuck in grenades
and so. Soaper, well, here's his Distinguished Service Cross citation.
(23:40):
The President of the United States of America, authorized by
Act of Congress July ninth, nineteen eighteen, takes pride in
presenting the Distinguished Service Cross posthumously to Private first Class
Gerald E. Soaper, United States Army for extraordinary heroism in
connection with military operations against an armed enemy while serving
(24:00):
with Company F two hundred and seventy fourth Infantry Regiment,
seventieth Infantry Division and action against enemy forces. On the
seventh of January nineteen forty five, at Wing in France,
during a daylight attack on the town, intense sniper fire
and automatic weapons activity halted the advance of Private first
class Soapers patoon. Disregarding the danger, he voluntarily crawled to
(24:23):
a basement window from which the enemy was firing and
hurled a grenade inside. Moving away from the window, he
was wounded. He then crawled back and tossed another grenade
through the opening. He was firing his rifle into the
basement when hit the second time, and died shortly afterwards.
Private first Class soapers gallant actions and ability to enable
(24:44):
his platoon to resume the attack and aid in the
capture of the town. His personal bravery and zealous devotion
to duty at the cost of his life exemplify the
highest traditions of military forces of the United States and
reflect great credit upon himself, the seventieth Infantry Division and
the United States Army. And you should know that while
(25:07):
Soaper was there chucking grenades in this basement window, it
skipped over these details in the citation. But the Germans
just stuck a rifle out the window and pressed it
against his chest and shot him twice in the chest
from point blank range. His friends were so enraged because
(25:28):
they watched it happen. They ended up taking the house.
His friends ran up chucking grenades in angry, obviously at
the death of their friend. But this is a private
first class. This is the young army guy, a young
army guy laying there in Europe. He actually one of
his arms didn't say so in the citation. One of
(25:48):
his arms was wounded, so like Rambo, he pulled the
pin of the grenade with his freaking teeth. And let
me tell you, having pulled the pin on a couple
of grenades, it ain't easy pulling a pin on a
grenade with your teeth without ripping your teeth out. But
this guy did it, and he gave his life for
his country. And that's the kind of thing we want
to honor today. That is impressive. In case you're wondering,
(26:10):
it took days and days and days and days and days.
We did finally take back wing in France. We took
some losses, the Germans took even heavier losses. It was
a brutal battle. We'll finish up with our World War
two hour next, this is a Jesse Kelly Show. It
(26:31):
is the Jesse Kelly Show on a Memorial Day, a
Memorial Day where we will spend three hours and hopefully
all day honoring the fallen. I do hope you are
enjoying this day. Remember that's totally okay to enjoy a
day off. Ain't nothing wrong with that. Just take a
minute and remember, and again, these are more names you
(26:51):
have emailed in. These are all World War Two names
this hour. Major General Maurice Rose, Private first Class Edgar Romeo, Roy,
Private Robert E.
Speaker 2 (27:02):
Or, Robert R.
Speaker 1 (27:03):
Gruwell, Gilbert Bruckner, Second Lieutenant renfrew A Yerksa, Carlisle Mendez, Pfc.
Thomas Shooning, Roy Beaver.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
We'll get to some.
Speaker 1 (27:18):
Korea Wars stuff next hour, to a couple more of
these Distinguished Service Crosses. And I warned you that there
are a lot of these quote lesser citations, these lesser awards,
because they're considered lesser or lower than the Medal of Honor.
You read some of these things, and you read about
the stories behind some of these things, and you wonder,
how the heck did this guy not win a medal
of honor. This one's for Paul Edwin Alexander. The President
(27:42):
of the United States of America, authorized by Act of
Congress July ninth, nineteen eighteen, takes pride in presenting the
Distinguished Service Cross posthumously to Staff Sergeant Paul Edwin Alexander
the United States Army for extraordinary heroism in connection with
military operations against an armed enemy while serving with Company G,
(28:02):
sixtieth Infantry Regiment, ninth Infantry Division, in action against enemy
forces on the fourteenth of June nineteen forty four, near Normandy, France,
when his company had been held up for over an
hour by extremely heavy machine gun fire from an enemy
strong point, Staff Sergeant Alexander led his squad forward to
attack the enemy position. As he moved ahead of his
(28:25):
men across the fire swept terrain, staff Sergeant Alexander was
seriously wounded, but nevertheless continued to lead his squad and
direct their attack. He personally threw hand grenades into four
enemy machine gun positions, completely silencing the guns and inflicting
numerous casualties on the enemy. Staff Sergeant Alexander's intrepid actions,
(28:46):
personal bravery, and zealous devotion to duty at the cost
of his life exemplify the highest traditions of the military
forces of the United States and reflect great credit upon himself.
The ninth Infantry Division and the United States Army yield
in action twenty three years old. This one's for Thomas A.
Green US Army. The President of the United States of America,
(29:09):
authorized by Acts of Congress July ninth, nineteen eighteen, takes
pride in presenting the Distinguished Service Cross posthumously to Staff
Sergeant Thomas A. Green, United States Army for extraordinary heroism
in connection with military operations against an armed enemy while
serving as a medical aid man with the fifteenth Armored
Infantry Battalion, fifth Armored Division, and action against enemy forces.
(29:34):
On the eighteenth of September nineteen forty four, in Germany,
a squad of Armored infantrymen accompanied by a tank was
assigned the mission of pushing through enemy positions to regain
contact with the battalion command posts. Staff Sergeant Green, though
the wounded the previous day, volunteerily accompanied his comrades on
(29:56):
the dangerous assignment. Near the enemy lines, the tank received
a direct hit while its crew members were attempting to dismount.
Two men were seriously wounded. Disregarding heavy artillery, mortar and
small arms fire placed by the enemy upon the disabled tank,
staff Sergeant Green advanced unhesitatingly to aid the wounded men.
(30:18):
He ignored the pleas of his comrades to return to
the rear when the squad was ordered to withdraw, and
chose to remain with the men. When intense own enemy
mortar fire began to fall in the area. Staff Sergeant Green,
with calm, efficiency, and at the risk of his own life,
continued to render medical treatment. He was last seen attempting
(30:38):
to drag his wounded comrades to the safety of a
nearby ditch. By his display of fearless courage, tenacity of purpose,
and unflinching devotion to duty, Staff Sergeant Green exemplified the
highest traditions of military forces of the United States and
reflected great credit upon himself the fifth Armored Division in
the United States Army. And you should know this is
(31:01):
one of those things just trying to put this the
right way. I'm trying to do all this the right way,
and I'm sure I won't. But he's listed as killed
in action and MIA. And you heard it said he
was last seen artillery mortars, these super super powerful, high
(31:26):
explosive rounds that are fired oftentimes. Oftentimes the reason somebody
is listed as MIA missing an action, it's not because
they were captured and died in a pow camp. That
actually is the lower percentage of MIAs. Most of the
(31:47):
time people are listed MIA because they got blown up
and there's nothing left. And I I'm sorry to put
it to you that way. I don't know a better
way to put it. That sounds like that's that's I
wasn't there. That sounds like the kind of situation we're
dealing with here where look at Look there are stories
all over World War One, world War two where if
(32:09):
you're in there'll be a group of dudes. Forget about
a dude, There'll be a group. There's twenty dudes, there's
thirty dudes. There's a platoon. They're sitting around having chow,
and an artillery round comes in and none of them
get buried. None of them get listed as KIA, or
if they do, they're listed later on they're considered MIA.
(32:30):
Why because even the freaking dog tags are gone. You're
walking around when you find somebody's foot, what are you
supposed to do with that? That's I know that's heavy,
but that's the reality of it. Lots of times when
you hear MIIA, it's because he got blown up and
there was nothing left. One more Owen's l kirk Us Army,
(32:50):
the President of the United States of America, authorized by
Congress July ninth, nineteen eighteen, takes pride in presenting the
Distinguished Service Cross posthumously to private first class Owens L. Kirk,
United States Army for extraordinary heroism in connection with military
operations against an armed enemy while serving as a medical
aid man with the one hundred and twentieth Infantry Regiment,
(33:12):
thirtieth Infantry Division in action against enemy forces on the
seventh of October nineteen forty four in Germany. Although realizing
that one aid man had been killed in attempting to
reach the side of a wounded man, Private first Class
Kirk heroically undertook the task himself. Despite the warnings of
his comrades. He moved across the open fire swept ground
(33:33):
to the fallen soldier. As he knelt in full view
of the enemy. He was fatally wounded, but continued to
administer aid to the soldier until darkness and subsequent evacuation,
and sacrificing his life to save that of another Private
first class, Kirk typified the highest traditions of the military
forces of the United States and reflected great credit upon himself.
(33:55):
The thirtieth Infantry Division in the United States Army is
World War two for this hour. Next hour will be Korea.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
Hang on b
This is a Jesse Kelly show. It is the Jesse
Kelly Show, and we are here. Yes, we will have
some fun, but we are here to honor the fallen
today because it is Memorial Day. And as we always
have done and Lord Willing will always do on the
(00:32):
Jesse Kelly Show, we do a show today. We do
a show that is much different than the normal Jesse
Kelly Show. If you tuned in today to hear anything
political at all, you might want to just turn it
off now because there won't be any of that. There
will be a ton of honoring the fallen. There will
be a ton of history.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
I will read.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
Names of the fallen you have emailed in. We will
go over distinguished Service cross stories and Navy cross stories
and lesion of merits, and we will talk about legends
who gave their life for this country. They will not
be politics. There won't be any soundboard fart sounds either.
We are going to just honor the fallen on this
(01:15):
Memorial Day. Couple disclaimers before we get going. Not disclaimers.
Couple fyis I guess I should say veterans today can
be a very difficult day for you. If you lost
a brother or sister in arms. If you are struggling today,
(01:39):
reach out. There are all kinds of phone lines you
can call if you want to know the Veterans specific line.
If you're struggling today, dial nine to eight eight and
press one.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Reach out.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
You are not alone. You are never alone. If you
are down and out today, reach out.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Okay, that is one. Two.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Remember, just a little reminder to everybody. I hope you
have enjoyed your day. I hope you're enjoying your day.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
That is good.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
That is what the people who gave their lives to
this country, that's what they would want.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
As long as you take a moment to honor them,
they would want you to do that.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
But just the heads up again, today is not Veterans Day.
It's not First Responder's Day, Police Environment Day, and all
those who serve day. This is a day to honor
the fallen and honor the families they left behind.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Now, before we.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Get into the Distinguished Service Cross stuff, the different citations
and things like that, and the history stuff around it,
we're going to read I'm actually gonna do a World
War two, and then a Korea and then a Vietnam.
Let's get to a couple of the names you emailed in,
just because there's some history around some of this stuff.
Matt Spangenberg, Colonel John Luther Aaron Bank, founder of the
(03:00):
Green Berets, Albert Duckett. These are names people have emailed
into the show. People they want honored. This is World
War two, kis these next ones? Tanker John Prizwara said
he died at the Battle of the Bulge. Staff Sergeant
Howard Harlan, he survived Baton and died on a prisoner ship. Actually,
(03:22):
let's pause right there. Let's do a little bit of
history on that before I get into some other stuff
and some other citation histories there the prison ships. I
read a book run time, great book called The Forgotten Highlander,
highly recommended if it's your thing. It takes a little
while to get going. I'll be honest with you. And
(03:45):
because the guy is I believe Scottish, it sounds a
little different. Some of the language uses a little different
in order. But it's a book about a guy who
was serving obviously with the British and was taken captive
in World War Two. And he was taken captive by
the Japanese. And I'll go over the Baton stuff here
(04:06):
in just the moment, we'll do a little history on that.
I hadn't intended to do that, but I figure we
might as well do that today. But anyway, setting the
baton stuff aside, we'll come back to this. This guy
was captured by the Japanese, and in the course of
his capture, he was put on a train when it
was over one hundred degrees out and they stuffed so
many guys in these trains. They would just die of
(04:28):
suffocation inside of the train. They're all sick, very very
very sick with disease and trying to do this as
gently as possible. I mean, coming out the other end sick.
You can't control it. Kind of sick. Now, picture all
the men in a sweaty train car being sick like that.
(04:51):
They're not pulling over for you to use the bathroom.
Just really really horrible. Okay, So he gets to put
on this train car. He gets sent to various prison
camps for various reasons. Remember the Japanese, they were horrible,
the prisoners of war, all of them, and for the
most part, the ones that didn't just let out kill
they just used them all as slave labor. They wanted
(05:11):
new slave labor. Well, one of the things you'll read
about if you ever dig into World War two and
kind of the Pacific area is this railway they were building.
They were trying to build a new railway. Why, well,
they wanted to get supplies and to and fro, that's
what they were trying to do. They were having a
(05:33):
hard time getting supplies to and fro, especially when you
get over into that India jungle area. So in the
Burma area, they'd created something called the Railway of Death
or the Death Railway. Yeah, no, it sounds intense, and
it was horrible. The Japanese would have these slave labor
units and they would make you get up and there
(05:55):
was remember there was no heavy equipment for these guys.
The Japanese would have you sit there if even if
you were so diseased ridden you could hardly walk, they'd
haul you out to the train where everyone else was digging,
and they'd throw big rocks beside you and make you
sit there and sledge hammer the rocks down and break
the rocks down, even though you couldn't stand. It was
it's unbelievable how many people died. Okay, So this forgotten
(06:19):
Highlander guy, he did the train thing, riding on the train.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
Then he built this railway and that.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
So he's been through all these living hells. He's been
tortured so many times. But the thing he said was
the worst thing was the hell ships. They were called
hell ships. They were the Japanese prison ships, and they Honestly,
it seems for me, I don't do that well with claustrophobia.
(06:47):
No I don't freak, but I don't do that well
with it. This sounds like I would rather just die.
I would rather you kill me. They would take ships,
they would not put markings on them showing that there
were prisoners on board. Therefore, our navy and our planes
would routinely sink our own ships with their own guys
in them. Anyway, they would have this gigantic metal hold
(07:10):
in the bottom of the ship. And remember no air
conditioning here, we're talking the South Pacific.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
It's roasting.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
They would stuff all the men down inside and then
close the hatch. So it's one hundred and twenty one
hundred and twenty five degrees. Everyone's disease ridden. It's so
cramped you can't even sit down. Guys are starting to die,
dying of disease a combination of disease and heat stroke.
(07:37):
Guys are routinely losing their minds because picture that environment. Okay,
you're mashed in there, you're hot, you're sick, everyone's sick,
everyone's losing control of themselves. Men would routinely lose their minds.
Men had to kill their friends. Picture this, Your friend
loses his mind and starts trying to hurt everyone in
(07:59):
this hold. You and your other friends have to kill
your friend with your bare hands to stop your friend
from killing other people.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
How does one.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
Ever get over something like that anyway? So these hellships,
that's what it was like in a hellship. This forgotten
Highlander guy said the hellship was worse than everything else, everything,
the train they're building, the railway, worse than everything, which
brings me back to this staff Sergeant Howard Harlan survived
(08:29):
Baton and died on a prisoner ship. Some of the
most heartbreaking stories I've read, and guys that I really
want to honor today are Americans who died on these
hellships because so often they would die. And I don't know,
I don't know if this is wrong of me, but
(08:49):
we all, we all kind of assign levels of importance
or levels of horror or levels of difficulty in our
own way, in our own mind. But in my mind,
I think it's so uniquely horrible to have lived through,
survived a million terrible things during the war, only to
die on a hell ship. And oftentimes, like I mentioned,
(09:13):
oftentimes I don't know this guy's exact circumstance. Oftentimes you
died at American hands or British hands. You survive everything.
This guy survived Baton, which will go over here in
just a moment. You survive everything, and then an American
(09:34):
submarine sees a Japanese ship it'll looked like a merchant
vessel of some kind or a naval vessel, and you
fire a torpedo into its side. You're the American submarine,
and you think you did good, and you find out
later And this happened to guys, they would find out
later on. Yeah remember that ship we sunk last week. Yeah,
there were five hundred American POWs on that ship and
(09:56):
they're all gone.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
Now take a thing of.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
That level of guilt, even though it's not your fault,
you have no way of knowing. Think what that's like.
So these guys to survive all this hell and then
end up on a prisonership and die on a prisonership
like Howard Harlan. I think that's something awesome. So we'll
cover some Baton stuff, read some more names, and then
we have some World War two two in Europe stuff.
(10:20):
There's a I don't know if it's a good story,
a heavy story, but a story about some of our
fallen And yeah, that's gonna be the show today on
the Jesse Kelly Show. All right, hang on, Jesse Kelly, Vaccian.
It is the Jesse Kelly Show on a Memorial Day
where we are doing a different show today, three hours
(10:43):
of remembering the falling and talking about the history around it.
And we're beginning this first hour is gonna kind of
be World War two centric, and the second hour is
gonna be Korea centric, and then the third hour is
gonna be Vietnam centric, and then we're gonna check out
here and go enjoy the rest of our day with
our families while remembering the fallen. Now, before we get
(11:04):
to the European section of World War Two that we're
going to go through today, I'm going to talk a
little bit about these prisonerships in Batan. The of the
Pacific part of the war. I know it's big. It's
never gotten the same amount of attention the European part
(11:24):
of the war has gotten. But more specifically, the prisoner
of war situation in the Pacific never really got the
attention it should get. It's just the main reason behind
it is this. Towards the end of the show, we're
going to read the names of trainees who died while
(11:46):
in military service, because I have always viewed them as
being just as heroic as the guy who charges a
machine gun nest in Vietnam. The prisoner of war portion
doesn't get the love it gets. One because it's not
as sexy as charging the machine gun bunker. And two
(12:07):
because the stories are so sad, and so we tend
to ignore those things. Not that all battle in battlefield
death isn't sad. It's all sad. It's all terrible. It's
a life, a wonderful life that's now gone. But the
prisoner of war stories, you have these brave warriors, and
(12:30):
they're these young, strong, fit guys. They train and they're patriotic,
and they say goodbye to their families, mom, dad, kiss
your wife goodbye, and they go to fight for America.
And yes, you know that they might die, and there's
a chance, you know, the bombs or bullets will get them.
But still you're gonna picture this young, strong guy in
your mind charging a hill. Look at Captain America. Go.
(12:52):
But these Pacific War pow stories end with guys who
are basically stick figures because they've been star to death,
dying of disease. One really, really terrible story that I
will skip most of the details on. I don't want
to make it too graphic. I'm trying to figure out
how appropriate, how appropriate it is to make it real,
(13:14):
but at the same time not getting too graphic about it.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
A guy.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Was visiting his friend in it was a Japanese pow camp,
and his friend was in the hospital if you even
want to call it hospitals. The Japanese did not allow
Americans to have very many medications or anything. The doctors,
the guys who would treat our guys, sometimes they would
just treat them with nothing and help the placebo effect worked.
Sometimes they were digging through trees and roots and leaves
(13:43):
like like it's tribal days. It was. That's that's what
our guys had to resort to. Oftentimes, they had to
perform surgeries on our guys, including amputations, without any anesthesia
because there was no anesthesia. So this is this was
the life in these hospitals anyway. So this guy's visiting
his friend in the hospital, and his friend has a
(14:07):
bag that he's kept with him. If I remember a
picture of his wife and kids. I think his Bible
was in there, just a couple of little personal effects.
And he told his buddy, hey, man, I think I'm
checking out here tonight. I think I'm going to die tonight.
So just make sure you take that for me, please,
and get that back to my family. And the guy
(14:28):
who was watching over his friend then had to roll
his friend over and clean him up because he had
severe stomach issues and disease problems going on. He had
to clean his friend, and as he was cleaning his friend,
his friend passed away right then and there. We don't
like telling those stories. You're probably cringing. Maybe you're crying. Look,
(14:52):
it's all appropriate. We don't pay enough attention to the
pow portion of it, because that's how they died. They
died in terrible ways, ways that you wouldn't want your
parents to find out about. You would tell your buddies, Hey,
please lie, don't don't tell my mom I died like this.
She doesn't need she just need that in her mind.
(15:12):
So these guys who survived Baton, remember we had this
huge military presence in the Philippines, and there were good troops,
there were good guys, but it was considered to be
really the ultimate and cushy assignments, especially if you're a
young man. Not that it's not hot and doesn't rain
in the Philippines, but it was considered kind of a
(15:35):
vacation spot. You can go look at old home videos
of our troops in the Philippines and they're riding bicycles
and playing volleyball and drinking beer and chasing Philippine dimes
around and life's good, and that all of a sudden boom,
a war breaks out and you find yourself essentially behind
enemy lines. They ended up crowded in Baton. It's the peninsula.
(15:57):
The Baton's a peninsula, so they're out and on the peninsula.
Japanese have them cut off on the peninsula. They then
are bombing them the Japanese. Now remember it's not just
that these guys are in this horrific conflict these guys,
I don't want to call them peacetime troops, that's.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Not what I mean.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
But they weren't in this mentality that you're about to
be fighting medieval barbarians. Soon they find themselves capturing monkeys
and snakes because they're starving to death, trying to eat
them in the jungle, with the Japanese infiltrating their lines,
stabbing them at night. They end up starved, racked with disease,
(16:35):
clothes falling off their bodies. Then they surrendered to the Japanese.
But this is at the very beginning of the war,
and we did know some stuff about how the Japanese
were treating POW's, and we certainly knew some stuff about
how they were treating the Chinese, but we had no
idea they were getting ready to march our guys miles
(16:57):
and miles and miles in the heat and then torture them,
and then at the end of that they would die,
oftentimes in the prison camps, die of disease. It was
just a respect for the respect for the Pacific War powts.
All right, let's go to the European portion of this
really quickly got a couple of citations govern more names
(17:17):
to honor on a Memorial Day version of The Jesse
Kelly Show.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
It is the Jesse Kelly.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
Show, a Memorial Day version of The Jesse Kelly Show.
Let's go to the little story. It took place in WinGen.
I'm probably saying that wrong, Wing in France. Wing in France.
This is the story kind of centered around Gerald Soper.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
But it's let me explain, okay.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
So it's nineteen forty five, getting late in the war,
nineteen forty five Germany, and we are busy trying to
root the Germans out. The Germans they are busy trying
to infiltrate us, to keep us on our heels. That's
what the Battle of the Bulge was all about, remember,
(18:03):
try to break through America's lines, which would screw us
all up and push us back. That brings us to
this little place called wing in France. This is a
town we hold. We nineteen forty five hold this town.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
It's our town. The Germans won it back.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
It's got a railway right above it, It's got a
ridge line right above it. The Germans won it back.
The Germans attack, and I need to clarify who was here.
The American troops who were here were very green. There's
a mistake that we all make. I know I make
(18:44):
this mistake whenever we look at American troops in a war,
especially in older war when we weren't in like World
War Two, we think about them being experienced troops. Especially
later in the war. They're all experienced troops, They're all
World War Two veterans. That's not how it works. There's
a constant rotation, a constant rotation, especially with America's troops,
(19:08):
who we would have our guys finish their time and
they would rotate out, and our guys would get killed
or get wounded, and they would rotate out. And so
you were always having if you were an experienced guy
in a unit, you were always having a brand new
batch of totally green guys who just don't know what
they're doing. And you have to on the job train
them before they get you and everyone else killed. And
(19:31):
they do get everyone else killed. We'll do Vietnam in
the last hour. But I was thinking about this story
I was reading the other day about this guy in
Vietnam shows up to his unit completely green. He didn't
know the who's who, the what's what, and they're out
on patrol and he sees something. I believe it was
a soda can on the ground out in the jungle,
(19:51):
which the veterans would know.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
You stay away from something like that.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
That kind of shiny object is the kind of thing
they would booby trap. He walks right up to it
and kicks it like it's a football. They were picking
pieces of him and his friends out of the tree tops.
It was a booby trapped artillery round they had. Again,
that's just what happens with the new guys.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
I just knew. They don't know anyway.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
So we have this town in Wing in France, and
our guys who were there, who had the town, they're
very green. The Germans. The Germans had some units that
were extremely highly trained units. They had some mountain units,
Alpine units, Alpine SS units. These were mountain units that
were trained better than other units were trained. I don't
(20:37):
know if you want to call them special forces, but
they were definitely the toughest of the tough units. Some
of the best troops in Europe were the German SS,
the Alpine SS units. Well, these these Alpine SS guys
do what Alpine SS guys do. They slip in between
our lines and take the town from us. We essentially
had to retreat from the town because they took over
(20:59):
the town. So now the Germans have not only this town,
they have the ridge line above the town. But wait,
it actually gets worse. It's really, really, really a big
deal for strategic purposes that we have this town. We
can't allow the Germans to have it because if they
have it, they'll split our forces. We must take it back.
(21:21):
Now we have a couple things in our favor. Yes,
these are super stud Germans who took the town, but
God was watching out for us. Their radios stop working.
They didn't have any functional radios after they took the town.
Therefore you can't call in artillery. In fact, they didn't
find out their commanders didn't find out till days later
(21:44):
they actually took the town because they couldn't radio back
and say we took the town. So you have these
super stud Germans there, but they are cut off. Now
you have to take them back. In taking them back,
it's a slog. It's a slog for a variety of reasons. One,
like I said, our guys were green. Two, it was
freezing and I mean frigid cold. The Germans were freezing
(22:07):
to death. We were freezing to death. And the bad
luck of combat happens this way. Sometimes. During one of
our assaults to try to take the town back, we
drove up to them with a Sherman tank. Trying to
drive up the road in a Sherman tank. The road
was so iced over. The Sherman tank just simply slid
(22:28):
off the side of the road and off a bridge,
just gone. It's just all of that's not glorious in
bombs and bullets. It's terrible things happen that brings us
to this, mister Gerald Eve Soper, because this is days
and days and days. We're attacking this town and attacking
this town and attacking this town, and guys like Soaper,
(22:49):
what they have to do is house to house fighting.
And as I've explained to you before on the show,
I am the furthest thinging away from an expert on
urban warfare, urban combat. But we did quite a bit
of training on that when I was in the Marine,
so I know a little bit about a little bit,
all right. I know enough to know it's horrible, and
it's horrible with training. It's horrible when you're trained. It's
(23:13):
horrible when you have the necessary equipment, necessary equipment like, oh,
I don't know, flash bang grenades and things like that
where you can throw in. These guys don't have house
to house combat training. They don't They can't do anything
but kick indoors and start shooting and chuck in grenades
and so. Soaper, well, here's his Distinguished Service Cross citation.
(23:40):
The President of the United States of America, authorized by
Act of Congress July ninth, nineteen eighteen, takes pride in
presenting the Distinguished Service Cross posthumously to Private first Class
Gerald E. Soaper, United States Army for extraordinary heroism in
connection with military operations against an armed enemy while serving
(24:00):
with Company F two hundred and seventy fourth Infantry Regiment,
seventieth Infantry Division and action against enemy forces. On the
seventh of January nineteen forty five, at Wing in France,
during a daylight attack on the town, intense sniper fire
and automatic weapons activity halted the advance of Private first
class Soapers patoon. Disregarding the danger, he voluntarily crawled to
(24:23):
a basement window from which the enemy was firing and
hurled a grenade inside. Moving away from the window, he
was wounded. He then crawled back and tossed another grenade
through the opening. He was firing his rifle into the
basement when hit the second time, and died shortly afterwards.
Private first Class soapers gallant actions and ability to enable
(24:44):
his platoon to resume the attack and aid in the
capture of the town. His personal bravery and zealous devotion
to duty at the cost of his life exemplify the
highest traditions of military forces of the United States and
reflect great credit upon himself, the seventieth Infantry Division and
the United States Army. And you should know that while
(25:07):
Soaper was there chucking grenades in this basement window, it
skipped over these details in the citation. But the Germans
just stuck a rifle out the window and pressed it
against his chest and shot him twice in the chest
from point blank range. His friends were so enraged because
(25:28):
they watched it happen. They ended up taking the house.
His friends ran up chucking grenades in angry, obviously at
the death of their friend. But this is a private
first class. This is the young army guy, a young
army guy laying there in Europe. He actually one of
his arms didn't say so in the citation. One of
(25:48):
his arms was wounded, so like Rambo, he pulled the
pin of the grenade with his freaking teeth. And let
me tell you, having pulled the pin on a couple
of grenades, it ain't easy pulling a pin on a
grenade with your teeth without ripping your teeth out. But
this guy did it, and he gave his life for
his country. And that's the kind of thing we want
to honor today. That is impressive. In case you're wondering,
(26:10):
it took days and days and days and days and days.
We did finally take back wing in France. We took
some losses, the Germans took even heavier losses. It was
a brutal battle. We'll finish up with our World War
two hour next, this is a Jesse Kelly Show. It
(26:31):
is the Jesse Kelly Show on a Memorial Day, a
Memorial Day where we will spend three hours and hopefully
all day honoring the fallen. I do hope you are
enjoying this day. Remember that's totally okay to enjoy a
day off. Ain't nothing wrong with that. Just take a
minute and remember, and again, these are more names you
(26:51):
have emailed in. These are all World War Two names
this hour. Major General Maurice Rose, Private first Class Edgar Romeo, Roy,
Private Robert E.
Speaker 2 (27:02):
Or, Robert R.
Speaker 1 (27:03):
Gruwell, Gilbert Bruckner, Second Lieutenant renfrew A Yerksa, Carlisle Mendez, Pfc.
Thomas Shooning, Roy Beaver.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
We'll get to some.
Speaker 1 (27:18):
Korea Wars stuff next hour, to a couple more of
these Distinguished Service Crosses. And I warned you that there
are a lot of these quote lesser citations, these lesser awards,
because they're considered lesser or lower than the Medal of Honor.
You read some of these things, and you read about
the stories behind some of these things, and you wonder,
how the heck did this guy not win a medal
of honor. This one's for Paul Edwin Alexander. The President
(27:42):
of the United States of America, authorized by Act of
Congress July ninth, nineteen eighteen, takes pride in presenting the
Distinguished Service Cross posthumously to Staff Sergeant Paul Edwin Alexander
the United States Army for extraordinary heroism in connection with
military operations against an armed enemy while serving with Company G,
(28:02):
sixtieth Infantry Regiment, ninth Infantry Division, in action against enemy
forces on the fourteenth of June nineteen forty four, near Normandy, France,
when his company had been held up for over an
hour by extremely heavy machine gun fire from an enemy
strong point, Staff Sergeant Alexander led his squad forward to
attack the enemy position. As he moved ahead of his
(28:25):
men across the fire swept terrain, staff Sergeant Alexander was
seriously wounded, but nevertheless continued to lead his squad and
direct their attack. He personally threw hand grenades into four
enemy machine gun positions, completely silencing the guns and inflicting
numerous casualties on the enemy. Staff Sergeant Alexander's intrepid actions,
(28:46):
personal bravery, and zealous devotion to duty at the cost
of his life exemplify the highest traditions of the military
forces of the United States and reflect great credit upon himself.
The ninth Infantry Division and the United States Army yield
in action twenty three years old. This one's for Thomas A.
Green US Army. The President of the United States of America,
(29:09):
authorized by Acts of Congress July ninth, nineteen eighteen, takes
pride in presenting the Distinguished Service Cross posthumously to Staff
Sergeant Thomas A. Green, United States Army for extraordinary heroism
in connection with military operations against an armed enemy while
serving as a medical aid man with the fifteenth Armored
Infantry Battalion, fifth Armored Division, and action against enemy forces.
(29:34):
On the eighteenth of September nineteen forty four, in Germany,
a squad of Armored infantrymen accompanied by a tank was
assigned the mission of pushing through enemy positions to regain
contact with the battalion command posts. Staff Sergeant Green, though
the wounded the previous day, volunteerily accompanied his comrades on
(29:56):
the dangerous assignment. Near the enemy lines, the tank received
a direct hit while its crew members were attempting to dismount.
Two men were seriously wounded. Disregarding heavy artillery, mortar and
small arms fire placed by the enemy upon the disabled tank,
staff Sergeant Green advanced unhesitatingly to aid the wounded men.
(30:18):
He ignored the pleas of his comrades to return to
the rear when the squad was ordered to withdraw, and
chose to remain with the men. When intense own enemy
mortar fire began to fall in the area. Staff Sergeant Green,
with calm, efficiency, and at the risk of his own life,
continued to render medical treatment. He was last seen attempting
(30:38):
to drag his wounded comrades to the safety of a
nearby ditch. By his display of fearless courage, tenacity of purpose,
and unflinching devotion to duty, Staff Sergeant Green exemplified the
highest traditions of military forces of the United States and
reflected great credit upon himself the fifth Armored Division in
the United States Army. And you should know this is
(31:01):
one of those things just trying to put this the
right way. I'm trying to do all this the right way,
and I'm sure I won't. But he's listed as killed
in action and MIA. And you heard it said he
was last seen artillery mortars, these super super powerful, high
(31:26):
explosive rounds that are fired oftentimes. Oftentimes the reason somebody
is listed as MIA missing an action, it's not because
they were captured and died in a pow camp. That
actually is the lower percentage of MIAs. Most of the
(31:47):
time people are listed MIA because they got blown up
and there's nothing left. And I I'm sorry to put
it to you that way. I don't know a better
way to put it. That sounds like that's that's I
wasn't there. That sounds like the kind of situation we're
dealing with here where look at Look there are stories
all over World War One, world War two where if
(32:09):
you're in there'll be a group of dudes. Forget about
a dude, There'll be a group. There's twenty dudes, there's
thirty dudes. There's a platoon. They're sitting around having chow,
and an artillery round comes in and none of them
get buried. None of them get listed as KIA, or
if they do, they're listed later on they're considered MIA.
(32:30):
Why because even the freaking dog tags are gone. You're
walking around when you find somebody's foot, what are you
supposed to do with that? That's I know that's heavy,
but that's the reality of it. Lots of times when
you hear MIIA, it's because he got blown up and
there was nothing left. One more Owen's l kirk Us Army,
(32:50):
the President of the United States of America, authorized by
Congress July ninth, nineteen eighteen, takes pride in presenting the
Distinguished Service Cross posthumously to private first class Owens L. Kirk,
United States Army for extraordinary heroism in connection with military
operations against an armed enemy while serving as a medical
aid man with the one hundred and twentieth Infantry Regiment,
(33:12):
thirtieth Infantry Division in action against enemy forces on the
seventh of October nineteen forty four in Germany. Although realizing
that one aid man had been killed in attempting to
reach the side of a wounded man, Private first Class
Kirk heroically undertook the task himself. Despite the warnings of
his comrades. He moved across the open fire swept ground
(33:33):
to the fallen soldier. As he knelt in full view
of the enemy. He was fatally wounded, but continued to
administer aid to the soldier until darkness and subsequent evacuation,
and sacrificing his life to save that of another Private
first class, Kirk typified the highest traditions of the military
forces of the United States and reflected great credit upon himself.
(33:55):
The thirtieth Infantry Division in the United States Army is
World War two for this hour. Next hour will be Korea.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
Hang on b
Host
Jesse Kelly
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