Some of the 'Services' and 'Programs we have available
Sgt. Henry W. Tisdale enlisted in Company I, Thirty-Fifth Regiment,Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry on July 10, 1862 at the age of 25. Sgt. Tisdale kept a very detailed diary of his service from 1662 t0 1865. His son and his sons wife typed and bound the diary in 1926. Please click on the picture and you will see the diary.
Pvt. L. Leon of the Charlotte Grays, Company C, First North Carolina Regiment, recounted his service in the Confederacy from 1861, and titled it "Diary of a Tar Heel Confederate Soldier. Put. Leon copyright and published the diary in 1913. Please click on the picture and you can read his story.
Pvt. George Edgar Cripps of the 34th Michigan Volunteer Infantry left Michigan in June of 1898 bound for Cuba.This diary is re-typed from the handwritten diary he left. You will greatly enjoy his account of time spent from Michigan to Cuba and back. Please click on the picture to read his diary.
Charles Normington was in Paris France and recounted in a letter to his mother the jubilation of the war being declared ended. Just click on the above picture and under "First-Hand Accounts" click on the letter from Paris 11 Nov 1918, to view his letter.
Induction Center in Baltimore, Maryland 1942. And actually all inductees were told especially 'what not to do', because "loose lips could sink ships'. So click on the picture and choose 'World War II' at top of site and choose the heading "loose lips sink ships', and get the whole story of induction education.
NOVEMBER 2021 By Blake Stilwell, Military.com
By November 1970, conditions for American prisoners being held by North Vietnam were reaching their darkest days. More than 450 were captive, they were dying from torture and starvation, and many already had been prisoners for some 2,000 days. The U.S. military was looking for any opportunity to rescue them.
In 2021, filmmaker Ehren Parks finished "27 Minutes At Son Tay," a documentary film that goes behind what it took to put 56 Special Forces soldiers on the ground in North Vietnam, in the middle of hundreds of thousands of enemy troops.
These guys today, they know the story they want to tell," Parks tells Military.com. "We're telling the story that they told us. We've removed the political layer, and we talk about it in terms of the relation to the troops on the ground."
In 1970, the U.S. got intelligence that an estimated 61 prisoners were being held at Son Tay Prison, just 23 miles west of Hanoi, so American planners decided to act. The Army, CIA, Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and the National Security Agency (NSA) teamed up to plan Operation Ivory Coast, the rescue of American POWs from the Son Tay complex.
The top-secret mission was the first military operation conducted under the direct control of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It required 148 troops and 28 aircraft and was the U.S. Navy's largest nighttime carrier operation of the war. It went off almost without a hitch. The only problem was that after the Special Forces soldiers assaulted the prison compound, they found there were no POWs held there.
The movie is a story told by the Vietnam veterans who were there for the raid and features high-resolution graphics and live-action recreations of what happened on the ground. Having the veterans' input for truth and accuracy was of prime importance to the filmmakers.
"Usually, in a documentary, the subject doesn't have any say in the content; it's a journalistic integrity kind of thing," Parks says. "But for me, having the veterans involved and willing to sign off is super important. I knew that if I could get it right and have these guys approve of it, then I know that all the U.S. special operators will like the movie."
They were even able to construct a 3-D rendering of the prison using the memories of one Son Tay prisoner, Bob Jeffreys, by recalling his daily trip to the bathroom.
December 2021, by J.D. Simkins, Observation Post
The phrase “shell shocked” took on new meaning last week when a man in Gloucester, England, managed to lodge a 2-inch-wide World War II anti-tank shell inside his rectum.
The rectum’s owner, who (understandably) chose to remain anonymous, told medical staff at Gloucestershire Royal Hospital that the 57 mm round, part of the man’s WWII memorabilia collection, became embedded inside his anus after he “slipped and fell,” as one is known to do in England.
An explosive ordnance disposal squad was subsequently called to the hospital to ensure the munition was not in danger of detonating within the individual’s personal hurt locker. By the time EOD personnel arrived, doctors had already removed the shell.
“It was basically an inert lump of metal, so there was no risk to life — at least not to anyone else’s,” a spokesperson told The Sun, adding that the round was no longer active.
“He was in a considerable amount of pain,” another source expertly deduced.
The patient, who is expected to make a full physical recovery — mentally is another story — is just one of a multitude of rectal cases medical practitioners encounter each year, according to Dr. Carol Cooper.
“The range of objects that are pushed into rectums is incredible, from wine glasses to ketchup bottles and parts of hoovers,” Cooper told The Sun.
1. One-third of the soldiers who fought for the Union Army were immigrants, and nearly one in 10 was African American.
The Union Army was a multicultural force—even a multinational one. We often hear about Irish soldiers (7.5 percent of the army), but the Union’s ranks included even more Germans (10 percent), who marched off in regiments such as the Steuben Volunteers. Other immigrant soldiers were French, Italian, Polish, English and Scottish. In fact, one in four regiments contained a majority of foreigners. Blacks were permitted to join the Union Army in 1863, and some scholars believe this infusion of soldiers may have turned the tide of the war.
We remember the Maine, but we don’t understand it.
In January 1898, as tensions flared between Cuban revolutionaries and Spanish troops, the battleship USS Maine was sent to Havana to protect American interests and civilians there. On February 15 a massive explosion sank the vessel, killing 266 sailors. Sensationalist newspaper articles and advocates of war accused the Spanish of destroying the ship, and a naval inquiry soon concluded that a mine had caused the disaster. With the rallying cry “Remember the Maine!” galvanizing Americans, President William McKinley reluctantly signed a resolution supporting Cuban independence and threatening Spain with military action. Today, however, experts generally doubt the Spanish had a hand in Maine’s demise. Though we may never know for sure what unleashed the tragedy that helped spark a war, recent investigations have implicated the ship’s design, ammunition storage and coal bunker.
In 1943, British intelligence was asked to help conceal Allied intentions of invading Sicily that summer. Germany and the Allies were involved in a high stakes deception/ guessing game to determine just exactly where the first European attack would occur. British intelligence officers came up with the idea of Operation Mincemeat, a plan to disseminate false information by allowing the Germans to "accidentally" discover faked top secret documents.
To carry out Operation Mincemeat, the British acquired the cadaver of homeless man Glyndwr Michael, transforming him into "Major William Martin." By the time a submarine crew pushed Michael/Martin's body gently into the water off the coast of Spain, he was handcuffed to a briefcase stuffed with falsified military documents and mundane items.
If the Germans had finished building it, the 1,000-ton Ratte would have been the largest conventional tank ever built. The Nazis envisioned the Ratte as a kind of battleship for land, literally. Its massive 283 mm cannon was to be taken directly off the deck of a Scharnhorst-class battleship, and would have been capable of hammering hard targets up to 17 miles away.
With armor 14.2 inches thick in some places, the Ratte would have been almost invulnerable to all but the biggest bombs in the Allied arsenal.
Over six decades later, we are no closer to a peaceful ending of the conflict.
A month after the Korean War broke out, Major General William F. Dean, commander of 24th Infantry Division, was separated from his forces in Taejon while trying to help wounded soldiers. While out seeking water for a particularly injured G.I., he fell down a cliff and was knocked unconscious. He would be isolated in the mountains for the next 36 days, losing 80 pounds in addition to the broken shoulder and head wound he had sustained. When two South Koreans found him, they pretended to lead him to safety, but in fact brought him to a North Korean ambush site. Though Dean tried to fight his captors, he was down to 130 pounds and too weak to resist for long. He was taken prisoner on August 25, 1950, and remained prisoner until the end of the war.
Many people mistakenly believe — much like the comical ‘coalition of the willing’ in Iraq in 2003 — that the Americans acted unilaterally in Vietnam. In fact, New Zealand, Australia, Cambodia, Laos and South Korea all contributed significant numbers of troops to the war.
Everyone knows about the defoliant, Agent Orange, because of the horrible birth defects it caused, but not many people know people sniffers — known as Operation Snoopy. Northern troops on the Ho Chi Minh Trail were notoriously difficult to find, so the Americans used sensors to detect effluents of human sweat and urine. While they frequently turned up false results, leading to attacks on civilians and cattle, they did prove to be somewhat effective. Though, the North Vietnamese Army eventually learned to hang buckets of mud mixed with urine from trees to throw off the sensors.
August 2021, Military Times
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Saginaw Grant, a Marine veteran who served during the Korean War then went on to become a prolific Native American character actor and hereditary chief of the Sac & Fox Nation of Oklahoma, has died. He was 85.
Grant died peacefully in his sleep of natural causes on Wednesday at a private care facility in Hollywood, California, said Lani Carmichael, Grant’s publicist and longtime friend.
“He loved both Oklahoma and L.A.,” Carmichael said. “He made his home here as an actor, but he never forgot his roots in Oklahoma. He remained a fan of the Sooner Nation.”
He began acting in the late 1980s and played character roles in dozens of movies and television shows over the last three decades, including “The Lone Ranger,” “The World’s Fastest Indian” and “Breaking Bad,” according to Grant’s IMDB filmography.
Grant was active for years in the powwow circuit in California and traveled around the globe to speak to people about Native American culture, Carmichael said.
“His motto in life was always respect one another and don’t talk about one another in a negative way,” she said.
Academy Award winning actor Lee Marvin (The Dirty Dozen) (The Delta Force) speaks about combat in this USMC training film on combat leadership. Marvin is a combat veteran of WWII and a recipient of the Purple Heart. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.
January 2022, Sarah Sicard, Observation Post
Actress Betty White, who lit up the silver screen for nine decades, died Friday. She was 99.
Her 100th birthday would have been Jan. 17.
Known primarily as a comedian whose career began at the age of eight, White also served during World War II with the American Women’s Voluntary Service.
“We are saddened by the passing of Betty White,” the U.S. Army tweeted. “Not only was she an amazing actress, she also served during World War II as a member of the American Women’s Voluntary Services.”
The volunteer group amassed more than 300,000 members and “provided a variety of services and support; they sold war bonds, and delivered messages, they drove ambulances, trucks, cycle corps and dog-sleds, they also worked in navigation, aerial photography, aircraft spotting, and fire safety,” according to Museum Textile Services.
“It was a strange time and out of balance with everything,” White is reported to have said of her time aiding the war effort.
When the war ended in 1945, she married U.S. Army Air Force pilot Dick Barker. The couple moved to an Ohio chicken farm owned by Barker’s parents, but their marriage ended after eight short months, Newsweek wrote.
After the divorce, White was married to Hollywood talent agent Lane Allen for two years until he asked her to give up her career for domesticity. She refused.
Her big break came the same year as her second divorce, in 1949, when she earned a spot on Hollywood on Television with host Al Jarvis. For her work with the series, she took home the Best Actress Emmy nomination in 1951, and became the first female host of a TV show after Jarvis and his successor Eddie Albert exited.
November 2021
By Flip Cuddy and Christine Cuddy
She was the first Asian American woman in the Navy and the first woman gunnery officer teaching air combat tactics. During World War II, Lieutenant Cuddy trained Navy pilots in dogfighting maneuvers and firing .50-caliber machine guns.
But her children, Flip and Christine Cuddy, didn’t know about her accomplishments until later in life. In 2018, they came to StoryCorps to remember her.
To read more about this story watch the video ... https://storycorps.org/stories/a-brother-and-sister-remember-their-trailblazing-mother-lieutenant-susan-ahn-cuddy/
July 2021, The Washington Post, Maria Sacchetti
The Biden administration unveiled plans Friday to bring hundreds, possibly thousands, of deported veterans and their immediate family members back to the United States, saying their removal “failed to live up to our highest values.”
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas ordered his department’s immigration agencies to “immediately” take steps to ensure that military families may return to the United States. He said the department would also halt pending deportation proceedings against veterans or their immediate relatives who are in the United States, and clear the way for those who are eligible to apply for U.S. citizenship.
“The Department of Homeland Security recognizes the profound commitment and sacrifice that service members and their families have made to the United States of America,” Mayorkas said in a statement Friday. “We are committed to bringing back military service members, veterans, and their immediate family members who were unjustly removed and ensuring they receive the benefits to which they may be entitled.”
IPresident Biden had promised on the campaign trail to direct DHS during his first 100 days in office to stop targeting veterans and their families for deportation and to create a process for veterans deported by the Trump administration to return to the United States.
Veterans advocates have expressed concern in recent weeks that few veterans or their relatives have returned, while others remained in deportation proceedings. Many deported veterans also say they have been unable to access benefits such as health care from overseas.
In a memo Friday, the heads of DHS’s immigration agencies said they will review policies to ensure that military veterans and their relatives are “welcome to remain in or return to the United States.” Officials said they would also work with the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Defense Department to ensure that veterans can access their health benefits, including coronavirus vaccinations, and that recruits can take the oath of citizenship, including while at basic training.
August 2021, by J.D. Simkins, Observarion Post
The seventh installment in an illustrated series dedicated to soldiers whose actions earned them the nation’s highest award for military valor is now available online.
The newest issue of “Medal of Honor,” a graphic series produced by the Association of the U.S. Army, spotlights the Civil War heroics of Mary Walker, the first woman in the U.S. to earn a medical degree and the only woman to ever receive the Medal of Honor.
Born in Oswego, New York, to abolitionist parents, Walker attended Syracuse Medical College prior to the outbreak of the Civil War, when she saw an opportunity to serve as a surgeon in the U.S. Army.
But the arrangement wasn’t a seamless one. In 1861, Walker attempted to join the ranks of U.S. Army surgeons but was denied for being a woman. Like many obstacles she encountered prior to 1861, Walker refused to allow the hiccup to derail her.
Years as an unpaid surgeon’s assistant finally paid off when, at the height of the war, Walker was issued a contract as a credentialed War Department surgeon at the recommendation of Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman and Maj. Gen. George H. Thomas.
April 2022, By James Barber, Military.com
Nehemiah Persoff, gifted with one of the greatest names in Hollywood history, played more than 200 roles in a long career that took off after he served in the Army during World War II. The actor died at age 102 on April 5, 2022.
Born in Palestine, Persoff immigrated to the United States in 1929 at age 10. Drafted into the Army in 1942, his commanding officers recognized his performing talent and assigned him to an acting company that traveled around the world to entertain troops. After he left the service in 1945, he worked as an electrician before getting his professional training at The Actors Studio in New York.
Once he broke through, Persoff worked constantly until he retired in 1999 and took up watercolor painting at his home in California. Few actors have worked as steadily or for as long as Persoff.
If you watched television in the '60s,'70s or '80s, Persoff seemed to be a guest star on virtually every show. You may not recognize his name, but you definitely saw him on "Columbo," "Mannix," "The Six Million Dollar Man," "Wonder Woman," "Charlie's Angels," "Hawaii Five-0," "Murder, She Wrote," "Law & Order," "Barney Miller," "Fantasy Island," "Baretta," "Gunsmoke," "Love, American Style," "The Streets of San Francisco," "Adam-12," "Mod Squad," "The Wild Wild West," "Mission: Impossible," :Magnum, P.I." "I Spy," "the Big Valley," "The Untouchables," "The Twilight Zone," "Gilligan's Island" or "The Man from U.N.C.L.E."
Persoff worked more in television than in movies, but he had some especially memorable appearances in feature films. Here are some highlights from an amazing career...
July 2021, by Blake Stilwell, Military.com
For decades, Air Force military training instructors have been using the example of an "Airman Snuffy" in preparing new trainees for the active Air Force. He (or she) is your average, everyday airman, working in the Air Force.
"Airman Snuffy is working the CQ desk one night when an MTI shows up without his CAC [ID card]," the Air Force training instructor would say. "What should Airman Snuffy do when the MTI demands to be let in?"
These are the questions that make trainee airmen sweat in their sleep.
Airman Snuffy is at times an instructional figure, showing young recruits how to do things. At other times, he's a cautionary tale, illustrating the potential dangers of making poor decisions while wearing the uniform.
The real Airman Snuffy, Maynard Smith, was both of those things and more; when Smith was notified that he was awarded the Medal of Honor, he was on KP duty as a punishment. Nothing could be more illustrative of his military career.
To read the full article click on the 'red-bar', find out more' on the right....
In 1942, he enlisted and volunteered to be an aerial gunner, because aerial gunners got an automatic promotion to a non-commissioned officer's rank and the pay that comes with it. Nobody wanted to fly with Smith, not because it was one of the most dangerous jobs of World War II, but because Smith was not a great airman -- yet.
He hated taking orders. He displayed a total disrespect for younger men of any rank. He was just as spoiled in the Army Air Forces as he ever was as a civilian. Now he was just getting paid for it. He was stubborn and belligerent. So it took a full six weeks before he ever flew a combat mission over occupied France.
September 2021 by Todd South, Observation Post
Arkansas native Bob Burns enlisted in the Marine Corps during World War I and sailed to France in 1918 as part of the 11th Regiment.
The artillery detachment converted quickly to infantry for trench fighting but saw little action, allowing time for Sgt. Burns, the lead in the Marine Corps’ jazz band, to fashion a homemade instrument that would become a part of combat lore for decades to come.
Back in the States the following year, a newspaper article noted that Burns’ deft jazz playing was drawing in young men to a Marine Corps recruiting office in New York City, according to Sept 1919 edition of the New York Evening Telegram.
“We play everything from Berlin (Irving) to Mr. Beethoven and will tackle anything except a funeral march,” said Robbie (Bob) Burns. “The outfit consists of two violins, a banjo, piano, drum, and the bazooka.”
Bazooka. The word traces its origins back to “bazoo,” a slang term for mouth that, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary, may have come from the Dutch term for trumpet, “bazuin.”
“According to tales told by the Marines, the Melody Six are the snappiest, zippiest, jazziest aggregation of tune artists in any branch of Uncle Sam’s service,” the newspaper article noted in a section adjacent to Burns’ own instructions to building that very item: “Two pieces of gas pipe, one tin funnel, a little axle grease and a lot of perseverance.”..
On the first Christmas Day during the war, Lincoln hosted a Christmas party during the evening; earlier that day, he spent many hours trying to legitimize the capture of Confederate representatives to Great Britain and France, John Slidell and James Murray Mason (the Trent Affair).[1]
U.S. President Abraham Lincoln and his son Thomas "Tad" Lincoln
In 1862, the Lincolns visited injured soldiers at the various hospitals.[2] Many Union soldiers in 1863 received gifts "From Tad Lincoln", as Tad had been deeply moved by the plight of Union soldiers when he was taken by his father to see them. The gifts were mostly books and clothing.[3] The most famous Christmas gift Lincoln ever received came on December 22, 1864, when William Tecumseh Sherman announced the capture of Savannah, Georgia.[4]
Christmas has always been a major holiday in the United States, but during World War II (1941-45) it took on special meaning as many families had a “loved one” serving in the military who could not be home for Christmas. During the war years “Peace on Earth” was not just a nice phrase found on Christmas cards, but the number one wish of all peace loving people throughout the world. The Christmas season gave hope that while this year many were away, maybe next year the war would be over and missing family members would return home.
Wartime brought about a unique turnaround in consumer purchasing power and availability of goods. Before the war, America was still recovering from the great depression when money and jobs were scarce. Shoppers were often limited to window shopping, not having any extra money to purchase anything not considered a necessity. When the war began, war production went into high gear with more good paying jobs and additional discretionary income to purchase goods.
By Carlos Bongioanni, Stars and Stripes-
Amid the horrors and devastation of war, a midnight Mass 65 years ago in a dilapidated church in Kyong-ju, South Korea, would prove to be a miracle of sorts for Army Pfc. Norman Deptula.
It was December 1950, six months into the Korean War. Deptula, then 21, was among the approximately 100,000 United Nations troops who had just been evacuated out of North Korea. He had been among the "Chosin Few" who had escaped intense battles against overwhelming Chinese forces in the Chosin Reservoir campaign.
In a telephone interview Wednesday from his home in Webster, Mass., Deptula, now 86, recalled how frightened he was after an estimated 300,000 Chinese crossed over the Yalu River into North Korea, intent on annihilating the U.N. forces.
Christmas could be a lonely time for a soldier deployed in Vietnam.
For many, this holiday would be the first time that they were away from their families. Deployed to a strange country, and in the middle of a war zone, the holiday period could bring tears to the eyes of the most hardened of troops as they remembered their families’ celebrations back home.
The music on the Army Forces Vietnam Network (AFVN) often did not help. As the holiday approached, their radio stations across the country and on ships in the area would play a variety of Christmas music. According to some, Elvis Presley’s “Blue Christmas” and Nat King Cole’s “A Christmas Song” were often on the playlist. However, while others remember hearing Bing Crosby or Johnny Mathis’ versions of “I’ll be Home for Christmas,” in some areas and on some stations, the song was banned as bad for morale.
"It was tremendous. Baghdad was lit up like a Christmas tree," said a U.S. wing commander back from bombing the Iraqi capital.
"I didn't run out of adrenalin. There were lots of bombs going off. It was an awesome display," said another pilot who took part in the first raids of the gulf war to drive Iraq out of Kuwait.Tomahawk cruise missiles launched from American warships, U.S. and Saudi F-15E fighter-bombers, British and Saudi Tornadoes, French Jaguars and Kuwaiti Hawks were among hundreds of planes which took off from bases in Saudi Arabia and the gulf early Thursday in a United Nations-sanctioned assault against Iraq.
Pilots said targets included surface-to-air missile sites around Baghdad. President Bush said U.S.-led forces were determined to destroy Iraq's chemical weapons and nuclear bomb potential.
I was a member of the 68AES, an Air Force Reserve medevac unit, stationed out of Norton Air Force Base, California. In December of 1990, I was doing my two week tour in Hawaii when our unit contacted me and asked if I wanted to go on another sandy trip. The Gulf War was getting ready to start. They were asking for volunteers. I was single and had just graduated from college. I said yes.
Twenty volunteer medics and nurses left the week before Christmas. At the same time we left, Bob Hope departed as well, ready to do his last military tour for the troops. Our civilian plane took us to Dover Air Force Base, where we waited with several other soldiers. The C-5 transport did what most C-5s do; it broke down…a lot. After a few days, we got in the air and flew to Ramstein Air Force Base, Germany, where it promptly broke down again. We huddled in tents before finally getting back on the plane to fly to Dhahran in Saudi Arabia. By then, it was Christmas Eve.
The last Active Duty, enlisted draftee retires!!!!
You have to hear his story.
Command Sergeant Major, Jeff Mellinger, shown here serving duty in Afghanistan. He was the last draftee during the Vietnam War.
Just 'thanking and recognizing' the service our men and women gave this country is Powerful Medicine! Please thank our Veterans when you see them.
Sgt. Sadler wrote a very popular song about his experiences during the Vietnam War, "The Ballad of the Green
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