They gave a couple rolls of toilet tissue. The Indians wanted to unroll the toilet tissue and divide it into six piles. I went out and walked around outside and when I returned they had used their share to wrap their hair and beards.
All in all it wasn't too bad an esperience. We were flown after our liberation to Naples where we were cleaned up and given new clothing and then shipped home.
I was given a 60 day recuperation furlough and my wife and I had 2 weeks at Miami Beach at a fine hotel on the ocean. I was then sent to Maryland to school for a month and then to New York
where I was the non com in charge of a large army Post Office. My pay was all loused up, but we got a room and same money from the Red Cross. Violet got a job in Wolworths and we got by OK.
I would eat at the mess hall and snitch food for her. Some fun. Actually we very fortunate and I thank God for all his blessings thru my life.
I don't know what I'd do to pass the time if it wasn't for the library. I read at least four books
a week. So with TV and crossword puzzles I get by. I always liked Michner, Clerre, Griffin etc.
But I can't keep track of the characters ond the plot any more the way my poor head is. My favorite any more is Dick Francis. His books are easy to read and they are not full of dirty words
and passionate love affairs. I try to keep up some kind of routine. That's why I get up every morning and go to early Mass. Jeopardy is a must and of course the Cubs and the History Channel is good most of the time. I used to try my hand at oil painting but I can't handle that any more. None of is worth keeping. I still have all the paraphenalia but I suppose its all dried up by now.
I heard from Jim today and John yesterday. Also got your last Email today also. I may have to get your address to send this.
All my love
Uncle Bill
THAT IS THE FINAL CHAPTER.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Letters From Uncle Bill Part Four
About the movie. It started out as a silent movie and then when the lady and man were having an argument and all of a sudden the sound came on just as he was shouting at her and I almost jumped thru the roof. When I told my friends about it when I got home and they said I was crazy. The just couldn't believe it.
I aslo visited my cousin Frank McMahon that summer. He was a year older than me. We rode all
over Chicago on the Els. We went to visit my brother Larry who had quit school and went to Chi. A relative of my farther took him in and he had a job at Harrison's Orange Aid Hut. It was something like a McDonalds of today. He was night manager and he was only 17 yrs old. He had an apt with another guy near Lincoln Park. When we went to see him he was at Lincoln Park hitting golf balls. He wore golf knickers, argyle socks and a soft cap and a big cigar in his mouth. He kidded around with us for a while and let us hit a couple of balls.Then he gave me a five dollar bill and sent us on our way. I'll tell you more about him later.
You ask about my prisoner experience. It really wasn't that bad. I went into the army in 1943 and was sent to Ft. Worth Texas. Tom and I went in the same day and were sent to Camp Grant, Il. As we took our physicals we bumped into each other in a room and both had a small bottle in our hands. It was very comical.
I was shipped the next day and never saw him again until our mothers funeral. I managed to get
on a cadre in Ft. Worth teaching the rookies what I didn't know myself. I was chosen for Officers
Candidate School but before I got to Ft. Benning, Ga. I was shipped over seas wirhthe 8th Div.
to Italy with a stop over in Africa. It was a terrible place to fight a war. (is there a good place). Nothing but mountains. The tanks were no good to us. We had to take the high ground before they could get up there. All our provisions were brought up by pack mule driven by Italians. (The Italians were out of the war then.) Anyhow I was wounded in the head in Oct of 44 by a mortar shell that hit a tree just above our fox hole. The fragment went thru my tin hat,my helmet liner, my stocking cap on to my poor head. It kncked me down but I wasn't unconscious. My buddy was hit several places on his face and chest. He jumped out of the hole and took off for the CP. I called the CP to watch out for him and to send a litter for the medic with us in the hole. I never did find out where he was hit. When I tried to touch him he just screamed. I dressed my wound and stopped the bleeding and when the guys came with the litter I took off for the aid station. It was dark and the aid men wouldn't take my partner down the mountain because it was to dangerous, so I stayed with him and we all we all went down at first light and took an ambulance to the Hosp.
What aggravated me was I was in the Hosp. for two weeks. The day after I was hit my company went to Monte Caturi for two weeks rest. So I got sent right back to the front and missed out on the fun.
In the spring of 45 after a three day rest we went back to Mts. near the Po Valley. My Co. was to take a small village in a kind of valley. The Cos. on our right and left were suppose to take the high ground on both sides but they didn't. We had several dead and some wounded but we were trapped. They were up in caves around us. They were putting delayed action mortors coming on us and it was bad. They told us to surrender or else. Our Capt. told them to stick it. They then let us take our wounded out and it all started over again. Our Captain was wounded badly. My weapon wouldn't fire anymore because of the plaster and dust from the building. Our First Lt told a Corp. to hold up a white sheet or cloth and we surrendered. I couldn't belive the tunnels and the rooms they had back in the mountain. There were some civilians with weapons that were very threatening but the Ger. officer controlled th. They told us they might have saved the Capt. if they had plasma. They took care of our wounded in a high train tunnel where they had an aid station and marched us off thru Po Valley into a prison camp in the Alps. Sometimes we walked or rode in trucks. They took us into opera house in Milan for a rest. ( La Scala). As we came out an old Italian lady had large basket of raw eggs handing out to us as we came out. I cracked mine and ate it whole.
The camp I think was a place called Breenico high in the Alps. The germans were blocked of at the Bremer Pass and knew it was about over. We were in what seemed to be a large airplane hanger. British, GI"s, Indians etc. We had blankets of a sort and slept on the cement floor in groups of six. W e had four GI's and two Indians with the beards and turbans.
We had a cup of black coffee for breakfast, a bowl of soup and a hunk of bread for lunch and a cup of hot water for supper. If you had tea you could make tea. We got some Red Cross stuff but I can't remember what was in it. We also got about six cigarettes a week.
MORE ON THE NEXT BLOG
I aslo visited my cousin Frank McMahon that summer. He was a year older than me. We rode all
over Chicago on the Els. We went to visit my brother Larry who had quit school and went to Chi. A relative of my farther took him in and he had a job at Harrison's Orange Aid Hut. It was something like a McDonalds of today. He was night manager and he was only 17 yrs old. He had an apt with another guy near Lincoln Park. When we went to see him he was at Lincoln Park hitting golf balls. He wore golf knickers, argyle socks and a soft cap and a big cigar in his mouth. He kidded around with us for a while and let us hit a couple of balls.Then he gave me a five dollar bill and sent us on our way. I'll tell you more about him later.
You ask about my prisoner experience. It really wasn't that bad. I went into the army in 1943 and was sent to Ft. Worth Texas. Tom and I went in the same day and were sent to Camp Grant, Il. As we took our physicals we bumped into each other in a room and both had a small bottle in our hands. It was very comical.
I was shipped the next day and never saw him again until our mothers funeral. I managed to get
on a cadre in Ft. Worth teaching the rookies what I didn't know myself. I was chosen for Officers
Candidate School but before I got to Ft. Benning, Ga. I was shipped over seas wirhthe 8th Div.
to Italy with a stop over in Africa. It was a terrible place to fight a war. (is there a good place). Nothing but mountains. The tanks were no good to us. We had to take the high ground before they could get up there. All our provisions were brought up by pack mule driven by Italians. (The Italians were out of the war then.) Anyhow I was wounded in the head in Oct of 44 by a mortar shell that hit a tree just above our fox hole. The fragment went thru my tin hat,my helmet liner, my stocking cap on to my poor head. It kncked me down but I wasn't unconscious. My buddy was hit several places on his face and chest. He jumped out of the hole and took off for the CP. I called the CP to watch out for him and to send a litter for the medic with us in the hole. I never did find out where he was hit. When I tried to touch him he just screamed. I dressed my wound and stopped the bleeding and when the guys came with the litter I took off for the aid station. It was dark and the aid men wouldn't take my partner down the mountain because it was to dangerous, so I stayed with him and we all we all went down at first light and took an ambulance to the Hosp.
What aggravated me was I was in the Hosp. for two weeks. The day after I was hit my company went to Monte Caturi for two weeks rest. So I got sent right back to the front and missed out on the fun.
In the spring of 45 after a three day rest we went back to Mts. near the Po Valley. My Co. was to take a small village in a kind of valley. The Cos. on our right and left were suppose to take the high ground on both sides but they didn't. We had several dead and some wounded but we were trapped. They were up in caves around us. They were putting delayed action mortors coming on us and it was bad. They told us to surrender or else. Our Capt. told them to stick it. They then let us take our wounded out and it all started over again. Our Captain was wounded badly. My weapon wouldn't fire anymore because of the plaster and dust from the building. Our First Lt told a Corp. to hold up a white sheet or cloth and we surrendered. I couldn't belive the tunnels and the rooms they had back in the mountain. There were some civilians with weapons that were very threatening but the Ger. officer controlled th. They told us they might have saved the Capt. if they had plasma. They took care of our wounded in a high train tunnel where they had an aid station and marched us off thru Po Valley into a prison camp in the Alps. Sometimes we walked or rode in trucks. They took us into opera house in Milan for a rest. ( La Scala). As we came out an old Italian lady had large basket of raw eggs handing out to us as we came out. I cracked mine and ate it whole.
The camp I think was a place called Breenico high in the Alps. The germans were blocked of at the Bremer Pass and knew it was about over. We were in what seemed to be a large airplane hanger. British, GI"s, Indians etc. We had blankets of a sort and slept on the cement floor in groups of six. W e had four GI's and two Indians with the beards and turbans.
We had a cup of black coffee for breakfast, a bowl of soup and a hunk of bread for lunch and a cup of hot water for supper. If you had tea you could make tea. We got some Red Cross stuff but I can't remember what was in it. We also got about six cigarettes a week.
MORE ON THE NEXT BLOG
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Letters From Uncle Bill Part Three
There was a creek ran through the length of the property and my cousins Frand McMahon and
Marie and I had a lot of fun there catching minnows and tad poles. It was a paradise for a young boy.
Life was so simple if those days. Not to many cars. Only one paved in town. No TV's or computers. We didn't ever have a radio and young people even married one another. If an airplane should happen to fly over all the kids around would be out in the street pointing and calling 'airplane! airplane!
Then one morning ma called we smaller children around her and told us about the new house. She asked if we would rather have a stove or a new car, and of course she gave us both. I guess things were pretty good finacially. Daddy and I think three of the boys all worked in the mines and they all lived at home.
I think I'll close for now. If there is any of this you'd rather not hear about just let me know. Or
if there is something you'd like to know about tell me.
All my love
Uncle Bill
Ellen wrote back and ask about other things, including his experiences as a prisoner of war in WW II. Letter #2 follows.
Hello Still Rambling Bk II
Thinking back again on the 'Hollow' I can't remember my older sister and brother. Lizzie and
Helen could have been married by then but I know the boys were home. I only remember John
taking me to see what was left of the barn after the fire.
When we lived in the big house Helen always came home to see us and it was always so good to see her and she was always loaded down with gifts for us. She play the piano very well and knew
a million songs and had a pretty voice. One year at christmas she walked from town and was so cold when she got there she was crying. Her husband was very likable guy but he had too many
problems and she had a very difficult time with him.
When I was in high school I worked for her as a dishwasher in her restaurent in South Pekin.
I had a lot of fun there and made a lot of friends. She paid me a salary and bought me clothes etc.
It was during the depression and I was happy to be there. I had room in the hotel and she had her own apt. Once I brought a friend of mine with me to stay a couple of wks and he stayed all summer. We had a blast and she never complained. God bless her. My sister Lizzie was younger than Helen. She was just a sweet lady. I stayed with her in South Pekin also but she and her husband moved to Chicago when I was 11 or 12 and I saw my first talking movie the Granado Theatre on the North side. They would take us for rides at night to see all the sights and to the beach and Sadie was there once and we all went to the beach together and had a great time. I would go to the beach by myself and Peoria during the day. I didn't like her husband but I put up with him because she was so nice to me. She lead a tragic life God rest her soul.
MORE NEXT TIME
Marie and I had a lot of fun there catching minnows and tad poles. It was a paradise for a young boy.
Life was so simple if those days. Not to many cars. Only one paved in town. No TV's or computers. We didn't ever have a radio and young people even married one another. If an airplane should happen to fly over all the kids around would be out in the street pointing and calling 'airplane! airplane!
Then one morning ma called we smaller children around her and told us about the new house. She asked if we would rather have a stove or a new car, and of course she gave us both. I guess things were pretty good finacially. Daddy and I think three of the boys all worked in the mines and they all lived at home.
I think I'll close for now. If there is any of this you'd rather not hear about just let me know. Or
if there is something you'd like to know about tell me.
All my love
Uncle Bill
Ellen wrote back and ask about other things, including his experiences as a prisoner of war in WW II. Letter #2 follows.
Hello Still Rambling Bk II
Thinking back again on the 'Hollow' I can't remember my older sister and brother. Lizzie and
Helen could have been married by then but I know the boys were home. I only remember John
taking me to see what was left of the barn after the fire.
When we lived in the big house Helen always came home to see us and it was always so good to see her and she was always loaded down with gifts for us. She play the piano very well and knew
a million songs and had a pretty voice. One year at christmas she walked from town and was so cold when she got there she was crying. Her husband was very likable guy but he had too many
problems and she had a very difficult time with him.
When I was in high school I worked for her as a dishwasher in her restaurent in South Pekin.
I had a lot of fun there and made a lot of friends. She paid me a salary and bought me clothes etc.
It was during the depression and I was happy to be there. I had room in the hotel and she had her own apt. Once I brought a friend of mine with me to stay a couple of wks and he stayed all summer. We had a blast and she never complained. God bless her. My sister Lizzie was younger than Helen. She was just a sweet lady. I stayed with her in South Pekin also but she and her husband moved to Chicago when I was 11 or 12 and I saw my first talking movie the Granado Theatre on the North side. They would take us for rides at night to see all the sights and to the beach and Sadie was there once and we all went to the beach together and had a great time. I would go to the beach by myself and Peoria during the day. I didn't like her husband but I put up with him because she was so nice to me. She lead a tragic life God rest her soul.
MORE NEXT TIME
Friday, February 25, 2011
Letters From Uncle Bill Part 2
We were pretty close as a family and I remember playing croquet on our lawn. I think we had four lots and it was all fenced in. The neighbors would line up along the fence and watch us play.
Of course we were all hams and would put on a great show for them, arguing and trying to cheat
one another and knocking your opponents ball to kingdom come.
The boys were all athletic. John, Pat and Jimmy played on the local soccer team and Larry and I played football in high school and ran the dashes in track.
My father, James, was of slight built but was very musculer. He came from a broken family and as a boy of ten he worked in the fields and was in the coal mines at the age of twelve. He was a little on the quiet side but had a good sense of humor. Daddy had a good voice and enjoyed the parties as well, especially after he'd had a couple of hot toddies. He had one song " See Me Dance the Polk" where he sang and at the chorus one of the ladies would get up and dance with him.
I was always always in awe of him (or I should have been) but as I got older we had some fun together. He had a good sense of humor and told me once I was born Ma was so tired of having babies that she wouldn't even look at me. He said he had to feed me whiskey and sugar water
for three days before she would nurse me. I can't say I blame her.
Daddy was really a farmer at heart. The place we had in the "Hollow" had about ten acres and he
grew corn, peanuts, water melon etc. We had a large barn, a cow, chickens, pigs and a horse. Also a model T Ford as well. (Now I can't remember what I had for lunch.) I can see him with the old horse and a scoop digging a basement for the house. One night Pat used the Model T on a date. He must have left a cigarette burning in the car and the barn caught fire and burned to the ground. They saved all the live stock but the old Ford was only a shell. I didn't even wake up until my brother John carried me down the next morning to show me the remains. I had a lot of fun playing in the shell of the old car after that.
MORE IN THE NEXT BLOG.
Of course we were all hams and would put on a great show for them, arguing and trying to cheat
one another and knocking your opponents ball to kingdom come.
The boys were all athletic. John, Pat and Jimmy played on the local soccer team and Larry and I played football in high school and ran the dashes in track.
My father, James, was of slight built but was very musculer. He came from a broken family and as a boy of ten he worked in the fields and was in the coal mines at the age of twelve. He was a little on the quiet side but had a good sense of humor. Daddy had a good voice and enjoyed the parties as well, especially after he'd had a couple of hot toddies. He had one song " See Me Dance the Polk" where he sang and at the chorus one of the ladies would get up and dance with him.
I was always always in awe of him (or I should have been) but as I got older we had some fun together. He had a good sense of humor and told me once I was born Ma was so tired of having babies that she wouldn't even look at me. He said he had to feed me whiskey and sugar water
for three days before she would nurse me. I can't say I blame her.
Daddy was really a farmer at heart. The place we had in the "Hollow" had about ten acres and he
grew corn, peanuts, water melon etc. We had a large barn, a cow, chickens, pigs and a horse. Also a model T Ford as well. (Now I can't remember what I had for lunch.) I can see him with the old horse and a scoop digging a basement for the house. One night Pat used the Model T on a date. He must have left a cigarette burning in the car and the barn caught fire and burned to the ground. They saved all the live stock but the old Ford was only a shell. I didn't even wake up until my brother John carried me down the next morning to show me the remains. I had a lot of fun playing in the shell of the old car after that.
MORE IN THE NEXT BLOG.
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Letters From Uncle Bill
Ellen's grandmother, Susan O'Neill traveled from Scotland to the USA in 1908 with five young children to join her husband, James O'Neill, who had arrived earlier and established a home in
the coal ming town of Gillispie, Illinois.
Ellen first learned, by accident in 1956, that she was born Ellen Elizabeth O'Neill in 1936.
That is the reason Ellen ask Uncle Bill to send her some of the history of the O'Neill family.
I have tried to type the letters word for word as they were written by Uncle Bill who was now near 90 years old.
Dear Ellen and Ted
I hope this will be legible enough so that you can dechiper it. I'm trying to think what you would be interested in knowing about your family so I'll just ramble on wi th what ever comes to mind.
Your grandmother Susan Brannan O'Neill was roly poly little woman who loved her family, parties and people. She had a sweet little singing voice and sang hundreds of old country
songs to us through the years. Ma loved to play games. It was a circus when she and my brother Pat played some kind of dice game. They always tried to cheat one another and would banter back and forth. Pat was John's father and he was the comedian in the family. Ma was very
religious but she was broad minded. She prayed her rosary every day but she was no purde.
When we moved from the house in what we called the "hollow" to the big house on Olive street,
she started a small grocery in our front living room. She sold bread and milk and some canned goods. It went so well that she had a store built on our corner lot and did very well for many years. This would be around 1920. She kept a lot of miners supplies etc. She and my father had only three or four years of schooling but she would have made a good business women. She told me once that her mother had six sons also. Her mother always said she had six sons to carry her to her grave, but it wasn't to be as they all died before she did. So when she passed away in 1945
we were the pall bearers. I had just shortly returned from over seas and Larry was still there
with Patton so we had a friend as a proxy for him.
Friends and neighbors were alwsys dropping in and the tea kettle was always on. We has a lot of parties at our home and family picnics in the woods near by. All of our cousins were within
six blocks of us and we were all pretty close. Ma had a quilting bee at home and her neighbors and friends came there to chat and gossip.
LOOK FOR THE NEXT INSTALLMENT SOON.
the coal ming town of Gillispie, Illinois.
Ellen first learned, by accident in 1956, that she was born Ellen Elizabeth O'Neill in 1936.
That is the reason Ellen ask Uncle Bill to send her some of the history of the O'Neill family.
I have tried to type the letters word for word as they were written by Uncle Bill who was now near 90 years old.
Dear Ellen and Ted
I hope this will be legible enough so that you can dechiper it. I'm trying to think what you would be interested in knowing about your family so I'll just ramble on wi th what ever comes to mind.
Your grandmother Susan Brannan O'Neill was roly poly little woman who loved her family, parties and people. She had a sweet little singing voice and sang hundreds of old country
songs to us through the years. Ma loved to play games. It was a circus when she and my brother Pat played some kind of dice game. They always tried to cheat one another and would banter back and forth. Pat was John's father and he was the comedian in the family. Ma was very
religious but she was broad minded. She prayed her rosary every day but she was no purde.
When we moved from the house in what we called the "hollow" to the big house on Olive street,
she started a small grocery in our front living room. She sold bread and milk and some canned goods. It went so well that she had a store built on our corner lot and did very well for many years. This would be around 1920. She kept a lot of miners supplies etc. She and my father had only three or four years of schooling but she would have made a good business women. She told me once that her mother had six sons also. Her mother always said she had six sons to carry her to her grave, but it wasn't to be as they all died before she did. So when she passed away in 1945
we were the pall bearers. I had just shortly returned from over seas and Larry was still there
with Patton so we had a friend as a proxy for him.
Friends and neighbors were alwsys dropping in and the tea kettle was always on. We has a lot of parties at our home and family picnics in the woods near by. All of our cousins were within
six blocks of us and we were all pretty close. Ma had a quilting bee at home and her neighbors and friends came there to chat and gossip.
LOOK FOR THE NEXT INSTALLMENT SOON.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Weak By Comparison
After a period of time working for this individual he called me into his office and wanted to know what was the biggest problem I had to deal with. Well he ask! I answered, " Communication with my supervisor. I can talk to your supervisor easier than I can talk to you." He looked at me a
second, stood up, walked around the office, then said, " OK, we will send you to school." As luck would have it, I went to school and he got transferred to a different job. Another of my
coworkers was so releived that he no longer had to report to this individual. However, he soon learned that he was going to be transfer with him. He said, "It just shortened my life by ten years."
Later in my career, after I had left the company, my old boss came to me looking for a job. I moved on and lived longer.
second, stood up, walked around the office, then said, " OK, we will send you to school." As luck would have it, I went to school and he got transferred to a different job. Another of my
coworkers was so releived that he no longer had to report to this individual. However, he soon learned that he was going to be transfer with him. He said, "It just shortened my life by ten years."
Later in my career, after I had left the company, my old boss came to me looking for a job. I moved on and lived longer.
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