Official "This Day In History" thread

[Dr Sardonicus]

The Chernobyl nuclear reactor 4 went blooey on April 26, 1986.

[Dr Sardonicus]

As some may know, Operation Overlord (better known as D-Day), commenced on June 6, 1944. One indication of Dwight Eisenhower's view of leadership was that he anticipated the possibility that the operation would fail, and was prepared to accept responsibility if that happened. He penciled a message to that effect and stuck it in his wallet. He ran across it over a month later. His naval aide asked to keep it, and Eisenhower agreed. That note is now in a vault in the Eisenhower presidential library and museum. It reads as follows:

Our landings in the Cherbourg-Havre area have failed to gain a satisfactory foothold and I have withdrawn the troops. My decision to attack at this time and place was based upon the best information available. The troops, the air and the Navy did all that Bravery and devotion to duty could do. If any blame or fault attaches to the attempt it is mine alone.

Within a year, he was able to send the following message to his superiors:

The mission of this Allied Force was fulfilled at 0241, local time, May 7th, 1945.

My father was not in country until weeks after D-day. He was at Falaise in August 1944. He was slightly wounded by shrapnel from a mortar shell, but stayed in combat until he was seriously wounded and shipped back home shortly before the Battle of the Bulge. The Army muffed both casualty reports. The telegram informing his parents of the minor shrapnel injury said he had been "seriously wounded." The second report, after he took a bullet to the shoulder from a German tank's machine gun, said he was "slightly" wounded. He was honorably discharged in 1946.

I remember seeing, as a youngster, the white areas on his shoulder. In front, a round circular area. In back, white all over the place. I asked him what those were. He told me they were scars, and that is how I learned what scars are.

Some time later (possibly during the 1952 steel strike), he was recalled to service. When he was at the bivouac he met one of his comrades-in-arms, and learned that they were the only two survivors of his unit. The rest had died in battle, most of them during the Battle of the Bulge.

My dad has been gone over thirty years now, and the anniversary of D-day is very near the anniversary of his death. Because of his sacrifice, and the greater sacrifices of so many, I was privileged to grow up in a country with ideals of liberty, freedom, and the rule of law. I even got to witness it seeking to improve its fulfillment of those ideals.

I don't think he could have foreseen that the country he fought and bled for would simply abandon those ideals, but I am glad for his sake that he did not live to see it.

[chalsall]

Originally Posted by Dr Sardonicus

My father was not in country until weeks after D-day.

My step-father was "on the ground" almost immediately. But "behind the lines". He was an engineer; responsible for getting some fairly seriously heavy stuff across paths that had intentionally been made difficult to pass...

His name was John. He knew how to manage people. And atoms. And time.

I learnt ***so*** much from him!!!

[kriesel]

Originally Posted by Dr Sardonicus

Because of his sacrifice, and the greater sacrifices of so many, I was privileged to grow up in a country with ideals of liberty, freedom, and the rule of law. I even got to witness it seeking to improve its fulfillment of those ideals.

I don't think he could have foreseen that the country he fought and bled for would simply abandon those ideals, but I am glad for his sake that he did not live to see it.

We have not all abandoned those ideals. They are always only a generation from being lost, and their defense is a continuous project.
I have observed over the decades that there is a pendulum effect in politics.

[Uncwilly]

Originally Posted by chalsall

My step-father was "on the ground" almost immediately.

Juno Beach?

[chalsall]

Originally Posted by Uncwilly

Juno Beach?

I don't actually know. Good question.

He survived the war (while British), which suggests he was not part of that Canadian sacrifice.

I'll have to ask Momzie the specifics. John didn't share a lot with the children.