Personal Break Cart

It was on Chesterbrook Farm. In Valley Forge. My grandfather would go out into the fields with a few men of this farm and work out in the fields. Each day, I would get on Sunset, my horse, and ride out to the field. I would bring a sort of... trailor. It operated as a wheelbarrow to the horse, and it housed milk cartons. Sunset and I would take this out to the spring house and fill those milk cartons with water. We would approach the throw gate, I would hope off, open the gate, Sunset would walk through, and I would close the hatch behind us. From there, we went around and distributed these milk cartons of fresh, cool water from the spring, to the working men in the field. I was their waterboy!

Bombs, Jeeps and Teeth.

Michelle: Wasn’t there another time you were in a plane in Europe during the war?

Colonel: It was a... let me think... a B24. It was so primitive a plane that the only guy up front was the pilot and the fuselage, the body of the plane, there was an opening. And they actually pushed the bombs out through this hole. Pushed em out! They were armed when they left, but they dropped down out of this hole. Real primitive.

 

Jackie: Did you see them pushing it out the hole? While it was armed?

Colonel: Yeah!

Michelle: Where were you flying over at that point?

Colonel: Germany. I don’t remember where.

Michelle: Why were you up with them that time? Weren’t you usually with your anti-tank company?

Colonel: Couldn’t tell you at the moment. Ya know, its just one of those things, yeah. You just... did.

Jackie: So what was being pushed out through the hole?

Colonel: Bombs. It would explode on contact with the land.

Jackie: Was there any chance of it going off in the plane?

Colonel: No. They were armed in the same way that a mortar shell is armed. A mortar shell is not, not alive. And you fire and drop it down the tube of a mortar. And there in the base of it, there’s a, like a shotgun shell. And it hits a triggering device at the bottom of the tube and that in effect, arms it. But it’s not fully armed yet. And it comes out the tube, still not armed. But when it leaves the nozzle, the end of the tube, then a spring in it, as a result of the change in direction, arms it. And a safety pin flies out at that point in time. Then its armed as soon as it leaves the tube of the mortar and it’s alive the whole time it’s in the air. As soon as it lands, it’s gone.

Jackie: What year was that, do you know?

Colonel: Mhmm, 1945. Yep some of it was 44, but most of it was 45.

Jackie: So how big was the bomb coming out of the place?

Colonel: 2 feet, maybe 3 feet long. A foot wide. Things are pretty primitive at that point.

Jackie: Were they heavy? Did you get to hold one?

Colonel: OH yeah. You took them to the plane on carts and then two guys carried them in, one at a time.

Jackie: How many were on the plane?

Colonel: Five.

Jackie: Did the second time landing the plane have a better landing?

Colonel: Mhmm! [Chuckles]

[See post First Flight for that story!]

Jackie: Have you ever driven a tank? Was it easy?

Colonel: Oh yeah. Yeah. It’s not as hard as it looks. If you’ve driven a bulldozer, you can drive a tank.

Jackie: Have you driven one of those?

Colonel: OH YEAH! [His entire expression lights up] [Chuckles]

Michelle: What was your favorite vehicle to drive?

Colonel: Jeep! Jeep! They were fun!

Jackie: Did it have the top around it or was it just open?

Colonel: Both, both. You had the material to make a top, but it was soft. Out in Luxemburg in February. 1945. We shared driving. It’s a hard top really, but it’s not very good. We went on and were on the back of the Frankfurt territory. And we could only hear sounds to know what’s coming. And I knew what I heard was an 88. The 88 was an artillery shell, 88 millimeters in diameter. And it has a typical sound when it’s coming. Sheer and I knew it was artillery, an 88 coming in. You can almost identity where it’s going to empty, and you can almost identify where it’s going to land. This 88 is in the air and I’m sitting on the right hand side, Sheer is driving. And we both sense the same thing. That that 88 is going to come in somewheres to our left. You can’t be sure where, but you get the sense where it’s going to be. Sheer took the Jeep off the road... into a ditch, turned it over, threw both of us out. But he had saved our lives in that the 88 went over and landed somewheres around there [past us]. Because he turned the Jeep over, we were both thrown out. He was in a ditch, and he was on his side, and so on. You have... the windshield was down, but we had a piece of canvas covering the glass. So that, there’s no reflection so no one is watching you. I got thrown out and got caught... and the front windshield is looking down on the front engine and the front of the jeep, and so on. I hit the corner of the window with the canvas covering. And my face went right smack into that. Knocked out three teeth. Actually it was two knocked out and one broke off, and so on. And they looked at me after and do on. There was actually a dentist in our unit! So he took me back and pulled out the reminder of the other tooth. So I was missing three teeth!

Trish: They don’t give you novocaine for that, do they!

Colonel: Heh, Heh! And that’s the way I lived for several years! Until everything’s all over, and I came back and notice, I have a partial, right there. They replaced my three teeth. So I still have that partial, after all these years!

Jackie: Do you have any scars?

Colonel: No, no. You act on incident, and when Sheer heard that, he knew coming in. He didn’t have to, but over the shoulder and into the ditch. The only thing that could be done was turn the Jeep over. He knew what to do!

Jackie: Did you ever drive the Jeeps?

Colonel: Once and a while, occasionally, but that was his job and I didn’t want to take it away from him.

Jackie: So tell me about driving the tanks?

Colonel: Oh, that was when we were back in the states, as part of getting acquainted, getting used to them and so on. Anti-tank company. As I say, if you can drive a bulldozer, you can drive a tank! Levers control the tracks, one on each side, one for each tred.

Jackie: So how do you see out? A tube?

Colonel: Yeah, you have two places to look. A tube up and you do have a slit in front of you, its narrow, but you can see out, etc. You can see reasonably well.

First Flight.

Michelle: Tell Jackie and Trish about the first time you ever rode in a plane.

Colonel: It was in the vicinity of Trier, T-R-I-E-R. Germany. March. And um, we had captured a couple of prisoners, and they were the type that wanted to intimidate you. They were vocal. Lemoyne [our translator] was with me, he knew what they were saying.

Jackie: Where were they from?

Colonel: Germany.

Colonel: As we interrogated these prisoners, they were vocal, ya know. “We’ll get cha! We’ll get cha! Our tanks will get cha!”

Michelle: How many were there of each of you?

Colonel: Oh! There was just me and a couple of other guys, maybe 3 or 4, something like that. And just 2 prisoners.

Colonel: And they were bragging that their tanks would get us. This told us that the Germans were capable of launching a tank attack. And I had an anti-tank company. But I needed to know where they were going to come from. We couldn’t tell where they were going to come from. Of course these guys weren’t telling us anything except “Our tanks will get cha”.  So, the Artillery Liaison Officer was there and a witness to this conversation. And he said, 'Captain, if you want to go up, I’ll take you'. He piloted an L4, which is a small plane, a piper.

We could take it up and look out and see what we could learn. So I said, “Okay!”. So we went back to where he had this L4, in a pasture, grass, that’s all. And it was a seat in the front and seat in the back. Pilot was in the front, and I got in the back. And up we go! We get up and he circles around, circles around. And I could tell from up there EX-ACTLY what those Germans had in mind. I could tell where they were going to come in, I could tell everything that I needed to know. I had a small radio, and I radioed back, gave directions, they radioed back, etc. And then came the time it’s beginning to get dark. It came the time for us to get out of there. He had been up; he had not gone over Germany [territory]. We had enough daylight that we could tell the pattern to their approach.  And um, he goes back to get the plane down, and as he came into that pasture, the wind was getting up. And the wind blew the plane sideways and he couldn’t begin to get that plane down. Circling around, came back, sideways again. Here we are going down across this pasture! Sideways! Up again. So he came in a third time and this time he went like this [holds his arms up at a 90 degree angle with fisted hands and pulls down on an invisible rope]. And I haven’t the faintest idea what he was trying to tell me. He was going like that [demonstrates again]. So I’m sitting in the back seat of this plane and in we come! This time I learned that he was trying to tell me that he was going to set it down. So we got in about eight feet off the ground and HMMM, HMMM, HMMM! We bounced around and so on, went all the way across the grass pasture, pretty close to a fence, but not really. That’s what he was trying to tell me – he was going to set it down no matter what! My first plane ride!


What were you thinking while you were up there?

I was really concentrating on what the Germans had in mind, I wasn’t thinking a whole lot about... He was going as far up as he could go, and still see, and not get over Germany. I say Germany, but out over the lines of their territory.

Favorite Books

Did you have any favorite books?

Bobbsey Twins! And... there was another... it was another one of those series of book, on the adventures of, trying to think... I can’t quite remember.

Sporting Background

Tell me about your baseball background.

Colonel: Well, in the early days, it was Valley Forge pickup games, so to speak. Then I played Phoenixville High School. I tried out, and I played my Freshman Year at Mont Alto [branch campus of PSU]. All freshman foresters spent their first year at Mont Alto. And I tried out my sophomore year, but I didn’t make it. And besides I was waiting on tables and taking care of a furnace, I was working my way through. I really, really didn’t have the time. So I gave up on it. When graduated, they assigned me to Lancaster and the Red Roses, so I gave it a try out there. I was a good field, no hit type of person. 

Did you like it though?

Oh yeah! Yeah.

Weren’t you first base?

Well yeah. 126 of us. We had our own team. We played locally. But after I got up to base at the main campus... Eh. There was a fellow by the name of Mel Vonarts and he was big. And a much better player than I was, so it was obvious that he was going to be the first baseman. 

Did you play any other sports?

I was 135 pounds for football and I didn’t go very far! I did get a little time kicking field goals. Little bit, but not much. In High School. 

Forestry Courses

Colonel: Mensuration. Forestry Mathematics. It’s specialized for forestry students, a mathematics course. You had to have calculus before you took it, you know.

Jackie: What kind of stuff did you learn in the class?

Colonel: Projection and volume at which you can anticipate in a given grove of trees, as a result of the size, the diameter, etc. And you learned that through a, moving through it. You have a trail, maybe 40 or 50 feet wide. You measure all the trees, diameter, species and anything like that. Then you projected that over a larger area.

Jackie: Was everything in the classroom, or did you go out?

Colonel: Both, both.

Jackie: What was your favorite class?

Colonel: It would probably in the field of Civil Engineering. I took all of my electives in Civil Engineering. And that’s what I ended up doing!

Learning Golf

Michelle: Can you tell us where you learned to golf?

Colonel: Phoenixville Country Club. I think it was in High School. And I learned that there were three holes, that I could sneak in and play golf. So I played those three, and three again. They couldn’t see me from the clubhouse!

Michelle: Could you ride your horse there? Or could you walk?

Colonel: Walk, we walked. 

Yust!

Michelle: Did you have a translator with you?

Colonel: Oh yeah, Lemoine.

Michelle: What was he like?

Colonel: He was a good kid. Personal young man. He knew that he was doing. I don’t know how many languages he spoke, but he knew everything.

Sara: I have forgotten about that other man that took care of you so good. The one from New York.

Colonel: Yust! 

Sara: Yust!

Colonel: We were in Camp McCoy, Wisconsin and they were filling in vacancies...transfers... new people joining the outfield as we prepared to go overseas. We had a few vacancies they filled in. And they shipped in this one kid and he was late checking in. And the First Sargent looked up at him and said, “Where have you been?”. And he, in his Swedish accent, said “I yust got here!”. From that day on, he was known as “Yust”. Everyone in the outfield knew his as “Yust”. “Yust!” No one knew his name! He was a PFC. Private First Class. Turned out that Yust was Evoug Green - a native born Sweed. Naturalized in the United States and enlisted in the Army.

Sara: His wife’s name was Elsie. She was a dancer in New York and a beautiful, beautiful lady. We got to be friends with her and they came down to see us.

Colonel: Yust was a character. We had crossed the Sauer River and its February 1945. Bitter cold, nasty, ugly. We were in a wooded area crawling up, no leaves on the trees, just brush... uh, there was a pill box up there and we wanted to get that pill box.  Take it, so we could live in it briefly at least and so on. So I’m crawling along through the brush, through the leaves and sticks and everything on my belly. I don’t want to stand up. Swanson’s over here [points to his left] and Nok is over here [points to his right] and we’re all working our way up. And here comes Yust right beside me and its 2 o’clock in the morning. And he gets up and gets a hold of my shoulder. And I turn to him and he says, “Captain, if we ever get out of here, I’m going to ask Elsie to marry me and I want you to be my Best Man.” At 2 o’clock in the morning! Middle of February! Snow! Bitter cold! Germans are dropping mortar shell's all over the place! And this Sweed wants me to be his best man! I said to him, 'You can count on it, Yust!' and we went on. 

Michelle: What was the wedding like?

Colonel: It was small. In New York City. Very nice, very nice. Who was the Orchestra at the Roosevelt?

Sara: Roosevelt Hotel?

Colonel: Lawrence Welk! At that time.

Sara: So we had beautiful music! It was nice because we were part of the wedding.

Colonel: Yust is gone. He was my good friend up until he left us. Parkinson’s took him. Extended period of time. Cremation. And we went up and his son had retained a boat to take the remains 3 miles out. The daughter and son were there. We quietly went out. Late afternoon. And as the sun went down, going down on the horizon, the boat stopped and they scattered the remains. And so the daughter had brought along a tape player. So after the remains were scattered, she played the appropriate tape. And we just sat there as it got darker, and darker, finally we came back in.