On cold winter nights I remember my dad saying, at least I am not as cold as I was during the Battle of the Bulge.
My father was in both the 7th and the 3rd Armies. He was not involved in the Battle of the Bulge, but was nearby.
One of his best friends from high school was in the 101st and jumped behind the lines on D-Day and into Holland and was trucked into Bastogne in the Bulge.
I came to be close to he and his wife when my wife and I were in college. He was finishing his Doctorate then.
They are both dead now. We bought their home from the widow when she was moving to a nursing home after Leon died.
Absolutely wonderful kind but tough people.
I am very blessed to still have my father. He is 88. We talk almost every day about the parallels of then and now. You should see the serious look on his face when we discuss the daily details. He knows full well where we are.
So was my Dad, 3rd Corps, 101st, 26th Army Combat Engineers, “Yankee Division”, fighting all thru Europe, Ardennes, Bastogne, and they lived on frozen turnips and other root crops when supply lines were cut by nazis. He was rescuing wounded US Troops, when shot by nazi sniper. Received Bronze Star w/ V, and Purple Heart. At 89, he still turns-up the heat, even in the summer. He hates cold weather. LOL.
My dad got a Purple Heart in the Battle of the Bulge. He has said the same thing many times. He also told me when they liberated a concentration camp under Patton - he doesn’t remember the name of the camp - he’ll be 88 on December 28 - but he does remember how Patton ordered the town’s people to walk through the camp. They were full of hubris on the way in, but as they left, the women were crying and the men looked shell shocked. The soldiers stood shoulder to shoulder on both sides of the road as the survivors left the camp. He said it’s a sight he’ll never forget. And he hasn’t. He still talks about it, the last time being over Thanksgiving.