Posted on 05/25/2008 6:22:56 AM PDT by kellynla
CHARLES TOWN, W.Va. -- Numbers come precisely from the agile mind and nimble tongue of Frank Buckles, who seems bemused to say that 4,734,991 Americans served in the military during America's involvement in the First World War and 4,734,990 are gone. He is feeling fine, thank you for asking.
The eyes of the last doughboy are still sharp enough for him to be a keen reader, and his voice is still deep and strong at age 107. He must have been a fine broth of a boy when, at 16, persistence paid off and he found, in Oklahoma City, an Army recruiter who believed, or pretended to, the fibs he had unavailingly told to Marine and Navy recruiters in Kansas about being 18. He grew up on a Missouri farm, not far from where two eminent generals were born -- John "Black Jack" Pershing and Omar Bradley.
"Boys in the country," says Buckles, "read the papers," so he was eager to get into the fight over there. He was told that the quickest way was to train for casualty retrieval and ambulance operations. Soon he was headed for England aboard the passenger ship Carpathia, which was celebrated for having, five years earlier, rescued survivors from the Titanic.
Buckles never saw combat but "I saw the results." He seems vague about only one thing: What was the First World War about?
Before leaving England for France, he was stationed near Winchester College, where he noticed "Buckles" among the names that boys had carved in their desks. This ignited his interest in genealogy, which led him to discover that his ancestor Robert Buckles, born in Yorkshire on May 15, 1702, arrived at age 30 in what is now West Virginia.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
Thank you, Frank Buckles, you and all of those heroic doughboys, the GIs of WW2, the Korean, Vietnam, Desert Storm and Cold War vets of countless conflicts and actions (many of which we don’t and won’t know about for quite some time). You have all sacrificed for the greater good of this nation, and those of us who understand are eternally grateful. I never served myself, but I appreciate what you’ve done for me, my family and our country. God bless all of you, living or gone, and also those in your families who had to suffer and sacrifice because of your service.
Thanks for the ping Lancey. Both my grandfathers served in that war. One said the trenches were a horror.
A HUGE Salute to all those who have served, are still serving, or serving in another way - Sgt. Evan Vela.
Thanks for the post and ping.
God bless all our veterans!
My step-grandfather, Boyd Sullivan of Mississippi fought with Pershing both in Mexico and in WWI.
His stories were awesome.
“My step-grandfather, Boyd Sullivan of Mississippi fought with Pershing both in Mexico and in WWI.”
so did my father...but he never opened his mouth about it...
he spoke more about Pancho Villa which they all found frustrating because they really wanted him...
Boyd had been born into the Sullivan’s Hollow clan in Mize Mississippi son of Wild Bill Sullivan and had been forced to leave early on as a lad when he shot a constable by the train depot in an argument over a woman. he went and joined up with Pershing which was easy since he had horsing skills. He spoke at length about this.
WWI, he recounted the voyage and the countryside and the French(?) women but said the fighting was like horror punctuated by boring horrible conditions and illness. He was glad when it was over and wondered aloud why he’d gone in the first place. He died in 1980 in his mid 80s.
My maternal great uncle RE Horne likewise of MS fought in WWI as well and was gassed and badly damaged. He suffered from shell shock all his life and drank like a fish. He died when I was a toddler and I remember being held by him as he was dying in his late 50s at the Veterans Hospital in Biloxi in barracks style wards. He had a hard life...some was the war, some was his personality and his reaction to the war.
Everyone is different in how they handle that sort of stress.
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