“Wished I’d have interviewed my dad when he was alive - but he never wanted to talk about it.
81st Recon Battalion of the 1st Armored Div - I just have a photo album and a roster of towns in North Africa and Italy they passed through. And a picture of his light tank after it hit a mine.
I know a lot of data was lost when that records warehouse burned down a while back. What a shame.”
Other than the locations, I could have written this. My dad was not willing to talk about anything until he was so near death he was not understandable. As with you, all his records were gone.
My Dad was a civilian employee (research & development) of a company that designed missiles for the Navy so he didn't serve in uniform.However,my sister-in-law's Dad served in Europe.She told me that he never talked about his time there.And I've heard many,many other such stories.
My guess is that WWII vets didn't tell their families much because they didn't want to unsettle or disturb them.However,it's not difficult to imagine that guys talked to each other at their local VFW Post.
>> “Wished I’d have interviewed my dad when he was alive - but he never wanted to talk about it.”
My dad only told me 2 things about his WW2 naval service.
The name of his ship (USS Heermann, DD-532) and that he’d received a battlefield promotion from Ensign to Lieutenant Commander during an engagement near the Philippines; nothing else.
It wasn’t until 3 years ago that I learned the details from another crew member I accidentally met. My dad’s ship was in the The Battle off Samar during the Battle of Leyte Gulf. He was part of the Taffy 3 Force and the 4 destroyers and 4 destroyer escorts who charged the Japanese fleet.
My dad fought in Korea and I don’t even know what battalion he was in.
He told one story about some patrol he was on that crossed paths with ROK troops and how they steered clear of some cave where they had some NOK POWs. They knew enough not to get involved.
That was it. He never said anything else.