|
Posted on 08/14/2004 11:32:17 PM PDT by snippy_about_it
|
|
 are acknowledged, affirmed and commemorated.
|
| Our Mission: The FReeper Foxhole is dedicated to Veterans of our Nation's military forces and to others who are affected in their relationships with Veterans. In the FReeper Foxhole, Veterans or their family members should feel free to address their specific circumstances or whatever issues concern them in an atmosphere of peace, understanding, brotherhood and support. The FReeper Foxhole hopes to share with it's readers an open forum where we can learn about and discuss military history, military news and other topics of concern or interest to our readers be they Veteran's, Current Duty or anyone interested in what we have to offer. If the Foxhole makes someone appreciate, even a little, what others have sacrificed for us, then it has accomplished one of it's missions. We hope the Foxhole in some small way helps us to remember and honor those who came before us.
|
 The Kiss and more It seems as if everybody's claiming to be the sailor--or the nurse he's kissing--in the famous photograph taken by Alfred Eisenstaedt for LIFE magazine 50 years ago on V-J Day, August 14, 1945. The most recent claimant is Carl "Moose" Muscarello, an ex-cop from New York, who has been identified by the self-proclaimed then-nurse, Edith Shain as the man who kissed her in Times Square. They've appeared on television last week to broadcast their claims. But LIFE magazine has never identified the couple in the historic embrace--and probably never will. In the past, some dozen ex-sailors have claimed to be the amorous seaman. And at least two other former nurses have identified themselves as his partner in Eisenstaedt's classic image.  From the August 1980 issue of LIFE, EDITH SHAIN SAYS SHE'S THE V-J DAY NURSE Who was the Nurse? Edith Shain had just begun her nursing career when she went to see the V-J Day melee--and was promptly set upon. Then single, she was unastonished--"at that time in my life everyone was kissing me." She recognized herself in LIFE but kept her secret. "I didn't think it was dignified but times have changed." Now, a teacher, part-time nurse and a grandmother, Mrs. Shain, Eisie says, is the "vivacious, lovely woman." WHO IS THE KISSING SAILOR? Our story so far: It all started coming back to pretty Edith Shain as she studied once more the famous picture of the nurse being embraced by the sailor there in Times Square that glorious V-J Day 35 years ago. She decided the time had come to declare her identity as the woman in Alfred Eisenstaedt's photograph. Eisie, delighted with the discovery, flew to Beverly Hills to photograph Edith as she appears today at 62--and that story ran in LIFE in August, 1980, along with a request for the real sailor to please step forward. Thus it was that memories stirred old seafaring hearts across the land, moments of danger and tossing seas and those too-brief winsome moments ashore. Then, most vividly, that unforgetable day--August 15, 1945--when any swabbie worth his bell-bottoms kissed any girl within reach.  No fewer than 10 sailors, as well as two more nurses, have managed to recall to the last detail how it happened and how they happened to be in Times Square--persuading us that all their stories are true. But who is in the picture?       |
free dixie,sw
four (4) hours later, my dad left Greenville, TX for the USAAF!
SHORT honeymoon!
free dixie,sw
Howdy!
Yep, things have a way of balancing out
hmmmm. I wonder if I've met him.
But I think it's better not to know who these two are.
Phil's family is from there, hmmm. Maybe he knows him. :-)
I think you are right, it's best to imagine it's every sailor and every girl.
Unknown then is that we would see this underground network again in Vietnam and more crudely in Afghanistan. It would have been very deadly for us.
Makes sense. The war had gone on so long and we were still in the thick of it. I bet it was a shock.
YEP!
playing the piano,
writing letters home for the GIs who couldn't write well/were too injured to do so,
praying with the "scared to death",
singing every popular song she knew (The White Cliffs of Dover & AMAZING GRACE were the most requested)
& "just listening" to them "talk".
she says that after the truth of VJ day "soaked in", that the GIs just sat & stared out the windows.
free dixie,sw
My mother took a troop train from NY to SF when she joined the WAVES. She's says the train ride was a blast! She also said at every town they stopped in the townspeople were there cheering them on and providing coffee and treats.
I'm sure with all that was on folks minds on those trains partying was the way to go just for some relief.
Besides, my son was born on Friday the 13th!
Getting to see people other than my family (not that they aren't swell ...) would be fun!
free dixie,duckie & sw
Morning PE.
Too many apathetic people or Liberals in the workplace. ;-)
Today's classic warship, USS Red Rover (ex CSS Red Rover)
Sidewheel Steamship
Tonnage. 786 t.
Lenght. 256'
Draft. 8'
Speed. 8 k.
Complement. 47
Medical Dept. 30+
Armament. 1 32-pdr.
Red Rover, the Navy's first hospital ship, was a side wheel steamer built in 1859 at Cape Girardeau, Mo. Purchased by the Confederacy 7 November 1861, she served as C.S.S. Red Rover, a barracks ship for the floating battery New Orleans. At Island No. 10, near New Madrid, Mo., from 15 March 1862, she was holed during a bombardment of that island sometime before 25 March and abandoned as a quarters ship.
When the island fell to Union forces on 7 April, Red Rover was seized by the Union gunboat USS Mound City, repaired, and taken to St. Louis. There she was fitted out as a summer hospital boat for the Army's Western Flotilla to augment limited Union medical facilities, to minimize the hazards to sick and wounded in fighting ships; and to ease the problems of transportation-delivery of medical supplies to and evacuation of personnel from forward areas.
Steamers, such as City of Memphis, were being used as hospital transports to carry casualties upriver, but they lacked necessary sanitary accommodations and medical staffs, and thus were unable to prevent the spread of disease.
Rapid mobilization at the start of the Civil War had vitiated efforts to prevent the outbreak and epidemic communication of disease on both sides of the conflict. Vaccination was slow; sanitation and hygiene were generally poor. Overworked military medical personnel were assisted by voluntary societies coordinated by the Sanitary Commission founded in June 1861. But by 1865 typhoid fever, typhus, dysentery, diarrhea, cholera, smallpox, measles, and malaria would claim more lives than gunshot.
Red Rover, serving first with the Army, then with the Navy drew on both military and voluntary medical personnel. Her conversion to a hospital boat, begun at St. Louis and completed at Cairo, Ill., was accomplished with both sanitation and comfort in mind. A separate operating room was installed and equipped. A galley was put below, providing separate kitchen facilities for the patients. The cabin aft was opened for better air circulation. A steam boiler was added for laundry purposes. An elevator, numerous bathrooms, nine water closets, and gauze window blinds ". . . to keep cinders and smoke from annoying the sick" were also included in the work.
Barges, housed over or covered with canvas, were ordered for the care of contagious diseases, primarily smallpox, and were moored in shady spots along the river.
On 10 June 1862, Red Rover was ready for service. Her commanding officer was Captain McDaniel of the Army's Gunboat Service. Assistant Surgeon George H. Bixby became Surgeon in Charge.
On 11 June, Red Rover received her first patient, a cholera victim By the 14th she had 55 patients. On the 17th, the gunboat USS Mound City exploded during an engagement with Confederate batteries at St. Charles, Ark. Casualties amounted to 135 out of a complement of 175. Red Rover, dispatched to assist in the emergency, took on board extreme burn and wound cases at Memphis and transported them to less crowded hospitals in Illinois.
From Mound City, Ill., the hospital boat moved down-stream again and joined the Western Flotilla above Vicksburg. Through the summer, she treated sick and wounded of the flotilla and the Ram Fleet engaged at Vicksburg and along the Mississippi to Helena, Ark. While off the latter point, she caught fire, but, with assistance from the gunboat USS Benton, extinguished the blaze and continued her work.
In September 1862, Red Rover, still legally under the jurisdiction of an Illinois prize court, was sent to Cairo, Ill.,to be winterized. On the 30th, she was purchased by the Navy.
The next day, the vessels of the Western Flotilla, with their officers and men, were transferred to the Navy Department and became the Mississippi Squadron under acting Rear Adm. David D. Porter. The Navy Medical Department of Western Waters was organized at the same time under Fleet Surg. Edward Gilchrist.
In December Red Rover, used during the fall to alleviate crowded medical facilities ashore, was ready for service on the river On the 26th, she was commissioned under the command of Acting Master William R. Wells, USN. Her complement was 47, while her medical department, remaining under Assistant Surgeon Bixby, was initially about 30. Of that number, three were Sisters of the Order of the Holy Cross. Later joined by a fourth member of their order and assisted by lay nurses' aides, they were the forerunners of the Navy Nurse Corps.
The work of these and other volunteers was coordinated by the Western Sanitation Commission, which also donated over $3,000 worth of equipment to the ship.
In December 1862 Fleet Surg. Ninian A. Pinckney relieved Fleet Surg. Edward Gilchrist. The administration and strict standards of day-to-day activities of the department were so well run under Pinckney from his headquarters in Red Rover, that by 1865 he was able to write "there is less . . . sickness in the Fleet than in the healthiest portion of the globe."
On the 29th, Red Rover headed downstream. During January 1863, she served with the expedition up the White River. As the expedition took the Port of Arkansas (Fort Hindman), she remained at the mouth of the river to receive the wounded. On her departure, she was fired on and two shots penetrated into the hospital area, but no casualties resulted.
From February to the fall of Vicksburg early in July, she cared for the sick and wounded of that campaign and supplemented her medical support of Union forces by provisioning other ships of the Mississippi Squadron with ice and fresh meat. She also provided burial details and sent medical personnel ashore when and where needed.
Red Rover continued her service along the river, taking on sick and wounded and delivering medicine and supplies, until the fall of 1864. In October of that year, she began her last supply run; and, after delivering medical stores to ships at Helena and on the White, Red, and Yazoo Rivers, she transferred patients to Hospital Pinckney at Memphis and headed north. Arriving at Mound City on 11 December, she remained there, caring for Navy patients, until she was decommissioned on 17 November 1865. Having admitted over 2,400 patients during her career, she transferred her last 11 to Grampus on that date. On 29 November she was sold at public auction to A. M. Carpenter.
occupation authorities after the war found that the number of military aircraft actually available in the Home Islands was over 12,700.
I didn't know that. (MAJOR NEWS FLASH!!!)
the problem they would of had is trained pilots to fly them.
I had a brother-in-law sitting on Okinawa waiting to go in. He was a See Bee took part in the Solomon, Siapan, Iwo, always said he figured he wouldn't of survived Japan he'd used up all his luck.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
