My dad was a war hero - and I didn't know

Tomorrow marks the 60th anniversary of the D-Day invasion, but when I was growing up in veterans' housing in the early 1950s, it seemed almost like yesterday. As kids, we regularly stormed make-believe beaches and fought our way through backyards and playgrounds.

Because our fathers had all served, we had a tremendous fascination with anything military. That led to a kind of hierarchy of heroism based on what your old man had done during the war.

At the low end of the totem pole were those whose dads had never been in combat, with the rankings climbing up to the kid whose father had been a fighter pilot.

I remember when I first asked my own dad about his wartime experiences -- how often had he gone toe to toe with the bad guys, for example, as John Wayne did in the movies?

Though I was disappointed when he said he'd served in the air force and never carried a rifle, I immediately had visions of Jimmy Cagney playing a dashing RCAF pilot in one of my favourite movies, Captains of the Clouds.

The right answer could still elevate me in the local status game of what-did-your-dad-do? But no, he had been a navigator on an anti-sub patrol plane -- disappointing news to a seven-year old.

It wasn't until years later that I began to research the role played by the Coastal Command squadrons. I learned it had been cold, dangerous, nerve-racking work, with the threat from German submarines ever-present.

Far from being sitting ducks for giant bombers soaring overhead, as I had thought, the U-boats were often armed with batteries of heavy anti-aircraft guns that could easily destroy a lumbering B-24 coming in for a low-level bombing pass.

That is, if the horrid weather or mechanical malfunctions hundreds of miles from shore didn't get you first. Even if you did survive going down in the frigid North Atlantic, you'd probably freeze to death before anyone found you.

Yet the airmen went out, my dad among them, month after month, year after year, hoping to find a target and praying not to become one.

The U-boats were often armed with batteries of heavy anti-aircraft guns that could easily destroy a lumbering B-24.

He and his crew were shot at by submarines, fighter planes and, on attacks against sub pens in the Baltic, shore-based anti-aircraft guns. On one of those missions they sank a U-boat while under heavy fire.

Without the kind of anti-sub work my father and his crew mates did, Hitler's wolf packs would have had a much better chance of destroying the lifeline of transport ships that made possible not only D-Day, but eventual victory in Europe.

When he died, he left me his flying log, and according to an entry made in a neat, precise hand, he spent June 6, 1944, on a training mission.

When I was a kid I would have thought a lot more of what he'd contributed to the war effort had the logbook entry been something like "flew Spitfire over Normandy beach."

Today, older and wiser, I recognize that what he actually did was part of a task that was no less heroic, no less brave, and no less necessary.

But for every boy whose father's wartime courage and willingness to put his life on the line will never be celebrated with elaborate ceremony on some far-off shore, on D-day or any other day, I'd just like to say "Thank you, Dad."

For my Dad, Thomas J. Sobers, born in Wilkes-Barre PA in 1923 to a coal miner. The only son of an only son.
Lost his dad when he was twelve. Lived during the Depression. Moved to NJ at age 17 and joined the US Army after the onset of WWII.He ARRIVED IN BRISBANE, AUSTRALIA, 1943. ATTACHED TO 6TH INFANTRY DIVISION 158TH REGIMENTAL COMBAT TEAM, WITH 48TH MM ORDNANCE. FINCHAVEN, NEW GUINEA, BUNA AND SALAMAUA. BIAK, WAKE ISLAND, NOEMFOOR, HOLLANDIA, SANSAPOR. PHILIPPINE INVASION, LINGAYEN GULF AND LUZON.
My dad came home alive. Became a police officer in Montclair NJ retiring after 38 years, a good cop. Raised 8 children including 4 sons and 8 grandsons to carry on his name.
He told me war stories and we sang army tunes together when I was a child. He always put on the brave soldier front. While looking on line a couple of months ago, I found an excerpt from an invasion that my dad was a part of. We were on the phone, he in Florida and me in NJ. I told him what I found and he asked me to read it to him. As I read it to him, he started to cry, no weep. I asked him if he wanted me to stop reading but through his choked up voice which was new to me, he asked me to read on, all the time apologizing for crying.
That was the first time my dad ever showed emotions about the war. He kept all of that inside of him, never showing the world, as all the greatest generation did.
Dad, thank you for my freedom and thank you for the freedom you have given to my neighbor next door and across the country. You are a true man, who lived through a time period which no young man today will ever know or understand. I salute you and all of whom you fought with.
God Bless you today and always.
Your daughter, Linda

Your Dad and all the other veterans. All great men, Linda.

How can we compare their like with the 'role models' of today? How can we let the self centered dross that run corrupt and failed companies (Enron, World Com, etc) and rip off their workers to enrich themselves, hiding their ill-gotten obscene millions in their wive's and family members names of course so that it cannot be recovered. And then use every twisted wile in their highly paid lawyer's shady book to avoid just retribution.

How would they stack up going ashore on a beach in Normandy under fire?

I recall recently reading about some of the boys in Iraq who had given up the chance of a satellite phone call to their loved ones, offered by a reporter, to a colleague who had some family problems back home.

That is the sort of folk we should be using as our models for our society, not the 'grabbing greedy moguls of industry' who never made a real life or death decision in their lives.

Hi Clive, saw your post and because of marked similarities to in my own life to the piece's author, wanted to respond to this:

"Far from being sitting ducks for giant bombers soaring overhead, as I had thought, the U-boats were often armed with batteries of heavy anti-aircraft guns that could easily destroy a lumbering B-24 coming in for a low-level bombing pass.

That is, if the horrid weather or mechanical malfunctions hundreds of miles from shore didn't get you first. Even if you did survive going down in the frigid North Atlantic, you'd probably freeze to death before anyone found you."

Quite true, this. Many U-boats had deck armament that ranged from fully-flexible mountings of twin cal. 7.92mm MG-34 machine guns, through 20mm automatic cannon (very much alike to US Naval mountings), up to 37mm rapid-fire cannon. In daylight conditions, a B-24 would indeed have a difficult time facing this defensive array from a surfaced U-boat.

The similarities in my own life are thus - I had an uncle who, as a US Navy Ensign during WWII, served as a navigator in the land-based anti-submarine patrol/bombing aircraft of the time; this was basically the B-24, but fitted out to Navy specs for the mission specialization, and designated PB4Y-1. His particular squadron, as one of a group of squadrons in England from Fleet Air Wing Seven (FAW 7), flew missions alongside Coastal Command. His squadron's aircraft were fitted with an extendable Air to Surface Vessel (ASV) radome, mounted in the position that a belly turret would have been. In addition, there was an immensely powerful searchlight mounted out on the starboard wing. Various kinds of droppable anti-submarine ordnance were carried, as well as ammunition issues for the .50 cal. turrets and gun positions.

Patrol operations were carried out at night, which in most of the Atlantic at that time, was the only time that a U-boat could have a chance of safely surfacing and spending enough time to run its diesel engines and recharge its batteries. By denying this to the U-boats, the night patrols were believed to be an element that would render the U-boats totally ineffective. In practice, the PB4Y-1 would fly a designated patrol route with its radar active. When a promising contact was achieved, the searchlight, which could be slaved to the radar, was so aimed and suddenly turned on. If the beam revealed a U-boat, the bomber would (theoretically ) be able to make an attack before the U-boat could either safely dive or mount an effective defense from the bomber. In both Atlantic and Pacific operations, this worked out well. Operations were also carried out against surface ships of nighttime enemy supply convoys.

My uncle, who passed away some years ago, spent many an hour on night patrol for U-boats. His flight crew made some attacks, which results were inconclusive. His squadron, and others on the airfield, had some confirmed U-boat and shipping kills. There was also some combat with enemy fighter aircraft, and some of the wing's aircraft went out on missions and never returned - quite possibly as a result of the aforementioned mechanical malfunctions. One thing that the original piece's author did not mention is that the B-24 was an aircraft which, ironically, did not have a high survival rate from ditching at sea. The large central bomb bay, through which the main wing spar passed, was usually where the fuselage, in all but the gentlest of ditchings on a calm sea (not very common in the Atlantic!), would break into two pieces, which would then lose buoyance very rapidly. Any aircrew which had not managed to exit the aircraft at that point were pretty much goners then. Not a very pleasant prospect, that.

Thanks for your post, Clive. Given the 60th anniversary of D-Day, I am grateful for your posting.

God bless President Ronald Reagan, and his family.

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