My grandfather loved world war 2. He stated it was the best time of his life getting to travel around Europe. He never saw that much action though. He rode motor bikes and was shot off one. He wore his scar as if it were a tattoo showing it off. My grandfather was one of the lucky ones and he knew it. He never bragged about what he did do during the war because he knew that those who lost their lives never could. I think his medals were a reminder of that to him along with his memories of his service. That man could tell war stories though...it was his favorite thing to do when I ever had a chance to see him.
It took a lot to pry the few medals I have of his off of him. Even harder because the ***** that was his second wife wouldn't let my mother come close to his war items (let alone let us see him much). My mother eventually just stole some items after my grandfather passes away. And gave me the medals because she knew my grandfather would have wanted me to have them. It's actually all I have of my grandfathers. I wear one proudly today for a lot of reasons. That was a tough as nails generation and very unselfish one.
My grandfather wouldn't really speak about it. He wouldn't watch war movies, and he only told us of a few stories of the good times. I don't doubt for a second that he didn't have a lot of good times over there with all the experiences. I don't know how in depth he got either, I do know he wasn't a front line soldier as he had more to do with communications, but he was at the front of some of the lines. He never talked about his medals, and I only found them after he was gone. The article with it was very vague. I believe he was in the 69th infantry and would love to know more but wouldn't know where to begin. I doubt he ever killed a man, but I could tell from the way he got that he saw some things that he never wanted to. To this day, my favorite story is the one that he told that started with "we didn't rob the bank, we just took all the money".
