OK, y'all, here's one of the biggest stories in my tour of duty:

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PRIVATE CHILDERS FROM KENTUCKY

The setting was summer 1944, a short time after D-Day in Normandy, and our artillery outfit was in basic training at Fort Sill, OK. We were fighting the 'good war', against Mussolini, Hirohito, but especially against Adolph Hitler, whose special interest apart from taking over the world, was his "Final Solution" to the Jewish 'problem' -- exterminating every last one of them (including me.)

The other significant setting was that Ted Theobold and I had applied to OCS (Officer's Candidate School) and I had to watch my every behaviour -- any irregularity and you were out, as far as acceptance was concerned. So with that background I will describe what started happening every night as I returned to the barracks from evening pass, after 'lights out.' As I would pass by Private Childer's bunk I would here in a loud stage whisper, "Dirty Jew Bastard!"

After about a week of that I was going nuts -- my natural inclination was to grab hold of him and beat the living s**t out of him, or vice versa (although I was pretty good at doing a job on guys bigger than I, when I entered my rage zone.) However, I had my eye on OCS, and a Second Lt. commission, so I held back. And of course Childers knew that was why I didn't bite the bait. So he continued on for the rest of our 17-week basic training program.

Well, when Basic ended on November 17, 1944, our outfit expected the traditional 2 weeks furlough, to say goodbye in many cases forever, to our family and friends. But what happened instead was -- the entire outfit was flown in by cargo plane directly into Europe. No 2-week furlough. The first time that convention was violated in WWII. Were the top brass in need of extra artillery, pronto? Who knows?

But what I knew for sure, and Private Childers knew for sure was:

as soon as we got into the combat zone the very first shell out of each of our M1 Carbines would be aimed not at the Germans in Europe, but at each other. I knew I would do that, because I knew Childers realized I was ready for that .... he figured, correctly, "Why would Schenker see a difference in a Jew-hater in a German uniform or one in an American uniform?" So I realized that Childers would want to pre-empt me on that one, by firing first. So we were both ready to pre-empt. The bottom line for me was: I was dead either way -- either I let him shoot first, or else I shot first, in which case I'd end up court-martialed and in front of a firing squad for murder.

The resolution of this dilemma? Well, the entire outfit was flown into Europe -- except for two of us, Ted Theobold and me. Why? We both figured it was because our records were still in Washington, awaiting disposition on our applications to OCS. Thus we stayed behind at Fort Sill.

And I never found out what happened to Pvt. Childers, but I know the outfit saw action in the Bulge (which was practically the only time in the ETO that Field Artillery outfits were confronted with hand-to-hand combat.) I have never dwelt on his ultimate fate, never had the desire to, to this day.

But I do have another story, turning on what happened to Ted and me after being left behind. That's coming up next. An interesting story.
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Bill

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True knowledge leads some from cocksure ignorance to thoughtful uncertainty.