relatives in the forces

kind of an off-shoot of the "relatives in ww2" topic , To start my Dad has been in the forces since 1972 , hes been to bosnia, croatia , cyprus and west germany(before it's unification with the rest of Germany) and many other places , hes a master corporal in the air force , and is in logistics. What about the rest of you ?

 

My cousin went for the Royal Marines, but shattered his ankle during the selection process (and I mean shattered).
He has since become a 'redcap' (British Military Police).

 

He's a monkey.

 

My maternal greatgrandfather was drafted by the Austrians i Lvov and fought heroically against my paternal greatgrandfather on the Russian side during WW1. Both were lightly wounded (I am almost sure they had arranged this between themselves, across the front line) and were discharged of duty.

My Father serves as a consultant for our forces, having retired from the same Organization a few ys ago.
I am not supposed to provide further details, sorry. :-?

 

Very interesting, Izaak. Do you know something about your relatives even more earlier?

 

How many centuries are you interested in? I mean it.

 

As many as possible!

 

I have to make it short:
My Father´s side is more managable: It was a banking family form Odessa for a couple centuries, who as such came to Russia directly form Koeln in 18. century. (I am only talking about the straight line). Shortly prior to WW1 they undertook some daring speculative businesses and went bancrupt (well, almost). My great-grandfather had therefore to seek a position in the other banking houses. He had unfortunately not enough money to bribe himself out of concription for WW2.
After the war, he was able to buy forged documents saying he had always been a worker. it was good for my Grandfather, who in the beginning of 1930s was accepted for a military academy and later became Soviet tank captain.

From my Mother´s side there is more to say: came to Poland in 15. century form Mahren, but earlier they had lived in France. Traders and leasers of land. In 16. century, what is now Ukraine was Polish and they moved there: trading on the west-east route and mostly – leasing huge land properties of aristocracy (squeezing the last drops from both the owner and the peasants, no dubt). Much of hteir revenue came from brewing vodka, by which the money paid to the peasants came back to “the family”. At the time of Chmielnicki´s uprising (uprising of Ukrainians against aristocrats and Jews) in 17. century they hid in Lvov, together with “their” aristocrats. They didn´t returned to the countryside afterwards, though. In Lvov they began large scale production of alcohol, more trade. Shops, in XIX – they established one of the first department stores (not really like Woolworth, but still… ). It was a good life. Both during Polish, then – Russian, and again Polish rule. My great-grandfather volunteered to the Austrian Army. Returned home in 1916 after a wound and continued economical education.
Before WW2, in 1938-9 many members of the family managed to buy visas to the USA in good time (everything was for sale and the US “diplomats” were no less negotiative than the Tsarist ones, of old). My Grandparents didn´t make it. In the last moment “their” diplomat spirited away with their money. They have been through the hell of Stalinist torture machne with prisons, camps and resettling to Kazakhstan. Half-dead of starvation, they foud a way to the Anders´ Polish Army in 1943, who was allowed to move (together with many civilians, also Jewish, through the Middle East to Italy and Britain (they settled in Palestine). They traveled together with Menachem Begin who also stayed there.

Sorry to everybody, I couldn´t make it shorter. Some cousins of mine have the family info a few centuries older. I have always had a little furtive interest to the family traditions.