World War II

Some of you may have seen the story about the V1 missile found in London last week near the Canary Wharf financial district. (Here’s the link to the CNN write-up.)

There are some impressive statistics to consider about this World War II era relic:

(You can read about the full history of the V1 here at Wikipedia.)

My point is that for supposedly old technology, the V1 that was unearthed in London is still an impressive piece of armament and was treated as such by bomb disposal experts.

Many years ago I remember running my fingers over damaged sections of the the wall around the British Museum and later the same week visiting the ruined shell of Canterbury Cathedral. Experts say that there are hundreds of unexploded bombs buried throughout England, silent reminders of the great Battle of Britain and capable of bringing the war back to life in a heartbeat.

V1, WWII, unexploded ordinance, London, Battle of Britain

Writing for the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune on July 19, Jeannine Aquino recounts a recent expedition to the jungles of Papua, New Guinea by a team of dedicated MIA hunters.

Three separate teams on three two-week trips searched for missing World War II crash sites in an effort to recover the remains of 60 American airmen missing 62 years.

A non-profit organization based in Minnesota and known simply as “MIA Hunters” makes it their mission to locate, recover, and bring home for burial these long-lost servicemen.

On this series of expeditions, eleven crash sites were located and potentially 38 American and 22 Japanese servicemen will finally be returned to their families.

There are still 78,000 servicemen listed as missing in action from World War II with about 70 percent of those in the Pacific Theatre of operations.

When the MIA Hunters find a site, they document its location, photograph the area, and leave identification markers. They then plan an American flag and offer a prayer for those who died there.

For more on the MIA Hunters, click here for their homepage.

MIA, Papua, New Guinea, MIA Hunters, Pacific Theater

I have fond memories of attending two Air Force reunions with my parents. My Dad was a staff sergeant pilot, one of a group of men without a college education accepted for flight training in the opening years of World War II. (He earned a commission as a first lieutenant before war’s end.) He was a member of the Army Air Corps Enlisted Pilots Association, a group I believe is now defunct as I can find no reference to them. (If anyone knows better, please correct me.)

When I ran across an announcement of the 83rd Infantry Divison’s planned reunion in Arlington, VA, August 22 to 26, I couldn’t help but smile. The war will be fought over — or at least the Normandy landings and the Battle of the Bulge in which these men participated — and we’ll win again, with even more dead Germans, even closer close escapes, and more youthful battlefield highjinks.

It’s hard to remember that these guys really were just a bunch of kids back then and when they could escape the war long enough to express their youth, they did. I imagine it helped to keep them sane.

About 350 of the men of the 83rd are expected to gather with their families. They plan visits to the World War II, Korean War, and Vietnam War memorials, the Holocaust Museum, and the Catholic National Shrine. They will also lay a wreath at the tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

Army Air Corps, enlisted pilots, staff sergeant pilot, 83rd Infantry Division, Normandy, Battle of the Bulge

According to the Wikipedia article on the subject, Italian and German pilots were the first to put nose art on their planes starting as early as 1913. The practice reached its zenith during World War II and then went into decline until Operation Desert Storm when the sassy, irreverent images were revived. They’re still going strong today with our fighting troops around the world.

Although FightingColors.com is in the business of selling nose art reproductions, you can still see some nice examples on their pages, like these from the plane my dad flew, the B-25 Mitchell.

You’ll find lots of interesting links to WWII era propaganda here. And there’s great photos from multiple conflicts at Nose-Art.net.

Fair word of warning. Most of these images are for grown-ups. If you’re trying to explain the war and its culture to kids in the house, preview the images before you click over.

noseart, nose art, military planes, propaganda

If you’re a fan of vintage aircraft, especially the great warbirds of WWII, you’ll want to spend some time poking around the home page of the Commemorative Air Force (CAF). The group started back in 1951 with a single Curtiss P-40 Warhawk. Eventually the CAF preserved a working example of every aircraft that flew in World War II.

Annually some 10 million people get to see these legends of aviation in action and some of the CAF birds are rare. They have the only working examples of both the B-29 Superfortress and the Curtiss SB2C Helldiver. The group maintains the American Airpower Heritage Museum on a 75-acre plot of land in Midland, Texas.

In addition to viewing approximately 20 aircraft on display at any one time (exhibits change quarterly), visitors will enjoy an internationally recognized collection of uniforms, photographs, weapons and a host of other memorabilia and artifacts. The CAF has an archives and research facility and has amassed an impressive collection of oral histories. These folks are doing an outstanding job of preserving an important part of World War II history, both mechanical and intellectual.

And be prepared to spend some time drooling over their online photo gallery of aircraft. I did.

Commemorative Air Force, CAF, vintage planes

After the Pearl Harbor bombing in 1941, the Naval Ammunition Depot at Mare Island, California went to full capacity producing ammunition. When the facility couldn’t keep up with demand, operations were expanded to the Port Chicago Naval Magazine in San Franciso.

Construction began on the new installation in 1942 and by 1944 African-American navy personnel could load two ships simultaneously at the site. Although the men worked around the clock under the supervision of white officers, the troops had received training in cargo handling only — not munitions work.

Late in the day on July 17, 1944 the SS Quinault Victory and the SS E.A. Bryan were receiving about 4,606 tons of incendiary and high explosive bombs, ammunition, and depth charges. On the pier, sixteen rail cars held another 429 tons of highly explosive material. At 10:18 p.m., it all blew.

When the smoke cleared, the port was crippled and 320 men, most of them African-American sailors, were dead. It was the largest disaster on the homefront during the entire war. No clear reason for the explosion was ever determined.

Yesterday ceremonies were held at the site to commemorate the 63rd aniversary of the blast and if advocates have their way, Port Chicago will become part of the National Park System. An important reminder that lives were lost on the homefront as well as on the battlefield and that the contribution of segregated troops to the war effort was heroic, patriotic and substantial.

For more on the ceremones see this story from the International Herald Tribune. For more on the disaster and work to preserve the site and the memory of the men who died there, click here. For a list of those who died, click here.

Naval Ammunition Depot, Mare Island, Port Chicago, San Francisco, WWII

The Christmas before my father died I insisted the three of us sit down together and label all the old photos that filled the drawers of the end tables in the seldom-used living room. What started as a chore about which my parents grumbled turned into an afternoon of laughter and story telling that remains a happy memory for me. I love old photos and it breaks my heart when the story behind the image is lost forever.

Sometimes at night when I can’t sleep I poke around on EBay, often looking at World War II photos that have outlived their original owners and become lost and homeless fragments of an age rapidly retreating from known memory. Look at this wrecked jeep. What happened? Is the damage battle-related or did a youthful G.I. go for a joy ride?

Or this group of sailors. Young, cocky, showing off their bare chests. The Ebay description plainly said, “There is no writing on the backside.” Did they live? Did they die? Is there anyone today who would know their faces? I find it both maddening and compelling.

I suppose a part of me always thinks I’ll find a snapshot of my Dad, taken by some buddy in North Africa or Italy, now sitting on EBay waiting for me to rescue and love. It’s a romantic notion. The odds are long even for someone like me who has bet on her fair share of gray horses at 20 to 1. But I do it anyway.

The message in this post? If you know a World War II veteran, spend an afternoon with that person and get those photos labeled. Learn the stories. Our days with “the boys” are numbered and once they are gone the photos will fall silent, most likely forever.

[tag]WWII, EBay, photos, vintage[/tags]

This morning I ran across a haunting video on YouTube, a five-minute tour of the ruins of a Nazi stronghold in Bretagne, France. Now, bear in mind, I’m a sucker for ruins of any kind. I’ve even been known to stop on the side of the road and take photos of abandoned, vintage gas stations.

There’s a rather extended blog entry here in relation to the video. (There are some opinions there that I’m neither advocating or refuting. Just providing the link to flesh out the story of the video since there is no narration.)

One of the things that struck me about the video was the fact that the ruins are covered in graffiti. While I realize it isn’t possible to preserve every remnant of every war, I’m still disturbed by that kind of thing. If we can’t make physical memorials, I’m glad we have photos and video at our disposal to preserve some of these sites before they disappear forever into the landscape or fall prey to what seems to be mankind’s desire to pave every square inch of the planet.

Just as a quick aside, another exciting project along these lines is the virtual reconstruction of Hitler’s long-destroyed Fuhrerbunker. For more information and to see some images, click here.

video, Bretagne, Nazi, Fuehrerbunker

Today Wired is running a story about the world’s first operational jet fighter, which took flight 65 years ago — today. The Messerschmitt 262 flew that July 18th in the Bavarian skies with World War II raging across Europe. (Couldn’t find a photo that wasn’t copyrighted, but click over to Wired and you can see the plane.)

Although the plane didn’t get into combat until 1944, giving Allied fighters, including the British Gloster Meteor, a run for their money, it helped to usher in the era of jet-powered fighters. As I was poking around looking for details on the plane I ran across the ME 262 Project over at stormbirds.com. They’re getting five examples of the vintage craft in airworthy condition.

I love to find this kind of endeavor to preserve vintage machinery of any kind. It’s a dream of mine to some day have a chance to go up in a B-25 and experience, in the most visceral way I can, what flying that plane was like for my Dad during the war. Keeping these old warbirds up and running is a real part of preserving the history of the war so let’s take our hats off today to the Messerschmitt 262. Even if, from an American perspective, it’s an “enemy” plane, she’s still a beauty.

vintage aircraft, jets, Messerschmitt, Gloster Meteor

Okay, in theory I have a pretty decent education, and I’ve spent most of my life reading about World War II. So I was a little stunned this morning when I read this article from Bloomberg about a team of U.S. and Japanese investigators searching for the remains of the Japanese soldiers who died when American forces re-captured Attu Island in May 1942. The fighting led to 540 American deaths and 2,300 Japanese.

According to the Wikipedia article, Attu is the largest and westernmost of the Near Islands group of the Aleutians. The 301st Independent Infantry Battalion of the Japanese Northern Army captured the island in June 1942. Forty-two native Aleuts became prisoners of war in Otaru, Hokkaido where sixteen died.

This one is about as obscure for me as the Battle of the Bees in World War I, also known as the Battle of Tanga. (If you’re a World War I buff you’ll know both the British Indian Army and the Germans were defeated by swarms of native bees.)

The current investigation on Attu is to locate the remaining Japanese soldiers since only 235 sets of remains were identified at war’s end and buried at Fort Richardson near Anchorage.

WWII, Alaska, Attu Island, Japanese soldiers, Battle of the Bees

If you are just beginning the process of tracking down information about the World War II service record of your granddad or some other relative, the National Archives site is a good place to start. (Click the image below to go directly to the site.)

In just a few easy steps you should be able to locate the enlistment records you need, which will supply necessary information to continue your research like the individual’s service serial number and the facility at which basic training was completed.

When you go to the site, go through the following steps.

- Under Wars/International Relations (third column) click “World War II.”

- On the next screen select the search icon on the appropriate record series. I used the first link for “World War II Army Enlistment Records, 1938-1946″ to find my Dad’s information. (Note there are 9,200,232 records included in the set.)

- On the next screen click the search icon on the Electronic Army Serial Number Merged File, ca. 1938-1946 (Enlistment Records.)

- On the final screen enter as much information as you have. I used name, state, and year of birth.

The results will give you all the men with the same name who enlisted in that period. Scroll through the list until you find the individual for whom you are searching. It’s just that simple.

WWII, service records, National Archives, enlistment

Being one of those folks who has a camera pretty much surgically attached to my hand, I’m always on the look out for interesting old photos. I was digging around on Flickr yesterday and ran across this set of images uploaded by a New Orleans man. All the photos are of his grandfather during World War II.

While at the same time that it’s frustrating not to know all the stories or put names to the men in the photos, it’s heartwarming to see a shirtless group of young boys cutting up with some kind of tropical fronds or to see a freshly scrubbed GI standing crisply at attention with his rifle.

As I was flipping through the photos I notice that they belong to a World War II Vintage Photo Pool. Oh. My. God. Be prepared to waste a considerable amount of time on these images. They’re from everywhere and they include everything from sweetly nostalgic images like the ones above to holocaust photos.

Flickr is one of those sites where you can get lost anyway. If you scroll to the bottom of the intial pool page you can browse out to the photo sets of the pool’s major contributors or look at the top five group tags — which gets you to a whole new host of images. Beware — you may look up and realize you’ve spent an hour or more combing through the photos. I did.

photos, vintage, nostalgia, WWII

When I told a friend I was going to start blogging about World War II her reaction was, “What are you going to do? Type a page out of a textbook everyday day?”

Now that more than 60 years has passed since the end of the war there are those with a tendency to treat WWII as nothing but history dead and gone.

That’s the farthest thing from the truth. Every day more stories come through my RSS reader than I possibly have time to blog about so from time to time I’ll share groups of links to things that have caught my eye. The first are for two upcoming documentaries I’m eagerly anticipating and a new film project in the works.

- Ken Burns says it all in this interview about his new documentary The War, “These people (who lived through World War II) are dying — 1,500 a day is now the statistic.” The more than six-hour program, which looks at the human side of war through the stories of four small towns, will debut on PBS on September 23.

- On July 8 the men who survived the horrific sinking of the USS Indianapolis were honored on July 8. Look for the Discover Channel’s Shark Week to open with the story on July 29.

And while we’re on the subject of film, Spike Lee is tackling the role of African Americans in WWII in a yet-to-be-titled project.

The stories are out there, every day, and I’m doing my best to keep up with them for you.

Ken Burns, USS Indianapolis, Spike Lee, WWII movies

As an historian I have decided objections to revisionism although as a sociological phenomenon I understand why cultures are often driven to rewrite events. In some cases the motivation stems from guilt, in others from political ambition. Neither makes the retooling of events acceptable or less dangerous in my opinion

The Taipei Times carried an interesting editorial reprinted from The Guardian out of Tokyo by Justin McCurry.

The editorial’s introduction discusses the battle of Okinawa, a conflict in which 200,000 Americans and Japanese died including 25% of the civilian population of the island. Many of those died by their own hand at the order of the Japanese army. They were given two grenades each and instructed to use one to kill enemy soldiers and one to kill themselves.

The Japanese education ministry has ordered references to the suicides stricken from the books produced by seven major publishing houses. The move is part and parcel of the efforts of the current conservative government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to sanitize or even obliterate much of the factual details of Japanese actions during World War II. These efforts extend to sugar-coating the militarism of wartime politicians, including those like Hideki Tojo, who were hanged as war criminals.

We hear a great deal about this kind of thing in relation to the history of Nazi Germany, much of it originating from new Aryan or Nazi movements. Japanese revisionism on a whole gets less press but the aggregate effect of such efforts will be no less damaging to the historical record.

revisionism, Japan, Okinawa, Tojo, Shinzo Abe

CNN has posted an interesting feature story entitled, “Japanese Look for New Meaning from Kamikaze Sacrifice.” Back in the day when I was teaching freshman history in college I tried to emphasize to my students that the identity of the “good guys” and the “bad guys” in any conflict is purely a point of perspective.

I knew a man whose ship survived a kamikaze attack. He described watching the plane plummeting toward the deck. The pilot had the canopy thrown back and his excited screams carried clearly across the sounds of the battle. I’ll confess my friend ended the story with the words “crazy S.O.B.”

In today’s world we still grapple with the concept of the suicide mission, now carried out almost daily on another field of battle for very different reasons. The act is inconceivable to most of us, yet in Japan the memory of the approximately 4,000 kamikaze pilots is increasingly honored and cited as an example of the kind of focus and dedication the nation requires. The story makes for a fascinating read and I highly recommend it, but I want to leave you with a slightly different tale.

Sitting in the company of a World War II vet one afternoon I asked if he’d ever seen any of his buddies crack up. He’d fought in several island battles in the South Pacific, brutal campaigns that resulted in carnage on both sides. “Yeah,” he said, smoking the cigarette I’d just watched him roll. “We had a guy got shipped home. They caught him with a Jap major’s head in a sack.”

Swallowing down the sickening bile that rose in my throat I asked, “What was he planning to do with it?”

“Said he was going to boil it down and make a lamp when he got home. Had a bunch of ears in a sack too.”

War brutalizes both sides, a fact we as historians and enthusiasts must embrace these many years afterwards in our attempts to keep alive the legacy of the conflict.

Kamikaze, Japan, South Pacific