Military family, tell us about yours

[Saltheart]

On Monday I attended the funeral of the last male in our family from my parenrs generation. It was a military funeral at the cementary. here a few days later its Veterans day so I thoght a good topic would be to talk about military in your family , not just a broad brush military. I'm sure it would make the old ones , long deceased happy to know their specific service was remembered.

My mother had 2 brother's and four sisters.
Here oldest brother fought in WW2 in the Army. He was an enlisted man , don't know his rank. He had it tough. He fought in the Pacific on some jungle Island (Borneo maybe) against the Japanese. He and several of his unit got seperated from their unit and spent several months in the jungle fighting and trying to survive. In the end he and a few others made it back to their troops. He finished the war with 2 purple hearts and a silver star.

Her second brother joined the navy and had an easy time of it despite WW2 going on. I think he did mostly supply stuff and maintenance stuff.

All her sister's married military guys. One of the three husbands also had a tough time in the service. He was a tank guy in WW2 and got all blown up. He was actually listed as Killed in Action because they couldn't sort out the mess after some big battle in Europe. He was in a military hospital for many months and finally regained his senses and was reuinited with his family. He also had a purple heart.

On my fathers side , he had 2 brothers and 2 sisters. They all served in the military. The two sisters were army nurses. My father went down to enlist in 44 or 45 and didn't pass the physical do to a hernia. The war ended soon after and he never served. His brothers were younger than him and served around the Korean War time. One brother stayed state side and one went to Korea. He was in an intelligence unit. He was required to carry a side arm at all times , even when on leave. Other than the fact he was in intelligence and had to carry at all times , he never talked about what he did in Korea.

In my generation , most all the men came of military age during or just after the Vietnam War. As all know , that war tore the country apart. Many guys fought but I don't know anybody who enlisted during that time. I know many who were drafted. I was eligible for the draft when they eliminated student deferments and had the lottery. I got lucky and got draft number of 359 so I never got called up. We were in college with no deferments and everyone I knew who got a low number enlisted or did ROTC, anything to avoid going to Vietnam. You had to live at that time to understand the feeling about Vietnam. I had grown up always thinking I would be in the service and trying to decide what branch etc. That desire all died in me when the whole country seemed to be down on service men during the vietnam war. I don't know anyone who went to Canada etc but I honestly don't know anybody who wanted to go to Vietnam either. I feel really bad for the guys who went and who took so much abuse for their service there. A very strange time in the USA relative to foreign policy and service veterans. In a way they deserved more praise than most other soldiers for serving at such an unpopular time but in fact they were ridiculed and called baby killers. A shameful time for the American nonmilitary.

The very youngest kids in what would still be called my generation or the next after me showed no interest in the military except in one family. My father's youngest sister had 4 boys. Two of them served in the Army and went to Iraq for the first war there. At that time , one was a Sargent and one was a Major, both in the 101st. These two guys became career military and both eventually became full bird Colonels. One was in the Pentagon when the plane crashed into it on 911 but was unhurt. He married another career Military woman , who outranked them their entire careers , despite them being Colonels. She is still in and is a Major General. The next generation is about 10 years old now. It will be interesting to see who decides to serve and who doesn't.