Family Members

[Cactus]

I am not sure if this topic was done? If so please just merge this with it. I was wondering if you had relative, aunts, uncles, grandparents, parents, involved with World War 2. If so what did they do if you know?

My grandfather on my mothers side was in the United States Coast Guard and was in training at the Manhattan Beach T.C. he went through all the training but caught rheumatic fever and obtained and honorable discharge. He was more than likely going to be sent to the Pacific Theater. He was going to be a coxin operator. He was also involved in Sail Patrol here on the home front for some time.

His brother was stationed in the Philipines I believe and was taken prisoner as the other thread I made told that tale and was stationed at Osaka POW camp. He was eventually liberated; surviving the horrors of the Bataan Death March and life inside a Japanese POW camp.

His other brother was in the Marines I am not to much sure about him. He served on the USS Erie for a bit, the ship which was sunk. He even made the big screen. He appeared on a reel of film as an honor guard on the USS Erie when some important Japanese official came to sign something. Man what I wouldn't give to see that film.

His other brother was in the Army and him I am not to much sure about either.

I know this story applies to one of his brothers, I think it was Paul it did. He was in the Rice Patty Navy and went into occupied China to train guerilla's and whatnot. His real desire in going over there was in hopes of helping free his brother in the POW camp. He went a bit off the rules and saw this child and took him under his wing and took care of him and made sure he made it to America and was in good hands. Years past and eventually a story arises from a PA newspaper from that very same kid saying he owed his life to my grandfather's brother. He wanted him to come over and meet him again but when asks I was told he said no. He did what he had to do and he wants nothing more of that. Sadly he passed on before I was born and had a chance to talk to him about anything of that nature. I haven't found the newspaper article but I know we have it somewhere.

My Uncle was involved in the European Theater. He was in the 12th Armored Division 82nd Med. Batt. part of the 2nd Armored Divsion. I never really heard stories from him as I was a weee lad when he was alive and never really had the interest I do now in the war. I get tid bits here and there. My grandmother said he always loved the ladies. I found one of his books he had, a little notepad. In it was the translations for such phrases as Do you have a sister? Give me a kiss. etc. You get the point. I have his scrapbook he made though so I have a good idea of where he was and what he did. Hell I even got his photograph publist in a book on the German Luftwaffe airplanes since he had some shots in the book of German airplanes.

My other grandfather on my father's side doesn't have much of a war story to him. He was in the army and was a MP. All in all he missed the boat to go overseas and I don't think he ever made it over there and wound up on the homefront.

[Jim O]

My father and his two brothers all served in US armed forces. My father was in a mechanical unit with the US Army Air Corps from 1942-1946. He spent most of that time in Florida but did finish his service with several months on Guam, after the armistice in the Pacific had been concluded.

His middle brother served in the Navy aboard the carrier USS Hornet (CV-12) and his youngest brother was a gunner on a long range bomber crew (B-24 I believe) as part of the 8th Air Force and completed 30 bombing missions and dozens of sorties over Germany and occupied territories. He finished his missions prior to D-Day (he volunteered just after his 18th birthday in January 1942) and was later an instructor at a school in Florida.

[Ingsoc]

My grandfather and his brother serve in the British army as part of the Jewish Bridage.

[Jim O]

I forgot two other family members whose service I recall. My mother's uncle, a lawyer by education, claimed to have served in the Judge Advocate General Corps but I believe that he actually was in OSS (Office of Strategic Services) given his activities. During the war he travelled to Iran and USSR among other places. His wife was a WAC (Women's Army Corps).

[gao_yixing]

Two uncles of my father served in New 4th Army which belongs to Communist Party. One of them was killed by Kuomingtang in Wannan Incident(New Fourth Army Incident - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia), the other one escaped but injured severely.
My grandma on father's side lived in Japanese-occupied Shanghai. She sabotaged the production of the fatories.

[Helmut Von Moltke]

my grandfather served in the Kuomingtang army. He did not see battle, and afterwards resigned from the army and lived in Japanese occupied territory, where he spent some time in a Japanese military prison on some false charge a friend of his made up. During imprisonment he was on good terms with a Kempetai soldier fro mthe university of Tokyo, who gave him food and helped get him released. The "friend" was arrested soon afterwards on another charge my grandpa did not know. My grandpa also saw the Chinese collabarator Wang Jingwei give a speech.

Kevin

[Klaus]

One of my grandfathers served in the DAK. My other was in the HJ but never saw battle because his two brothers and his father allready served in France, Norway and Russia.

[Jim O]

Originally Posted by Ingsoc

My grandfather and his brother serve in the British army as part of the Jewish Bridage.

Were they British citizens or had they left the continent to avoid Hitler?

[Ingsoc]

Originally Posted by Jim O

Were they British citizens or had they left the continent to avoid Hitler?

Like most soldiers of the Jewish Bridage they were citizens of British mandated Israel, they both born in Israel.

[temujin77]

My paternal grandfather served in the (Nationalist) Chinese Army Air Corps as a ground engineer, and served in Shanghai in 1937 during the Japanese invasion. My grandmother lost at least one son during the chaotic refugees fleeing from the city during Japanese bombings, and she picked up a lost girl cowering in the street corner and she later became my aunt. My grandfather later served in Burma maintaining supply routes, possibly the Burma Road. After the war, he fought the Communists in Manchuria, then fled to Taiwan with his immediate family with the government after China fell.

My maternal grandfather was a servant for a Japanese official or businessman in Taiwan. He performed menial tasks, but was treated well. He was given a Japanese education and later became a civil engineer for the Chinese government in Taiwan and designed dams in central Taiwan.