June 22, 1945: The war is over

[Apex]

We just didn't know it yet.

from:

[H]

On that date (April 20) on page 238, A. Hitler was having his 56th birthdate in his last days in the bunker beneath Berlin. The war in Europe (as far as the Nazis were militarily concerned) was truly at its end. On that same date, my dad, in the medical corps, had his 27th birthdate in Italy... it was still some time before my birth but his life was nearly half over.
It was bad on both fronts but the Pacific Theatre was up front brutal.

8-)

[Apex]

My father didn't talk about the war much, but would answer questions if put to him.  Unfortunately, back then I didn't know what questions to ask.

In the early 50's on a trip back to New York, my grandmother turned up his wartime letters.  I told my father to take those letters home with us, but she refused to give them up.

When she passed away in 1982, my Aunt sent down some items, chairs, a statue, a vase.  But no letters.

If my Cousin had the letters when my Aunt passed, she would have sent them to me. 

I will never know what happened to them, or what was in them.  My father was a good writer, they may have contained some interesting items.

[H]

I didn't get as much from them as I now wish. Like you, had little thought as to what to ask or, later, how. My dad told me only a few of the less combat-related occurances in his sojourn from South Africa to Europe, less about the fighting and his actual job. The same with my uncles, one of which learned what little German he knew in pow camp at the end of the war; I just lost a Navy uncle this past Christmas and I know nothing of his ventures and doubt that my cousins do. I do know that my mother's brother (just into his 80s now; he was under age and cheated his way into the army via the Merchant Marine) met up with my dad and another acquaintance from our home town in North Africa. I've been told more from others of the era than by family.

8-)