View From The Porch: On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month...

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month...

...the guns fell silent.

10 comments:

New Jovian Thunderbolt said...: Except Lee Marvin of the 1st Infantry Division stabbed that one guy, after.; 7:55 AM, November 11, 2008
Anonymous said...: Sorry, n.j.t., wrong war.

Y'know, Tam, there ain't a lot you can say in a short blognote about war, except that there sure have been a bunch of dumb sumbitches in the decision-making which led to all those dead bodies.

And the boys are never home by Christmas.

Art; 9:26 AM, November 11, 2008
Crucis said...: A cousin of my mother was a WW1 vet. In one of the larger mass attacks late in the war, he was held back while the rest of his company attacked. He spoke fluent German and was held back to help translate for the anticipated prisoners. Instead, his all of his company except for 8 were killed in the attack.

He told that story a number of times and always with tears.; 10:57 AM, November 11, 2008
Hunsdon said...: Art:

Actually, njt was right. Sam Fuller's "The Big Red One" opens up with Lee Marvin in "the big one," in "the war to end all wars," out on patrol all by his lonesome, knifing to death a German soldier . . . shortly after the eleventh hour, of the eleventh day.; 11:35 AM, November 11, 2008
Old NFO said...: Thanks for remembering Tam, my Dad was in both WWI and WWII, and never talked about either one.; 1:31 PM, November 11, 2008
BobG said...: I only knew one veteran of WWI personally, and he wore a pickelhaube. Had a lot of interesting stories (and pictures and artifacts) when we'd have a few beers.; 3:09 PM, November 11, 2008
Anonymous said...: My grandfather was in the Kaiser's army in WWI, came up through South America in 1920 to the US. I'll bet he had a thousand stories about both, but never told any of them.

As an aside, a now deceased aunt was denied a top secret military clearance because her father had carried arms against the US.; 5:31 PM, November 11, 2008
Anonymous said...: Grampa Russell was gassed a few days after Belleau Wood, which is probably the only reason my cousin Ritchie and I managed to get into the 5th Marines.
He spit his lungs out the following winter, leaving behind his widow, who had just lost her firstborn to the Influenza epidemic, and a newborn little girl, who, almost 30 years later, became my mother.
Grandma died while I was in bootcamp, and never saw me in my dress blues.
She had remarried seven years later, and was a good wife to old Mike.
But shortly before she died, she showed me a picture of my grandfather that had been hidden behind the wallpaper all those years. I understood then why I'd always been her favorite.
To absent friends. Semper Fi.; 7:38 PM, November 11, 2008
Tommy Paine IX said...: A huge heartfelt thank you to all who've served.; 3:35 AM, November 12, 2008
brbiswrite said...: From an old vet: Thanks to all who remember.

BRB; 10:16 AM, November 12, 2008