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Transcribed by: INA C. LeBLANC, CSR, RPR SEPTEMBER 27, 2010
MS. EILEEN DOWNEY HURST: Today is Thursday,
August 26th, 2004. I'm interviewing veteran
Joseph Menditto at Central Connecticut State College in
New Britain, Connecticut. Interviewer is Eileen Hurst
Downey.
Joseph, would you tell me your full name, your
birth date, and your current address.
MR. JOSEPH MENDITTO: Yeah. My name is
Joseph J. Menditto...
Q: What war were you in and what branch of service?
A: I was in the Italian Campaign. After the war was over
in Africa, the -- the war took place in the invasion of
Italy, and I came in about a month or two after the
invasion.
Q: Okay. So this is World War II?
A: Right.
Q: And what branch of the service?
A: Army. United States Army.
Q: Army. What was your rank?
A: I was PFC.
Q: Were you drafted or did you enlist?
A: I was drafted.
Q: Where were you living at the time?
A: I was living in New Britain.
Q: Oh. So you were a New Britain guy from way back?
A: Yeah.
Q: Do you remember where you were, what you were doing
when you were drafted, how old you were?
A: I was -- When I was drafted, I was -- it was 1942. I
was 21 years old at the time.
Q: And what were you doing?
A: I was working for my father.
Q: And that was in New Britain?
A: Right. We were....
Q: You were drafted by the Army. Did you think of
choosing a different branch of service, or you were
satisfied to go in the Army?
A: Well, at that time there was a lot of confusion, so I
didn't know too much about the military. So if I was
going to get in the service, I think at that time I
figured one was as good as the other. Yeah.
Q: Try to look over towards me and the camera.
A: Yeah.
Q: Do you recall your first days in the service?
A: When I was at Fort Devens, Massachusetts, we --
Q: Is that where you did your basic training?
A: No. We were -- We were sent to Fort Devens,
Massachusetts to get our clothing and equipment to go
to our permanent base in Oklahoma.
Q: So you went to Fort Devens, Mass., got your clothing
and gear, and then you went to --
A: Camp Gruber, Oklahoma.
Q: Can you spell it, Gruber.
A: Yeah, G-r-u-b-e-r.
Q: And is that where you did your basic training?
A: Yes.
Q: Can you remember what basic training was like?
A: It was tough, because we were all frail and tender and
everything. Naturally, they're trying to get you in
shape to withstand the hardships of war, so it was kind
of tough for all the recruits that I was part of. And
the first couple of months there, it was tough,
especially when we were on these hikes and stuff like
that where you had to go 15, 20 miles at a time, and we
weren't used to it. Our body wasn't used to it, and we
were falling out and stuff like that, and getting
gradually toughened up.
Q: Do you remember any of your instructors from basic
training?
A: Well, it's hard to say, because I was there in basic
training for about four months, and then I was
transferred to headquarters company, and I had a new
group of officers and commissioned -- not commissioned,
officers in charge of our training.
Q: Where was the headquarters company, still in Oklahoma?
A: Yeah.
Q: If you were four months at basic training, that was to
learn just the basics?
A: Yeah.
Q: What did you learn at headquarters company?
A: Well, then they sent me to headquarters company. I was
in the S2 section, which is the intelligence section
for scouts and fort observers, and learned how to
operate observation posts on the front lines with
radios and telephones that were brought to us by the
communications platoons.
Q: Did they give you a choice, or is that where they told
you you were going to be trained? Did you choose to go
to the intelligence company?
A: In the Army, they don't give you no choice.
Q: Why -- Did you have any special background in
intelligence that they thought that would be a good
company for you?
A: It wasn't a company. It was a platoon. Part of this
platoon -- one section of the platoon was devoted to
intelligence. The other part was records and things.
Everybody had their own specific job.
Q: How long was the training at headquarters company?
A: Well, from there we went to maneuvers in Louisiana, and
then I became a permanent part of that headquarters
company. I was temporarily assigned when I first went
there from G company, which is a rifle company; and
then after maneuvers, I was permanently made a part of
the headquarters company, which is part of the
battalion. There's three rifle companies in their
battalion and the headquarters company, and I was in
this headquarters company.
Q: After maneuvers in Louisiana, where did you go?
A: From Louisiana we went to Texas. We went to
San Antonio, Texas for a little bit more training there
and to get equipped to go overseas.
Q: Okay. And we've already mentioned that Joseph was in
World War II.
Where exactly did you go? When you left Texas,
you went overseas?
A: We went -- From Texas we went to --
down to Virginia --
Newport News, Virginia -- to get on the ship destined
to go somewhere, but they didn't tell us where we were
going.
Q: So when you shipped out, you didn't know what your
destination was?
A: No, no. It was 1943. I think it was October 1943 when
we were shipped out of Newport News, Virginia, and we
were in the convoy of 200 -- of 105 five ships, 105
ships. As you looked out from the ship, everywhere you
turned there was a ship, and you were hoping you
weren't going to get strafed, because we were good
targets.
At that time, 1943, when we went into the
Atlantic Ocean, the Germans were operating all their
submarines in the Atlantic there, and they were
blasting all our ships with supplies. And our men on
land in Italy and North Africa, and stuff like that,
were getting less supplies, because they were getting
torpedoed.
So the trip from Newport News to North Africa,
we landed up in North Africa, Oran, North Africa. Took
us 21 days. And the reason why it took us 21 days is
because there was so many submarines in the area --
German submarines in the area of the Atlantic Ocean, we
had to zigzag so they couldn't set their target on us,
because I think it takes nine minutes from the
beginning to actually pull the trigger, nine minutes to
strike a ship, and before that nine minutes is up, you
change your course. So it took us 21 days to go across
the Atlantic.
And in the middle of that 21 days, I was on the
liberty ship, which is a private ship. These were
leased ships by the car maker after the war. I think
it was -- what's his name now -- the big car maker.
Anyway, he made a bunch of these liberty ships, and he
leased them out to the government, and about the tenth
day out, which is the middle of our journey, we woke up
and -- because the ship we were on, liberty ships, were
private ships, they were merchant marines. They
weren't regular sailors. They were merchant marines.
They were paid. And we woke up, and we were stationary
in the ocean, in the middle of the ocean.
Q: Why? Why?
A: We were broke down. And there was one big cruiser
making big sweeps around us, and I asked one of the
merchant marines there, "What do we do now?"
Q: Were you the only ship left all alone? Did the rest
keep going?
A: Yeah, yeah. Sure. They can't stop. One hundred four
ships stop for one? They can't stop. They got a
mission to accomplish. They have to keep going. They
left this one cruiser making big sweeps around us, and
I said to the merchant marine there, talking to him, I
says, "What do we do now?"
He says, "Pray."
I said, "How long is that ship going to stay
with us?"
"Only as long as it takes him to catch up with
the rest of the convoy. If it takes him ten hours,
that's all he gives you. They're not going to
sacrifice 104 ships for one ship."
So it took us about four hours to repair this
ship, because every ship has a machine shop on it. If
it's minor stuff, they can fix it. If it's major,
you're out of luck. But God was with us, and it was
fixed, and we sailed. And when we went back, we didn't
go back by that shifting of the seven minutes. We went
straight, because we had this cruiser following us, and
we caught up with the rest of the convoy.
Q: That was pretty scary --
A: Oh, yeah. There was about -- I'd say about 200 of our
men in that ship too, because they had mostly cargo,
bringing cargo to wherever points of destination. But
they had racks, bunkers, sleeping on top of each other
four high in a crowded thing. In a thing about as big
as this here, there would be 200 men sleeping here.
Q: Oh, my. I'm going to shut this off for a second.
(Pause.)
Q: When you caught back up with the other 104 ships, you
went to Oran, North Africa?
A: Right.
Q: And what did you do there?
A: We stayed there about three months. It was mountain
training. North Africa is similar terrain as Italy.
It's very mountainous. We were there because our
forces -- all the Allied forces left North Africa for
the invasion of Italy.
Q: At that point in North Africa, did you know you were
going to Italy?
A: Well, we didn't know -- They don't tell you anything.
So they -- Sometimes if you don't know nothing, you're
better off anyway.
Like I say, we were there about four months, and
I had the biggest scare of my life when I was in North
Q: What happened?
A: Every day in order to keep fit -- You don't have the
regular exercises. They make you go on hikes. Walking
is the best exercise. So every day, we're up and down
the mountains and everything. So you start at about
8:00 o'clock in the morning, and then you come in at
about 4:00 o'clock. So -- And every company is one
following each other in single file. So there's 250
guys in the company, and if there's four companies,
that's 1,000 men single file. You can imagine, that
would be from here to the center of New Britain, the
line of soldiers walking, a hike.
So this particular day, my company, headquarters
company, was last in the line of march, and I had a
stomachache and I had to relieve myself. And as they
were walking through a wooded area, I left to relieve
myself and went into the woods to relieve myself. And
when I was through, I came out, and I'm looking for
them, and I couldn't find them. That was in North
Africa.
And I was so scared. I climbed the trees, you
know, looking for them, and there were trees and stuff,
and I couldn't see anything. So I went to the ground
to try to see if I could hear any truck movement or
voices. I couldn't hear anything. I run here and
there, and I came back in a circle to where I started.
And I looked here and looked there, and I went -- I
couldn't -- I was running and running.
I had a rifle with me but no ammunition. When
we were in North Africa, it was not a combat area, so
no ammunition was furnished. We had just a rifle with
a bayonet and stuff like that, with a pack on your
back. I couldn't turn back. I didn't know to go back,
so I was going forward, and I'm heading towards a
little village there. And on the mountainside -- There
was Arabs on the mountainside staring down at me, and I
was scared. I thought maybe they were going to attack
me, because they said they would jump a soldier just to
take his t-shirt, and I was by myself. I had a rifle,
but they didn't know I had no ammunition.
So I'm heading towards this village,
(unintelligible chanting). I was scared as hell, and I
couldn't turn back, because they were looking down on
me. And I had to go forward. I'm going forward, and
they were (unintelligible chanting). And there was two
horses striding each other, and there was a thing
across them. I think it was like a funeral procession.
And I had to go through that.
And I made -- I just -- I held my poise, and I
walked through, you know, didn't appear to be scared or
nothing, understand? I walked through, and I went
through there, and I landed on the other side of the
village there. And I'm listening to the ground and
looking for dust, because there's no roads over there.
The roads they had was all dirt roads. And we had a
lot of trucks moving, so they create a lot of dust. So
I'm looking at these trees to see if there's any dust
accumulating up in the air. I'm looking and looking.
All of a sudden, I hear some rumbling. I heard some
rumbling, and I'm running towards the direction of the
rumble. I'm running, running, running, and I meet a
road there, and there's trucks going up and down the
road. I hollered at the whole -- the drivers. It was
a big, regular-size truck, and it was bringing water to
the camp. I hollered. I said, "Hi! Hi! Help me!"
"What's wrong, soldier?"
I said, "I'm lost."
"Where you going?"
I said, "Headquarters company, second
battalion."
He said, "You're lucky. I'm going to go down
there and bring some water down there." He said,
"Hop in."
Q: Boy, you were lucky. Then you got a ride there?
A: Yeah, he brought me right to the place.
Q: I bet you were glad to see your old company.
A: They didn't know I was missing --
Q: They never knew the whole time?
A: -- because I got back about 3:00 o'clock, understand,
and they got back about 4:00, so they didn't know I was
missing. Nobody knew that I was missing. They could
have killed me, and they never would have found me.
Q: Wow! You already had two scary things happen, and you
hadn't even been in combat yet.
A: (Laughter.)
Q: So you did more training in North Africa, and then
where did you go?
A: From there we took a boat, an English boat, a big
English boat that brought us from North Africa to
Naples, Italy. A carrier. It was a stormy six days
that we were on -- It was the time of the year when the
storms were in the Mediterranean Sea. We had to go
across the Mediterranean Sea into Italy.
Q: Now this was still 1943?
A: Yeah -- Well, 1944, the beginning of 1944. We had a --
Like I say, they made the invasion -- While we were in
Africa, they made the invasion of Anzio, so we were
there.
In case they needed us, there was another
division ready to help. They didn't know whether to
send us to Anzio, because the Germans now were pushing
the forces that invaded Anzio out to the sea, and they
didn't know whether they had to go back to the sea or
what. So they counteracted the attack, and they were
able to hold -- stabilize their positions, and they
sent us to Monte Cassino. That's where I went to,
Monte Cassino.
Q: And can you tell me about Monte Cassino, because we
know that's a very famous battle in World War II.
A: Yeah. It was all rainy. We were there about two
weeks. Most of the time it was rainy, and we were
climbing the mountains there, and there was mud and
everything. We had more trouble there -- there was
constant --
Monte Cassino was the biggest battle that was
going on at the time, because there was no D Day or
nothing. This is prior to D Day. This is prior to all
the action that was in Europe. We were the only forces
in action in Italy. They were in England preparing for
the invasion of D Day and stuff like that while we were
doing the fighting, holding back the Germans, their
best forces in Italy, you understand?
Like I say, I was with the S2 section. They
took me up on line up in the OP, which is the ground,
and we tried --
Q: What does OP mean?
A: Observation post. We -- We had a radio with us and a
telephone. Our communications would bring us a line,
and we had our telephone, and we would wind it up and
ring the bell if we needed it. And we had a radio with
us. It was a heavy radio, not the radio like today.
Everything was all massive. We were up there, and we
were so far up there that we were way up in front of
our own troops, and they were afraid that we were going
to get captured, and they were by roving general
patrol. So our engineers came up one night, and they
put a taut wire across in front of us, maybe about 30
yards, just in case any patrol tried to contact us --
our enemy patrol trying to force their way into our
position there, they would trip on this wire. And at
the end of the wire, there would be dynamite, blocks of
dynamite, and it would explode, and we would know to
get the hell out of there, because somebody tripped the
wire.
Q: Now at that time, was Monte Cassino in German
hands or --
A: It was in German hands.
Q: Is Monte Cassino a mountain, a town, a monastery?
A: No. It's a monastery, and it's up high on this
mountain that they built this monastery. That's why
they call it "Monte." "Monte" means, in Italian,
mountain. Monte Cassino, see?
They warned the Germans not to use the monastery
as a battle ground. They said it's against the laws of
Geneva. And they said, "We're not using the thing,"
but they took surveillance planes every day and flew
over, and they saw new activity all the time, new enemy
activity, going on at Monte Cassino. So they warned
them. We saw the activity change from day to day.
"Get out of there, or else we're going to bomb it."
"Oh, no. We're not doing it."
So American forces bombed it. After they bombed it,
they showed new diggings. They were still using it,
because it was high up there, and it had the whole
valley -- because it was high up there, they had the
whole valley under surveillance, understand? So that's
the reason why they wanted it. And they wanted to hold
it as long as they could, understand?
And they -- they made this -- They made the
troops, our troops, go up there maybe a couple weeks at
a time as a battle training ground, which is good
training, but that's why our boys got killed, because
they were using actual live shells. And this was the
only battle ground in Europe at the time, so we were
taking a beating. But when we come back off the lines,
we went to Tufo after.
Q: Tufo, can you spell that?
A: Yeah, T-u-f-o. Tufo. There was a British -- _______+
were maintaining that line, which is the Gustav line,
and we relieved them at Tufo, and we -- we were there
over a month. In fact, we were in this -- this town --
little town of Tufo, and the buildings were all
battle-ruined, you know, by machine guns and whatnot,
and we were using them but they're not -- show them
that we were using them, because they were on a higher
ground ahead of us, and they could see everything. So
we were very discreet not to -- where we was under
observations, to be careful and wouldn't use it at
night and stuff like that.
One of my friends was a ______ Jeep driver for
the _________, Joe Dobrick from New Britain,
Connecticut. Nice guy. He used to do all our running
around with the Jeep, and he had to pick up the mail,
and the mail was on the other side of this roadway, but
the roadway was under observation during the daytime,
not to use the road, because it was about a mile long,
and the Germans had observation of that road. They had
it all zeroed in, so they had....
Joe -- One day he had to pick the mail up, and
he left a little early, and so he was going to chance
it to go on this road. So he's driving on this road
with him, the fellow next to him, and two other fellows
from the other company that are going to pick the mail
up for their companies, and they get almost to the end
of the road, they get air burst. And Joe -- It went
right through the hood of the cab where your feet are
under there. One piece of shrapnel cut his legs right
off. It was a good thing they were near the end of the
road where there was an aid station. He was going to
die from loss of blood --
Q: They saved him?
A: Yeah, they saved him. So he went -- he -- One leg was
right at the moment lost. The other one was partially,
but it was badly banged up. So they brought him to a
hospital in Santa Maria Caserta, and we happened to
come off the lines for a rest, and I said to my
sergeant, I said, "I want to go down to the hospital to
see Joe Dobrick," because he's from New Britain. We're
close friends.
So I go down to the hospital in Santa Maria, and
Joe had -- he was on a bed there. It was a regular
hospital, but it was taken over by the Americans, you
know. Joe had his feet way up in the air like that,
and they cut both legs at the same length. And they
were stretching them to have them -- the skin heal over
the ends. They were being stretched. So he was happy
as hell. This was April 1944, and the war didn't end
till May 1945. They had a year to go yet, so he's
happy.
"Hey, Joe. I'm going home, I'm taking that
white boat home."
I didn't know -- "Joe, thank God you're all
right." I said, "When you get back home, go down and
see my folks now."
"Oh, no. I'll go down and see them, Joe."
I said, "Sure?"
"Yes. I'll go down and see them." He was
happy. He said, "I'm taking that white boat home."
The white boat is the Red Cross boat.
Q: Oh.
A: That there, you can have all the lights on you want at
night, and not one German would fire on it. They
recognize that, because if you start fooling around,
we're going to do the same to you, understand? So they
recognize that. He was happy he was going home.
You know what? This was about April of 1944,
and in about September of 1944 my folks sent me a
letter saying Joe Dobrick came down to see us. He was
sent to Walter Reed Hospital in Washington and fitted
with prosthetics, and they -- he was able to walk on
his own with the prosthetics. They taught him how to
walk and everything. And he came down to see them. In
fact, he stayed overnight.
My father lived in a three-family house, and
there was a party on the third floor, a young couple
that lived there, and there was a hurricane that day,
and he stayed upstairs because he knew them. He stayed
upstairs until the hurricane was over.
We're losing a lot of time here, huh?
Q: That's all right.
So did you see Joe Dobrick when you got back home?
A:
He was getting a disability check. At that time there
was a lot of bars around. I came home. I go uptown --
You know, I was in uniform and everything. Everybody
was in uniform. I said, "Hey, do you ever see Joe
Dobrick?"
"Oh, yeah. Any time you want to see him, he's
down at the Arlington Arms." Always at the Arlington
Arms. He's spending his check at the Arlington Arms.
So I -- One day I go down into the Arlington
Arms. It was a long walk from the door -- the entrance
door to where the bar was, and Joe's sitting on a stool
at the bar, and he looked around and sees me. It was a
different story now. I had my legs, he didn't. And he
was sorry that I came back. He didn't even want to
hardly talk to me, because I had my legs and he didn't.
I hated to see that moment, but that's part of
living, part of war. You see, it turns people around.
You know, he was the guy that was suffering. He went
through all that hell and everything, but he made it.
But when he made it, those other guys that were there
with him came back a little better than he did. You
understand? They went through more hell than he did,
but they came back. I hated that.
You know what? He lived about five minutes from
where I lived. I used to walk sometimes to his house.
He lived in a two-family house. And one day, it was
hot as hell, I went to see him. And he came to me and
now his -- his mechanical feet weren't working. They
weren't working. Guess what? I went to the back door,
knocked on the door, and he came to me walking on his
stumps. So he said, "All right, Joe. Come in."
It was hot as hell. I sit down and tell him,
"How you doing, Joe? I'm just checking up on you."
He goes over to the refrigerator, gets a bottle
of Coke. And then he goes to the cupboard, gets a
glass, sits it on the table, opens the bottle, pours
the Coke and drinks it. He doesn't even offer me a
drink.
Q: Oh. I guess you found out how he was doing.
A: Yeah, but that's....
Q: Where did you go from Tufo?
A: Tufo, they set up a sand table, big table. On this
sand table they had all the terrain marked out in the
hills and valleys, and houses and everything, so when
we made the attack, we would know where we were.
Q: This was which attack? Attack on --
A: On Santa Maria Infante, which is part of the major
attack of Cassino. We were all on the same line.
Q: Santa Maria Infanto (sic)?
A: I-n-f-a-n-t-e. Infante.
Q: So these were towns --
A: Yeah.
Q: -- on the way to getting to Monte Cassino?
A: Yeah. On the road to Rome. On the road to Rome.
Q: So did you attack those towns?
A: We went -- that's what the book is -- my part in the
book is. I was with the colonel. He was a battalion
commander, Colonel Kendall. Nice guy.
And he --
I had a -- I had an extra radio on my back in
case our radioman needed -- wore out the battery. I
had another live battery to use. And part of my
equipment -- I had to carry a tape that round, about
18 inches in diameter, about three-quarter inches wide,
cloth tape, you know, regular cloth tape (indicating).
And you know what the use of that tape was?
Q: What?
A: The lead man in the attack now was supposed to carry
that like I did, and as he progressed on the thing, let
it out. So when he's walking, if he doesn't step on a
mine, he's safe, so somebody can follow him. So leave
the tape out. If he made it, the rest can make it. So
follow that tape.
Q: Yes. And you were the lead man?
A: No, I wasn't the lead man. I had extra tape. In case
that man ran out of tape, I was supposed to tie into it
so the rest of the guys could use it.
So guess what happened? In the attack, the
Battle for Santa Maria Infante was from Minturno,
Italy, was on the Gulf of Giada, which was a seaport
there, and our naval ships were firing big shells at
this target. And, you know, when they fire shells, you
know, they miss. A shell there, a shell there. When
you're walking there now -- and they make big craters
when they bomb, the dirt flies over, and there's a big
hole. You're walking in the dark, and you stumble into
them.
I stumbled and I lost my helmet. I'm looking
for my helmet. I can't find it. The machine guns,
du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du. Hell with the helmet. I
won't need it. I left it there. I was walking around
without a helmet with my rifle out, and I had that tape
with me, understand? And they were firing ______
pistols in the air. And it made it -- see how bright
this is?
Q: Uh-huh.
A: It was even brighter up there. The parachutes would
come down with the flares slowly, and it lit up all the
place. You couldn't move. They were firing at
shadows. The Germans were firing at shadows, the
mortar fire. How do you get out of here? How do you
get out of here? And the colonel, he was supposed to
have this town taken by 3:00 o'clock in the morning.
It was 3:00 o'clock, and we were just about starting.
In Italy, because there's mountains, there was
walls there, retaining walls, to hold up the soil so
people could use it for planting and stuff. And they
were all huddled behind these walls. The Germans were
up on the hill firing down, du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du.
The colonel comes up and he sees them, "Come on,
get out there. Fire your pistols." There was a
building there, and the machine gun was coming from
that building there. "Fire that building." He was
firing his pistol, du-du-du-du-du. He ran out there,
he grabbed the man's rifle, du-du-du-du-du. He grabbed
the bazooka. He was going crazy, because he couldn't
keep up. He shouldn't be there. He was a colonel.
Q: Wow!
A: So he says, "Come on, come on." So me and another
fellow from New Britain, Frankie Skorzado (phonetic) --
His Jeep driver was in back of him. He says, "Come
on." He goes in back of him, du-du-du-du-du-du-du, and
he gets hit in the head.
Q: The colonel?
A: (Nods head.)
And I said, "Frankie!" Frankie comes over. I said,
"The colonel got hit!" So we took his first-aid kit
off his thing there and tried to wrap it around his
head. And blood was coming out, and the white stuff,
the brains, was coming out. And I said, "Frankie, he's
gone. He's gone. We better alert everybody."
"Oh, what we got?"
We got to be afraid of a counterattack now. We
had nobody to lead us here, so Frankie took all his
identification out in case we had to leave his body.
We couldn't do nothing. We had to take the
identification off. He said, "I'm taking all the
identification off."
I said, "I'm going to use his helmet," so I took
his helmet, and I wiped the blood off, and I used it
for three days.
Q: Do you still have it?
A: No. I had to use a new one, but it was a hole like
that (indicating). And, you know, after three days
when we lost that battle and somebody else had to push
through us in order to get -- the Germans, they killed
so many of our men there and captured so many men that
we lost the battle, and then they took off. They took
off. And that's when we started to advance.
And the news correspondents in town, in the area
where we were, they're looking for news stories. So he
sees me with this hole in the head like that
(indicating). When Skorzado (phonetic) took the silver
leaf off the colonel's thing, the helmet, it left the
solder mark. It looked like lieutenant bars.
Sid Fedder was the reporter. He says, "Hey,
Lieutenant. How did you survive that hole in your
head?"
Q: What did you say?
A: I said it wasn't my helmet. It was the colonel's
helmet.
"Were you with the colonel?"
I said, "Yeah. Frankie and I were from the same
town, New Britain, Connecticut," and he wrote a story
about us. He wrote a story about us.
Q: Wow! Where did you go from Santa Maria Infante?
A: We walked all the way -- from there we walked to Anzio.
We went up to the mountains. We're two weeks in the
mountains. We were walking, because our orders was to
cut off the road that was feeding the Germans, the
troops at Anzio, so we had to cut them out.
So we were up in the mountains there, and we
were out of food, out of ammunition and stuff. And one
day a plane comes over and drops boxes with parachutes,
you know, and we're way on top of the mountains, and
the pilot misses his mark on the mountain, and the
parachutes land down on the bottom of the hill, way
down at the bottom of the hill.
And the guys are hungry. They're hungry, you
understand? So they're running down the hill. They're
running down the hill with bayonets so they could
open -- because in those days it was wooden boxes.
They went running down the hill. They wanted to get
something to eat right away. He opens the box up.
Guess what? Hand grenades. He was so mad he was going
to take the hand grenades and throw it back at the
plane (laughter).
Q: Did you finally get some food?
A: Yeah. They brought it by mules.
Q: Wow! How long were you at Anzio?
A: We walked there and came out of there. It was free.
They had no problem there.
Q: (Unintelligible.)
A: Yeah, yeah.
Q: Where did you go from there?
A: We went on the road to Rome. We were one of the first
divisions in Rome. We walked and walked, and our
planes -- on good days they would spray the Germans in
front of us. Of course, in those days they didn't have
too much gas, gasoline, so a lot of their heavy
equipment and stuff was brought by Belgian horses. So
when the planes came down, they killed the horses, and
the horses were in the middle of the road. And when we
came by marching through the town, the Italians were
there cutting all the meat off the horses, the dead
horses, understand, to eat. There's flies all around.
And there was these big heavy Jeeps with the
German officers in there, and one Italian was taking
this one shoe off -- the boot off one, and another guy
was fighting for the boots off the dead German, and he
was laying there bullet-ridden.
Q: Wow! Any other incidents happen on the way to Rome?
A: Yeah. You know, they were so happy to see us that --
Italy -- Rome wasn't touched at all. It was an open
city. Everybody agreed not to fire nothing, the
Germans and Americans. It was an open city. You could
go into one of the stores and buy a pair of silk
stockings for yourself that they had in Rome at that
time. It was an open city, understand?
Q: Uh-huh.
A: And we met while we were there. And of course they
were bringing out the wine and pastry and stuff. One
civilian -- I spoke a little bit of Italian, you see.
I could understand Italian. He said, "Come on upstairs
to my apartment." He lived in the block there. And me
and this other fellow went upstairs, and he was an
archeologist, and he was showing us the coins that he
had found in his work. And they were a bunch of pieces
of mud that was frozen together.
And he said, "See this?" and then he showed us
the final product. And my friend from New Jersey -- He
offered us some of his coins, gold coins, and I wasn't
that type of guy to take advantage of anybody. And I
felt this guy was going -- He was so happy that we
relieved him, and he wanted to return something for
being a liberator. I was a liberator, you understand?
He wanted to return the favor, so he offered us some,
and my friend took it. And I didn't take nothing. I
was an honest guy and....
Q: How long were you in Rome?
A: We were there about a day or so, and then the war had
to go on. As soon as we got on the outside of Rome,
the fighting started again.
Q: Where was your mission after Rome? Where were you
headed?
A: So long ago. Like I say, we were -- there was -- I
think -- yeah. We were firing, we were going
through --
Like the book there, we were going through --
out of the mountains, and we went towards the plains
where it was plains like out West, you know, miles of
plains, but it's around this mountain, see?
So we go -- We were supposed to go relieve this
division on line, and we walked to within about eight
miles of where we were supposed to be, because we could
walk eight miles in about three hours, two or three
hours. And if we walked back to where they were, we
would be under observation by the mountains, the
Germans. They could see us. They could kill us. So
we had to stay about eight miles away behind the line.
As it got dark at about 8:00 o'clock at night
about this time of year, July-August, we would walk
that eight miles to the front line. It wouldn't be no
problem for us. But about 4:00 o'clock in the
afternoon, we were on line, and all our men -- don't
forget, you had to be stretched out all the way down,
all the way down.
I knew that we were going to stay there until
about 9:00 o'clock that night, so I was kind of
restless. I said, "I'm going to take a walk." So I
was taking a walk down this way, and I see a bunch of
soldiers that I didn't recognize. Being that I was in
S2 section, I was always assigned to an elite company,
and I knew a lot of the guys in all the other
companies, because I was -- in between them, I would
give them support, but I didn't recognize nobody down
here.
So I went up to one of the fellows. I said,
"Hey, what company are you?"
He says, "A Company."
"A Company? That's first battalion. I was
second battalion."
He said, "Yeah, A Company."
I said, "Do you know Jerry Salvio?"
He said, "Yeah. Why?"
I said, "He's a good friend of mine from my
hometown. We had a bunch of good times together."
He said, "See that tree over there?" -- it was
about 15 feet away or so -- "See that guy standing
against that tree there? That's Jerry."
"No."
"Yeah. Go."
I went over there, "Hey, Jerry!" I hugged him.
We were friends. We got drafted together, and I didn't
see him since we left Camp Gruber. We had basic
training together.
He said, "Joe, I got good news."
I said, "What's that, Jerry?"
He said, "I'm going home!"
I said, "How are you going home?"
He said, "Rotation." He said, "They started
this rotation system." He said, "I'm one of the eight
guys surviving left. Out of 250 guys, I'm one of eight
left, and they're going to send me home on 30 days.
And I'm coming back here, but I'm going home first for
30 days."
I said, "Don't forget when you go home now, see
my folks down _________ Street."
"Joe, don't worry. I'll go. I'll see your
folks and tell them you're all right."
And, you know, we were talking for a little
while, and I hugged him and I left. And a couple days
later -- My outfit in Italy, there was about 200 guys
from New Britain, my hometown. They were scattered all
over. So a couple days later, we're walking through
the wooded area, and I see Johnny Burns. Johnny Burns
was with A Company with Jerry. I said, "Johnny, how
you doing?"
He said, "Not good."
I said, "What's wrong?"
He said, "I'm a GRO now," you know, GRO, grave
registrar's office. He's out there to pick the bodies
up.
I said, "How's my friend Jerry?"
He said, "I picked his body up this morning."
I said, "No!"
He said, "Yeah."
I couldn't believe it. I was just talking to
him two nights ago. I couldn't believe it.
So when we came off the line, off of that, I
went down to A Company. I found out where A Company
was. I went to talk to this sergeant. He said, "You
know what happened? Jerry and all his platoon went
into a wooded area, an olive grove, and when the
Germans found them in this olive grove, they shelled
them with artillery shells, and when the artillery
shells burst, all these wooden things made more
shrapnel. These fellows didn't have a chance. They
didn't have a chance," he said. "They threw artillery
in there and busted the trees and everything. These
fellows didn't have a chance. We lost a lot of men in
there."
And I said, Now what am I going to do when I get
home? Am I going to tell his mother? His mother was
living. I was scared to go up to his mother's house.
She'll say, "Why didn't Jerry come home with you?"
Q: Strain.
A: I'm with PTS. Do you know what PTS --
Q: What?
A: Posttraumatic stress. Do you see it? Could you see
it?
Q: In you?
A: Yeah.
Q: No. I interviewed several soldiers that had
posttraumatic stress, and I'm hearing a lot of stories.
I mean, up to this point, you've already seen so much
combat and death and destruction, it's unbelievable.
It's a wonder that the soldiers can keep on functioning
and keep on doing their job in the field.
Where did you go from there?
A: I went to Mount Capello.
Q: Capello?
A: Mount Capello. Mount Capello. I got wounded twice
there.
Q: Do you want to tell me how that happened?
A: Yeah. It's in the -- You didn't have a chance to read
my notes, huh?
Q: No, but if you let me borrow them, I'll make a copy of
it so I can send it into the Library of Congress.
At this point, we should probably note that
Joseph brought this brand new book out that talks about
Monte Cassino, and there are several pages in it with
Joseph's name in it and the role that he played in that
battle.
Do you remember the author of the book?
A: Yeah. Matthew Parker.
Q: So that's noted for the record, and that's just out
now, 2004.
So how were you wounded at Mount Capello? What
were you doing there? You seem to get yourself in the
thick of the battle wherever you go.
A: Well, that was my job.
Q: I would have chose cook or something.
A: (Laughter.) You know, when I got wounded and I went
back to the hospital to get operated on, I wanted to go
back to my friends. I wanted to go back.
Q: And that's what a lot of soldiers say too.
What were you doing at Mount Capello? Did the Germans
hold that?
A: Yeah. Too bad -- My notes are there. The battle of
Mount Capello is short. If you want to read them
now -- You can't read them now?
Q: No, but I'll read them later, and, if you don't mind,
I'll make a copy and send them in.
A: But anyway, Mount Capello, we were on the move and
everything. The -- On the way, it was rainy weather, a
whole week rain, and we were getting -- the Germans
were -- they were really holding us in Italy. They
didn't want to lose their foothold in Italy, you know.
So we were climbing the mountain. It was like
a -- like a -- maybe a ten-foot trail leading up to the
top of the mountain there, and it was covered with
small growth and stuff, but there was enough room for
us to walk up. And we were walking up this thing, and
it was rainy, and it was about 6:00, 7:00 o'clock in
the morning, and it was foggy. And as we were walking
up to the mountain, there was fog. See, we were
walking up to the mountain, it was foggy, and as we got
towards the top of the mountain, the fog lifted. The
fog lifted. The fog lifted.
There was a machine gunner up there waiting for
us. Du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du-du. Oh, he had us to
scatter down. We had to scatter down. I was kind of
scattered down, and as we were scattered, coming down
the mountain, the fog came down on us again. We
couldn't see too much in front of us. As we kept going
down the mountain, we saw something moving towards us.
We saw -- We got about from here to that thing
(indicating). __________, there was Germans, about 14,
15 of them. We were walking right into them. Walking
into them. They scattered, we scattered, they started
to fire. My colonel -- another colonel, another one,
got hit in the neck. I landed on the ground, and my
pack got caught in that scrubby bush. I couldn't get
myself out of that pack. I had to unbuckle the thing
so it releases everything. I left the thing, and I
took my rifle and ran down the hill, and everybody
scattered (laughter).
And about an hour later, these Germans knew that
they were in the wrong land. They came in -- They were
recruits. They were replacement. And they came in at
night, and they got lost in the fog, and they were
trying to go back to their own side of the mountain.
Q: So they were probably just as confused as you guys?
A: Yeah, yeah.
Q: They were shocked running into Americans.
Were you wounded at that time?
A: No, no. So we captured them. There was 20 of them.
They gave up. They gave up, because they knew they
were outnumbered. They were in our land, you
understand? They were smart. Guess what? They take
all the information off these 20 guys, now. Take all
the information off them.
Q: Yes?
A: Okay. "Menditto, take this down to the rear CP, all
this information." Now they wanted me to go to ***
land nobody ever went through, maybe loaded with German
snipers, with all this information and bring it down to
the rear CP and walk it through the wooded areas,
understand?
I said, "I can't go down. What if they catch me
with all this information? They'll string me up."
So they said, "All right. Take another man with
you."
We went and we were crawling down the mountain
with all this information, bringing it back. As we
went -- we found -- This is all fluid. This is just
moving. This is not stationary. The war is moving all
the time. If the OP is here right now, in another half
hour or so, you're someplace else.
Q: So did you make it back to the CP?
A: Yeah, I made it. It was raining, and we were checking
out these homes, houses that were in the -- our way
going. So it was raining like hell. We were soaking
wet. We knock on this door. It's 8:00 o'clock in the
morning, and this Italian comes to the door. "Tadesky"
(phonetic) -- "Tadesky" means German.
"No, Americano."
"Si, Americano. Si. Si, Americano. You
Americano. Part Italiano?"
"Si, part Italiano." He's asking if I was part
Italiano.
I said -- They didn't believe we were Americans,
because the Germans were just there a while ago. How
could you be Americans when the Germans -- we were just
talking to them not too long ago. But that's war.
So anyway, we were going to go. They said no,
no, no. They had a fireplace going. They took our
coat, our jacket, put it by the fireplace, and they
were making some kind of breakfast there, so they gave
us the breakfast.
Q: It probably helped, Joe, that you spoke Italian. And
after you got fed and warm, you were on your way?
A: Yeah, down to -- as we were approaching the thing --
actually one -- The captain was crawling around. I
said, "What's wrong, Captain? Why are you crawling
around?"
He said, "There's a sniper around here. Watch
it. There's a sniper around here."
Q: After you delivered the stuff to the CP, did you have
to go back to your unit then?
A: Yeah.
Q: The same way you had just come?
A: So anyway, at Mount Capello, our troops -- G Company
was trying to take this mountain, and they got about
three-quarters of the way up there, and the Germans
surrounded them. And they -- They threw fire machine
gun, mortar fire and artillery fire, behind them. So
their only alternative is to go forward, because there
was no firing in front of them. So they were going
forward. As they were going forward, there was Germans
there to capture them or shoot at them. So a lot of
them were shot, wounded, and they were left there on
the ground (?daytime?), see? And they're hollering,
"Medic! Medic!" all hollering for medics, see?
So it started getting dark, but there was a new
battalion commander now. We lost a lot of battalion
commanders. You know why? Because they had their
insignia on their helmets, and these guys are looking
through the things there, so they killed the guy that's
got the most power. So we lost a lot of battalion
commanders.
So the order was to go up there and retrieve the
wounded men. Now the Germans wouldn't let you go up
there, understand? So I was with the group that had to
go up there to relieve them about 2:00 o'clock in the
morning. They're hollering, "Medic!" Now that --
They're all exhausted from yelling all day long, and
they're tired, and they're wounded. And the lieutenant
says, "Okay. You and you, go up about 300-400 feet and
establish a listing post. In case they try to
counterattack, you come down and warn us."
Me and this guy go up way on top there. So we
were there about a half hour, and they -- the Germans
might have seen us as we came up there. Sometimes
there's a moon out. And they were outlined. You know,
they could see us going up there. About a half hour
when we were up there (indicating), they threw a hand
grenade. I got hit right under the eye. The piece is
still there. I was bleeding profusely. I was bleeding
like hell. So me and this other guy, he was wounded
more than I was, we said, "Let's get down. We'll warn
them." So we went down the hill to warn our men, but
they knew that there was something going on, because
they heard the grenade go off.
So I was trying to wipe myself, clean myself off
and everything, and when day broke and they saw me, I
was all -- blood all over and everything. They said,
"Hey, Joe. You better go down and check that out.
Your uniform is all bloodied and everything."
So I ended up getting down the mountain, but on
the way down, "Hey, Joe. Oh, good luck to you, Joe.
You're going back." I had what they call a
million-dollar wound. I had a million-dollar wound.
"Oh, you're lucky, Joe. You're going to go back for a
rest." And they were on the bottom of the hill in
reserves, some of these guys, you understand?
Q: So what happened? You went to the hospital?
A: Yeah.
Q: Obviously, we both know you didn't get to go home.
A: No, no. I had -- Like I say, this is a fluid
situation. The medic station is not stationary. He's
moving around like everybody else. So I'm looking
around for the medic. So I find the medic. He looks
at me and says, "Let me wipe it off." He took some
alcohol, washed it off and said, "Okay. Go back up."
Q: He sent you right back out there?
A: Yeah, I went back up the hill. So I went back up the
hill, and when I went back up the hill, the guy that I
passed going down, "Hey, what are you coming back for?"
So I go back up there, and guess what? The
medics, they got a couple of sticks, and some -- I
don't know where they got the white from, the
handkerchiefs or what, and they put it in the air like
that, and they retrieved all of the wounded guys in the
daylight (indicating). It was about 10:00 o'clock in
the morning. They retrieved all these wounded guys,
took them off the hill, and not a shot was fired by the
Germans. Not a shot was fired, so I got back down
there, and they took these Germans off. I never saw
that before. They took all these Americans off that
were wounded, down.
So I was up there about 10:00, 11:00 o'clock,
and somebody says, "Hey, Joe. Your sergeant is down at
the bottom of the hill. He says for you to come down."
So I go down, and I said, "Hi. What's wrong?"
He said, "I understand you got wounded."
I said, "Yeah."
He said, "Well, take a little rest."
So I was taking my jacket off -- I was taking my
jacket off, and guess what?
Q: Don't tell me you got wounded again.
A: Yeah, mortar fire. Mortar fire. They go (indicating)
right on my back, so I hollered to the guy next to me,
"Did I get hit?"
"Yeah, yeah. You better go to the medic."
At this time, I knew where the medic was. I
went to the medic, and I see him writing a tag out, and
I know I'm going this time. So they took me and a
bunch of other guys to -- in back of a place where
there was an ambulance and -- there was an ambulance
there, and he was driving us guys about four or five
miles to an area where there was an open field, and
there was a C47 plane, and we flew back from that point
to Rome. I went to Rome. I went to Rome, and they
took off the shrapnel. I had pieces in my cheek here,
and -- you see that (indicating)?
Q: Uh-huh.
A: That piece there. I still got this one here
(indicating). And the VA, they wanted to do an MRI on
me a couple years ago, and the woman radiologist down
in Westhaven, she said, "Mr. Menditto" --
"Yes."
She said, "I understand you need an MRI."
"They tell me that I do."
"Well, I'm chief radiologist at Westhaven. I
got to ask you a couple of questions."
"Go ahead and ask."
"Do you have any metal in your head?"
"Yes."
"You do?"
"Yes."
"How come?"
"I got pieces of hand grenade under my eye,
lodged under my eye."
"How do you know that?"
"I was there at the plastic surgery, and he took
an x-ray of it and he found it. And there's a piece
under my eye, and I asked him why can't he take it
out." He said, "No, it's too close to something else,
and it's too dangerous to take it out." I said, "Mark
that down so I can get compensation for it." I said,
"This is deteriorating my life, because now I need an
MRI, and I can't get it." I'm not getting nothing for
it. They wouldn't -- my --
Q: (Unintelligible.)
A: I have trouble with my eyes, and I'm not supposed to be
doing any driving. So I asked the DAV for rides, and
you know what they said? "You have to be 30 percent
disabled."
"What can I do? How am I going to get here? I
have trouble getting a ride." They brought me here.
Q: Right. Well, after you recovered from the mortar wound
in your back, you still didn't get to go home?
A: No. I was in Rome at the hospital. After I was
convalescing there -- I was at a mess hall downstairs
where ambulatory people were able to walk down to eat.
There were about ten -- about ten tables further over
from where I was eating, you know. This guy is looking
at me, I'm looking at him, he's looking at me, I'm
looking at him. So he's waiting for me, I'm waiting
for him. All the people leave, see? They leave. I'm
going towards him, he's coming towards me.
"Pucci!"
"Menditto!"
Q: Another New Britain guy?
A: Yeah.
Q: It's pretty amazing all your buddies from New Britain
that you run into in Italy.
A: And you know what? I was at the VA the other day.
Guess who I saw there?
Q: Who?
A: This guy I met in Rome.
Q: You're kidding?
A: Sixty years later.
Q: Oh my heavens.
A: Pucci, Ray Pucci.
Q: Isn't that funny? He keeps coming back.
A: Yeah. I meet a lot of my friends.
Q: After you got out of the hospital in Rome, where did
you go?
A: You know what they said to me?
Q: What?
A: "If you want to visit Rome for a couple days, every day
you can stand guard outside the hospital here, you get
a day off to go to Rome," so I did that for about a
week or so. And guess what?
Q: What?
A: I'm a Catholic.
Q: Tell me you went to the Vatican and saw the Pope.
A: I kissed his ring. Pope Pius XII. I see a bunch of
English soldiers going into the Vatican, so I asked
them, "What's going on?"
They said, "The Pope is due out, going to give
us his blessings. Come into the chapel here."
I went into the chapel there, and the Pope is
sitting there on his thrown, and there's a Swiss guard
here and a Swiss guard there in colorful uniforms, and
the Pope comes out, gives us his blessings. And then
after his blessings, we all filed past him, and he
extends his left ring out. We kiss it, and the Swiss
guard wipes it (indicating).
And you know what? That was October 1944, and
that was my key to come home, my blessings to come
home. My ticket to come home.
Q: Why? Did you leave shortly after that?
A: No, but I came home. See what all I went through? I
came home.
Q: No small miracle, if you ask me.
A: Like I say, I came home. I said I went to Pope
Pius XII. He was the tall pope.
Q: After -- So where did you go back to?
A: Then after that we went to -- We were stationed during
the winter at Bolzano. Winter came and we stopped.
The static line.
Q: And from there where did you go?
A: I'd like to guess we -- we went there on the line
there. Nobody moved. The Germans didn't move, we
didn't move. In fact, I was on the line on Christmas
Eve in an OP, observation post, on the ground,
understand? At about 11:00 o'clock, me and another
fellow -- there's always two men there -- these
Christmas carols on the line, singing, you see?
So I ring the phone. "This is the CP." The CP
is the command post. "This is the CP."
"Well, this is OP-1."
"What's wrong, OP-1?"
"Well, we hear a bunch of carols being sung out
there in front of us."
"What is your azimuth?"
Do you know what azimuth is? It's a direction
on the compass.
"It's five degrees."
"How do you estimate the range?"
"About 500 yards."
Thirty minutes later, (indicating), and they
sent over artillery shells.
Q: Were the Germans singing Christmas carols or Americans?
A: Yeah, the Germans were singing Christmas carols. I
didn't want them to send them artillery shells or to
kill the guys.
So a half hour later, our phone rings. "OP-1?"
"Yes."
"This is CP-1. Is there any more Christmas
carolers out there?"
Q: I don't think so.
A: And you know what? At New Year's Eve, the Germans shot
tracer bullets in the air. The whole sky is
du-du-du-du-du-du, tracer bullets, 12:00 o'clock at
night. Tracer bullets, du-du-du-du-du-du.
Q: Did they have a sense of celebration?
A: Yeah.
Q: After your winter rest on line, where did you go?
A: I -- We started to get prepared for the final attack at
Bolzano and Bologna -- I think it was Bologna. Yeah.
Q: Did you attack Bologna?
A: Well, we -- the difference -- We're now on -- more or
less not as active as they were originally, because now
time was getting closer towards the end of the war, but
we didn't know it was that close to the end of the war.
In fact, we didn't even know the war was over until
they told us.
We're at this mountain -- by the foot of the
Q: Are we into 1945 now?
A: Yeah, right. In '45. Yeah.
Q: So did you attack Bologna before the war ended or no?
A: Well -- yeah. We -- Let's see. We were continually
moving, you know, and we got through this mountain
and -- near the foot of the hills of the Alps, and we
wanted to know why we were stalled there. You know, it
was good weather and everything. We thought maybe
being that we were close to the Alps, we were going to
get into the Alps, and they were going to give us
heavier clothing, because we were going to be colder at
higher altitude.
So we were there a couple days, two or three
days, and all of a sudden the lieutenant commander, he
gets all of us together, gets the whole company
together. He said, "Okay, friends, fellows. I got
news for you. Don't raise your hopes up, but we got
word they're talking peace in Naples. "Wow!" Screams
going on, everything else. "Don't get your hopes up.
They're just talking, you know."
We were told to hold what we have, not to
advance, just stay where we are until more further news
comes. The chaplain's going to say a mass at
5:00 o'clock in the local church, and everybody went.
Hedonists, Jews, Christians, everybody was at that
service praying that this was true. It was a small
church in a small town, and they all went to this
church.
Q: How much later did you hear about -- that the war was
over?
A: Then the next day, they told us it was definite that
they were continuing talks, and we were not supposed to
advance. And the Germans sent word to us -- I don't
know how they do it, but they sent word to us that we
were told not to have any fight between us, that there
is some talk going on but nothing is definite, and we
didn't know what to do. So a couple of days goes by,
and now they say the war is over.
Q: Where were you when you heard the news the war was
over?
A: I was in this town -- I forget the name of the town.
Borgo, I think. I think it was Borgo, Italy. And
everybody was happy. Now they say the Germans sent us
the word, "Don't advance. We will kill anybody
advancing towards us."
So we sent word to them. "We'll give you an
ultimatum. At 12:00 o'clock tomorrow night, if you're
not laying down your arms by that time, we're coming in
with power," you know, "We're going to resume the war."
Understand? So we didn't hear nothing from them.
So it was 11:30 that night, the trucks coming
in -- all the trucks, they were coming in. We were
loading up all these trucks and advancing, maybe have
to go two, three miles into their land to take over the
position. The trucks are all lined up. And you
know -- You're not old enough, but all of the lights --
all the headlights on the cars in the United States had
tape over them; did you know that? They had cats'
eyes; did you know that?
Q: No. For the war?
A: No, during the war.
Q: Why were they taped?
A: Because they didn't want the lights to show up.
Q: So it was --
A: In case an airplane started to attack, the lights would
give them places where they could fire at; do you
understand? Especially car lights. Understand? So
all the headlights and stuff were taped, and they just
had cats' eyes so they had a way to see without getting
into an accident.
We used to have them on our trucks out there,
because they didn't use trucks at night on account of
the lights would illuminate the place. So they took
all the tape off, the lights were shining bright, you
know, and we were with our rifles on the thing, and
we're sitting in the truck, back of the truck. You
know, there's about 10, 15 guys in each truck on each
side, and not a word. Everybody was in fear, waiting
for the artillery shell to come in and bust our truck
up. And we were advancing towards the enemy position,
see? And we go all the way up, we get into _______,
and not a shot was fired, and they accepted it.
And we come in there -- it was about
12:00 o'clock at night now, and we get into this
building, old building, and the German soldiers is
sleeping here and there, all over. They were sleeping
all over. And we Americans, the night before that we
were enemies, and now they was talking back and forth,
fraternizing.
Q: Wasn't that a bizarre feeling? It must have felt
strange.
A: The next morning we woke up, and we saw the young kids.
They were soldiers, 16 years old.
(Sneeze.)
(God bless you.)
Towards the end of the war, they were using
kids, so I told this kid, a friend of mine from
New Jersey, the one that took the gold I told you.
(Sneeze.)
(God bless you.)
I said, "Rudy, do you see that house up on the
hill over there? We're going to go up there and bring
our K rations."
Do you know what K rations are?
Q: Uh-huh.
A: "We'll bring our K rations, and we'll try to get some
eggs for it."
So we go up to this house on the hill, so we
knock on the door. It's about 7:00 o'clock in the
morning. We knock on the door, and a lady about 80,
85 years old, comes to the door scared like hell. I
said, " ___________ +."
"___________ +." She called us Germans.
They were there the same afternoon. I said,
"__________+." I said, "The war is over." She
wouldn't believe me.
She says, "Why does an American" -- They thought
the Americans were princes and kings. "Why would a
princess or a prince come down to visit my humble home?
Why would American --"
She thought the Americans were so -- you know,
everything -- nothing but the best, you know, and
coming through her house looking for eggs. She
wouldn't believe it. She wouldn't believe it. She
wouldn't believe it.
I said -- I convinced her that we were
Americans, and I said, "Could we have some eggs? We'll
give you this American food in exchange."
And she said, "Yes, but I have hiding places for
all that stuff, because if I didn't have hiding places,
the Germans would take it." She had hiding places for
her chickens, hiding places for her eggs, and stuff
like that. They would hide everything. Otherwise,
they would have nothing to eat. She was on top of the
mountain, like the Ozark Mountains. You know the Ozark
Mountains? They're destitute and way up on the
mountain. That was about the same thing with her. She
was way up there. And she gave us eggs.
You know one thing she said that -- She said,
"I'm a very old woman," and she said, "There's one
thing I'd like to see before I die."
Q: How much longer were you in Italy before you shipped
home?
A: I went to Germany after.
Q: You went to Germany?
A: Yeah. I took the prisoners back from Italy on freight
Q: Did you take the prisoners back to Germany?
A: Yeah.
Q: Oh man.
A: In July of 1945. It was three days up, because there
was only one track working, because it was -- May, the
war ended, and this is July. So they didn't have a
chance to repair all the tracks. They just repaired
one. So they repaired one, and they had these freight
cars going every day to Munich, Germany, and anybody
like me that wanted to volunteer to see another
country, you had the chance to see another country by
volunteering as a guard escort going to bring these
German prisoners back to Germany.
Q: Did you go right into Munich?
A: Yeah, we went to Munich.
Q: And you delivered the prisoners?
A: Yeah. We had 40 cars -- listen to this -- 40 cars.
Each car had 40 prisoners in it and one American guard,
and no contact between this. No contact between the
guards, nothing. And guess what? When we first got
into the cars about 2:00 o'clock in the afternoon,
there was always one -- out of the 40 prisoners, there
was always one that could speak English. And guess
what he asked me?
Q: Do you have a cigarette?
A: "Comrade, do you sell the cigarettes?"
Q: Did you have a cigarette?
A: I had six packs, because I was a front-line soldier,
and every day we were rationed a pack of cigarettes.
They gave us six packs, three to go up, three to come
back, so I had six packs of cigarettes with me. And
this guy wanted to buy cigarettes off of me. And you
know what? I don't know if I should say this or not.
They had the American Japanese in Italy as a soldier
like I was --
Q: Yep.
A: -- for 42nd, the regimen. And before we took over
their camp, the PW camp, the prisoner of war camp, they
were in charge of this camp. And when they were
selling cigarettes -- and I don't know. This is rumor.
When they were selling cigarettes to the Germans, they
were selling them for $20 a pack.
Q: A rip-off, huh? What did you sell them to them for?
A: (Laughter.)
Q: You don't have to tell me.
A: You know what? I was -- Like I said, there was no
communication between the cars, and we were going
through tunnels four or five miles long, dark --
Q: Right.
A: And we were going over bridges 60 feet in the air made
out of -- Do you know what Erector Sets are?
Q: Yes.
A: We had to go five miles an hour over these Erector
Sets, and I got scared. I said, If I don't play ball
with these guys, they're going to throw me out the
door. Accident.
Q: Right.
A: So about four or five hours later, they kept pestering
me. I said, "You want to buy cigarettes?"
"Yes."
"I'll sell you three packs." I got three
packs -- I was smoking at that time, see? "I'll sell
you three packs."
You know there was a non-fraternization ban.
You couldn't fraternize with these guys, never mind
talking with them. And if you're doing business with
them, you're in trouble. So I didn't want to -- I
would have gave them the cigarettes, but they're
enemies. Why should I give them something, understand?
They're going to take it away from me, so I might as
well get something in return for it, right?
Q: Right.
A: So I said, "In the camp, you were buying cigarettes for
$20 a pack. I want $20 a pack."
"Oh, no, no, no. We don't pay for $20 packs."
I said, "Well, you don't get no cigarettes."
So like I say, it started to get darker, and I
was getting more scared. So I says, "Here." I took my
steel helmet off. I had my steel helmet. I said,
"Here" -- I put three packs in there -- "pass it
around. Put whatever you want into the thing. I'll
take whatever you want." He passed it around. There
was $54 for three packs.
Q: So you just about got your $20 a pack?
A: Yeah, but I wasn't there for the money, because they
were prisoners. How did I know they didn't kill my
friend?
Q: Exactly. We're running out of time, so I'm going to
jump on to hurry. How did you finally get home?
A: I came home on the West Point boat.
Q: Did you leave from Germany or Italy?
A: Italy. There's another story involved too. I had
cousins out there, uncles, in Italy, and I tried to
locate them. And what happened was they were living in
an area that was occupied by the Germans, and I was
about 35 miles close to them.
And I contacted maybe a distant relative of
mine, because my father and mother, when they found out
I was in Italy, they gave me this address of this
cousin to locate, to see if he could help me. So I
located him, and I visited with him, and he said,
"Joe" -- In Italian he said, "Joe, I can't help you."
I said, "Why not?"
He said, "Your uncle's where the ________ are
right now. The front lines are there. You can't go
there. _________+." He says, "Come back when the
lines are moved, and then you and I will take a bus,
when the buses are running, and I'll take you right
where your uncle is."
I said, "Okay."
When I went back to my line, I had to stay there
because the lines didn't move. So two or three months,
and then we moved. And when we started to move, we
started to move, and then we was getting farther away."
So when the war ended, it ended -- I was up in Verona,
way up in northern Italy.
So now we were coming back home by the freight
cars. We were sitting in the freight car, no seats, no
nothing. Just straw, a little bit straw. We were
coming back down to Naples to get on a boat to come
home. But the war in Japan was still going on. We
were supposed to go home for 30 days and then go to
Japan.
So -- So I went to see this guy, this guy that I
met before. He said, "Joe, thank God you're alive. We
worried about you. I saw your uncle in the meantime.
He's happy you were here and can't understand why you
didn't come down to see him," and this and that. "Come
on. Tomorrow morning, you come here first thing in the
morning, and I'll take you to your uncle."
I said, "Joe, I haven't been home in two years.
If they tell me I got to go on the boat tomorrow
morning, I'm going on the boat. I'm going home first."
So I go back to camp. The sailing list is on
the board, and my name is on the board. So I missed --
a year and a half. That was one of the heartbreaks of
the war for me, that I didn't see my uncle. Yeah.
You know, the Hollywood story, there's always a
good ending to it. In my case, there wasn't.
Q: Where did you land when you got back to the United
States?
A: I landed in Fort Devens, Massachusetts. Boston.
Q: Do you remember your last day in service?
A: Yeah. I had to go to Fort Bragg down in North
Carolina.
Q: Is that where you were discharged?
A: Yeah.
Q: What did you do after the war?
A: I was in the house-wrecking business.
Q: The what?
A: House-wrecking business.
Q: House wrecking?
A: Yeah.
Q: And you came back to New Britain, Connecticut?
A: Right.
Q: And you stayed here all these years?
A: Yeah. I got married here and got three kids.
Q: When did you get married?
A: August -- I mean September 15th, 1945.
Q: And you have three children?
A: Yeah.
Q: How many girls, how many boys?
A: Two girls and one boy.
Q: Did you stay in touch with any of your Army buddies?
A: Yeah, I met them at reunions. I went to reunions in
San Antonio, Texas; Atlanta, Georgia; Baltimore;
Boston, Mass.; Hartford; Washington. I went to the
reunions.
Q: Do you still attend the reunions?
A: No, no. I'm too old. Got to use a cane and stuff.
Q: You're still in pretty good shape, let me tell you.
A: How old am I?
Q: Well, you told me you were born in 1920, so that makes
you 84.
A: Yeah.
Q: Did you join any veterans organizations?
A: I belong to all of them.
Q: Huh?
A: I belong to all of them.
Q: Can you remember all the names?
A: Yeah, VFW, American Legion, the AV, Elks.
Q: Wow!
A: The TGM. Do you know TGM?
Q: No.
A: That's -- The TGM is the northwestern veterans
organization. Northwestern veterans organization.
Q: How did your military experience affect your life?
A: Well, I wouldn't sell my experiences for a million
Q: You wouldn't?
A: No. Even $10 million dollars, no. I didn't -- I
didn't come out monetarily, but I made a lot of
friends, and I've seen a lot. You know, I went to,
like I say, Germany, North Africa, Italy. I would
never have gone if I wasn't in the service.
And I've been treated right. The VA treats
me -- The only thing I resent, I'm a World War II
veteran, was wounded twice, and I still have to pay for
my medication, and I don't think that's fair. I've
been paying for my medication -- sometimes it's $160 a
month -- and I don't think that's fair.
Q: Did your military experience influence the way you
think about war or about the military in general?
A: Well, there has to be -- There has to be an Army to
protect the innocent, and I think that they should
renew the draft, because the experience I had, I met a
lot of fellows that were drafted. They were good
soldiers, real good soldiers, and just because we were
being drafted, that doesn't mean later on your pistol
or rifle -- you're going to do your job, because, like
I say, you're part of America, and America is, as far
as I can see, the best country in the world. And in
order to get the best men to fight for your country, I
think you have to draft them, because you meet all
kinds of good people. I had the experience that I say,
you meet a lot of good -- a lot of good people.
Q: Joseph, I would like to thank you very much for sharing
your story, and I would like to thank you for the
service that you've done for our country. Thank you
for coming here today.
A: Well, I'm privileged to be honored -- to be accepted
into your program, because I think that word has to be
out there that there's a lot of sacrifices being made
by men that were drafted like I was. Understand?
I was drafted. I didn't volunteer. That's on
my record. And I tried to make the best of it. I came
back, and, like I say, I met famous people. Like I met
the pope, Pius XII.
And I met -- at one of my reunions, I met
Mark Clark and his wife and his family, with my wife,
when we were at the reunion, and they had the -- what
do you call that? The thing before the banquet. Just
a get-together, social before the banquet, and I got to
talking with Mark Clark, which is the general of the
armed forces of Italy, with his wife.