Paul Humberd
My brother Paul was awarded a Bronze Star Metal for “Courageous action” on December 20, 1944, in the Battle of the Bulge. He never told anyone about it, and would not talk about it to anyone. I asked several times, and he just ignored me completely. At his funeral they read the citation, and that was the first time that brother Jesse (a Naval officer who fought throughout the South Pacific in WW II) had ever heard of the medal. Paul just would not talk about it to anyone, and when you read the citation, and if you knew Paul, you can understand why he did not want to rember the horrors of the war. He and Leila have visited Europe two times, and he would not visit anywhere that he had been during the war.
As I remember, my Mother and I met Paul at the train station in Flora, sometime in mid-1945. I think I asked Paul what the various ribbons on his chest were for, but I think that is the only time he ever mentioned it, and at the time I didn’t make an impression on me. Many years later I asked, and asked, and asked, him to write more of his WW II experiences in the Humberd Chronicles. After a couple of letters, he said “No more.” This is the most I could get out of him about the medal.
THE BRONZE STAR
• I think it was sometime in early March 1945 they had a special company meeting and presented me and the fellow that was with me with the Bronze Star Medal. We were the only ones in the company to receive that Medal for Heroic Achievement against the enemy.
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In 1947 when I was the Battalion clerk at Fort Sill, Okla., the Battalion Commander was Colonel Bernard P. Major (his last name was Major), a very nice man. During WW II he was in the 28th Division as a Sergeant (he was Sergeant Major Major). He said he remembered Paul’s (and my) last name, but could not remember why, until I looked through a book he had, and found that Paul was one of the only two Bronze Star winners in the 28th Division. The Colonel remembered that very well.
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As I understand it, Susan gave Paul a “fill-in-the-blanks” book that would record some information about his life. Paul said he would rather just write something, and this is the result. He sent me a copy, and I typed it as best I could. That was in July 1993.
Some of the story of Paul’s Four Years in the Army during WW II, was included with that original story, but I asked him for more detail. He wrote more in early 1998, and I edited and combined the two versions.
LIFE STORY of PAUL HUMBERD
With italicized comments by the typist!
IN THE BEGINNING
• I don’t remember, but they say I was born on October 19, 1919 at my Grandpa Black’s house. My father was in Chicago, going to Moody Bible Institute, so that is where I went soon after. My sister Mary was 18 months older than me. We lived in Chicago, until my father graduated in the spring of 1921. I must have learned to walk while living there, because they said I walked across busy LaSalle Street by myself, one time. I don’t remember anything about living in Chicago. We then moved to Roann Ind. where my father took a church there. Jesse was born on Dec. 21, 1921 while living there, when I was two years and two months old. I can remember that day getting to go into the bedroom to see him.
MY FIRST HOME IN INDIANA
• We moved from Roann to Roanoke, Ind. where my father had taken a church. While living there my brother John was born on March 8, 1924. I have gone back to Roanoke a couple times, but could never find the house that we lived in. However, I found the house in Roann, and it still looks just like it used to. We then lived for a few months at a farm that we called the Shanks Farm. It may have been while my father had a church at Sidney, Ind.
HOME IN OHIO
• We then moved to Ashland, Ohio, where my father attended Ashland College. I don’t remember that street where the first house was located, but remember the next house was located at 621 Grant Street. I think it must have been during summer vacation from college that we lived in an apartment in Detroit, Michigan for a short time, while my father was selling real estate with his cousin, Earl Flora. While living in Ashland my sister Esther was born on April 2, 1926. I went into the first grade of school while living on 621 Grant Street. Years later, while visiting my daughter Susan and family, when they lived in Lexington, Ohio, I went to Ashland and was able to find the house that we lived in, and also the school that I attended.
THEN THERE WAS MICHIGAN
• We then moved to a very sandy farm, near Lake Odessa, Michigan. We didn’t have electricity, or a telephone, and we walked to a one room school house, which was about one mile away. There were some hills on that farm, where we had lot’s of fun playing in the snow, in the winter.
My brother James was born on March 16, 1928 while living here, and I went to the 2nd, 3rd, and started 4th grade, before moving into the town of Lake Odessa. Here I finished 4th, 5th, and 6th grade, at a school 2 blocks away. I have been back to Lake Odessa several times and found the places where we lived and also the schools. I think it was June 1990 that Jesse, Mary, and I drove up there and had a good time seeing all the old places.
WE MOVED TO PENNSYLVANIA
About the 1st of Sept. 1931 we moved to Martinsburg, PA. into the church parsonage. For this move from Michigan to Pa. everything was put into wooden boxes, barrels, and crates and was then put in a railroad boxcar. We lived in this parsonage about three years and my father pastored two churches, the one in Martinsburg and the other about 8 miles away, in Vicksburg.
We then moved to a 20 acre farm, one mile from town and we walked to school. After moving to the farm, my father only had the one church at Vicksburg. We lived here 2 yr.. and this is where my sister Martha was born on May 24, 1935. We farmed with one horse and had 3 or 4 milk cows and quite a few chickens. We then moved just across the road to a bigger farm of 60 acres. I think the rent for the house, barn and other buildings and ground was $16.00 a month. We had two horses, 5 or 6 milk cows, chickens and some pigs.
THE HIGH SCHOOL YEARS
• I graduated from Martinsburg High School in May 1937. There were 21 in my class. I played basketball in my Junior and senior year. Our Senior Class took a trip by Greyhound Bus. We went to Gettysburg Battlefield, and then on to Baltimore, where we got on a boat and sailed down to Newport News, the first night. The next day we toured Williamsburg and Jamestown. That night we got on the boat and sailed back to Washington, D. C. We then had a good tour of all the places of interest in Washington. I even had an airplane ride for $1.00 over the city. We then started for home that evening and I got back home about three o’clock in the morning.
THE EARLY WORKING YEARS
• The first of Feb. 1938 I started working for Emery Huntsman on his farm for $30.00 a month, including room and board. He had 25 to 30 cows, which we milked by hand. I think it was in May 1939, that my Uncle Kenneth Black had an emergency appendectomy operation, so I went to Indiana to help on their farm. That fall I went back to Pa. and again worked for Emery Huntsman. In Dec. 1939 I bought my first car. It was a 1936 Chevrolet, which had 13,000 miles on it, and cost $398.00. By the time I made the payments and insurance on it, I had $1.00 left each month for gas. However I could get 5 or 6 gallons for a $1.00.
BACK HOME IN INDIANA, AGAIN
• I think it was in the fall of 1940 that I went back to Indiana and helped my Uncle Charles and Uncle Kenneth harvest their crops. That spring I worked for Ernest Sink until the 1st of July making $40.00 a month and that made it possible to pay off my car. After that I detasseled corn for Pioneer. While Bob Pearson was on vacation I delivered bottled gas and continued working for Pioneer until I left for the Army in October 1941.
FOUR YEARS IN THE ARMY, IN WW II
• In 1941, a couple days after my 22nd birthday I left from the courthouse in Delphi with a bus load fellows, going to Ft. Benjamin Harrison, near Indianapolis. After being there about a week I went to Camp Lee, VA. (a quartermaster camp) where I took my basic training. This was a quartermaster training camp and I was put into a bread baking school. I was drafted for 18 months, but of course Pearl Harbor Day, Dec. 7, 1941 changed that to duration plus six months.
I didn’t know about it at the time, but just a few years ago learned that my folks and my Grandparents, had saved all the letters that I had written to them and they were given to me. I sorted them by dates and years 1942 - 43 - 44 - and - ‘45. By reading through them I was able to straighten out a lot of things that I had wondered about.
• The first part of January in 1942 I had a furlough and went to Martinsburg, PA to visit the folks and then came back to Indiana and visited my Grandparents. While I was there Jesse Zinn, Charles, Orman, Kenneth and Grandpa Black butchered four hogs. Since I had just came back from the Army they insisted that I shoot the hogs. I must have done a good job because everyone of the hogs dropped.
As soon as I got back to Camp Lee we left for Camp Livingston, Louisiana. I was put in a Car Company and was only in it approximately three weeks when they reorganized the Division, so I wasn’t sent to Africa with them. Eventually I was put in the 28th Division Quartermaster Company and was given a truck to drive, which suited me just fine.
In October and November we went on maneuvers and drove around in Louisiana, and even got into Texas. After being in Camp Livingston a year, we left our trucks there and went by train to Camp Carribelle, Florida for amphibious training. Omar Bradley was our Division Commander, but he left in February to go to Africa.
CAMP PICKETT
• The last of April 1943 we loaded our trucks on trains and went to Camp Pickett, VA, near Blackstone, which was a nice camp, with nice barracks. We were there until the last of September. I remember one day, while at Camp Pickett, my truck was loaded with artillery shells, and there were two big red flags on the front of the truck. While driving this load of shells through downtown Richmond, VA, I had two policemen on motorcycles escorting me through town.
I MET A RED HAIRED GIRL !
• While I was at Camp Pickett, around the last of July, I got a furlough, and I went to Pa. to see my folks, and then on to Indiana to see my Grandparents. While there my Cousin, Wayne Zinn told me that some couples were going to Logansport to the Cass County Fair. He said if I wanted to go along, he would get me a blind date. I said yes, and so he got a red haired girl for me. I think it was on Thurs. night and I remember that we had a good time. Then on Saturday night I went to Delphi with my Uncle Charles Black and I saw that same girl there again. She drove me back home to my Grandparents and let me out, and that was that.
THE TRIP ACROSS THE ATLANTIC
• After going back to Camp Pickett we left our trucks and went by train to Camp Miles Standish near Boston and was there just a short time, then went to Boston Harbor and loaded onto a troop ship. We loaded on the ship in Boston and crossed the Atlantic with a big convey and 10 days later on Oct. 18, 1943 we landed at Swansea, Wales.
The Army had taken over the Caribbean Cruise ships, the “Santa Rosa,” “Santa Paula,” and the “Santa Clara.” I think I was on the Santa Clara. It was built to hold 500 passengers, but the Army put 3500 of us on it. Some fellows were sea sick all of the way across the ocean and stayed in their bunk.
The way I remember it, they fed us just two meals a day, because no one was doing anything but laying around. It took 4 or maybe 5 hours for everyone to get through the chow line each time.
They fed us hot meals and we had to stand up to a high bench-like tables that were built across the ship. The tables had a raised edge on both side to keep our mess kits from sliding off. Some times when it was rough, the floor would be slick from spilt food, drink, and fellows getting sick. I just remember sleeping on the floor of the promenade deck.
LANDING IN WALES
• After landing at Swansea, we went to Tenby, Wales right along the west coast, along the water, and stayed there for six months. I remember that we lived in a small hotel right along the sandy beach. We could look out our window and see the beach and watch the tide change, one hour every day. There was a castle on a little island just off shore. When the tide was out, we could walk to the castle, but we had to make sure we started back in time before the tide came back in. I think they said the castle and stone wall could be about 1,000 years old.
The best I can remember, I was sick only one time during the four years I was in the Army. One Sunday morning I was to be on KP (That’s short for Kitchen Police, the Army’s designation for dish washer, garbage man, etc.). We were in Tenby Wales and it was the Sunday before Thanksgiving. They put me in a room right close to where I stayed along the beach, and a Welsh lady took care of me. I got out Thanksgiving day morning, so I missed KP. (You would think we could have heard a little more about the Welsh lady at least, and perhaps a little about the illness.)
A VISIT TO LONDON
• In January 1943 two other fellows and myself went to London by train, on a seven day furlough. We stayed at a place run by the Red Cross or the USO, ate some meals in English restaurants, other meals were eaten at an Army mess hall close by.
The Germans bombed London a couple of times while we were there and there were blackouts at night. We didn’t take the bombing as seriously as the English did, but of course we didn’t stay in the street to watch it either. We saw Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, Tower Of London, St. Paul’s Cathedral and went out to Windsor Castle. We traveled the City by Subway.
SWINDON AND D-DAY
• In April we moved close to Swindon, England, which was near to some Airborne Divisions. We didn’t know what they were doing. One night when the moon was right for them to practice for the invasion they had an exercise. All of the men were loaded down with about 100 lb.. of equipment. They were dropped so low and the air was so calm that when they landed some broke their legs. We had to go out that night and pick up the parachutes and haul them back to their camp.
One time we went by train to Lands End, England and practiced shooting the machine gun, at what they called a sleeve being pulled by a cable several hundred feet behind an airplane. One time as I was shooting at it, I hit the cable and the sleeve came down. The officers weren’t very happy, as that ended the shooting for that day.
D-DAY, THE SIXTH OF JUNE, 1944
• On June 6th, the morning of the invasion of D-Day I was driving somewhere when an Englishman hollered at me, saying the invasion had started. Each of our trucks were supposed to have ten 5-gallon cans of gas and a 5-gallon can of water, so the mechanics were busy welding brackets on our trucks to hold the extra gas.
Division Headquarters wanted some trucks fixed up for an office, so they asked me if I wanted to use my truck for that. They put on longer stakes, so the Sergeant could stand up in the back of the truck. They had their desks, typewriters, files etc. My truck was the G-2 Intelligence Office. My truck had a 50 caliber machine gun turret on it.
ACROSS THE CHANNEL TO OMAHA BEACH
• About the middle of July we moved down to Southampton and my truck and trailer was loaded on a ship. After being on the ship two or three days we landed on Omaha Beach. I have no idea which town we were near, but I do remember they unloaded my truck and trailer over the side of the ship on to a small narrow floating dock and I climbed down a rope ladder and drove my truck to the beach.
I remember on that ship they had big tubs full of hot water with what they called “C rations.” It was a meal in a can, and there were 3 or 4 different kinds of food and we could pick out the meal we wanted and use our can opener and use our spoon to eat our meal. Of course we always had coffee too.
• After we landed in France I heard the Lieutenant tell the Lieutenant Colonel that he had talked to a French farmer and had given him a whole carton of cigarettes for giving him information about the Germans. The Colonel really bawled him out. He said just a couple cigarettes would have been plenty for any information and at the very most just a pack.
• Soon after we were in France one nice clear day, about 2,000 airplanes flew over to bomb St. Lo. Their contrails made it a cloudy day. The first planes dropped their bombs on St Lo, then the wind blew the dust and smoke over the US troops. The planes then dropped their bombs in the dust and smoke, and killed and wounded some of the US troops.
HOW DO YOU KEEP ME DOWN ON THE FARM AFTER I’VE SEEN PARIS
• The way I remember it, I went for the first three weeks with the same shirt and pants on. I remember when we got to Paris and were going to the Liberation Parade they gave everyone in the Division a new outfit, so we would look nice. The night we got to Paris I was laying on the ground in front of my truck sleeping, when before morning it started to rain and I had to get up and get in the cab of my truck, for the rest of the night.
• The next morning, August 28, a few of us got to tour the Versailles Palace and saw the Great Hall of Mirrors, as well as the grounds. I think we could have been the first Americans to visit it, after the Germans left. We parked our trucks in a park near the Arc de Triomphe and walked to the Arch and watched the 28th Division march in the Liberation Day Parade. Of course we carried our rifles with us.
The next day we left Paris, but we could still see the Eiffel Tower in the distance. The city had very little war damage, as the Germans disobeyed Hitler, and didn’t level the city, as he had instructed them to do.
ON THE WAY TO GERMANY
• For a while we really moved a long ways everyday, up to thirty miles and we were running out of gas. I tried to keep my tank full every chance I got, and not use my extra cans of gas. We moved real fast by way of Rheims and Verdon, until we got to the German border. One day someone asked if I would let the Commanding General of our Division have a can of gas for his jeep, so I let him have it.
The General that headed our Division after Omar Bradley had to leave, was an old man by the name of Brown, but soon after we got to France they sent him home. The General that replaced him was killed the very first day and had to be replaced with General Norman Cota, who was with us the rest of the war.
We hadn’t been in France very long until one night the Germans bombed us. They dropped flares, so they could see, then dropped the bombs. They hit our company hard. One of the mechanics was under his truck and lost his arm and was sent home. I had laid in a slit trench and was shaking so hard that the dirt kept falling in my face.
LIVING IN A GERMAN HOME
• I remember one time when we got to the west edge of Germany, they had people move in with their neighbor, so we could live in every other house. I parked my truck in their back yard and saw a World War I Army Springfield rifle in the tree, above my truck. I took it and carried it in my truck for a long time, but could not figure out how to get it home so left it somewhere.
The house where I stayed was attached to the barn and you opened one door and there were the cows, and chickens. A girl would come back each day and take care of the animals. I remember it was one evening in October we were staying in a field and there where shocks of oats standing. At supper it was raining and I remember eating very fast so my food wouldn’t get too cold and float away. I thought it must be nice to be a Civilian.
We were not moving very much now, so they took the office out of my truck and I went back with my old company.
FIGHTING THE WAR, INCLUDING HÜRTGENWALD
• I remember one time when the fighting was really bad, we hauled replacements to the front. The new fellows just off the boat thought it was fun and were cutting up and having a good time. The veterans who had been wounded and were going back to the front were very quiet. We heard a shot and one veteran had shot himself in the foot. He may have done it on purpose so he could go back to the hospital and not go to the front line. He could be court marshaled, but I never heard what happened.
Another time the Infantry was being replaced at the front at the Hürtgenwald, a forest east of Aachen, Germany. I went up to help haul them back. They all were like Zombies, and they never said a word. They hadn’t shaved for a week, and they could hardly put one foot ahead of the other.
• I think it was late in November that we moved to what was supposed to be a rest area. Our Division was spread out over a twenty five mile area. We were living in a factory in Wiltz, a little town in Luxembourg. Since I had an office on my truck for Division Headquarters and the Prince of Luxembourg was with Division Headquarters, I saw him a time or two, but that was all. I remember one time we opened a big box of 10 in 1 rations. It had enough food for 10 people for one meal. I remember we all picked out the best things we wanted and then let the Prince of Luxembourg have what was left.
BATTLE OF THE BULGE
• About the middle of December they were telling us something could happen, so I was to be in one of the details to guard different places or blow up bridges. However, I was to go with several others about 40 miles north to get supplies. Over to the east we could see hundreds of artillery guns going off all the time, but we kept going.
When we got to the supply depot at Eupen, Belgium (right at the German border) we were really worried, because there was a large prisoner of war camp near by. If the Germans would capture it and release the German prisoners, we didn’t know what might happen. So no one got much sleep that night.
No one knew what to do, so we loaded up the next morning and started back. The supply Depot at Eupen was a Corps or Army Depot and we picked up everything that was needed like shoes, clothes, toilet paper and what ever, but not food, fuel, and ammunition. We hauled very little fuel and ammunition.
We hadn’t gone very far when we could see German parachutes everywhere, so we knew something was going on. However, we kept going and finally got back to Wiltz. Wiltz was a rather quiet place, until Dec. 16 when the Germans started what became known as the Battle of the Bulge. I didn’t get to bed and get any sleep, until Dec. 21st. I really think the Germans had crossed our road in several places.
A NEW PAIR OF SHOES
• When we got back to Wiltz, Luxembourg, things had really changed. The groups had left and someone had taken my place and had unloaded our trucks. The next morning I went to a pile of shoes that had been unloaded and found my size and so I had a new pair. Late in the afternoon they decided to move, and since my truck had a machine gun they wanted me to be at the front of the line. As we went out of Wiltz I saw a couple of artillery shells explode nearby. We went through Bastogne and a few miles west and stopped at a small school house.
We were just getting settled down for the night, when we got word that they needed 15 trucks for a detail. We started to unload trucks on the ground but changed our minds and left them loaded to see what would happen. We drove with blackout lights on, and arrived back on a hill just outside of Wiltz, so we didn’t get much sleep that night. We sat there all day long and could hear the German burp guns and other guns going off all the time.
• One time some of our artillery guns were moved in a field right next to us and fired off several rounds. Then they hooked up their guns and were going to move. We asked them why they were moving, and they said the Germans would know where they were at and start shooting back. Of course you can imagine how that made us feel.
Finally just before dark they figured no one was left in Wiltz who would need to be hauled back, so we started back. We hadn’t gone very far until someone stopped us and said the Germans had the road blocked. We didn’t know what to do, so just kept going and got through to Bastogne again. We were going back to that school building where we had been the evening before.
A Sergeant was driving the first truck with an infantry person with him and next was a three quarter ton pick-up truck with the driver, a Lieutenant and two others riding in the back. Next was my truck with the machine gun and the fellows who were riding with me. Behind were the other trucks and one had a machine gun on it too. At the corner where we were to turn to go to the school house the road was blocked with other trucks, so we had to stop.
MY FRIENDS WERE CAPTURED
• Soon the two fellows who were riding in the truck ahead of us, came back and told us the Germans had the road blocked. I got out of my truck and walked around the pick-up truck to the back of the first truck. I saw that two Germans had the Sergeant and the other fellow riding with him and also the lieutenant from the other truck. I heard them say “Achtung” (attention ) and “Marsch” (march ) and marched them away. I just stood at the back of their truck and watched them disappear.
Soon the Germans started shooting with a machine gun. Since it was night I could see the tracer bullets, some on one side of me and then on the other, hitting all the trucks in the line. I think I was standing behind a truck when the bullets hit the truck instead of me. I soon got down in a ditch on the far side. The fellow with me laid on the hood and over the windshield of my truck and started firing back. Someone with the other machine gun fired back too and they started the German outfit on fire. It kept burning and exploding for quite a while.
I had just two short belts of ammunition for my gun, so the man laying on my truck ran out, and he came down where I was. All the other drivers disappeared and I have no idea what happened to them. The two of us were all alone. Soon we could hear artillery shells coming in. I think there were five of them, and they landed between us and the Germans and exploded, but didn’t hurt us. We could hear fellows that had been wounded crying and hollering for their mothers. They were in the back of the trucks that blocked our road. I think they were on the way to a hospital close by.
TO BASTOGNE, WITH TWO WOUNDED MEN
• Soon a jeep tried to pass our trucks, but the Germans opened up on them and wounded them, so they had to stop and were with us. After a while we figured we might just as well start walking toward Bastogne. We had not gone far when we met an officer in a command car with his driver. We told him what happened so they turned around and loaded the two wounded men in the back of the car and I sat on the front fender on the left side and the fellow with me on the other. We made it back to town all right.
Of course everything was dark and no lights of any kind. They had us go to a room to get some hot coffee and told us we could go across the street to a room and lay down. Soon more fellows kept coming and also an officer with his men. Soon someone came in and told the officer that they needed some men. They kept doing that all night until there weren’t many left. So the other fellow and I thought we had better leave before they sent us out some place.
So we went back to the place where we had got the coffee and sat in the dark. While we were sitting there I told the fellow with me that I thought the man across the table from us looked like one of our lieutenants. So he asked and sure enough it was. Here he had been in the last truck of our convoy and had got lost in town and also the last three trucks that were with him.
REPORT TO THE COLONEL
• When morning came the fellow with me got on the telephone and kept calling around until he found where our outfit had moved to. So with the three trucks we went out another road and soon found our company. There sure weren’t many left. I had not been to bed for three nights, so I ate dinner and went upstairs and went to sleep. Someone woke me up at supper time, I ate and went back to sleep again.
The next morning the Colonel wanted to question us, so I had to borrow a shaving kit to clean up. I told him who I saw being captured and marched away.
MY TRUCK AND MESS KIT, RIDDLED WITH BULLET HOLES
• I think it was the next day that I got my truck back. I have no idea how or who did it, but I think they had to take some tires off of other trucks to put on mine, so they could drive it in. Of course my bed roll and the machine gun and other things were gone. My mess kit was laying on the seat and a bullet had gone through it. I have often wished that I had kept it and brought it home as a souvenir.
There were at least twenty bullet holes in the truck and since my truck was loaded with Christmas mail, they told me when they unloaded it, the bullets had chewed up the mail, like mice had been in it. I have read in three books about this, but of course none of the authors were there, so they did not tell it like I remember it.
CHRISTMAS, 1944
• We moved again on Christmas day. I was in another school house, and watched the 4th Armored Division tanks go by to help retake Bastogne. The most important trip each day, was what we called ration detail. Some of us would go to the supply depot and pick up the food for all the Division units, and then some one from the each unit in the Division would come and pick up their rations. During the Battle of the Budge, at Christmas time, several units could not use their supply of turkey, so we ate turkey till after New Years Day.
So this was my experience in the Battle of the Bulge.
THE WAR WINDS DOWN
• Sometime in January we were to move all the way down to Colmar, France, south of Strasbourg. We had to put chains on all our tires, even the front tires. Our trucks didn’t have heaters or defrosters and it was freezing rain all day. I had to keep changing hands on the windshield to keep a small spot thawed out, so I could see. The Germans thought they had completely wiped out our Division and were surprised to see we were still fighting.
From Colmar we went back up north and I remember I crossed the Rhine river the first time on Good Friday, on a pontoon bridge. I don’t remember exactly where we crossed the Rhine, but I think it was a little north of where the Remagen bridge had stood. On Easter Sunday morning I had to fix two flat tires. Easter was in March that year. We kept going east until we got the Kassel Germany. They then had us go back to Kaiserslautern to work with displaced persons. Our fighting days were over.
VICTORY IN EUROPE DAY
• One day in early May, just my truck and a Lieutenant in a three quarter ton pick-up truck with his driver went up to Brussels, Belgium to get a load of liquor for the officers. We were almost to Brussels on May 7, when a British soldier hollered at us and said the war was over. The people celebrated all that night, all the next day, and all the next night. Yes James we got to see the little boy fountain.
• After the war was over we loaded the displaced people on trains so they could go home. We didn’t have much to do the rest of the summer. I hauled rations in the morning and went to baseball games in the afternoon. Some fellows went along on the trains as guards. I think the Russian people knew that Stalin would have them shot when they got back, because they had been with Americans. One guard said that a Russian man jumped off the train and ran, so the guard shot, but not at him.
• Soon we got word that our Division was to go to Japan, but us older fellows would be transferred to another Division that wasn’t going to Japan. So the younger men got to go home first and we had to stay. Of course before they left the US for Japan, the war was over.
Several of us were transferred into the 106th Division and stayed in some nice places. Finally we moved to Karlsruhe and they gave me another truck to drive. It was the only truck like that, that I ever saw. It was a cab over engine, with an extra long bed. Every other day I would drive up the Autobahn to Mannheim about 40 miles and back. While I was in the army I had 4 different trucks and figured I drove about 45,000 miles all together.
THE BRONZE STAR
• I think it was sometime in early March they had a special company meeting and presented me and the fellow that was with me with the Bronze Star Medal. We were the only ones in the company to receive that Medal for Heroic Achievement against the enemy.
CROSSING THE ATLANTIC, GOING HOME
• Sometime in late September we loaded into the back of some trucks and it took two days to get to camp near Le Havre, France. We were there about a week, then loaded on a Victory Ship and started home. It took us 10 days to come across, but I don’t remember anything about where I slept, or how we ate, on this ship. The ship rolled and rolled from side to side. I was laying on the Promenade deck and the ship dipped enough water, that we had to keep moving our blankets to find a dry place to lay.
I didn’t get sea sick on either trip, coming or going. It took us 10 days to come home and we were all by ourselves. This time we were going into the waves. First the front of the ship went way up and then the back of the ship was out of the water and the propellers would really make the whole ship vibrate. One time when the doors were closed, the front of the ship came up so high and came down with a bang. The engines stopped and the lights went out and it seemed like we were just setting still. Fellows were calling for their mothers.
IN THE UNITED STATES, AFTER TWO YEARS AT WAR
• We finally got to New York City and passed the Statue of Liberty and were given a hero’s welcome, with fire boats shooting water into the air. We stayed there a couple of days, so I went down town and saw some of the sights. We stayed at a camp there for three days. I don’t remember how I knew that Johnny was taking Merchants Marine training in (Sheepshead Bay ) New York. I found the right place, but he was out on a ship.
We went by train to Camp Atterbury south of Indianapolis. I was there 3 or 4 days and then was discharged. I lacked just a couple days being in the service four years. I then went to Indianapolis and got a train to Flora. I remember Mama being there to meet me, but I don’t remember you being there James. (But I was! )
OUT OF THE ARMY, THEN A TRIP TO PENNA.
• I soon moved back to Grandpa Black’s and started working for Charles and Kenneth. Late in November I bought a car, a 1939 Oldsmobile. Cars were very hard to get, but Kenneth knew about this one, so I was lucky. The last of April I went back to Pennsylvania. James I don’t remember you going with me. (But I did.)
MEETING SOME OF MY ARMY COMRADES
When I was going through a town close to Pittsburgh I saw a fellow crossing the street, who had been in the Army with me. I stopped and we talked for a little while.
Several of the fellows that were with me all the time in the 28th Division, had been in the National Guard and were all from Huntington, PA., which was just about 25 miles from Martinsburg. One Saturday I drove to Huntington and found 4 or 5 of them. They didn’t have jobs yet, and of course no car. They told me where the Sergeant that I saw being captured, was working. I found him and we talked. I was told that there would be a meeting that night at the VFW, so I went, but the fellow at the door would not let me in. However a couple of the fellows that knew me happened to come by right then and I was let in.
• It must have been while I was at Huntington Pa that the fellows I was talking to told me about one of our fellows who was captured. He was a jolly big guy and everything was always funny to him. After he was captured he still kept laughing about everything, and the Germans kept telling him to stop laughing. Finally they made him put a hand full of rocks in each shoe and when the blood started oozing our of his shoes, he wasn’t laughing any more.
• I have never seen nor heard from anyone I was with since I met those fellows at Huntington, and never heard of any reunions, except for the car company I was in for a short time. I used to get letters telling about their reunions in PA but I never went.
A FEW MORE THINGS
• There are a lot of things that I have not written about, that I have since remembered about. Like while I was at Camp Livingston, Jesse was at Bryan College in Tennessee and he came to visit me one week-end. Then while I was at Camp Pickett, Va. Jesse was in the Navy at New Port News or Norfolk, VA. He was married and Laura was with him, so I went to visit them one week-end. There are other things too, but this is sure more that I ever thought I would write when I started this.
BACK HOME IN INDIANA, AGAIN AND AGAIN
• I moved to my Grandpa Blacks and started working again on the farm, for my Uncle Charles and Kenneth. Soon after this I went to the Radnor Church and saw that red haired girl again. We went together several times until Feb., when we broke up. However, in April I had my car painted, and one Sunday in May at the Radnor Church I told her what I had done. When she went out to look at it she ask if it made it ride any different. I told her I would take her home and she could fine out. Well that did it, and I’m still taking her home.
• Leila’s parents, Leonard and Hannah Clawson had never traveled more than 200 miles from home, so in August of that year 1946, we decided to take a trip, if I would do all the planning. We went to Colorado Springs, Pikes Peak, Denver, Yellowstone Nat’l. Park and back to Indiana. We divided the expenses, between the four of us.
ENGAGED, MARRIED AND PARENTS — TWICE
• By Sept. 21st we were engaged and thought our house would not be ready to move into until the first of the year. However, the folks living there moved out the last of October, so we moved our date up, and were married on Nov. 10th, the ceremony was conducted by my father.
We moved into a small house on State Road 18, west of Flora that Harry Spitler owned and was being farmed by my Uncle Charles and Kenneth. We lived there just one year, and on our 1st Anniversary we moved back the lane across from my Grandpa Black’s, on Nov. 10, 1947. I continued to work for my Uncle, and Leila worked in Delphi at Globe Valve Corp. until sometime early in 1949. That year on Dec. 24th Steve was born.
• On the first of March 1950 I bought out Wayne Clawson, Leila’s brothers share of the farm equipment and started farming with Leonard Clawson, Leila’s father. On January 21, 1952 Susan was born.
• I believe it was the 1st of Dec. 1955 that we took a trip to California, on the California Zephyr.
WE BOUGHT THE FARM
• In 1956, we bought the house back the lane where we were living, with 3 acres of land, that went out to the road. We remodeled the kitchen and bathroom and put in a furnace. In Nov. 1960 we bought the McCouch farm. consisting of 96 acres, and buildings for $38,000. We then sold the buildings and 3 acres back the lane to Harold Eaton’s for about $14,000.
• We worked all that winter in the farm house. We took out some walls, made more door ways, steamed off all the wall paper in every room, upstairs and down. We put in new wiring for lights and plug-ins, had the house insulated and put on storm windows, and had a hot water, base-board furnace installed, also new kitchen cabinets, a new well, new drain for the kitchen and washing machine. We moved into the house in Feb., before a lot of the work was finished, because Eaton’s wanted to move into the other house.
• The next couple of years we took down all the fences, had a lot of stumps and corner posts buried. We burned lots of big piles of trash and old buildings. We had the house sided with aluminum siding and painted the barn. In 1968 we sold 3 acres off to Sohigro, for a fertilizer plant. I think in 1966, my mother traded her farm ground for ground just up the road from our farm, and we bought 29 acres remaining, to finish out the farm.
• In 1972 Leila’s folks, gave each of their three kids 50 acres, which took four years of making payments before the ground was paid for. Leila and I then bought 25 acres from Wayne of his 50 acres for $3,500 an acre. About the same time we bought my Mother’s 53 acres of ground for $65,000.
HOME IN FLORIDA, FOR THE FIRST TIME
• In November 1979 we bought our home in Ft. Myers, Florida for $44,000, completely furnished. We spent Jan., Feb., and March there in the winter of 1980 and then stayed there longer each winter, until we retired in 1984. We now spend six months in Florida.
BACK HOME AGAIN IN INDIANA WARSAW, THAT IS
• In Oct. 1983 we bought a house on Winona Lake, Warsaw from Herb Evans for $85,000, and sold our buildings on our farm to Randi Flora’s for $70,000 in November 1984. We worked on the house on Winona Lake during the summer of 1984, and got it ready to move into. Then on Saturday Oct. 27, 1984 we had our farm sale. At the same time Steve and Shirley sold their trailer to Randi’s brother Brian Flora and they moved to Ft. Myers, Florida. We moved into our Warsaw house and was there only 10 days when we headed to our home in Ft. Myers for the winter.
TRAVEL
• We have taken several trips. In the summer of 1983 and in 1994, we went to Europe with a tour group. We have also been to the Canadian Rockies, The New England States, Western States, Southern States, Alaska and also to Hawaii.
CONCLUSION
• In May 1991 we bought 20 acres of Kathleen’s share of ground, so that Leonard Clawson’s Estate could be settled. We paid $2,500 an acre for this ground, so Leila ended up owning 70 acres from the Estate.
• My father, Russell Isaac Humberd was born on November 3, 1893 to John and Phoebe Humberd, and died on May 5, 1965 at the age of 71.
• My mother, Anna Marie Black was born on December 12, 1897 to Charles G. Black and Lottie Black and died on July 14, 1986, at the age of 88.
TYPIST COMMENTS ABOUT “PAUL’S YEARS IN THE ARMY.”
• The Army portion of the above story was told in four editions. The first was in 1993, then a several page document that Lelia typed in 1998. Steve and Shirley (I think I know which one, but I’ll spread the good will) typed it into their computer, then sent it to me via the Internet on January 29, 1998. Thanks a lot, Shirley. That way I didn’t have to type it into my computer.
(Some people! I received a note from Steve that said, “She did not! I typed the whole thing with my two little fingers.”)
After getting that story formatted for the Chronicles, I had some questions that Paul answered by a five page handwritten letter. A day later I received another two page handwritten document. I incorporated those two letters into the original story, then edited the Army story in with the story originally told in 1993. Paul’s second letter ended with the comment: “This is it, that’s all, there will be no more.” Hey, I can take a hint, and I can issue a thank-you, too.
Jim’s Comments on Paul’s Story
These comments are not in any particular order, and they are not of any particular value, either. I didn’t want to mix them in with Paul’s Story.
But I couldn’t resist adding them.
This first story is not in chronological order, but I believe it is the most important, most interesting comment.
• When I was the Battalion clerk at Fort Sill, Okla., the Battalion Commander was Colonel Bernard P. Major (his last name was Major), a very nice man. During WW II he was in the 28th Division as a Sergeant (he was Sergeant Major Major). He said he remembered Paul’s (and my) last name, but could not remember why, until I looked through a book he had and found that Paul was one of the two Bronze Star winners in the 28th Division. The Colonel remembered that very well.
Why do I think that maybe Paul was awarded that metal for action above and beyond what is described above. And that is understandable.
• We don’t remember just which years we visited with Mama, but in about 1982 or ‘84, Emmy and I drove her to Lake Odessa to look around. We thought we found the farm, but she never recognized the house in town. I was almost sure we saw it, but she just wasn’t sure.
We ate lunch at the Dairy Queen in Lake Odessa that day, and she was sure we hadn’t eaten there regularly in the late ‘20’s! We also took her to Roann, Roanoke, and we think, to Sidney. She was already having problems remembering where this or that was, just as I now tend to forget when this all happened. We have since visited Odessa, Ukraine, still in the USSR at the time of our visit. Well, maybe there is a connection of some kind.
• Mary has mentioned the trip to Lake Odessa with you and Jesse, several times. She really enjoyed that day with you and Jesse. Try something similar again, some day.
• Remember the neighbor boy in Martinsburg tearing off the quarantine sign on our front door? He had been told you couldn’t come to play as long as that sign was up, so … . Sonny Heilman, or something like that.
• After you three older boys left, I had to do the work of all three of you, both at home and at the neighbors. Years later I found the Army was much easier than that. Cove High was a girls school until it snowed, the younger boys had to replace the ones who had already left for the war. I remember when they extended the noon hour to two hours so there was time to play ball, but the parents would just come and pickup the boys so they could plow for two hours.
• I remember you playing basketball in High School, and someone’s trip to Wash. DC. I remember it was Mary’s trip, but who knows, or by now, cares. Maybe both of you went in your senior year. Don’t remember hearing about your airplane ride before.
• I remember hearing you being warned about the great costs and problems you would have with that ‘36 Chevy, in 1939. Little did I know would great fun I would have in that car years later, near Chicago! We finally sold it in about 1951, after it had been owned by you, Papa, Mary, and me.
• Didn’t know you were at Fort Benj Harrison. I was stationed at Ft. Monmouth, NJ in 1951, and discovered a school that was held at Ft. Benjamin Harrison in Indianapolis. Somehow I persuaded the Army to send me there. I wasn’t interested in learning anything, I just wanted to be near enough to Chicago to spend each and every week-end visiting with Emmy, until we were married on June 2. Haven’t the slightest idea what the school was all about, don’t remember even a tiny speck about it. I remember being offered free tickets to the Indy 500, both the practice rounds, and the race itself. That offer didn’t stand a chance, when compared with the competition in Chicago!
• Bet your war-time letters are much more interesting than mine. Jesse did send me some letters (written while in the US Army) that the folks had saved.
• I remember watching Paul walk to the train after his furlough in Martinsburg. I remember Papa was the saddest I ever remember seeing him. Papa was almost crying.
• We visited Tenby, Wales in 1980, and remember it as a pretty little seaside resort town. We remember the castle on the little island off the coast, and the stone wall with a gate of five little stone arches at the entrance to the town.
• Don’t remember that you mentioned the German air raid in London before. We have been to London three different years (1970, ‘80, ‘85), and don’t remember seeing any sign of War damage. We have been in all the places you visited during the war in Europe. By hindsight, it would have been of interest to have seen Europe in 1945 to ‘50, and compare it to what we have seen in 1970 to ‘95.
• Those docks, where Paul landed in France, were called “Mulberry.” Some still exist in the water, and are still rusting away, at Arromanches, at the east edge of Omaha Beach. We’ve been there four times. The “Mulberry” docks were built in England, floated across the channel like a barge and then were sunk near the coast, so vehicles could be unloaded and driven to shore, just like Paul did.
The Allies unloaded 9,000 tons of supplies each day, nearly 500,000 tons of supplies by the end of August 1944, when other ports became available.
• I remember eating the C-Rations, in 1946-47 when I was in the Army the first time. The “Beef and noodles” and the “Ham and lima beans” were my favorite. Of course I never had to eat them under the same conditions as you did. My conditions were all made-up, just for fun, during training.
• In 1980 while we studied the commemorative brass plate in the street just below the Arc de Triomphe, two Paris policemen stood at attention and saluted when Jim explained that his brother had a part in that great occasion.
• Concerning the battle at Hürtgenwald: “Wald” means forest, it is just a few miles east of Aachen, Germany near the border with Holland. I once talked to a man who was there, and he said it was the worst battle he had ever seen or heard of.
• Emmy’s cousin Hugo (a solider in the German Army), a most wonderful man, was wounded in the cheek by an American hand-grenade in Luxembourg. At one time he said he, and another solider, were walking through the forest in Luxembourg and met a couple of British soldiers. They all immediately decided they did not want to shoot each other, so they all just turned around and went away. I can’t even imagine what something like that would “feel” like. And I don’t want to find out, either.
• Near the end of WWII the US Army requisitioned the house where Emmy’s relatives have lived in Mettlach, Germany for over a hundred years. US soldiers lived there for a few months. We were pleased to learn that when the Army finally left town, a note was written to the family, thanking them for the use of their house. We hope no one got into trouble for leaving a couple of “GI shovels” in the attic. One is now displayed with my cane collection.
• We’ve driven through Bastogne, Belgium (at the center of the Battle of the Bulge) a couple of times, but it was raining both times, and we didn’t spend any time sightseeing. Somehow we bet Paul didn’t do a lot of sightseeing there either.
• The area just north and west of Colmar (and of course Colmar itself), is just about our favorite area in Europe. We have been there a dozen times, at least once on seven trips, and two or three times on some. A really beautiful area.
• Paul said he crossed the Rhine midway between Bonn and Koblenz, near the remains of the Ludendorff Bridge, at the town of Remagen. During WWII, as the German Army retreated, they tried to destroy all bridges across the Rhein. Only part of the explosives on this bridge exploded, and it stood long enough for several divisions of the US Army to cross the Rhein. The Germans concentrated artillery fire on the bridge and it fell on March 17, 1945.
• Stalin even killed his own soldiers who had been German prisoners. Even though this was war-torn Germany, they had been exposed to a better way of life than was to be found in Russia.
• In 1970 we found the statue of the little boy, Manikin Pis, a few blocks from the Brussels, Belgium city hall. The name tells it all. Teen aged girls sometimes have little off-hand comments they use for no good reason. In 1970, Linda H. said, from time to time, something about a “big ’ol hanging thing” when talking about a huge Cathedral, a bridge or whatever. Wonder if we will ever forget Linda’s comment, “I thought it would be a big ’ol hanging thing,” when she saw the statue of the little boy in Brussels, with the very natural water fountain! That’s the last time we ever heard that comment!
• Emmy’s cousin Monika lives in a suburb of Le Havre. Her late husband Henri, was one of the Harbor masters there.
• I remember that in Calcutta, in 1946, my ship was loaded with GIs for the trip back to the USA. Just as we were about to leave the dock, a convoy of Army trucks came speeding to the dock and yelled for us not to leave yet. Their commander had said if they could get on the ship, they could go home right now.
Well, our ship was already loaded to capacity, but the Captain announced over the loud speaker that if the troops didn’t mind sleeping on deck and standing in longer lines to eat their meals, and eat a little less, they could get on. Everyone already on board yelled their approval, so on came the extra men. All day long, and most of the night, there were lines of people waiting to eat. The chow lines lasted from sunrise to after dark. Come to think of it, we had a few war brides on board also, and the married couples had a special deck for their own use! And they did use that deck space. There were also a lot of Army nurses and Red Cross workers on board.
• You say you took the red-head home from church one night. If memory serves, I was in the back-seat with a redhead of my own that night. I remember the radio in your car played only loud static, and you “had difficulty” hearing your redhead telling you that you had just passed the turn to her house. Don’t think she tried all that hard to make you understand, but what would have happened, or not happened, in the years that followed had you “heard” her, and turned at that corner.
• I remember visiting you late one year when you were harvesting corn. It was very, very cold, and you had no cab or other protection on your tractor. I told you that your car was rather new and nice, your house was in excellent shape, but here you are in your “office,” the place where you make the money to buy those other nice things, and you were freezing (or at least I was), so why not do something about it.
The next time I was there, you had a (fabric?) cab of some kind on the tractor. Don’t know if I gave you the final push or not, but I thought you should make the “office” at least a little comfortable.
• I remember that someone told me (thought maybe it was Paul, but he says no) that during an Atlantic storm on one of these Victory ships he could see welding rods just laying in cracks between steel plates. They had not taken the time to put it together right, and the troops were afraid the ship would break into pieces in the storm.
• I remember going up a step or two into the train car, and reaching for your suitcase, but since you didn’t recognize me, you pulled it away and didn’t let me have it. I also remember you drove the car home from the station, and it was the 1936 Chevy that you, then Papa, then Mary, then me, owned over the years. I also remember that you tried to move the gear-shift lever up and to the left, to get in first gear, like on the Army trucks, but that was reverse on this car. (Of course I doubt that, but I do remember it just as if it happened.)
I later drove it to Ft Monmouth, New Jersey in 1951, then drove Emmy and Ronnie home to Chicago, stopping at Johnny’s to drop off a crib that we didn’t need any more. They used the crib for who knows how long, or for how many. I traded the Chevy for a 1946 or ‘47, 6 cylinder Olds, with a stick shift.
• Boy did I ever make an impression, you don’t even remember me being along! I don’t know how it happened, but I remember when we made the trip to Pennsylvania, you wore some of my clothes, a brown jacket and pants, if I remember right.
• I remember stopping to see the man on the street in the little town in Penna.
LETTER I WROTE TO PAUL DATED SAT, JUL. 3, 1993
• That date reminds me of something that happened 40-some years ago (maybe in 1950). Do you remember the Fourth of July weekend when I visited from Rochelle, Ill, and helped you harvest wheat? As I remember, the wheat-field was back the lane beyond Grampa’s horse barn.
Several weeks earlier I had bumped my hand on an 220V electrical cord that exploded and burned the fingers on my left hand, almost down to the bone. (I worked in a factory that made RR engines.) Whatever the Doctors did, the fingers would not heal. The day before I came to your place, they more or less decided they would have to make a skin graft of some kind. I tried to protect my hand for the first day of working with you, and made sure the bandage was kept clean, but then just let it go, and worked with my bare hand in the wheat.
When I arrived back at the doctor’s office a few days later, the fingers were healed! Not just getting better, but healed. (The scar is very faint now.) The Doctors were amazed, and said something about the healing power of fresh wheat, and of the sun. In the years since, I have read an article somewhere about the healing power of some chemical in fresh wheat. Did you ever hear anything like that about wheat?
THE END OF PAUL’S STORY
••• Paul, I sure appreciate your writing your Life Story. My comments are meant to just add a little more information. We have been to each and every place you mention in Europe, some of them many times. We really enjoy visiting that part of the world, and wish you had had the same opportunity during your first visit to Europe.
Paul and Leila’s Indiana Prairie Farmer European Tour
August 11 to August 25, 1981
August 11 - Tues.
Paul and I drove ourselves to Lafayette and took the Air Wisconsin 1:35 PM flight. It only took 40 min. from the time we boarded the plane until we were walking into O’Hare airport. It was a beautiful day to fly. We were scheduled to leave Chicago at 5:30 PM, however due to controllers strike we were told we wouldn’t be able to leave until 7:55 PM. Since Canada wouldn’t permit KLM to fly across Canadian waters we were then booked to leave Chicago at 9:45 PM on Air Canada to Toronto & were then to transfer to KLM & then on to Amsterdam.
We did leave Chicago at 9:45 PM and arrived at Toronto 1 hr & 15 min. later. Beautiful night flight, as lights were simply indescribable. However when we walked into Toronto Airport it was dimly lit, & only two persons to be seen. The one man told us the Canadians were in sympathy with the American Controllers, and therefore had canceled all flights out of Toronto. They told us we weren’t going any further that night & to find us a place on the floor. What else could we do but find a spot to lay down. However it was impossible to sleep, as they turned all the lights on, & ran vacuum sweepers all night long.
August 12 - Wed
Around 5:00 AM people started stirring around & were in the wash rooms trying to wash-up a little. At 7:00 AM we heard that the Canadians had called off their sympathy strike. As a group we got a bus and went to the KLM terminal thinking we could continue on to Amsterdam, but couldn't as there were no flights for us. Here we sat until 1:00 PM when they herded us all together in a small room (45 of us) & said we were scheduled to leave at 2:00 PM.
A half hour later it was announced that we wouldn’t be leaving until 4:00 PM, so we waited some more. When 3:30 PM came they boarded us on a KLM 747 place that held 400 passengers & we at last were on our way. We flew 33,000 ft at 600 miles an hour. There were 10 seats across the plane & also had a upper deck. The ride was so smooth, was just like sitting at home in the living room watching TV. It took 6 hours, 40 min. to fly from Toronto to Amsterdam. We arrived in Amsterdam at 5:00 AM Holland time.
August 13 - Thurs.
At 8:00 AM we boarded a plane for London & arrived at the airport in London at 8:00 AM London time, as they are 1 hr behind Holland. Our Tour Guide was there to meet us, & loaded us into our tour bus & took us to The London Tara Hotel. It seemed so strange & even frightening to see all the cars driving on the left hand side of the road.
Everyone was so glad to get into a hotel room, as we hadn’t seen a bed from Monday night until Thursday night. So needless to say we were all just dead & had missed one days tour of London. The rest of our group slept all afternoon, but Paul & I didn’t. We went to bed for 1 - 1/2 hours, & then rented a taxi & toured The Tower of London & Tower bridge, & saw the Crown Jewels, toured St. Paul’s Cathedral, and spent time in the famous Harrods Department store. That night while the rest of our group went out to a theater we slept.
August 14 - Fri
After a continental breakfast we got into our bus & toured all over London. We strolled at Buckingham Palace & got to watch the changing of the guards. From there we went to Westminster Abbey & toured it. We then headed out through the countryside of Kent. Before leaving we saw Big Ben which was striking while we were there, the Houses of Parliament, # 10 Downing street, Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly Circus & many other places.
The English countryside was so beautiful, with flowers blooming in their gardens & flower boxes on their homes. At 2:00 PM we arrived at the farm of Mr. & Mrs. John Fraser. They had prepared a buffet lunch for us & was such a beautiful warm day, so we picked up our plates of food & ate out in their yard. This was supposed to be a typical English farm, but sure was way behind any of our American farms, with no big machinery & so much done by hand.
We drove to our hotel in Tonbridge, Kent, England where we were served a 4 course meal that evening, or should I say night, as we never ate until around 8:00 PM at the earliest.
August 15 - Sat
Beautiful sunny morning, so after breakfast at our hotel in Tonbridge we got in our bus & headed for Ramsgate where we boarded a Hovercraft to cross the English Channel into France. The “Hovercraft” is an intriguing cross between a ship and an airplane, which rides across the water on a cushion of air at speeds up to 70 MPH. It is propelled by four airplane-type propellers on top of the craft.
After arrival at the port of Calais in France we boarded our waiting bus and headed for Paris. All along the way we saw many farmers combining wheat. We arrived at the Nikko DeParis Hotel around 5:00 PM. Our hotel was real close to the Eiffel Tower. After a 5 course meal we got on our bus & took a night tour of Paris. We got off our bus & walked to the top of Martyrs Hill.
August 16 - Sun
Soon as breakfast was finished we went to Eiffel Tower & had a group photo taken with our tour guide & bus driver. While we were lining up, there was such a cute little dog running around. When we received our pictures, there was the little dog in the picture, looking like he had poised with us. We then toured the Louvre Palace (now an art museum), the Tuilleries Gardens, the Place de la Concorde.
We went inside the famous Notre Dame Cathedral, saw the Luxembourg Gardens & the many sidewalk cafes. After lunch we toured the Palace of Versailles & its gardens. On our way back to our hotel we stopped at the Arch of Triumph.
At 7:00 PM we went to a Parisian Cabaret “La Nouvelle Eve” where we had a 4 course steak dinner & show. The entertainers were really professions. As we drove back to our hotel we saw the call girls out along the streets.
August 17 - Mon
After a breakfast of delicious French pastries we said good-bye to Paris & boarded our bus & journeyed across Bourgogne. As far as we could look, there were vineyards. We drove through forests where former Kings of France used to hunt. There were signs along the road saying watch out for deer & wild boars. Really beautiful rolling farm land.
France has 436 different kinds of cheese you can buy. There are few insects in France. We drove for hours through Juro Mountains up & down & around sharp curves on our way to the border into Switzerland. The houses so neat & clean & right on edge of road with no yards.
We crossed the border into Switzerland at 6:00PM, then continued driving along Lake Geneva until we reached the Eurotel Hotel in Neuchatel. Vineyards all along the roads & everything so clean & beautiful, air so pure, as no high humidity.
August 18 - Tues.
We left our hotel at 7:45 AM and headed for Bern (the capital of Switzerland). The entire drive was along lakes & canals with swans swimming on them. We stopped in Bern to exchange our money. The farmers were having their market on the streets selling their produce.
While in Bern we saw the Moses Fountain, Clock Tower stopped at the Bear Pit. We then drove on to Interlaken, situated on
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