Here is the talk that I gave at New Life church Sunday. I ad-libbed some during the talk

 Here is the talk that I gave at New Life church Sunday.  I ad-libbed some during the talk, but this is pretty true to the way it was presented.  A member of New Life after hearing the talk emailed me this.  “These were common men that did extraordinary things for their country”.   I’m putting this up for all to read.  It is hard to conceive the valor of these men  who called DeRidder and Beauregard Parish home. I encourage you to take this and share with others. For your friends who are not on FB and  probably would like to read this , why don't you copy & paste so you can print for them. These are the folks who laid the foundation of DeRidder as we know today. 

Intro:

Here’s what founding father , John Adams, had to say about the 4th.

“The forth day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America.  It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance , by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty .  It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more.”

This nation will remain the land of the free only so long as it is the home of the brave.

On this patriotic weekend Lynn thought it would be fitting to hear the WWII stories of  our areas servicemen.  I am going to speak about 4.  I know there are many others who answered the call, but these are the one's I'm familiar with. 

These men came out of the Great Depression with all the terrible economic hardships that the depression produced,  they went way beyond their own shores to help save the world, they came home, kept their values, never whined, never whimpered. 

Just like the men of 1776, this group of young men and women did not know how that war was going to turn out.  Victory was at times, far from certain, and came with great cost.

 

From every  corner of our little  Parish,   27 Servicemen  gave the supreme sacrifice.  2 of the 27 were brothers from Merryville.

I know  as many of you,  families who lost loved ones during the war.   From the moment they received the dreaded telegram, or the knock at the door,  their lives were changed forever.  As Tom Brokaw said, 'we cannot say enough, we cannot  do enough, for America's Greatest Generation. 

            BEN HUDSON:

Marine corp Ben Hudson, father of Dr Charles Hudson,  was an eye witness to history.  On  Sunday, Dec 7th , 1941 Ben was carrying a marine detail to the golf course .  Ben said when the first wave of Japanese planes came in over Hickman he immediately knew what was happening.  Using sledge hammers to break the locks off doors of the building that housed anti aircraft guns, Ben and his men set up the big guns on the golf course.  For over an hour, with the barrels of the guns red hot, they battled the Japanese airplanes. 

Later that day he retrieve bodies floating in the harbor.

  Me and a bunch of others pulled the bodies out of the water so we could get those ships out to sea. We put the bodies on the back of a flatbed truck. 

I asked Mr Ben , years ago, did he shoot any of the Japanese planes down.  He looked at me with that twinkle in his eye  and knocked the ash out of his pipe, and said , ' vincent, don't think I hit a one.'  He laughed at what he just said.  To this day I'm not sure if he was telling the whole truth.

Ben went on to do battle at Midway and Okinawa where some of the bloodiest battles of WWII took place. . 

After retiring as a Master Sgt after a 30 year career  in the Marine corps  , Ben Hudson came back to the little community of Singer, locked up his Colt model 1911 semi automatic pistol for the last time, and for the rest of his life raised cattle and from time to time while working the fields behind his home would think of his Marine buddies who gave all their tomorrows for our today's. 

PERRY ANDERSON:

Judge Anderson's dad,  Mr Perry Anderson,  just turning  20, Perry   took a bus from DeRidder to Shreveport for induction.  He was given a choice of Army, Marines or the Navy. 

While been inducted  Perry got into the Marine line but then decided at the last moment  to step into the Navy line.

Mr Anderson served aboard the ship, USS Gambier Bay.

Oct. 25th of 1944 would be a day that he would remember the rest of his life.

On that fateful Wednesday morning the  Gambier Bay was involved in the famous Battle of Leyte Gulf with the Japanese Battleship Yamato.  8 inch shells from the Yamato hit the Gambier Bay flooding its engine room.  Consequently the Gambier Bay was dead in the water and quickly overwhelmed by heavy Japanese warships .

The 1st hit on the Gambier Bay was at 8:20 in the a.m and until she sunk, was hit every other minute. At 8:50  , Abandon Ship was ordered.  With shipmates dead or dying and many trapped on board  Kerry's Dad  gripped a rope and slid  down  the side of the giant carrier as the rope burned his hands. 

Although his leg was wounded he managed to swim away from the sinking ship , eventually finding a donut life raft who's wooden slats had been torn away.  For over a two day period Perry Anderson and 1100 of his fellow sailors drifted more than 60 miles in shark infested waters without food or drinkable water.  The sharks were eating three or four sailors each day.  The sailors of the Gambier Bay were in constant fear.  They could see the fins of the sharks all the time. 

This went on for over 72 hours when finally a ship came by looking for survivors.  Mr Anderson was taken to a new Guinea Naval Hospital and from there to the fleet hospital in San Francisco.

Seaman 1st class, Perry Anderson was awarded five battle stars and a purple heart.

Mr Anderson retired from teaching school here in Beauregard Parish after a 22 year career. He later became a very successful businessman.  For many years he would go to the annual reunion of the USS Gambier Bay. This was done to preserve the honor and memory of the crew who fought an epic battle against hopeless odds.

RAY GIBSON:

In 1940 Ray Gibson graduated from high school and enrolled in John McNeese Jr College.

While at McNeese war breaks out. Ray said that as a boy he was fascinated with the army airplane flying over the  Beauregard and Vernon parish countryside during the La maneuvers. 

Ray knew then that the Army Air Corps was the place for him.

Ray was a bombardier on a  B-17 plane named 'the Nasty Habit".  Ray said that the B-17 got the name Nasty Habit because it had a bad habit of getting shot up on most missions. Not only that but the Nasty Habit crashed landed twice. 

During this particular difficult  time, one out of three of our planes were been shot down. 

On march 3rd 1944, the Nasty Habits luck ran out.

On their 17th mission, heavy flak knocked out their right engine and the plane caught on fire.  With all their bombs still on board , the pilot gave the order "Everybody Out".

Ray told me that considering he had never parachuted before in his life, 'he would have rather been someplace else that fateful day'.  Ray was one out of 5 crewmembers  who were able to get out of the plane before it explored.

I had asked him did he break anything when he landed on the ground.  Ray said he broke nothing but his pride.  He had landed in a hog pen.

Ray was immediately captured and put in a cellar.     But during the night, not knowing if he was going to be shot or  not,  an inner voice came over me and said , Ray , its going to be ok.  

Ray was imprisoned for  395 days in the famous German prison camp Stalag Luft 3. 

As the war was going badly for Germany , Ray and the prisoners were moved further west as the Russian army was approaching from the east.  The prisoners were forced marched in below zero weather for 4 days, then put in cattle box cars for a 3 day train ordeal

On April 29, 1945 Gen Pattons 3rd Army attacked the camp Ray was in.  Ray always liked to tell this story.  An American tank pulled up to the prison gate, there were hundreds of American prisoners on the other side.  On this particular tank the turret door opened up and the tank commander stood on the tank, with a cigar hanging out his mouth  and yelled out, Does anyone here know a McFaddin,  Once of the POW's said , "I do,   The tank commander then said, "Go get him and tell him that his brother is here to take him home."

Ray was awarded 4 Air Medals . 

Shortly after coming back home, Ray entered LSU and graduated with a degree in Forestry.  Ray worked for Bosie until he retired.  Ray was a boy scout leader and a member of the Methodist church choir for over 30 years. 

  Only in the past few years has he been able to talk about his war experience.  Ray and his wife live in a assisted living facility in Tyler. Ray and I served together on the city council.  I have never known a finer man.

BOB BLANKENSHIP:

Last September there was a front page story in the New York Times about the dedication of the largest single span river bridge in Europe and one of the biggest memorials of liberation on the Continent of Europe.

The article goes on to explain how 365 days a year , 48 fallen soldiers of I Company are honored by  street lamps spanning the bridge by lighting up in a slow succession at dusk.  Every day at sunset, we will remember the Americans that were killed for the liberation of our country, said the mayor of Nigmegen, a city of 177,000 in Holland.

Here are excerpts from a book I'm reading.

The goal was to capture the Nijmegen Bridge .  CBS war correspondent Bill Downs reported on the crossing this way, "A single isolated battle that ranks with Guam, Tarawa, Omaha Beach.  A story that should be told to the blowing of bugles and the beating of drums for the men whose bravery made the capture of this bridge possible

Gen Gavin writes in his book, in order to get to the north end of the Nigmegen Bridge, Lt Blankenship and his men of I Company had to cross the Waal River in canvas boats, often using their rifle butts as paddles with entrenched German soldiers with machine guns shooting at their canvas boats from the other side.  Bullets whistling around.  The river water looked like raindrops hitting it. It was not raindrops, it was German bullets.  The river turned red with the blood of the I Company men. 

Only ½ of the first wave of boats made it to the other side.  48 out of the initial 104 men lost their lives during the crossing.

Frank Van Luntern in his book the Battle of the Bridges, says that Lt Blankenship was the first officer  to make it to the far shore of the Waal River.  Lt Blankenship had became acting company commander when all the other officers were wounded or killed. 

Here are the exact words of Gen Gavin in the awarding of the first of two Silver Stars that were awarded to Bob Blankenship.

For gallantry in action on Sept 20th, 1944 near Nigmegen Holland, 1st Lt Blankenship a platoon leader in Company I of the 50th parachute infantry  crossed the Waal River in the first boat of the assault wave during the daring daylight operation designed to establish a bridgehead.

As follow up boats were preparing to land, and enemy machine gun on the left flank opened up, wounding and killing several men and pinning down the larger landing force. 

Lt Blankenship by crawling and moving by leaps and bounds, moved across 100 yards of open terrain until within 50 yards of the machine gun, whereupon he killed the four man crew with rifle fire.  Lt Blankenship suddenly observed a concealed enemy sniper only five yards from his position firing on his scout.  Since he had no time to reload his then empty rifle, Lt Blankenship silenced the sniper by use of hand to hand combat, 

Lt Blankenship then led two of his men within 15 yards of a flak wagon which they proceeded to neutralize with hand grenades.  The courage , outstanding leadership, and unselfish actions displayed by Lt Blankenship through out the entire action reflect great credit on himself and the Army he serves. 

For this action Bob Blankenship was inducted into the Military Order of the Knights of William.  This decoration is the highest decoration granted by the government  of Holland.   It is equilivant to our Medal of Honor.  For his gallantry, he was Knighted and assigned the name of Sir Robert. 

For his military actions during WWII, Bob Blankenship was awarded two Silver Stars, one Bronze Star and five Purple Hearts. 

This epic battle in Holland  was made into the movie, “A bridge too Far."

The school children in Holland are taught about this epic battle.  In Holland it is called “The Crossing”.  Everyone in Holland knows the story of how the 82nd Airborne saved their country.

In closing , I would like to recite a few words from the famous Lee Greenwoood song.

And I'm proud to be an American,

where at least I know I'm free.

And I wont forget the men who died,

who gave that right to me. 

And I gladly stand up,

next to you and defend her still today.

‘Cause there ain't no doubt I love this land,

God bless the USA. 

and God Bless America’s Greatest Generation.