Howard Parks
Era: World War II
Military Branch: Army
Oral History Interview with
Howard Parks (WWII Vet)
Born October 16, 1917
Interviewed by
Daniel Hartman
Program Director of Veterans Memorial Hall
Transcribed by
Karin Swor
Program Assistant of Veterans Memorial Hall
D.H. Daniel Hartman
H.P. Howard Parks
E.P. Ellen Parks
R.P. Ronald Parks
DH. Hello, today is June 4 of 2008 and we are doing an interview with Harold Parks.
Daniel Hartman is conducting the interview and it is approximately 3:50
and we will start the interview now.
D.H. Howard can I have you say your name and spell your last name.
H.P. Howard Parks, last name P-A-R-K-S.
DH. OK, which war were you involved with?
H.P. World War II
D.H. What division were you a part of and what was your unit’s name?
H.P. I was in the Rainbow Division, 42nd Division.
D.H. And that was an Infantry Division, correct?
H.P. Yes, I was Infantry Division.
D.H. And you were the 232nd regiment?
H.P. That is right.
D.H. Ok, now lets back up a quite a bit then. What year were you born in exactly?
H.P. 1917
D.H. And you actual birth date is?
H.P. October the 16th.
D.H. Ok, and where were you born originally?
H.P. Coal Harbor, North Dakota
D.H. And were your parents originally from Coal Harbor, North Dakota, as well?
H.P. Well, at the time I was born, yes.
D.H. Ok, where did they come from originally?
H.P. Well my dad was born in Minnesota.
D.H. Ok, do you know where in Minnesota?
H.P. In Parkers Prairie.
D.H. How about your mother? Where was she from?
H.P. My mother was born in Germany.
D.H. Ok, so did she immigrate, I take it from Germany over here?
H.P. Yes, I think she was three years old when they immigrated over here.
D.H. So she spent most of her life in the United States?
H.P. Oh yeah
D.H. And the two of them were, do you know how they met and how they came to be?
H.P. No, I do not know that.
D.H. OK, do you know what their background was? Obviously she was German, and what background was your father?
H.P. English and Irish
D.H. And did they have a common religion or did they have different religions?
H.P. I am not sure of that. - Mrs. Parks spoke up and said your mother went to the Lutheran Church, I don’t know about your dad.
D.H. If you want to sit at the table too you can. What was your mom’s maiden name?
H.P. Bertha Breck
D.H. And joining us here at the table is Howard’s wife. And I am sorry your name was, Ellen Parks, and your maiden name is?
E.P. Ellen Korkala
D.H. Can you spell the last name please?
E.P. K-O-R-K-A-L-A, and I was born in Finland.
D.H. Do you remember Finland at all?
E.P. Yeah, I do.
D.H. Ok, What made you come to the United States? Your parents, I imagine?
E.P. My father was born here, he went to Finland when he was 12 and stayed there until he married my mother and had my sister and me. Then he came here and he sent for us 3 1/2 years later when he could afford it.
D.H. Hey that is a neat story. I will skip back to you real quick and make you part of this too then. When you were a kid growing up in North Dakota, how long did you stay in North Dakota? Or were you there until the war?
H.P. No we left there when I was about 2 years old. We came back to Minnesota.
D.H. Did you move back to Parkers Prairie, Minnesota?
H.P. No, we moved to Henning, Minnesota.
D.H. I am not familiar with where that is?
H.P. It is close to Parkers Prairie.
D.H. Ok, and I guess, growing up in the 1920’s, correct? For the most part in your childhood.
H.P. I don’t remember the exact date that we came there. Cloquet, I think maybe the early 30’s.
D.H. Growing up, a lot of things have changed so I will ask you some questions about your past just for future generations so they can understand that time. When you were growing up what were some of the usual games that you played with some of your neighborhood friends? Or was there a certain sport that you played a lot?
Some kids played Hockey in the area some actually ski jumped, believe it or not.
E.P. He hunted and trapped.
D.H. Was that pretty much your hobby?
H.P. I didn’t do much of that until we got married and the kids were small. I did a lot of trapping for, to make a few extra dollars.
D.H. Ok, Growing up there wasn’t any certain games you played, like kick the can or anything like that?
H.P. Oh yeah, there were a few odd games, jinni-I-over.
D.H. I don’t even know what that game is. Do you want to explain the game a little bit?
H.P. Well, you throw the ball over the roof of a building and back and forth.
E.P. And try to catch it when it comes down.
D.H. Ok. And it is called einni-I-over?
H.P. Yeah, and you would run around the building and try and hit somebody with the ball.
D.H. Was it a pretty common game back then?
H.P. Oh yeah
D.H. Were there other games similar to this that you played a lot?
H.P. Not that I recall?
D.H. What were some of the popular sports that you played growing up?
H.P. Well, we played football in school, a little bit.
D.H. Was that one of your favorite sports?
H.P. Not exactly.
D.H. Was the game played a little bit differently than it is today?
H.P. I suppose it is more complicated now days. About ½ of them had uniforms the others had other stuff they wore. It was sort of primitive.
D.H. Some people say that is better.
E.P. Baseball was pretty common then, softball
H.P. Don’t talk; they will get that all on there.
D.H. Don’t worry about the recorder running out of time, either. I don’t think we are going to be here for 15 hours and that is how much time it has. Did you have any brothers or sisters growing up?
H.P. Yes I did.
D.H. Could you name those brothers and sisters?
H.P. Well I had my brother Walter, brother Irvin, and sisters Lucille, Emma and Elsie and Vivian and Barbara. It was a big family.
D.H. It sure was. Was this pretty common back then to have large families like this?
H.P. Yes it was.
D.H. Where did you fall in this line? Were you one of the youngest or one of the oldest?
H.P. No, I was kind of in the middle.
D.H. During the 1920’s, there was prohibition, and a lot of vets don’t remember this, but do you remember much activity with this, much going on?
H.P. Yes, I remember it. The guys used to buy moonshine and hide it.
D.H. Any interesting stories you remember from that?
H.P. Lets see?
R.P. How about the trips to Oliver?
D.H. What is that about?
H.P. My dad and my brother-in-law they used to drive to Oliver and get this moonshine. They had this Model T Ford with a trunk and they would make me get in the trunk when they got to the bridge so they could save a dime on the toll bridge in Duluth. When they got across the river they would let me out just to save a time. They would get a jug of moonshine and put that in the trunk on the way back.
D.H. So they actually got the moonshine in Oliver?
H.P. Yeah
D.H. That is kind of a neat old story. What did your family do with the moonshine was it just for drinking purposes?
H.P. Well, they used to sell it to a guy out at Lake Minnewawa. That was an all day trip out there. In those days.
D.H. How long of a trip was it? About a 6-hour drive?
H.P. It must have been and if you could get there without having a flat tire you were lucky.
D.H. So that is pretty neat. So you actually remember it pretty well and remember the family members that were involved in it. Any other stories like that you remember from those days? Any crazy stories where you almost got caught?
H.P. Well I remember this one guy used to come up and bring moonshine up there, Floodwood. We lived in Floodwood for a few years and he would bring moonshine up there and sell it to some of the guys. He stopped in Tamarack on the way up and robbed a bank. So then he waited a few weeks and then the next trip he was going to rob the bank again but he got arrested. That was the end of his bank robbing days.
D.H. You guys knew that guy?
H.P. My dad knew him, yes.
R.P. Do you remember his name?
H.P. No, I can’t remember his name, no.
D.H. So this guy that used to sell you moonshine actually got caught robbing a bank the second time. So were those kind of crazy times, I Imagine, or were people worried about getting caught with the moonshine?
H.P. Well, I don’t really know.
D.H. It was obviously quite a long time ago.
H.P. Oh yeah.
D.H. Any other particular stories that you can remember that would be fun.
R.P. How about that one where the jug fell out on the street?
H.P. Oh yeah, I remember, when we lived in Floodwood. The young guys took up a collection and they were older than I was anyway but I happened to be in town with some of my buddies. They had taken this collection, and this one guy had a Model T and he drove all the way to Oliver and bought a gallon jug of moonshine and then he drove back and when he got into Floodwood why he parked by the curb and somebody opened the door on the other side of the driver and the jug rolled out and broke on the sidewalk. I always remembered that part.
D.H. Were the guys pretty happy about that?
H.P. Pretty unhappy.
D.H. Is there anything else from the 1920’s that you think in general that you would like to have in there? Like any stories about your father or your parents that would be especially interesting for future generations to know?
H.P. I can’t think of any at the time.
D.H. OK, I will skip ahead a little bit to the 1930’s during the depression; do you remember this time frame fairly well?
H.P. Oh sure.
D.H. A lot of guys that I have interviewed they would generally say that they could tell that the depression was on but they were poor before then anyway, is this kind of the case?
H.P. We lived on a farm just out of Floodwood in the early 30’s. We stayed in Cloquet and then I remember we drove up to Floodwood. My older brother bought a new car, it was a Model T, in 1926 and he brought that with him, so that is how I know the dates. It was a car he paid $600.00 for brand-new.
D.H. That is a little bit different than today. You said your parents were farmers. Was this his only occupation?
H.P. No, my dad had an outside job. He had a steam engineer’s license so he was a janitor at Floodwood High School for quite awhile. He took care of the steam boilers and stuff like that.
D.H. So he did two jobs, he was a farmer and also a steam engineer at Floodwood high school.
H.P. Yeah, and he worked at a logging camp at Wolf Lake north of Big Sandy, that would be west of Floodwood. They had a steam engine that run the saw mill and he took care of the steam engine. When the camp closed why he and his buddies walked all the way from Wolf Lake to Floodwood to get back home. They didn’t have a car or anything so they just cut across country out there.
D.H. That is quite a ways.
H.P. Yeah it was quite a walk.
E.P. He was a mechanic too.
H.P. Yeah, he was a mechanic in a garage in Floodwood, too.
D.H. So he was kind of a jack of different trades?
H.P. Oh yeah
E.P. Very handy.
D.H. Did he teach you any of those skills growing up?
H.P. Well, I worked on a farm too, but I think the only skills he taught me were how to shoot a rifle.
D.H. Growing up in the teen age years, what were some of the things you did for fun that were different than the 1920’s, like I imagine, this was the big era of theaters and Duluth had quite a few. Did you go to a lot of movies growing up?
H.P. Yeah, I went to quite a few movies, yeah.
D.H. Was there a certain theater you usually went to?
H.P. Well, we went to Cloquet theater; they used to call it the Leb theater.
D.H. Were there any certain movies in particular that you liked to go and watch when you were growing up?
H.P. Yeah, the Westerns with Tom Mix and those guys.
D.H. When you were growing up did you live in this area as well, then?
E.P. Well, I lived in Ely when I was little then I lived in Superior until 1934 then we moved to a farm in Prairie Lake, that is between Cromwell and Floodwood.
D.H. Ok, Did you guys meet before the war or after?
E.P. Well, we got married in 1938.
D.H. So when did you guys meet for the first time?
H.P. I don’t remember.
E.P. I remember. I was on a date, Prom, coming home and it was raining and the roads were muddy and we slid in the ditch and he came along and went and got his horses and pulled the car out.
H.P. We lived right close.
D.H. So you were actually on a date with someone else and that is how you met him and he actually pulled you out of the ditch. That is a pretty cool story. Was this 1936?
E.P. 1937 because we got married in 1938.
D.H. So within a year you guys were married? Does that sound right?
E.P. 1938 yeah, a year after we met.
D.H. How old were the two of you at that point?
E.P. I was seventeen and ½ and Howard was 21 when he got married.
D.H. Growing up, I can ask the two of you this. When you went on dates where did you go for dates, typically in the 1930’s?
E.P. We went to the theater in Floodwood and then there was a bar and dance hall in Prairie Lake, a small one, we used to go there.
D.H. Was there a certain movie that you guys like to watch together growing up when you went on dates? I can’t imagine you went to Westerns as a date movie.
E.P. I don’t recall what movies we went to together.
H.P. I don’t either that’s too long ago
E.P. But I remember somebody stole a wheel off his Model A when we were in the theater to a movie. Come back and a wheel was gone.
D.H. On your car? And that was in Floodwood? Do you remember any of those Western movies that you liked to watch?
H.P. No, I don’t. There was Hop-Along Cassidy and Tom Mix. Gene Autry.
D.H. Growing up was there any other activities that were special to that era that people wouldn’t be doing today or in the future for that matter?
H.P. Well I don’t think you see it much now days. We used to have picnics on the weekends and play baseball and stuff like that.
E.P. Oh, they had parties too. All the families went and all the kids were put in the bedroom to sleep and the parents would, sometimes they would dance. Howard’s dad called dances
D.H. These picnics, describe these picnics a little bit, like where would you go for the picnic, which would come along?
H.P. Well, we would go out to some lake, like Prairie Lake north of Cromwell.
D.H. Ok and just kind of relax for the day, and bring some food, I imagine just as it sounds. The parties, how often did these parties take place and were they family parties or just kind of friend parties or just a mix?
H.P. It was kind of mixed. Just during the summer months, like July and August mostly.
D.H. Which brings me to another good question. How did you cope with the winter months in the early 1920’s and 30’s? What did you do for fun? Did you cross-country ski did you snowmobile, no you probably didn’t snowmobile.
H.P. Well, we did a lot of ice fishing.
R.P. You skated on the river.
E.P. Yeah, you used to skate on the river.
H.P. We used to skate on the river in Floodwood.
D.H. Any fun stories of skating on the river, any scary moments? Do you remember?
H.P. No
D.H. Was the winter a little bit harder to deal with back then compared to today?
H.P. Well, I don’t know, I didn’t mind the winter. When you are young you don’t mind it much. That is the way it was.
E.P. We had a lot of snow, lots of snow.
D.H. A lot more snow than there is today?
E.P. Oh yeah
D.H. Was the winter season longer or about the same?
E.P. I think spring came earlier, because I remember the lilacs were in bloom the end of May and they aren’t now.
D.H. Yeah, now it is the beginning of June. Any certain winter memories that you guys remember in the 1920’s and 30’s that you would like for the records?
H.P. Not especially.
E.P. I remember after we were married, Howard’s sister came down and the nieces and nephews. He would take his old Model A with some toboggans and put them behind the Model A and go out on some old country roads. I would stay home and cook some hot chocolate for them.
D.H. What sister was that?
E.P. Emma Parks maybe and Lucille. Emma’s, they were his sisters Emma, his ½ sister. No I mean your sister’s children, you went with like Lyle.
D.H. I imagine they enjoyed that quite a bit? During the depression, could you tell, like when the depression actually physically hit, could you tell that was on and how could tell that it was on? And by on, I mean actually effecting a lot of people.
H.P. It didn’t seem to bother me much because we lived on the farm and we always had food to eat. I never went hungry in my life.
E.P. I never went hungry either but we didn’t have all the nice fruits and things that we can get these days. We picked a lot of Blueberries and canned and canned peaches. A lot of garden of course and cattle.
D.H. Did the depression affect some of your friends at all?
H.P. Not to my knowledge.
E.P. I don’t think so; nobody thought anything about it because we were all in the same boat.
D.H. Did you have electricity growing up all your life or is there a certain time in your life that it came?
H.P. No, we didn’t have electricity.
D.H. It never did come to the farm?
H.P. Eventually we got electricity in the farmhouse. We used kerosene lamps and we did get a radio. We had a wind charger to keep the batteries up on the radio.
D.H. A wind charger for the radio? Different times that is neat! How was it to have electricity for the first time, was it kind of a weird experience, for the first time?
H.P. Pretty nice, otherwise we had a wood heater, just a heater in the living room, on the farm. That was the only heat we had in the wintertime. Then we had a cook stove in the kitchen that of course burnt wood too. It was all burning wood.
D.H. You said earlier that the winters weren’t that difficult on you, though, so the wood burner worked pretty good and kept you warm.
E.P. Cut a lot of firewood.
H.P. Cut a lot of firewood.
D.H. Do you miss that ever? I still do it.
E.P. He has big piles of firewood out there. We have 40 acres behind this strip here. The wind blows a tree down and he has to go and cut it up for firewood.
D.H. So you have to enjoy it a little bit if you still want to do it today?
H.P. Oh yeah, I do it. It keeps me going, I guess.
D.H. I understand; Now, in the 1930’s as Germany started growing up and having power in Europe, was that something either of you were paying any attention to. Were you worried about what was happening?
E.P. I wasn’t.
H.P. I don’t think I was too concerned about it.
D.H. Eventually FDR made a promise to America that we wouldn’t ever enter the war. Did you believe that was true?
E.P. I don’t think I even thought about it, really.
D.H. Ok. That is the most common response I get. Do you remember when the British and the French declared war on Germany and vice versa in 1939?
H.P. Oh yeah, I remember when the fighting started, oh yeah.
D.H. Did you start paying attention at that point?
H.P. Oh yeah, we followed it, more or less.
D.H. Did you have any thoughts that you would be eventually going over there?
H.P. No, I didn’t even think about it.
D.H. It was more just like a news flash?
H.P. Yeah
D.H. In what year did you begin your military service?
H.P. 1943
D.H. 43?
H.P. I don’t remember the exact date.
E.P. Drafted, we had a 3-year-old son when he went in the service.
D.H. OK, what was the son’s name?
E.P. David Parks
D.H. When the draft began, were you guys watching the draft pretty closely, I Imagine. Were you pretty worried about it?
H.P. No not really.
E.P. I don’t think we were worried about it but we were definitely aware of it and I went to work at the Match mill before he went in so he could build a little house for us so we had a place to stay while he was gone.
D.H. Where were both of you working in the 1930’s and what did you do for money? Obviously you worked on the farm.
H.P. Well, I worked at these mills in town. I worked at the Match factory.
E.P. Paper Mill.
H.P. I worked at the Paper Mill, and I worked at the Wood Conversion.
E.P. That was after the war that you were there, wasn’t it?
H.P. Yeah
D.H. When you moved to Cloquet? You worked at the match and the paper mill after you moved to Cloquet, correct? When you moved to Cloquet did you both move here together then?
E.P. Yeah, we were married already then, we were married in 38, so we moved her in 39 and we have been here since.
D.H. Did you have any other side jobs at this point?
E.P. I don’t think then so, no.
D.H. You said then, when did you start work?
E.P. After the war started I went to work.
D.H. In 1941 when Pearl Harbor took place, December 7, do you remember the day?
H.P. Oh yeah, I remember the day.
E.P. That was on the radio and everybody was aware of it I think.
D.H. Where were you when you heard it for the first time?
H.P. Well, I was working at the paper mill I think.
D.H. Who told you?
H.P. I don’t remember. It was on the news. Everybody new it.
D.H. How about you, do you remember where you were by chance?
E.P. No, I don’t remember.
D.H. But you remember the day for sure.
E.P. I remember when it happened, yeah.
D.H. What were you guys thinking at that point? I guess tell me some of your thoughts of what you may have been thinking back then?
H.P. I wouldn’t remember that.
D.H. How about you, I imagine this was a concern for you?
E.P. No, I don’t remember what I was thinking.
D.H. Ok, then we will start moving along. When the war started it sounds like you took on another side job then, and what was that?
E.P. I worked at the match factory.
D.H. Was he still at the match factory at that point?
E.P. No, he was at the paper mill.
H.P. Yeah, I think so.
E.P. Then I went to work at the wood conversion before he came home. It was a little bit better pay. Match factory you got .49-½ cent per hour.
D.H. You still remember that number pretty good.
E.P. Oh yeah, and we had to wear a badge with our number on it.
D.H. Really
E.P. I got mine here, I will show you. (Image is attached).
D.H. That is impressive. Where was the match factory? I have never heard of that still here today, is it?
H.P. It’s still running.
R.P. Diamond Match
D.H. Oh
E.P. That’s me when I worked at the match factory.
D.H. This is pretty incredible that you guys still have these. I am going to take pictures of these before I leave.
E.P. Have you seen these Marley?
R.P. No
D.H. Do you want to describe, why did you need to wear these, just so they could identify you quickly?
E.P. It was during the war, I don’t know why we had to wear them. I don’t know why that would be in danger, the match factory.
D.H. Oh that was because of the war that you needed to have them.
E.P. Yeah, this was during the war.
D.H. Really! Were there extra guards around some of these buildings?
E.P. Not that I remember, no there wasn’t.
D.H. Just because I know some of the other plants did have some guards that they didn’t have before. Tell me how did things change when the war started?
E.P. They had little red coupons to get meat and blue ones for the vegetables. We were very limited on the meat. Whipping cream wouldn’t whip. A lot of fillers in the bologna even, it was a lot of cereal. It wasn’t like the good bologna.
D.H. Yeah, so it was kind of hard, a little bit harder time to live through.
E.P. Yeah, and then when he was gone I had to have a baby sitter. She stayed with me and she was going to high school. Her mother kept all of her coupons or whatever they were, so we had to go kind of easy so we could make the food go around. Especially the sugar. I miss that, so I quit using sugar in my coffee so I could make a cake a week.
D.H. Man, Is there anything you remember from living during the war?
H.P. I was working at the match factory then they started this Alaska Highway, so I quit there and went up to the Alaska Highway. I worked there for a few months then came back home. I got a job at the paper mill. I was drafted from the paper mill.
R.P. Edmonton
D.H. How long were you working on the Alaskan highway?
H.P. I wasn’t there very long. Maybe three months.
E.P. Something like that, cold winter.
H.P. 40 below zero.
D.H. That’s pretty cold. I imagine that it was a group decision to do the Alaskan highway. How did you handle him being gone for that short period of time?
E.P. Well, it was kind of hard. We were all ready used to our married life.
H.P. We were building buildings and insulating them inside of a big tent, then they loaded these buildings on flat cars and shipped them up the railroad as far as the railroad went, Peace River so that the people that were working above there had a warm place to stay there during the winter.
D.H. That is pretty important too. I guess I will start moving in to, when you were actually drafted, what was the process for that? Where did you have to go when you found out you were drafted?
H.P. I had to go to Fort Snelling.
D.H. Ok, what happened at that point, did they do any tests to see if you were still able to go in the service?
H.P. No
E.P. Physical?
H.P. We had our physical and then they just assigned us to a certain place.
D.H. Where did they assign you?
H.P. Camp Walders, Texas, infantry training camp.
D.H. Did you know what division you would be at this time already?
H.P. No, No. This was just training camp.
D.H. Was this you basic training then?
H.P. Yup
D.H. What was going through your head at this point? Were you guys writing letters back and forth?
H.P. Oh, yeah.
D.H. Did you guys ever keep any of those letters?
E.P. I might have a couple of them and a few cards or something, but I didn’t keep to many of them.
D.H. When you went to Fort Snelling down in the twin cities was this the first time you had been to the twin cities?
H.P. I don’t remember, I think I had been to the twin cities, but not very much.
D.H. Did you take a train or did you drive?
H.P. We took a train.
D.H. Was that out of the depot in Duluth?
H.P. No, it was out of the depot in Minneapolis.
R.P. No, from here to Minneapolis.
H.P. Oh, from here to Minneapolis. I don’t remember.
E.P. I thought you took the bus.
H.P. I might have taken a Greyhound bus.
D.H. So when you went to Fort Snelling and took your physical and took you test, you went straight from there to Camp Walders, Texas? You didn’t have to go back home for a period of time?
H.P. Right.
E.P. No
D.H. How long were you in infantry camp, in Texas?
H.P. Basic training, I think was 16 weeks.
D.H. How was Texas, I imagine that was the first time you probably were in Texas.
H.P. Hot, Hot! It was right in July the 1st of July.
D.H. Your memory of Texas was not a fond one?
H.P. No, not to good.
D.H. How often were you writing back and forth, daily?
E.P. No, not every day, not that frequently.
D.H. But he was pretty good at writing back to you?
E.P. Not to good, he is not a good writer.
H.P. Sometime there is no place to do any writing.
D.H. When you were drafted, you already had a kid, and had been married for a while. That is a little bit different then most of the guys I interview. Most guys are just married or not married yet. What did you do down in camp? Tell me a little bit of what your training was in Texas, what did they have you doing down there.
H.P. We went on a lot of marching. We had to go on the machine gun range, and crawl under the barbed wire and they shot over you with machine guns. Cross the river on a rope, if you could hang on. Half of the guys fell through. They had to let go of the rope and fell in the water.
D.H. But you didn’t have to do that yourself?
H.P. I made it across.
D.H. How was it, I imagine this was the first time you worked with machine guns and things of that nature.
H.P. We had to fire all our weapons on the range before we got out of there.
D.H. Was that a fun thing for you?
H.P. Yeah, I didn’t mind. Use a rifle, mortars and machine guns.
D.H. How did you do with the rifle, pretty good?
H.P. Yeah, I did pretty good.
D.H. You were there for 16 weeks? Is there anything else that you want to say about your basic training, any great stories?
E.P. Was Camp Gruber part of your training also?
H.P. Well, that is when we joined the division; I was going to get to that.
D.H. But no great memories in Texas besides the awful heat?
H.P. It was hot and the sand was blowing all the time.
D.H. So you were definitely in a desert type area not a humid area?
R.P. How about the story about the drill sergeant? With the packs on and falling in the ditch.
H.P. We went on one speed march and our Lieutenant he had a little bag, not a very big bag. The rest of us guys had to have a rifle and a field pack with our stuff in and it was hot. We would run a telephone pole length and then walk a telephone pole length, for twenty miles. When we got back to the camp and I think there was only about four of us that made it, out of the whole platoon.
D.H. And you were one of those guys?
H.P. Yeah, I made it. The Lieutenant he told us to fall in and we fell in there in a line about six, seven of us. He fell on his face in the dirt, he passed out for a while, and he got over heated.
D.H. Any other stories that you remember that he may have said about Texas?
R.P. No
H.P. There wasn’t much to say just that training.
D.H. Were there any guys that you met in basic that you became friends with?
H.P. Yes, a few, but then when we shipped out of there they sent us to Camp Gruber, Oklahoma and they split us up. But there was some of them I remember.
D.H. Do you remember some of the names?
H.P. Yeah, a few.
D.H. What were the names, just for the record, I guess?
H.P. There was, well if I looked at those pictures, I could tell a lot of them, but most of them were from the East coast.
E.P. Here are some of them in the beginning.
H.P. Oh there was Rudolph Hess I remember him, there was a Willy Foster, Mark Cook, Jim Nevens, some of these guys I remember them but I can not remember their names.
D.H. Ok, Do you remember any certain unique things about these guys? Like was one of them a pretty funny guy?
H.P. Oh yeah, (he laughs) Well I can’t remember any of the details about them too much.
D.H. Ok, so what was the laugh about?
E.P. What were you laughing about, do you want to tell?
H.P. Oh, this one guy, and I can’t remember his name, but when we went on a pass to town why he would walk along the sidewalk and then he would get in the curb and he would act like an ape and start scratching himself hobbling along with his arms hanging down. People would stop and look at him.
E.P. How about the guy that thought he was going to have to go overseas?
H.P. I don’t want to get involved with that.
D.H. I guess we will move: Where did you go from basic training?
H.P. Camp Gruber.
D.H. Do you know how to spell the last name?
E.P. G-R-U-B-E-R
H.P. Yeah, I think so.
D.H. And where was that?
H.P. Oklahoma
D.H. Was that any better than Texas?
H.P. Oh, yeah. That was better than Texas.
D.H. Ok, how long were you there?
H.P. I don’t remember exactly.
D.H. But it wasn’t like a year or anything like that. Maybe a couple of months, maybe?
H.P. We shift from there to Camp Kilmer, New Jersey.
D.H. What do you remember about Camp Gruber? Were you assigned to the division at this point?
H.P. Yes we were assigned to the Rainbow Division, and then had more basic training, a certain amount.
D.H. Were you assigned to your duty at this time, or what you may be doing?
H.P. Well, yes in a way we were. We knew what we were going to do. We did that thing when we got overseas, what ever it was.
D.H. What were some of the activities that you did at Camp Gruber that were different than at Camp Walders, Texas?
H.P. I can’t remember exactly, it was just more target practice and stuff like that.
D.H. Were you happy to be part of the 42nd infantry division?
H.P. Oh Yeah, I didn’t mind it; it was as good as any, I guess.
D.H. Any other memories of Camp Gruber that you want to have for the record? There was something that she was hinting at earlier?
H.P. The only thing I remember was this one guy he was a supply sergeant, and of course he wouldn’t go out in the field, and the rest of us would go out in the field for the day, and the guys would come back and some of their stuff was missing and the money out of their pockets. So one day the Captain had one of the guys stay in the barracks, he hid at a place in the barracks, and he caught that guy going through their clothes. So then we got ready to ship out, we had to all fall out, of course they put in the stockade, but he was there, he was standing beside the Captain and the Captain said, “ I want all of you men to look at this guy, he has been robbing all of you and he thinks he is going to stay here in the states” but he said “ I am taking him right along with me.” So he had to go along. They got him on the ship, and it was really ruff, and the guys, these landings on the ship, you come up to a landing then you turn and go up to another landing. The guys were sick in all those corners and after the ruff weather they made him clean up the mess.
D.H. The next camp you went to was Camp Kilmore?
H.P. Well that was Camp Kilmore, New Jersey; we just stopped there for a day or two before we went on the ship.
D.H. Do you remember the name of the ship you were sent on?
H.P. No, but it was an old German Liner.
D.H. Was this something we had already taken from World War II or is this something we had taken from World War I?
H.P. I am not sure, I think it was from World War I, no World War II, I’m sorry.
D.H. When you were in New Jersey did you get to go to New York at all?
H.P. No, we didn’t, they wouldn’t let us leave camp.
D.H. Even when you were in Oklahoma or Texas did you have any days off when you could enjoy the local area?
H.P. Not very much, no.
D.H. Ok, In New Jersey, was that any fun, or you didn’t have any time?
H.P. No, just a couple days and then we had to board ship.
D.H. How was the sea passage on the old German Liner?
H.P. It was ruff, but on a big ship it didn’t bother us too much.
D.H. How many men were on that ship?
H.P. It seems that there was about 5,000.
D.H. We are restarting the interview and it is June 4, 2008 and the interview is with Howard Parks. We will start back on, we were talking about journey across the North Atlantic, I imagine.
H.P. No, we went the southern route, across the Azores.
D.H. Were there a lot of guys, I imagine, getting sick on the ship?
H.P. Oh yeah.
D.H. How did you handle it, were you ok?
H.P. Yeah, it didn’t bother me that much.
D.H. Ok, How was the food on the ship on the way over there?
H.P. Well the food as I remember it was ok.
D.H. Was it better than the food you had in basic training?
H.P. No, no, it wasn’t better.
D.H. You don’t by chance remember any of the meals you had?
H.P. No I don’t.
D.H. Ok, when the ship finally landed where was the first place you landed at?
H.P. Well, we went right into the Mediterranean and we landed at?
E.P. Mercedes
H.P. We landed close to Mercedes
D.H. Do you know what year and month, about?
H.P. I don’t remember exactly. I think it was around August.
D.H. This was 1943 or 44?
H.P. 43
D.H. What was your first impressions of Europe?
H.P. Well, we landed on, there was a sunken ship by a dock and they put the gangplanks down on the sides of that ship. It was lying on its side. We went ashore there.
D.H. How was the Mediterranean? Were you scared at all going through the Mediterranean for the German subs?
H.P. No not at all.
D.H. You didn’t see any close calls or anything like that?
H.P. No, no Not with the ship, no.
D.H. What happened after you landed, I guess?
H.P. Well, it was raining and everything was about a foot deep with mud. We spent the night out there in an open spot.
D.H. Did you have a tent?
H.P. Yeah, we called them a shelter half. You are kind of buddied together with two guys and you put that shelter half together and made a pup tent. So we dug a trench around there to keep the water from going under the tent. We spent the night in there. I don’t think we slept much.
D.H. So what were you thinking that day that you landed, were you kind of excited or kind of?
H.P. Not really, kind of bad.
D.H. I am sure at this time you kind of knew you were close to war?
H.P. Oh yeah,
D.H. Where did you move on from there, slowly?
H.P. We slowly went inland until we ran into resistance, and that was it.
D.H. And where did you first run into resistance at?
H.P. I don’t remember the exact place or where it was or the name of any town.
D.H. Were there, at what point were you assigned to be a jeep driver or a driver?
H.P. Before we got over there.
D.H. So that was a role you took on right away after you got on.
H.P. As soon as we got to Camp Gruber they assigned us to a certain job.
D.H. When you actually arrived in Europe, you did that right away?
H.P. Yeah, as soon as they got the jeeps lined up.
D.H. Tell me a little bit about your average day when you first started out, like what were you doing, who were you driving around?
H.P. Well, we would probably have a Sergeant or a Lieutenant. We just moved with the flow. I followed behind the tanks.
D.H. What country were you in when you finally met resistance for the first time.
H.P. It was in France.
D.H. It was in France. Who did you run into did you actually run into the French?
H.P. No, we ran into the Germans.
D.H. How was that? I imagine it was pretty scary moment for the first time you actually ran into them.
H.P. One thing I can remember is that one morning I was talking to a buddy of mine, he was a jeep driver too, and we were going to move ahead and he said, “I don’t think I am going to make it”. (Long pause) Anyway the Germans put a roadblock in on the road. They cut a notch in the tree so that when the tree went down it would fall on the road. Anyway we took off that day and the tank went ahead of us.
H.P. Anyway he pulled in behind the tank when we come to this roadblock. There was a field along the side so we could get around the roadblock if we went in the field. I don’t know how it could have happened but they took off with that tank and they went around the roadblock. He went behind it and he blew up.
D.H. And he followed in behind the tank, and that is how?
H.P. Yes, but his jeep hit that land mine. I stopped; I must have been only about 100 feet behind him. But he never made it.
R.P. Were there other guys in the jeep?
H.P. Yeah, but it blew the jeep off the ground about 8 feet high.
D.H. Do you remember the other driver’s name?
H.P. No, I don’t remember his name right at this minute.
D.H. Ok, now where was this about and was this pretty early on your journey in France?
H.P. Nah, we went quite a ways before this happened.
D.H. At this point were you getting a little bit different feeling of what was going on?
H.P. Well, I don’t know, I kind of just took things as they come.
D.H. I imagine you were anxious to come home at the same time.
H.P. Oh yeah.
D.H. So lets slowly just walk through you journey through France. After you met resistance for the first time what battles did you take part in your unit?
H.P. Well, I don’t know if there was any certain battle at all. We just kept moving and mopping up whatever there was.
D.H. According to the 42nd infantry division you guys, for a while, you defended a line and there were several German counter offensives. Were you aware of these offensives being against your unit?
H.P. Yeah, a line…Oh, yeah, there was one town, well the villages used to be fairly close together over in Europe. In the old days they build them for defense. Anyway we were in, well there was three towns there, the town on the end or our left, the German’s were in there, so they chased everybody out of there. We moved back into the middle town and they sent some tanks up there. We had some of those Free French with us at that time and they had our tanks.
D.H. How were the Free French were they pretty good fighters?
H.P. Well, I don’t remember too much about them only that one incident. The town where the German’s had taken over, of course they set their guns up and nobody could see them do it anyway, but the Free French they started across that opening, I would say about ¼ mile, no it must have more than that, maybe ½ mile. They were all going across and they waited till they got way out in the middle then they knocked out all seven tanks.
D.H. The German’s knocked out all the tanks?
H.P. Yeah, they knocked them all down. I remember watching. I was alongside a building there and they had that red tile on the roof and one of our tanks pulled up alongside that building. There was a church steeple in the town where the German’s were and they figured they had an artillery observer up there and that tank shot around over there to that church steeple. I was under that roof with a concussion, some of those loose slate tiles; one of them came down and hit me right on top of the head. I remember that pretty good.
D.H. I imagine you were pretty happy to have the helmet?
H.P. I remember we were there for several days dug in there. The foxhole we had, my buddy and I were full of water. We were right by a road there, the roads that run to the towns. My Captain he was in the third town down, and somebody notified him that we were having a little bit of trouble, so he came down to investigate. So he went right through the town we were in, nobody flagged him down or nothing and he went most of the way across that big opening over there towards that town where the German’s were and they shot him with a machine gun. The jeep went in the ditch and rolled over. I could see it from where I was.
D.H. And no one stopped the guy?
H.P. They didn’t think he was going to go through town, I suppose. He didn’t make it.
D.H. Did you guys eventually take out the German town?
H.P. Yeah, eventually, yeah. We were dug in there for that road and there was one of our jeeps sitting there and I told my buddy, I said I am going to get up there and lay along side of that jeep. I got up there and artillery round came in and went over me and blew up in that field. The next one came in and it was short of the jeep, I think he was shooting at the jeep, I don’t know but I rolled under the jeep and put my head between the rear wheels. The next shell came in and I don’t know how far it was from me, but not very far, maybe 20 feet or something. That shrapnel riddled that jeep. Pieces of that steel went right through the rims, right where my head was. A piece went through my gas mask, but I made it.
D.H. I bet you were pretty happy?
H.P. I rolled out from underneath that jeep; I think I dove head first into that foxhole.
R.P. What about the one piece that hit you?
H.P. One big chunk hit me on the, you know that shrapnel would break into pieces it was kind of flat, and if it hit flatways sometimes it didn’t do much damage. Well a chunk hit me in the elbow, I thought my elbow was shot, but I made it in the hole and there was nothing wrong with my elbow it just hurt a little bit, that’s all.
D.H. I imagine you were pretty thankful to get through that incident?
H.P. Oh Yeah.
D.H. A common saying is “There’s no atheist in a foxhole”.
H.P. That’s right.
D.H. I imagine you guys prayed quite a bit in that.
H.P. Yeah
D.H. Do you have any certain, you know, any lucky charms or anything. Like some guys refused to clean their socks, do you have anything like that?
H.P. No, I didn’t.
D.H. Ok
H.P. I remember one incident there on that same road. The road was built up and you could walk along the side so you were down like this almost. My buddy and I were sneaking along that road there and there was a house back in the woods there quite a ways, but I could see the house. Somebody shot at me, just missed me, so I ducked down because I didn’t know where it was coming from and I put my head up slowly to have a look and another shot went past so I didn’t try to look at it no more I stayed down.
D.H. How long did it take you guys before you were able to take that third German town?
H.P. I don’t remember any more, it was a matter of a few days or so.
D.H. You don’t remember how that happened? Like did you get more reserve forces that came through to help to that town?
H.P. Yeah, like some of the Free French were coming in there too. They captured quite a few Germans out of there.
D.H. You don’t remember what German unit it was by chance?
H.P. No, I don’t.
D.H. Ok, where did you move on from there?
H.P. I don’t remember exactly how, I think we were lost ½ of the time. That is how it felt to me.
D.H. That is entirely possible. How were the French people?
H.P. They were ok, once and a while they would come out with a little bit of that schnapps when you were going through a town. That was terrible stuff made from potatoes.
D.H. You didn’t like it?
H.P. It smelled just like rotten potatoes.
D.H. Did they ever give you any of the French wine?
H.P. Oh, yeah
D.H. Did you like it?
H.P. Some of it was ok.
D.H. Sometimes the French gave a lot of bread away to soldier too, did that happen?
H.P. I don’t remember that.
D.H. Well when you would come into a town did sometimes were the townspeople out welcoming the soldiers?
H.P. Oh yeah, they were standing out on the sidewalks, the street was narrow in most of the towns.
D.H. How did that feel? I imagine that felt pretty good, I am sure they were welcoming.
H.P. Yeah, they were welcoming. It would have been different if they were hostile.
D.H. You didn’t have any, like some towns, some of the girls would go up to the American soldiers and thank them and the guys would shake their hands.
H.P. Oh yeah
D.H. No memorable experience from that you think is a story to tell?
H.P. No, not that I can think of.
D.H. How long were you in France?
H.P. Well I don’t know that either, we kept going north so I don’t remember exactly and like I said they moved you from one place to another.
D.H. It sounds like they moved you pretty frequently too?
H.P. Yeah, we were right at, one time we were right at that French line, that Maginot. We were dug in along there one time for, while I don’t know, it must have been five or six days, anyway. We were right in the timber then there was an opening right in front of us and the German’s were across the canal. My buddy and I, we dug a good hole and covered it with poles and paper and dirt so we were fairly safe under there. But the German’s shell it all night, the last night before we moved out. The next morning we stuck our head out and all we could see was splinters sticking up where the trees were around there.
D.H. How did it feel sitting through one of those artillery barrages? I imagine they were very loud and scary.
H.P. Yeah, but of course, like I say, we covered that hole and we just left one place in the corner where we could crawl down under all that dirt so the only thing that could get us was a direct hit.
D.H. How were you doing during all this? Were you writing letters when you were over seas?
H.P. Not to much, no.
D.H. It was pretty hard I imagine. Did you have a picture of her that you carried along with you?
H.P. I might have had but I don’t remember.
E.P. He had a picture of me and David.
H.P. Yeah, one thing there in that place it was in the winter time, there was some snow on the ground, I walked back behind our lines, because you know you sit there all day, and you didn’t want to build a fire because the German’s would see the smoke and were able to shell over in there. Anyway I walked back behind the line, just to do something, and I saw a little deer back there and a little buck. They had those fallow deer or whatever they were, they were small. I shot one of them and cleaned it out and I brought it up to the foxhole. We waited until after dark and we had made a stove out of a dehydrated food can, a five-gallon can. We had a drainpipe off a house and we cooked that venison and they ate up the whole thing that night.
D.H. How many guys ate the whole thing?
H.P. I don’t know. We passed the word down the line and the guys would come and then go back to their position.
D.H. So out on the front you guys actually shot a deer and cooked it up for the crew?
H.P. Yeah
D.H. That is pretty impressive. That is definitely, in my opinion, a northland, northeast Minnesota story. It sounds like that wasn’t the only time you shot a deer?
H.P. Well after the war I shot an Elk up there in the mountains and I gave it to the German prisoners. We had a lot of prisoners. They were cutting timber; I don’t know just for something to do I think. But they were glad to get that Elk. They carved us some steaks and they took the rest of it.
D.H. I am going to look at these real quick. Is there any story behind this photo here? It looks like basic training.
H.P. In Texas. That guy was with us when we were in Texas. I don’t know what happened to him, he disappeared. He went someplace else I guess.
D.H. Where do you, do you remember where you acquired this money, in France?
H.P. No, I don’t remember that?
D.H. I know I asked you before but do you remember where you acquired this Nazi patch
H.P. No I don’t.
D.H. Ok…. now a lot of time when you guys were actually, you know, taking over these German soldiers and sometimes killing them, did a lot of guys take patches from them and swords and things of that nature, like guns? Was that a common thing for a lot of your guys over there to do?
H.P. I never run into that at all. The only thing I ever took from a prisoner was a watch. Not a prisoner a dead guy. I took a watch and brought it home. I think I gave it to my grandson.
D.H. You don’t remember where you got this?
H.P. No I don’t, I have another one of those armbands someplace.
E.P. Probably in the basement.
H.P. No, I think it is in that top drawer.
E.P. It could be.
D.H. These are honestly neat pieces.
H.P. The other one has some blood in the corner.
D.H. We will continue wit your, you went into Northern France, then did you go into Germany or did you go into Austria, or where?
H.P. We went into Germany.
D.H. Do you know where in Germany you came in?
H.P. Yeah, we went into Munich, we ended up in Munich.
D.H. Was it different going into Germany compared to France? Could you tell the moment you were in Germany, like were the people a little more hostile?
H.P. No they weren’t. They weren’t hostile. It was cleaner for one thing.
D.H. Germany was cleaner than France?
H.P. Oh yeah
D.H. Do you think it was just because the German’s took care of their cities better?
H.P. I think so, yeah. Munich that is where that Dachau prison was.
D.H. Were you part of the group who helped liberate the prison?
H.P. Well, I wasn’t right there when they liberated it but I went out there the day after, a bunch of us went up there and turned all those prisoners loose.
D.H. Did you yourself get to help free some of the prisoners there?
H.P. Well we didn’t do much we just went in there and let them all out of that place.
D.H. Do you want to describe the scene of how it was? Were you surprised at how bad the conditions were?
H.P. Oh yeah, you didn’t feel very good about looking at it. But we turned the guys loose and they were all half starved and dressed in those stripped suits. I think they looted everything they could after we turned them loose, after we turned them loose they were scrounging for anything they could find to eat, you know.
R.P. Could they speak English?
D.H. Do they speak English?
H.P. I don’t remember that at all. They were kind of thankful though.
D.H. Do you remember any of them coming up to you personally and thanking you?
H.P. Oh yeah, they would come and give you a hug.
D.H. I imagine, did you feel like you were there for a reason now, did you feel pretty happy?
H.P. Well we knew the war was just about over.
D.H. A lot of times when veterans were a part of this they were pretty glad for what they were doing because they knew what the Germans were up to.
H.P. Yeah
D.H. Were you shocked at how?
H.P. I don’t think that the common soldier knew much about it.
D.H. So when you saw and your fellow friends saw it, I imagine they were shocked by it too?
H.P. Oh yeah, it was kind of a mess.
D.H. Do you want to describe like the living conditions that these guys were in?
H.P. No, I never really went in and looked around much, just went in the gate and that was it.
D.H. But you guys were pretty, was it kind of like the images that you see right now, the really ghastly skinny guys.
H.P. Oh yeah
D.H. After they went and looted the town were you guy’s upset about that, or was it something you were ok with?
H.P. No, we didn’t care about it. We would have done the same thing anyway.
D.H. Were you guys trying to find any food to hand out to them?
H.P. Well the only thing I remember about that place was the railroad. There was a building there and it was a refrigerated building and there was still frozen stuff and it was full of frozen peaches, in little containers.
D.H. In the actual prison?
H.P. No, no, in the town in the railroad yard. Of course the railroad was all blasted and the only place that the tracks were still laying on the ground, was where there was an agent sitting on top of it. Otherwise all the rails were all twisted up and all blasted out with bombs.
D.H. Did you guys hand out some of those peaches to some of them?
H.P. I don’t remember, there was a lot of them so I mean all they had to do was help themselves. It was cold, kind of cold.
D.H. What time of the year was it?
H.P. I don’t remember exactly it was fairly cool weather I know that. Whatever it was when the surrender come it was about the same time.
D.H. I may be backing up a little bit on this. Do you want to describe this railway gun a little bit?
H.P. I never have seen that gun only in pictures.
D.H. You guys refer to it as “Bertha” What was the name for it?
E.P. Big Bertha?
H.P. I don’t know.
D.H. But you yourself, you never encountered the railway gun yourself?
H.P. No I never did.
D.H. Were these newspaper clippings were they things you were cutting out back home?
H.P. She cut that out.
D.H. So a lot of these clippings were because of your historic work?
E.P. Yeah
D.H. When he was over seas you were definitely trying to follow the 7th Army?
E.P. I was.
D.H. How were you back here with a child? I imagine that had to pretty tough too?>
E.P. Yeah, it was pretty tough. I worked mostly 4-12 so I was with David all day. Then I had a high school girl living with me the last year and she took care of him after school, until I got home. She stayed right with me.
D.H. It must have been pretty nice having that high school kid helping you out?
E.P. She is in Tennessee and she comes to see me every year.
D.H. Really, that is pretty great. How often did you guys keep in contact during the war, once every couple months, if that? I imagine it was pretty tough especially with him moving around so much.
E.P. I sent him a package and he got it and the cookies were all crumbs. I sent him cheese and I had to put wax all over it and to the box so it wasn’t solid, never got that. I sent him some fishhooks so when he was fishing trout in the stream.
D.H. Did he get that?
H.P. Yeah, I think so.
E.P. I think you did.
H.P. That was after the war.
D.H. In these pictures right here, where are these? Are these in training still?
H.P. No, some place in Europe but I don’t remember where?
D.H. Do you remember these guys pretty good?
H.P. Oh yeah.
D.H. Are there any certain stories about any of these individuals you think should be told or kind of fun?
H.P. I don’t really have any stories about any of them. They were good friends.
D.H. Do you know where they were from?
H.P. Not all of them.
D.H. Where were some of them from?
H.P. This guy here, this is the same guy. He came from West Virginia. His folks, I think it was, had a store there. He came from one of the southern states, his name is Peters. This is Hess, his last name is Hess.
D.H. When you had down time what did you guys talk about? Just to kind of pass the time when you were over seas?
H.P. I don’t remember much.
D.H. Did you play any cards?
H.P. After the war we played cards when we were up in Austria.
D.H. But during the war you didn’t play any cards?
H.P. No, no
R.P. Where did you ride on that motorcycle?
E.P. Yeah
H.P. I can’t remember where that was.
D.H. Lets hear it, what’s the story on the motorcycle?
H.P. Well, we came into this town and there was a motorcycle there, but something was wrong with the battery, so I found a battery in a vehicle there and I put it in there. Of course I was no motorcycle rider anyway but there was a stonewall there, like a courtyard, and we were inside of there. We got it started and I thought I would take a ride so I went through the gate and when I got into the street there was a couple of little kids in the street and I couldn’t avoid them so I ran it into the side of one of the buildings there. Got all banged up, my legs were all black and blue.
D.H. Were you kind of embarrassed?
H.P. I don’t remember, I left the motorcycle.
R.P. Wasn’t that in Germany?
H.P. I think it was in Germany; the German’s had a lot of motorcycles.
D.H. And the German people they were pretty nice to you?
H.P. Oh yeah, what I seen of them they were ok.
E.P. Why don’t you tell him about the farm that you swore there all night and you met the cow and went and fed him?
H.P. Oh yeah, that was a different time. That was in the winter, there was snow. We came in that village, people had all left, a lot of those villages they would have a barn with a few cows. Well this place had some cows and they were in the barn, I don’t know when the people left. We, I think there were four or five of us, we went in that house and there was nobody there so we checked out the buildings and saw no one was around. I saw them cows and my brother was the only one that milked a cow in the first place. So I fed all the cows, gave them all hay and water. I then got a bucket out of the house and milked that cow. Then there was a cellar on the end of the house where you had an outside entrance. We used to call them a root cellar, we used to call them. There was a couple of barrels of wine up in a platform they had laying there, they were lying on their side. There was a facet hanging on the wall, there was no facet in the barrel and there was a wooden mallet so I drove one of the facets into the barrel so we got a big picture out of the house and filled that with red wine. Then we had that milk and upstairs there was bacon and ham in a fire pit. They used to burn those little twigs all they burnt was clean wood. They smoked their meat in that place so we sliced some of that and fried it up. We had a pretty good night, there, it was snowing outside. Yeah, then we lay down in the bed. They had those feather filled things, like for a blanket.
D.H. This was in Germany?
H.P. Yeah, and boy did it feel good to lie in a bed?
D.H. That is a pretty cool story. Were you part of this march?
H.P. With the platoon bridge?
D.H. I guess I will move more ahead then. Is there anything that you want to say about these photo’s here on the left?
H.P. No not much.
E.P. Where was this one?
H.P. I have no idea. We never knew the names of any, like us guys we never knew the names of any of those towns in the first place so we never kept tract.
D.H. You really weren’t there that long anyway.
H.P. No
D.H. I am trying to find. How was it encountering some of the prisoners of war? How were the prisoners, reluctant do you think they were happy to have the war over? What was the feeling you got?
H.P. I think most of them were happy that it was over with.
D.H. Did any of you guys actually become friends with any of the guys over there.
H.P. Well, not real close friends; some of them could talk English. They seem to be good guys, most of them that I talked to.
D.H. Did you ever run into any Americans that were of German decent that actually went back?
H.P. You mean to live over there?
D.H. I mean, there were some guys that lived in the United States that went back and were in the German service.
H.P. Oh, I don’t know I never did run into any of them.
D.H. It doesn’t happen to often.
R.P. You have stories of the prisoners when you were guarding them, of fishing and picking mushrooms.
H.P. That was in Austria in the Mountains. We had a stockade there and they fixed it up so they could cut logs and stuff. Just for something to do, you know, there were quite a few prisoners in that stockade. That is where I shot that Elk and gave them the Elk.
D.H. How long were you guarding prisoners in Austria?
H.P. Oh, I don’t know. We must have been there a month or so.
E.P. I think you were there longer.
H.P. Then they discharged some of those guys, some of them sneaked out of there, at night, a few of them. But I didn’t really care, if they wanted to sneak out, we used to guard them, you know, at night we changed off.
D.H. This photo, this looks like a copy. Were you guys ever visited by any movie stars or did you ever go to any of the USO shows or anything like that?
H.P. No, I didn’t.
E.P. You had lunch with an Austrian.
H.P. There was, I guess she was suppose to be some kind of an actress. I ran into her up there in the mountain. I had gone for a walk, her and her boyfriend they sat down and talked to me, they could talk good English, and they sat down and talked to me.
D.H. How did you know she was a major star in Austria?
H.P. I don’t know, they must have told me that.
D.H. I don’t mean to skip Germany so I am going to go back a little bit. In your time in Germany how long were you actually in Germany, fighting the war? Were you in Germany when the war ended or were you in Austria when it ended?
H.P. Well we were at Munich.
D.H. Ok, so you were actually at Munich when it was done?
H.P. Yes
D.H. Do you remember when you heard the news it was over, were you pretty excited about it, I imagine?
H.P. Oh, yeah, we felt good about it.
D.H. Did you guys celebrate that night?
H.P. I don’t remember. We celebrated a couple of other nights though, I remember.
D.H. Which nights were those?
H.P. The guys used to fill their canteens with wine if they could find it in the cellars, in those barrels. In fact we all filled ours, where those cows were, we all filled our canteen in the morning when we left with that red wine.
D.H. It was a pretty fun night, I imagine.
H.P. Oh Yeah.
D.H. Was there a small group of guys that you generally hung out with over there?
H.P. You generally hung around with your own squad.
D.H. Do you ever keep in contact with those guys in the squad today?
H.P. No, no, I was in contact with a few of them but that is quite a few years ago. I think most of them are gone.
D.H. When you were Austria, I heard that you went fishing at one point, how was fishing in Austria compared to Minnesota.
H.P. Oh, there was a lot of fish in them streams.
D.H. What did you catch what kind of fish?
H.P. All trout, rainbow and browns. In fact we had a couple of German prisoners, I don’t know, they could talk English pretty good, so we went and got them and went to this one river. It was fairly wide but not very deep, like knee deep, a little more maybe, they waded in there, one guy on each side. I don’t know how many of them trout they caught. They must have caught 25 trout out of there. They would feel under the bank and they would come out with a trout.
D.H. With their hand?
H.P. Yeah, they caught them all with their hands. The water was really clear and they could see them trout going across the river and they would go under the bank, they knew where they were. As long as you didn’t make any quick movement, just put your hand in there and gradually touch them and you could take a hold of them.
D.H. Did you do that yourself?
H.P. Oh I caught a couple, yeah.
D.H. Did you ever do that back here?
H.P. No, I never did, the water around here is too brown, you can’t see nothing.
D.H. How was Austria?
H.P. It was a beautiful country.
D.H. Would you say that is one of the more beautiful places you went to when you were over there?
H.P. Yeah, I think, well I was in the Alps Mountains there you know.
D.H. Did you do any skiing?
H.P. No
D.H. Ok. The people of Austria were they a pretty pleasant bunch.
H.P. Oh yeah.
D.H. Any stories of Austrian or Germany that you want to tell that I by accident have skimmed over?
H.P. No, I’d rather…I remember one town we went through, I was going down the left side of the street and I got to the end of the street the last building, and I didn’t walk right out in the open, I just looked around the building and somebody shot at me from the woods at the end of the town and they missed. So I hollered at him “come out with your hands up” This guy hollered back at me “why don’t you come over her and get me”
D.H. What happened?
H.P. I just didn’t poke my head out there no more.
D.H. Any other stories of Austria? What were your duties? It sounds like you were guarding the prisoners for a while you drove jeep quite a bit.
H. P. Yeah
D.H. What are some of the other things you did?
H.P. We had a transportation corporal; he took care of the jeeps, just to see that you had ammunition and stuff. We had three jeeps at our outfit. I was driving a jeep at that time, it must have been earlier. We stopped at one spot and a couple of AH shells came in there and that buddy of mine, that was the transportation corporal, he was about, just a little ways, maybe like 15 feet and it blew his leg off; way high up and he fell down on the road and his foot was up under his head. We put a tourniquet on his leg that stub. He survived but I never saw him any more after that. Of course they shipped him home.
D.H. Did you go through the war yourself not having any major injuries?
H. P. No, I never got injured at all. I was lucky.
R.P. Ask him about that Bronze Star thing?
D.H. Oh yeah, the Bronze Star. How did you earn the Bronze Star?
H.P. Well I didn’t really do anything, I think out of the ordinary. All we did was, the Germans, it was full of Germans, I am trying to think. I mentioned the town earlier.
D. H. Where you had the three towns?
H.P. Wiertzburg? We moved into that Wiertzburg late in the afternoon. Did I tell you that already?
D.H. No
H.P. Anyway we moved in there, there was some resistance there then it kind of quieted down so we kind of stayed over night in there. The Germans counter attacked during the night, part of them. There was a lot of Champagne in that place, that depot there and I think the German’s were drinking a lot of that too. They come in their and one place we had a machine gun sitting in the doorway on the street. They through a hand grenade under that but the guys heard it coming, so there was two doors in the entry way and they dove through the second door and it went off. It didn’t hurt anybody. My buddy and I put a machine gun behind that building we were in; there was a railroad track there. Pretty soon we heard some German’s coming, they were walking on that gravel road, and they were talking. We could have shot at them easy, they weren’t far but we just sat there in the dark and they walked by. They never knew we were there. I didn’t want to shoot they see that gun flash and they would know right where we were. The next day we went out and the guys ran in to some, a firefight up in the hills above Wiertzburg. I went up there and brought some ammunition over there. That is all I did. They were shooting at that, well I spent the night in the woods all by myself. But they were shooting this 20mm machine gun at us. I think it had explosive shells because when it hit those trees, I was right in the woods and it would explode right on the limbs and stuff. That stuff was flying all over. So then I stayed overnight, in that hole, all by myself. In the morning, I was watching there it was getting daylight and her comes a whole bunch of German’s coming out of those woods. But they didn’t have their guns or nothing so I crawled out have there and I went with them and we march back and ran into some of the other guys. I don’t know where they put them then. But that was the incident.
R.P. You ran ammunition to guys.
D.H. You ran some ammunition through some pretty rough fire?
H.P. Yeah, I didn’t think it was that bad but that is what they said, I don’t know.
D.H. Well either way it is pretty impressive you have a Bronze Star that is something you should be proud of. They don’t give them away too easily. Anything else before I go into this book a little further? Once again, this patch of Herman Goring, you don’t remember why you have that?
H.P. No, I don’t remember that.
D.H. You don’t remember these patches up here either, then?
H.P. No, that was just some patches they sewed on our uniforms.
D.H. You took it off a uniform or did someone give it to you?
H.P. I don’t remember, it seems to me I found them in some house.
D.H. Ok, I am going to move through here fairly quickly. This is German money or Austrian. A question for you, what did you think when the war ended? Were you pretty happy?
E.P. I sure was.
D.H. Do you remember the day you found out?
E.P. I don’t remember but I was working and they closed the mill because we all went to celebrate.
D.H. So you had to know he would be coming home fairly soon.
E.P. Yeah, I expected that.
D.H. Were you worried about him getting sent to Japan at all?
E.P. No
D.H. Were you worried about going to Japan?
H.P. No, we heard about it but I don’t know. It didn’t amount to much.
D.H. Right here, Edelweiss, I can never say the word correctly, you don’t remember why you have this?
H.P. Well, the ski troops used to have them on their uniform. Of course I never ran in to any of them but that is what it is for.
D.H. This looks to be a peacock feather is there a story behind that at all.
H.P. No, not that I remember.
D.H. Any thing in particular that you want to talk about any of these post cards?
H.P. Well, there is some old guy, what is he doing there anyway?
E.P. I don’t know.
H.P. It must be some old guy that lives up there.
E.P. Well you visited somebody up there in the mountains there and had a meal with them.
H.P. Some of those guys herded their cattle up in the mountains. There is like a plateau up in the mountains, you know. They push them up there in the summer time and they eat up there.
D.H. Anything in these photo’s here that you want to talk about.
H.P. No, they don’t bring back any memories.
D.H. Did you send these post cards to her?
E.P. He must have because I don’t think you carried them.
D.H. Did you keep in contact with your parents at all when you were over there, or did your parents kind of hear about through her?
H.P. My mother had died already.
E.P. You wrote to my dad.
H.P. Yeah
D.H. Were any of these guys particularly good friends of yours?
H.P. Yeah, him and I used to dig holes together.
D.H. Can you say who this is exactly?
H.P. Yeah, Brumm was his name, he was from California.
D.H. Now, when I read about the Rainbow Division was that you guys were a group of people from all over the United States.
H.P. Yeah, we were.
D.H. Do you think that was kind of neat to meet with guys from all over the country?
H.P. Oh yeah.
D.H. You had a pretty diverse group.
H.P. I never did get to see him after the war.
D.H. Who were the two guys that you used to meet with, kind of?
H.P. Well this is a guy and my buddy together. We would dig our foxhole together. They recommended you dig in with two guys it will be easier to keep warm.
E.P. Norman
D.H. Makes sense. Is there a story behind this rail line at all?
H.P. No, I can’t remember anything about that. Oh, here is a picture of that one deer I shot.
D.H. Is that the one in Austria?
H.P. Yeah
R.P. He had his own camera.
D.H. I will come back and take a picture of that myself later. Is this the camera that you brought from the United States?
H.P. No, I picked up a good one.
D.H. Did you bring the camera back? Yeah, I think I still have that stuck away, that old box camera.
R.P. I have it I think.
E.P. You have it?
D.H. Did a lot of the guys that went over with you have cameras?
H.P. No, I don’t think so.
D.H. Any photos in here in particular that you want to talk about?
H.P. No, this guy here, he was kind of a characters. When we were down in Camp Gruber, the General came to visit the camp and our captain told him to play this certain thing on the bugle and Hess said, “I don’t know how”. I used to go up under this big tree on the hill, him and another bugler and practice but I think they spent most of their time in the service club. So he didn’t know how to play that. So then he told him just play anything.
D.H. How long did it take for you to come back to the United States when you knew you were able to return and did you have enough points to come back, how did that work out for you?
H.P. Well they sent us down to Oraha France. They took so many guys to send at a time, I don’t know. We shipped out of Oraha, France.
D.H. Did you go the south route again?
H.P. No, we went the North Atlantic.
D.H. Was there a difference for you?
H.P. Oh yeah, it was a little rougher.
D.H. Usually the North I have heard is pretty rough.
H.P. We were on one of that Rawlins Victory ship that was the name of the ship Rawlins. But we were all alone then.
D.H. How many guys do you think went back with you?
H.P. I don’t remember, well the ship was full, I think and it was really rough.
R.P. No escorts
H.P. No escorts, we took eighteen days to come back.
D.H. Did a lot of guys get sick on the way back again?
H.P. Oh yeah
D.H. Any stories that you want to talk about on these ships over her in France?
H.P. No, well there is one sunken one there.
D.H. Is that the one you talked about earlier?
H.P. No, that is a different place
D.H. Now when he came back to the United States, I imagine you were pretty happy to have him back?
E.P. Oh yeah
D.H. Do you guys remember the first day that you saw each other again, and do you remember where you met him?
E.P. No, he came to the house, he came home.
H.P. We lived at Larch Street in town.
D.H. I imagine you were pretty excited to be back too?
H.P. Oh yeah
D.H. The post war years I imagine, is there any comment you want to make about, coming back? How did it feel to be back after being overseas in the war for so long, was it?
H.P. It felt pretty good.
D.H. I imagine it helped you cherish the things you had here a little bit more too?
H.P. My one friend, he had a camp out in the woods, he was cutting balsam and I went out and helped him out for a few days.
D.H. Otherwise, is there any other story that you want to have for the record that I haven’t asked you about yet or that we haven’t talked about that you want to make sure we have down.
H.P. Well, I can’t really think of any.
D.H. How about you two, any you can think of?
E.P. How about the time you guys were sleeping in the building and the German’s came through there at night?
H.P. Well, I wasn’t in there, some of the guys were. They were sleeping in a house and the German’s came in one door. This guy was standing guard by himself and the German’s walked right through the house and went out the back door, didn’t even know he was there.
D.H. Well, then I want to say Thank You for allowing us to do this interview today. Thank you two for being here because honestly you helped out with the interview quite a bit. Thank You.
