My Heritage
To Hell with Kaiser Bill!
I’m reading, The Last of the Doughboys: The Forgotten Generation and Their Forgotten World War by Richard Rubin. Rubin had this great idea to interview living American veterans of World War One. Frankly, it was a race against the clock since all survivors of the Great War were well over 100 years old by the […]
Morgenrot_Morning Glow
The 26th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment was a “German” Regiment raised for the Union during the American Civil War. It was nicknamed “The Sigel Regiment” after Franz Sigel himself a German immigrant from Baden. Twelve regiments of Germans were raised in 1862 from areas in the north with heavy German immigrant populations. The 26th Wisconsin was […]
Wisconsin National Guard Behaving Badly
My dad was proud of military service in WW2. Before he passed away he asked me to get an honor guard for his funeral which I did when he died in 2006. The men that showed up to fire the salute and hand me the flag were professional and courteous. The squad leader gave me […]
Uncle Bill’s Cold War Cruiser
Sometimes when you did through family history pictures you get a surprise. My Uncle Bill (William Zoromski), whom I had only met a couple of times once when I was 6 and another time when I was sixteen, reportedly served on the USS Providence, a guided missile cruiser that I supposedly toured in 1959 when […]
What did you do in the war dad? Part 8, occupation currency
I have in my possession two envelopes in my mom’s handwriting. My parents were married in 1952 and did not meet until 1950 or so long after my dad’s occupation duty in Germany. This tells me that dad’s pictures and the French francs and German marks below were in my parent’s possession by then and […]
What did you do in the war dad? Part 7_Liege
Although my dad spent most of his overseas duty with the 504th Military Police Bn. he was first assigned to the 707th Military Police Battalion headquartered in Brussels, Belgium after the war. Among my dad’s pictures that he sent home are 16 on the same kind of paper. Two are marked, “Liege, Belgium” and the […]
What did you do in the war dad? Part 6_Giessen
Dad spent most of his tour of duty in Cologne, Germany in 1946. For a time his unit, or at least a portion of it, was transferred to Giessen, Hesse, Germany. Giessen is smaller than Cologne and is located about 50-60 miles SE of Cologne and about 15 miles north of Frankfurt. Frankfurt would host […]
What did you do in the war dad? part 5 Liberty Ships
I remember my father telling me that he made the trip to Europe and then back to the USA on Liberty Ships. He said the trip back was faster than the trip to Europe. The Liberty Ship or the later Victory Ships are among the unsung workhorses of America’s war effort during the Second World […]
Addendum #1 to What did you do in the war dad?
For those of you who have been following my series on my dad’s time spent in Cologne, Germany right after the war as a military policeman I’d like to call your attention to an excellent website. It’s called Dierk’s Page and features a photographic record of prewar Cologne, war-time Cologne as well as post-war. This […]
What did you do in the war dad? part 4
Within the packet of pictures my dad sent to his father in 1946 from Cologne, Germany are about 20 that appear to have been purchased. The 20 pictures show scenes of what appear to be prewar Cologne. The packet contained about 40 other pictures that appear to have been taken by my dad with the […]
History and Hobbies 