Remembrances of Things Past 
By Pete Behr

While waiting to see a doctor, along with other mostly old people, I came upon a magazine whose articles all started with some kind of catch phrase, like "The dust welled up around my pick-up, as we wound along a road into the Peruvian Andes…" This is apparently typical of modern reporting, blending facts and romance. Snoopy, the dog in the comic strip Peanuts, always started his novels with "It was a dark and stormy night…"

It reminded me of my early college days. I had been in the Army from 18 to 21 years of age, by chance in the infantry, and had been in the assault waves and subsequent combat in the invasion of the Philippines at Leyte, and then the precursor to invasion of the Japanese mainland, Okinawa, perhaps the bloodiest battle of World War II, but largely forgotten because the war in Europe had already ended, and the war in the Pacific ended immediately after, with the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. 

After returning to civilian life, I had learned quickly that nobody was interested in my experiences, and even if they were, they couldn’t possibly comprehend them. When I entered college, after spending the spring and summer playing baseball and otherwise loafing, I had to take a course in English, presumably to prove I was literate. My professor asked that we compose a series of short pieces, preferably biographical. Having had a lot of experiences that nobody was interested in, I put them to pen, in three hundred words or less. The only beginning phrase I remember was "Night falls swiftly in the jungle…" It has a nice ring to it, don’t you think? I got an "A."

I wrote about various experiences, like the time the company commander’s dog-robber (our slang for his orderly) found a cobra in his foot locker. While we amused ourselves watching the orderly, who was transfixed by the swaying reptile, the captain came back, pulled out his forty-five, and shot the cobra. I had to expand this story a bit to reach my allotted three hundred words. 

I didn’t recount any real combat stories. There was no point in doing so, because it is virtually impossible to describe being shot at in terms which ordinary law-abiding people can visualize. Also, combat was filthy, exhausting business. One was always unwashed for days on end, deprived of rest, and hungry. Initially, one was frightened, but constant exposure to combat conditions made danger normal. The first time I was caught in an artillery barrage, I was momentarily a shaking, useless person, as the shells burst around me. But only days later, I was used to it. Once I was on watch in my foxhole with two buddies, who were lying below ground level, during a nightly shelling by the Japanese, who were on higher ground above us. I described the pattern of the explosions as they approached us, and told them I was going to get down, since they were getting close. There was an explosion, and our foxhole was collapsed.. The next thing I remembered was my buddies feeling me to see if I was in one piece. All I had was a slight concussion and some contusions. Life went on, and we persevered. You can train people to get used to anything -- even being shot at. 

When we were on Leyte, we had more losses from sickness than from combat. After we had secured the island, we had dengue fever, yellow jaundice, various forms of dysentery and "jungle rot," fungus infections. But the worst was liver fluke, or schistosomiasis, a disease one could get from bathing in the rice paddies. Many of our outfit got this sickness, including our company clerk. I was a rifleman, but when our clerk got sick, the Army records showed I could type, and they asked me to replace him. I got promoted to corporal.

On Okinawa, we had many casualties, and when our numbers were diminished by half, I told my C.O. that I could take over a platoon. His name was John Van Vulpen, and he was from Tennessee. He said "Son, I need you here, and besides, you’ll be safer inside the perimeter." He always called me "son." 

One of my jobs was to write letters of condolence. The Army had form letters, and whenever there was a lull in combat, I would take out my portable typewriter and catch up on the letters, which I would change to provide a heroic description of the soldier’s death, especially those who were my particular friends. I usually closed the letters with "I hope this letter provides you a small measure of comfort…", signed by Captain Van Vulpen. He was killed just before the island was secured. I don’t know who wrote his letter of condolence. They gave him a Silver Star, posthumously. 
 

Pete Behr writes a regular column for the Vermont Standard