My Grandfather’s Memorial Day Letter
Today, I’m writing something deeply personal. This Memorial day, I ask you to join me, my family, and my late grandfather (Ltc. James A. Fife) in remembering the personal stories of friends and family lost to war.
Many of us take time to pause on Memorial day to remember the fallen. However, so few of us have ever lost someone to war. My grandfather lost many friends to war, some of them grew up with him in Middlebury, Vermont, a small town where friends got close. These boys were not just colleagues, they were children he grew up with, boys he rode bikes with, played baseball with, and made cherished memories with. Those boys were barely 18 when the were killed in WWII. Some of which met heroic ends along side their brothers, some met heroic ends alone in jungles.
Every Memorial day, my grandfather would do what he could to honor those who were lost in war. As he aged and cancer took its final hold on my grandfather in 2017, I was blessed to be able to spend time with him, hearing his stories and sharing time and thoughts with him. He told me that a lot of times he had wondered why so many good men died while he lived. I honestly believe, my grandfather was a peace when he passed, knowing that his legacy as a father and grandfather were equally important to the United States as a Nation as his work as a solider.
To serve as a soldier, he protected the rights of future generations of the Nation. To serve as a Father, Grandfather, and as a Man, he instilled those rights that are precious enough to be worth our lives, so that the Nation could be better through his teaching.
Here, I want to share something that is extremely cherished by my family. It is a letter he wrote on Memorial day of 2005, to his friends that he lost in WWII. I share this with us so that I hope we all can remember the sacrifices that so many Americans made. Many of us have never known a soldier who did in war. Our more recent generations did not make the sacrifices on the same scale that our nation once did. However, one day, we may need to. And when we do, I hope we are inspired by our values to make those sacrifices if we must.
Here is my grandfather’s letter:
Gee, guys its Memorial Day again. This time it is 2005 and I am 78, been a father, grandfather, and great grandfather. We never saw each other after you were eighteen and you each died not long after, but remember Memorial Day when we were kids? When the Fade got to the cemetery and the men fired the salute we would scramble to catch the cartridges as the men ejected them. We never thought then that there would be many Memorial Days on which you would be among those to be remembered. And, with a very heavy heart I remember:
S/Sgt Morris “Slats” Peck, who may have parachuted from a B-24 over a German occupied island in the Aegean Sea after a Ploesti raid. The Government said it could find no evidence of you after parachutes were seen by fellow flyers. But “Slats” remember the day you and “Gabby” Caswell, who were number one and two in the batting order of our high school team, talked to me to calm me, the last man in the batting order batting for first time in a real game. You said: “Jim, so he is the champion pitcher in the State, you can still hit him if you go up there and hit the first pitch he throws you wherever it is.” Then after my two bagger from his first pitch you and “Gabby” fanned out and left me die on second base with the winning run.
1/Lt. Robert Pierce, shot down in a B-17 raid over Germany. Bobby, remember how you and your brother Charlie picked on Alby and I when we had our BB gun fights? You would run downhill from us and then howl with laughter when the BB rolled out the barrel of our old guns when we tried to shoot you. Even with your neat new “Buzz Barton” repeater BB guns you laughed so hard you must have missed us once in a while as we ran to get behind a tree and spit another BB down the barrel of our ancient Daisey BB guns.
Pfc. Alfred Wickenden, who was last seen being taken captive wounded by the Germans in the Hurtgen Forest battle of 1945 and never heard from again. Alfy, remember the dark night we killed the cow with your Dad’s new Chevy as we were coming home from bird hunting? My Dad told me after the war that he was greatly honored that you came to ask as a disabled veteran ofWWI how a soldier afraid of the coming battle could keep courage. Dad sure hoped that he helped you to bear your fear as you gave that last full measure of devotion to the American Dream.
Pfc. Charles ‘’Hoogy’’ Needham, shot in his halftrack by a sniper on the very last day of combat in Europe. “Hoogy” I remember well the “shinny” hockey games we played and you would be the prime example of a snot nosed kid when the game got hot and you couldn’t take time to wipe with the back of your mitten.
Pfc. Grant Novack, who died on the beach at Normandie on D Day. Grant, I remember so well the lurid tales you told of your older brothers and their adventures riding the freight trains with the hoboes during the jobless days of the Great Depression. You and I were too young to have bourn the heat from that the Depression, but later when I bought gas at your older brother Ted’s station; his quiet thoughtful ways made me wonder about the accuracy of your tales.
Pvt. Paris Palmer, who managed to escape Japanese capture in the Philippines and was killed as a guerilla fighter in the jungles late in the war. Paris, that first bike that I bought from you for five bucks coasted down hill better than any other kid’s bike. That is why later I paid you five bucks for the bike that during summer vacations from school I rode home Friday nights from the farm I worked on early in the war and back to the farm every Sunday night. Although your fate was then unknown to me, coasting on the hills to cool off the sweat, you were one of the reasons helping the war effort on the farm seemed so little to contribute to winning the war. My soldiering was the opposite of yours. For me there was always the power of Nation, Anny, and my unit and buddies to help with my load and it is most troubling to wonder how alone you were when you died.
