Never spoke about

Discussion in 'General' started by NannaPink, Nov 18, 2017.

  1. NannaPink

    NannaPink Member

    My grandad never spoke about his time in service.he was a tank driver in Egypt.was in Palestine and Africa. Was decorated yet never wanted his medals and they where disguarded by the war office . Where there other men like him
     

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  2. canuck

    canuck Closed Account

    Yes, quite a few that I have heard of. Some have described burning their uniforms immediately upon discharge after the war and then never having anything to do with the legion or unit reunions. Their individual motivations may have been different but some Canadian vets described being so disillusioned and bitter about the experience that they wanted no further association with anything related to the war or the military.
     
    Last edited: Nov 18, 2017
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  3. bamboo43

    bamboo43 Very Senior Member

    I would say that the majority of the Burma veterans I have spoken with over the years, did not want to discuss their experiences once they came back home. Most were attempting to protect their loved-ones from hearing about the terrible things they had witnessed, but in some ways were preventing themselves from re-living those times over and over again. If anything, they would tell humorous stories about their mates antics or tales about India and the cities they might have visited.

    In later life, some of these veterans began to feel that they wanted to talk about their WW2 experiences after all and this is how some of us on WW2T have been fortunate enough to learn about what they achieved.

    As for medals, many never applied for them at all. One officer I interviewed told me that when he saw the quality of the medals, he simply threw them in the dustbin in disgust.
     
  4. CL1

    CL1 116th LAA and 92nd (Loyals) LAA,Royal Artillery

    I would agree with all the above and would also add that they never spoke about it because to many it was the way of the time.
    They just got on with life on the return home
     
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  5. redtop

    redtop Well-Known Member

    All my Father would say until very late in life was.
    "I have seen terrible things Bryan .terrible things"
     
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  6. NannaPink

    NannaPink Member

    The only mention of his service was of his time in Egypt and how bad the smell of camels got right up his nose..
     
  7. canuck

    canuck Closed Account

    The other aspect to this is the very few veterans who have confided about being haunted not by what they saw, or experienced but by what they did. The lingering memories of the men they killed is something that they only talk about with each other, if at all.
     
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  8. Charley Fortnum

    Charley Fortnum Dreaming of Red Eagles

    Big generalisations here, but from listening to a lot of IWM veteran interviews, I've noticed that a good number of soldiers (perhaps particularly those who served for a long wartime period) 'took a break', as it were, after the war. A lot of the post-war officer corps, for instance, seems to have been made up of those who had joined during the latter stages of the war. No doubt, the fearful rate of attrition among junior officers accounts for some of this, but I also get the impression that a good number of long-serving officers who did come through alive saw the cessation of hostilities as the perfect point to call it a day and either retire or move onto a second career on Civvy Street. By 'a break' I mean I've heard more than a few times that a soldier started a family or got a new job in 1945-6 and drifted away from his unit and comrades only to return and join regimental associations and attend reunions later on in the 50s and 60s.
     
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  9. dbf

    dbf Moderatrix MOD

    My Dad took nearly 20 yrs after the war to get married and start a family. I'd joke it was to make sure he had an audience. Talked about everything, very much warts and all; age appropriate wasn't invented then. I took from his stories what I could understand and had plenty of opportunity for re-caps. I still regret not recording more before he died and I still catch myself thinking: Must ring Dad and ask ...

    Dad applied for his medals but as far as I know, he never wore anything other than ribbons post-war - before de-mob and then on his Merchant Navy uniform. He eventually put the medals in a display cabinet, next to his father's (British WW1 & WW2) and father-in-law's (German WW2).

    We hear this so often: "... didn't talk about the war". Some did, some didn't, but some just didn't want to talk to their family about it... so always a good idea to try and track down their mates, starting at RBL, regtl old comrade associations, etc. Especially now, tick tock and all that.
     
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  10. timuk

    timuk Well-Known Member

    FEPOWs didn't discuss the war for a number of reasons:
    Their ordeal had been so horrific they just wanted to forget.
    They had been ordered not to talk about it (supposedly so that relatives of those who died were not upset).
    No one would believe their stories (long sea voyages and good food whilst being repatriated had done much to improve their health and physique).
    By the time they returned the war in Europe had been over for six months and people just weren't interested.
    Tim
     
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  11. Ron Goldstein

    Ron Goldstein WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    When I first saw this thread i figured that I must have been the exception to the rule by posting so much about my life in the Forces bu on reflection I realised that it wasn't until 2004 that I started posting on the BBC site and that was nearly 60 years after the event.

    Ron
     
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  12. dbf

    dbf Moderatrix MOD

    You're an exceptional exception!
     
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  13. Ron Goldstein

    Ron Goldstein WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    As the Japanese stamp collector once said "Philatery will get you anywhere !"

    Ron
     
  14. Enigma1003

    Enigma1003 Member

    Regarding the FEPOWS, if you had received one of these leaflets, and also knew the context of Churchills speech stating
    "the worst disaster and largest capitulation in British history", would you have wanted to talk about it ?
    .
    guard your tongue.jpg
     
  15. tmac

    tmac Senior Member

    I think all of these posts have encapsulated very well the various reasons why veterans rarely wanted to talk about their experiences.

    When I was growing up in the Fifties, almost everyone’s father, uncle or brother had served in the war. In our own little backstreet community, men who were now struggling to earn a living had not so many years earlier fought with the Desert Rats, landed on the Normandy beaches, parachuted into Arnhem. One had been a prisoner on the Burma Railway.

    It’s only with the passing of the years that we now appreciate what these men did and what they experienced. I think they genuinely thought they had done nothing out of the ordinary. As Clive says, it was the way of the time.
     
  16. TriciaF

    TriciaF Junior Member

    My Dad was another quiet one, I can't remember one thing he told us about his WW2 experiences. Apart from telling us where his various mementoes etc came from.
    I remember him as a man who hated arguments and anger - I wonder if this was a result of his experiences.
    He was in the RNVR, mostly the Mediterranean.
     
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  17. Shiny 9th

    Shiny 9th Member

    My father did talk. To me, but if my mother heard she interrupted and changed the subject, He found it difficult to live when good fellow soldiers had died. Never sent for his medals. He left me a great collection of phitos and momentoes, as well as his stories. He really needed the company of other men he had served with, especially as he got older.His reunions filled a real emtional need in him, and, I think, help kept him mentally healthy.
     
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  18. canuck

    canuck Closed Account

    This relates to a celebrity but it is entirely understandable that this same sentiment was shared by less notable veterans.

    After Great Britian declared war in 1939, Niven was one of the first film actors to go back and join the army. Although Niven had a reputation for telling good old stories over and over again, he was totally silent about his war experience.
    He said once: "I will, however, tell you just one thing about the war, my first story and my last. I was asked by some American friends to search out the grave of their son near Bastogne. I found it where they told me I would, but it was among 27,000 others, and I told myself that here, Niven, were 27,000 good reasons why you should keep your mouth shut after the war."

    Actor Jimmy Stewart also did not speak of his combat service.
    Author Robert Matzen writes about this postwar period in the actor’s career in a nonfiction book, “Mission: Jimmy Stewart and the Fight for Europe,” and said that during the course of his research, he spoke with “the guys that flew with him, who told me about the fact that he went flak-happy (PTSD) on a couple of occasions. ... He wasn’t afraid of bombs or bullets. He was afraid of making a mistake and causing someone to die. That was his endless stress, and that’s what ended up grounding him.”
    Stewart’s war record included 20 combat missions as command pilot over enemy territory,
    including raids deep into Germany to Berlin. He didn't fly the milk runs, and his missions
    included bombing raids to Berlin, Brunswick, Bremen, Frankfurt, and Schweinfurt. His most
    memorable mission, Stewart served as the flight leader of a 1000 plain raid to Berlin.
    When filming It's a Wonderful Life in 1946 he was still having nightmares, the shakes and the sweats. He had some hearing loss, from the engine noise on seven-eight-hour missions. He had difficulty hearing his cues.
     
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  19. NannaPink

    NannaPink Member

    I have been glued watching everything online about the desert rats.Alamein.Montgomery.and all that's recorded about these brave men and their fight against Rommel.maybe no words could ever express their war years and what they achieved and how they felt. They truly where the Gladiators..
     

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