a War Story....again
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Forum Name: Military, Veterans, LEO, Fire and Rescue
Forum Description: These men and women put their lives on the line every day for us and we say THANKS! Forum dedicated to Lance Corporal Jeremy Scott Sandvick Monroe, USMC - KIA Iraq 8 OCT 2006
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Printed Date: 26 March 2026 at 17:54
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Topic: a War Story....again
Posted By: Irish Bird Dog
Subject: a War Story....again
Date Posted: 17 March 2011 at 09:51
This was sent to me by a veteran friend of mine.....ENJOY AND REMEMBER.....share with a young person so they too will remember....
----- Original Message -----
From:
To: undisclosed-recipients
Sent: Monday, March 14, 2011 8:58 PM
Subject: A little bit of history.....
This is a story I found on one of my quilt forum sites. The lady
that shared this story goes by the name of Ditter. I wanted to be sure she gets
the credit for sharing this with the rest of us. Enjoy!
Six
Boys And Thirteen Hands...
Each year I am hired to go to Washington, DC,
with the eighth grade class from Clinton, WI where I grew up, to videotape their
trip. I greatly enjoy visiting our nation's capitol, and each year I take some
special memories back with me. This fall's trip was especially memorable.
On the last night of our trip, we stopped at the Iwo Jima memorial. This
memorial is the largest bronze statue in the world and depicts one of the most
famous photographs in history -- that of the six brave soldiers raising the
American Flag at the top of a rocky hill on the island of Iwo Jima, Japan,
during WW II.
Over one hundred students and chaperones piled off the
buses and headed towards the memorial. I noticed a solitary figure at the base
of the statue, and as I got closer he asked, 'Where are you guys from?'
I told him that we were from Wisconsin. 'Hey, I'm a cheese head, too!
Come gather around, Cheese heads, and I will tell you a story.'
(It was
James Bradley who just happened to be in Washington, DC, to speak at the
memorial the following day. He was there that night to say good night to his
dad, who had passed away. He was just about to leave when he saw the buses pull
up. I videotaped him as he spoke to us, and received his permission to share
what he said from my videotape. It is one thing to tour the incredible monuments
filled with history in Washington, DC, but it is quite another to get the kind
of insight we received that night.)
When all had gathered around, he
reverently began to speak. (Here are his words that night.)
'My name
is James Bradley and I'm from Antigo, Wisconsin. My dad is on that statue, and I
just wrote a book called 'Flags of Our Fathers' which is #5 on the New York
Times Best Seller list right now. It is the story of the six boys you see behind
me.
'Six boys raised the flag. The first guy putting the pole in the
ground is Harlon Block. Harlon was an all-state football player. He enlisted in
the Marine Corps with all the senior members of his football team. They were off
to play another type of game. A game called 'War.' But it didn't turn out to be
a game. Harlon, at the age of 21, died with his intestines in his hands. I don't
say that to gross you out, I say that because there are people who stand in
front of this statue and talk about the glory of war. You guys need to know that
most of the boys in Iwo Jima were 17, 18, and 19 years old - and it was so hard
that the ones who did make it home never even would talk to their families about
it.
(He pointed to the statue) 'You see this next guy? That's Rene
Gagnon from New Hampshire. If you took Rene's helmet off at the moment this
photo was taken and looked in the webbing of that helmet, you would find a
photograph...a photograph of his girlfriend. Rene put that in there for
protection because he was scared. He was 18 years old. It was just boys who won
the battle of Iwo Jima. Boys. Not old men.
'The next guy here, the third
guy in this tableau, was Sergeant Mike Strank.. Mike is my hero. He was the hero
of all these guys. They called him the 'old man' because he was so old. He was
already 24. When Mike would motivate his boys in training camp, he didn't say,
'Let's go kill some Japanese' or 'Let's die for our country.' He knew he was
talking to little boys.. Instead he would say, 'You do what I say, and I'll get
you home to your mothers.'
'The last guy on this side of the statue is
Ira Hayes, a Pima Indian from Arizona .. Ira Hayes was one of them who lived to
walk off Iwo Jima . He went into the White House with my dad. President Truman
told him, 'You're a hero' He told reporters, 'How can I feel like a hero when
250 of my buddies hit the island with me and only 27 of us walked off alive?'
So you take your class at school, 250 of you spending a year together
having fun, doing everything together. Then all 250 of you hit the beach, but
only 27 of your classmates walk off alive. That was Ira Hayes. He had images of
horror in his mind. Ira Hayes carried the pain home with him and eventually died
dead drunk, face down, drowned in a very shallow puddle, at the age of 32 (ten
years after this picture was taken).
'The next guy, going around the
statue, is Franklin Sousley from Hilltop, Kentucky . A fun-lovin' hillbilly boy.
His best friend, who is now 70, told me, 'Yeah, you know, we took two cows up on
the porch of the Hilltop General Store. Then we strung wire across the stairs so
the cows couldn't get down. Then we fed them Epsom salts. Those cows crapped all
night.' Yes, he was a fun-lovin' hillbilly boy. Franklin died on Iwo Jima at the
age of 19. When the telegram came to tell his mother that he was dead, it went
to the Hilltop General Store. A barefoot boy ran that telegram up to his
mother's farm. The neighbors could hear her scream all night and into the
morning Those neighbors lived a quarter of a mile away.
'The next guy,
as we continue to go around the statue, is my dad, John Bradley, from Antigo,
Wisconsin, where I was raised. My dad lived until 1994, but he would never give
interviews. When Walter Cronkite's producers or the New York Times would call,
we were trained as little kids to say 'No, I'm sorry, sir, my dad's not here. He
is in Canada fishing. No, there is no phone there, sir. No, we don't know when
he is coming back.' My dad never fished or even went to Canada. Usually, he was
sitting there right at the table eating his Campbell's soup. But we had to tell
the press that he was out fishing. He didn't want to talk to the press.
'You see, like Ira Hayes, my dad didn't see himself as a hero. Everyone
thinks these guys are heroes, 'cause they are in a photo and on a monument. My
dad knew better. He was a medic. John Bradley from Wisconsin was a combat
caregiver. On Iwo Jima he probably held over 200 boys as they died. And when
boys died on Iwo Jima, they writhed and screamed, without any medication or help
with the pain.
'When I was a little boy, my third grade teacher told me
that my dad was a hero. When I went home and told my dad that, he looked at me
and said, 'I want you always to remember that the heroes of Iwo Jima are the
guys who did not come back. Did NOT come back.'
'So that's the story
about six nice young boys. Three died on Iwo Jima , and three came back as
national heroes. Overall, 7,000 boys died on Iwo Jima in the worst battle in the
history of the Marine Corps. My voice is giving out, so I will end here. Thank
you for your time.'
Suddenly, the monument wasn't just a big old piece
of metal with a flag sticking out of the top. It came to life before our eyes
with the heartfelt words of a son who did indeed have a father who was a hero.
Maybe not a hero for the reasons most people would believe, but a hero
nonetheless.
Let us never forget from the Revolutionary War to the
current War on Terrorism and all the wars in-between that sacrifice was made for
our freedom.
REMINDER: Everyday that you can wake up free, it's going to
be a great day.
Great story - worth your time - worth every
American's time. Please pass it on.
-------------
Irish Bird Dog
NRA Life/Endowment
2nd Amendment Supporter
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