Long story short, when Virginia was only 26, she went on a hunting trip in Turkey and accidentally shot herself in the leg. Sadly, the injury was so extensive that the doctors couldn’t save the limb and had to amputate.

But that didn’t stop her from making history. She ended up as a clerk in France and was trapped when Nazi Germany invaded in 1940. She snuck out of the country and joined the Special Operations Executive (SOE) in Britain. SEO was created by Winston Churchill and was an effort to wage war in ways that didn’t involve direct military engagement. Known as the “Baker Street Irregulars,” they engaged in spreading propaganda and spying.

Virginia was sent to German occupied France to spy. The Nazis were aware of her presence, but not who she was. She was known to them only as “the woman with the limp”. Virginia spent 15 months on her first tour – most spies only spent three.  She spent most of that time in France assisting the Resistance, helping them receive supply drops from the Allies.

In 1942 she was forced to flee over the Pyrenees Mountains into Spain when German troops were moving forcefully through France.

When she returned to London, Virginia signed on with the American intelligence office, the Office of Strategic Service. They sent her back to France in 1944 disguised as an elderly woman. This time she operated in a much more guerrilla fashion – destroying bridges, sabotaging trains, and causing overall havoc for the German forces.

Keep in mind that she only had one leg – and she managed all this.

Virginia Hall was the only woman during World War II to receive the US Distinguished Service Cross. I believe that she more than deserved that honor.

Known as the “Balloon Buster”, Frank managed to shoot down many enemy observation balloons. This was a dangerous business, since the balloons, being only balloons, were heavily guarded. Large squadrons, military vehicles, and a healthy number of anti-aircraft weapons surrounded the fragile balloons, and it was his job to get through them.

Really, he was lucky to do this feat once, but Frank Luke managed to down 18 balloons and enemy aircraft in only 18 days.

During one mission (to be his last), Frank was shot down over enemy territory. During that mission he managed to take down 3 balloons and 2 German planes. He was alive when he landed and so he also took 11 German soldiers, wounding others, with him during his last stand.

What an amazing soldier Frank Luke was. He was posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his heroic actions. For more about him, click here.

Is there anything more horrific than burying a loved one felled in a war?  Perhaps. Some families of those who have fought overseas have never received closure in the form of their loved ones’ remains or even a small personal memento.  In 1947, having calculated that the whereabouts of 78,750 American soldiers remained unknown after World War II, the United States Air Force dedicated the third Friday of every September as POW/MIA Recognition Day.

Over the course of the next six decades, the number of missing warriors rose.  The Korean War claimed 8,051; Viet Nam, 1,742.  The Cold War took another 165 and the Gulf War, 7.  To date, the sole American soldier missing in Iraq is Ahmed Qusai al-Taayie.  These numbers do not include personnel killed in action and never brought home.

JPAC (Joint POW-MIA Accounting) is the governmental organization charged with the daunting task of locating, identifying, and returning to their native soil the aforementioned service men and women.  Housed in Hawaii, JPAC has been headed, since 2008, by Rear Admiral Donna L. Crisp.  Colonel John M. Sullivan serves as Deputy Commander, Johnnie E. Webb as Deputy Public Relations-Legislation Affairs, Sergeant  Major Jackie D. Brown Jr. as Command Senior Enlisted Leader, and Dr. Thomas D. Holland as Scientific Deputy Director for the Central Identification Lab.  In addition to these officers are teams dedicated to search and retrieval missions, comprising archaeologists, anthropologists, linguists, and deontologists.  A quick second read of those job titles is indicative of the enormity of JPAC’s objectives.

…On the third Friday in September, the State of New Jersey honors its POW-MIA‘s with a breakfast sponsored by Assemblymen Jack Conners and Herb Conaway.  These public officials invite veterans from all over the state to join in a memorial ceremony dedicated to the men and women who never made it home from the wars.  Honored Guests at the 2008 event included WWII POW veteran Joseph O’Donnell, Mrs. Judith Young, who is a Past President of the “Gold Star Mothers,” Mrs. Anna Marko of Cherry Hill, an 84 year old widow of WWII POW Leon Marko, State Adjutant General Glenn Reith, Colonel Stephan Abel, and other veteran dignitaries.

Read the rest of the article…

Harry Patch was a young apprentice plumber when war broke out and was called into service in 1916. He didn’t agree with war and was reluctant to go.

Born in southwest England in 1898, Mr. Patch was a teenage apprentice plumber when he was called up for military service in 1916. After training, he was sent to the trenches as a machine-gunner in the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry.

The five-man Lewis gun team had a pact to try not to kill any enemy soldiers, but to aim at their legs unless it came down to killing or being killed, he said.

Mr. Patch was part of the third battle of Ypres in Belgium. The offensive began on July 31, 1917, and it rained all but three days of August. It was not until Nov. 6, 1917, that British and Canadian forces had progressed five miles to capture what was left of the village of Passchendaele. The cost was 325,000 Allied casualties and 260,000 Germans.

Mr. Patch’s war had ended on Sept. 22, when he was seriously wounded by shrapnel, which killed three other members of his machine-gun team.

“My reaction was terrible; it was losing a part of my life,” he said.

After losing the majority of his team, Patch was taken to a hospital, where he had to have the shrapnel removed from his body without the aid of anesthesia. He and the other machine gun team survivor both agreed never to share the details of their comrades deaths with the families. For them it was too horrible to share.

World War I was a brutal and grisly event – a dark time in world history. The advent of new weapons technology meant that the killing could be done with horrific efficiency. It was war in a way that no one ever dreamed of being possible. This post is in memory of, not only Harry Patch, but all the brave soldiers who endured hell in the trenches.

Click here to read the entire article about Harry Patch. Defininely read it.

The World War II Memorial honors the 16 million who served in the armed forces of the U.S., the more than 400,000 who died, and all who supported the war effort from home. Symbolic of the defining event of the 20th Century, the memorial is a monument to the spirit, sacrifice, and commitment of the American people. The Second World War is the only 20th Century event commemorated on the National Mall’s central axis.

Check out their website to see if a family member is honored on the memorial. If not, register them on the website. It’s important that we remember these brave soldiers.

It was a miserable existence all winter long some six decades ago as Morris N. Bishop was among the Allied forces fighting the Germans, hunkering in a freezing foxhole in the mountains of Italy.

Then, when the Army sergeant returned home from World War II in full uniform, he couldn’t even buy a hot dog in Washington.

It was 1946, the U.S. was still widely segregated, and Bishop is black.

A member of the only all-black infantry division in Europe, the 92nd, or “Buffalo” division, Bishop at 21 was deployed to the front lines, where he sprayed machine gun fire toward entrenched enemy lines in August 1944. There he stayed until the following May, when the war ended in Europe.

On Monday, his 86th birthday, Bishop finally got the recognition that was coming to him for his service when city and state officials and the Army honored him as he was presented the Army’s Bronze Star medal, reserved for those who show bravery in combat. Read on…

Morris Bishop didn’t originally think that receiving this medal was necessary, but later changed his mind and accepted it in honor of his fellow soldiers.

“It gets me sentimental, when I think about the buddies that I lost,” he said after the ceremony, noting that most of his comrades were either wounded or killed in the war. “Some of them were very good friends.”

Bishop certainly earned his Bronze Star. Personally I think that he not only was amazingly brave facing the German forces in Italy, but coming home and having to face the racism directed towards him. All of our returning soldiers deserved respect and freedom to enjoy what they could of their lives after having lived in such hellish conditions in war torn Europe.

Have a happy and safe 4th of July!

I am always impressed and humbled by these healers who are called to the battlefront. They could easily perform their duties far away from the front, but somehow they find the courage to run out into the fray to rescue the poor souls laying injured in the mud. And thank goodness they do! So many have been saved by these brave efforts who otherwise would have lost their lives.

Please click on Noel Chavasse’s name to learn more about him.