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Last weekend I was in Draguignan and
visited the Rhone American Cemetery on of the many cemeteries
maintained by the U.S in Europe. I had visited this cemetery before,
as I have many WW I & II cemeteries in the past. I would walk in,
admire how well they were kept, read what I could about the place and
leave having no real connection with the people there. However, this
time I was fortunate enough to met Alison Libersa, a Cemetery
Associate and Guide. She is a very vivacious person and eager to tell
the stories of “her boys”. I did not have time but asked if I
could come back. She assured me that could I return at almost any
time and she would introduce me to “our boys” and tell their
stories.
Captain William “Bill”
Steinhurst
On Thursday I drove over unannounced
for a visit. I caught her on her way to water the flowers in the
chapel and asked if she could give me a story or two about some
people there. She quickly changed course and led me across the
cemetery to the grave of William
Steinhurst. She began to tell me his story. I
was now sure that she was personally acquainted with almost every one
of “her boys” or “our boys” in the cemetery. She met Captain
Steinhurst through his daughter. As she was closing the cemetery one
day a car drove up and a couple got out and she explained in French
the cemetery was closed and please return tomorrow. When the lady
said she did not speak French and Alison repeated it in English she
could feel that this lady had a connection to the cemetery. It is a
trait she has picked up over the years of working in the WW II
cemeteries across Europe. The lady said, “I think my father is
buried in there”. When asked, she said her father's name was
William and Alison said “there are a lot of Williams, lets go in
the office and see what we can find.” When she said the last name
was Steinhurst Alison knew exactly who she was talking about as he
was one of the few Jewish soldiers buried in the cemetery. They
walked out to the grave and Alison was walking away to give her and
her husband time to be alone with her father, but she asked that she
stay as she wanted to share the story. From military records they
knew that Capt. Steinhurst had been in North Africa and had landed
on the beach in Anzio with the troops and participated in several
other major actions. From the daughter, Alison learned that he and
his brother were doctors and had joined the Army together. She also
learned that he died when the daughter was six months old and the
daughter had never, in her whole life, known anything about her
father. Whenever she asked her mother about her father, even in her
sixties, she would cry and not discuss it. Only after her mother's
death did she learn about her father when she found the pictures and
letters from her father. She vowed to some day go to France and find
her father. And that was the day.
Alison telling my about Capt. Stienhurst at his grave
1st Lt. Aleda Lutz
From there Alison
led me to the grave of 1st Lt. Aleda Lutz. Lutzy, as she
was called, was the daughter of German immigrants. She was not very
pretty and a little wide in the hips. She went to nursing school so
she would have some type of future. When the war started the Army Air
Corp recruited her and she came to Europe as part of the 802nd
Evacuation Squadron. Their mission was to fly to the front lines with
resupply and then evacuate the wounded. Lutzy, like many others, had
seen combat up from North Africa, through Italy, the invasion of
France and up to the Rhone. Twenty aircraft departed one day to
northern France with resupplies and Lutzy on her 196th mission. They landed, off loaded the cargo,
and loaded about twenty wounded soldiers on board. The weather had
deteriorated and they had to follow the Rhone river back south. Only
nineteen aircraft landed. Lutzy's did not. She had sacrificed her
all for her country. Also on that plane was Capt. Steinhurst. 1st
Lt. Aleda Lutz was someone everyone loved and that is why a VA
hospital was named after Lutzy. And in her home town, because she
loved to bowl, they named the bowling alley after her.
Alison had to continue on her mission
that I had disrupted and so she handed me off to the park supervisor
Bruce
Malone.
Pvt. Patrick Michaels
Pvt. Michaels was
in the 596 Engineer Co. part of the 517 Parachute Rgmt. Pvt.
Michaels, like most of the others here, had fought his way up through
Italy and through the invasion of France. One day Bruce came upon a
man standing at the grave. He introduced himself and the gentleman
said “you want to hear a story”. Pvt. Michaels and his Company
were having some down time. His good friend did not know how to
drive, as back then, very few people had a car or a need to drive.
Patrick volunteered to teach his friend how to drive. The student was
not getting the clutch thing down very well and Patrick told him to
give it a lot of gas and let the clutch out. The student did just
that, but lost control of the of the jeep and rolled over off the
road. The student had a broken ankle. Pvt. Michaels, after having
fought his way into France, was killed. The man telling the story
was the student.
PFC Lattie Tipton
Not many people
know PFC Lattie Tipton. Almost every one of forty or more know his
best friend.
Lattie and his
best friend, again like many here, had fought their way up to France.
His squad was landed on the beach near St. Tropez with the mission
to take out a cannon on top of a hill that was harassing the Navy.
The squad was led by a man we all know and Lattie's best friend who
had just been promoted to Sgt. Between them and the cannon were
numerous machine gun positions. When the Sgt. said to move out
,Lattie was right behind his best friend. The rest of the squad was
not as eager. The Sgt. convinced them to move on and they destroyed
several of the machine guns. The next machine gun nest waved a white
flag and the Sgt.'s best friend, Lattie, stood up, was shot and
killed and he fell back on the Sgt. The Sgt charged up the hill and
single handedly took out several machine guns and ultimately the
squad captured the cannon. Lattie's best friend won our country's
second highest honor, the Distinguished Service Cross. Lattie's death
was the turning point for his best friend. He went on to be one of
the most decorated soldiers in WW II. He earned the Medal of Honor,
the Distinguished Service Cross, two Sliver Stars, two Bronze Stars
one with a V, three Purple Hearts, the French Legion of Honor, and
both the French and Belgium Croix de Guerre. That best friend was
Audie Murphy. That day Lattie had earned two Purple Hearts, as he was
wounded when landing on the beach and was told to go back for
evacuation – PFC Lattie Tipton refused and had charged on with his
best friend.
Sgt. Charles C. Perry
USMC
Bruce told me that
Sgt. Perry was only one of four Marines buried in Europe. I had
never thought about it,but he explained the Marines did not
participate in Europe in WW II. All their action was in the Pacific.
So how did Sgt. Perry come to be buried in Europe? As you see on his
headstone, he had no unit affiliation. Sgt. Perry was fluent in
French and was recruited into the OSS. He was parachuted in behind
enemy lines before D Day near the Swiss border to help organize the
French resistance which was a big part the invasion from the south.
Unfortunately, Sgt. Perry's parachute malfunctioned and he was killed
in the jump.
Pvt. Henry Wikins
Pvt Wikins broke his leg while parachuting into France on a combat assault. His fellow soldiers hid him in a barn and had planned to come back for him. Before they could return, the enemy found him and because he was Jewish, tortured and killed him.
Alison's telling of these stories
was much more detailed, personal and heart wrenching. I had to fight back the
tears as she told the stories as she had learned them from family members. She is a great asset to our Cemetery
system in Europe. She cares and teaches others, from grade school
children to people like me, that these are not only crosses in the
ground. They are people and each and every one of them has a story.
Bruce
is a retired 1st
Sgt from the U.S. Army and thus has a different perspective on “the
boys” and how he presents his stories. He too is an excellent story teller. He is able to connect, not only because of his military background, but his maternal grandfather is buried in our Cemetery in
Belgium. He can relate to families that come here. He can tell
stories of not having a grandfather when he grew up and being told he
was buried far away.
I
wish to thank them both for a great job. I will go back to visit and
meet more of their “boys”. I encourage you, when you go to a
military cemetery, to look for someone to introduce you to at least
one person buried there. Our country has forgotten that our dead
soldiers are real people and we should not be so eager to send them
off to end their lives and the dreams of their families.
If only this were true
