Cool Old War Stories
- Thread starter roguemocha
- Start date
Neighbor was in charge of interrogating enemy in Vietnam. I'm sure he's seen some stuff. Never talks about it or anything for that matter. When I seem him out on his daily walk, I can only imagine what he is thinking about from his past.
I spent a good amount of time as Asst NCOIC of Security at a radar station in Tan My. We had a few local civilians doing menial work on base. One night as a "warning", the Viet Cong raided the village of Tan My and "executed" all those who worked for us. One was a innocent teenage girl who used to clean our office.
Yeah I just mean anything you do in war, if done on the streets in peace time would definitely be a crime.
My GGG Grandfather was killed by Bedford Forrest at the battle of Sacramento. Not sure if he was first or second man killed by him. Southern McLean KY.
Civil war was brutal. My GGG uncle might have been at Sacramento.
Yeah, mine was a union corporal. I have numerous ancestors on the other side as well. One GG grandfather was killed post civil war at Hopkinsville because he went back in after Donelson.
Mine was a confederate private in the 8thTN Cav.
That one had moved to KY from western North Carolina. Last name was Mitchell.
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WildcatfaninOhio
All-American
Each time I see the thread title I read it as “Cold War stories”.
I was on the front lines of ‘Murica’s longest and most expensive war, the Cold War. But I got no juicy stories. It was kinda boring!
I was on the front lines of ‘Murica’s longest and most expensive war, the Cold War. But I got no juicy stories. It was kinda boring!
The US killed a whole bunch of surrendering Japanese soldiers after WW2 was over.
My G was 24th infantry US Army...after the war he was following a Sherman tank on some Philippine Island, the tank had a loudspeaker mounted on it broadcasting that the war was over, to come out and surrender or whatever. At one point at a group of Japanese soldiers came out with their hands up...my G watched as they were all gunned down with a Thompson machine gun.
I asked him if that bothered him and at the time he said no, it didn't. The accounts he retells to this day are pretty horrific. He turns 99 this year.
My G was 24th infantry US Army...after the war he was following a Sherman tank on some Philippine Island, the tank had a loudspeaker mounted on it broadcasting that the war was over, to come out and surrender or whatever. At one point at a group of Japanese soldiers came out with their hands up...my G watched as they were all gunned down with a Thompson machine gun.
I asked him if that bothered him and at the time he said no, it didn't. The accounts he retells to this day are pretty horrific. He turns 99 this year.
I read they would attack a town and intentionally let a few people escape and kill the rest, so the people who escaped would run to the next town and warn them of what was coming. This would make the next town either empty out before they got there, or virtually surrender because they were so afraid. It made taking each town a lot easier and with a lot less likelihood of losing men.
Yup that’s true as well. The classic, “go tell your people what happened here today.”
Just wanted to add. That he was wounded at the Bulge. German Flak88 shell hit near him and shrapnel went into his sciatic nerve, thigh, and stomach. He was paralyzed from the waist down and discharged. He's my hero. Gave everything for this country.
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I thought McClean lived in Ft Sumpter, SC? I remember the Ken Burns PBS documentary saying the war started in his back yard and ended in his parlor.The McClean family from Virginia have a similar tale.
In April, 1861, their home was partially destroyed in Manassas, Virginia by a Union cannonade targeting the HQ's CSA Genl Beauregard, during the very first battle of the war (Bull Run aka First Manassas).
Wilbur McClean afterwards wanted nothing more to do with the war, so he moved his family south so they could avoid the conflict entirely and live in peace, in a tiny rural area called Appomattox, Virginia.
Flash forward 4 years to April, 1865 - Lee now pushed south and thoroughly surrounded, visits Grant to seek terms of surrender. They meet in the Union commandeered home, owned by none other than Wilbur McClean.
Afterwards their home was looted for souvenirs and ransacked by the Union Army - Ol' Wilbur had been screwed again.
McClean's were at the very beginning and then the very end of the war, at least in the eastern theater.
Astronomical odds.
The first shots were at Sumpter, after the Union abandoned Moultrie, but the states, including Virginia had not yet seceded.
The first actual battle with armies was at Manasas...also the first time in history that an army (Johnston's) was strategically transported by rail to a battle. (Manasas Junction)
The last battle in the eastern theater was the action around Appomattox...now to be sure others CSA forces who weren't engaged, didn't surrender for a while and did so piece meal, over coming days, weeks and even months.
But when Lee surrendered the ANV, it was the end for the confederacy. I think the actual last General to surrender was Stand Waite, who was an American Indian.
War isn’t murder…combatants are legal targets. There are war crimes that equate to murder
The Confederates had 42,000 men in the Trans Mississippi. They didn't surrender until a few weeks later. They could have held out in Arkansas and Texas for a few months I would say. Hell in the western theatre they had 90,000 when they surrendered at Bennet's station.
After the war, Lee supposedly said, if he knew how it would eventually play out, they would have taken to the hills and changed tactics, fighting a guerilla style campaign.
History changed when Lincoln was assassinated - he was, at the chagrin of others, going to let the South up easy and establish normal relations, but Johnson hated the South and took the opposite approach, a carpetbagging conquest.
What's interesting. Is that Kentucky had virtually no union support in 1864. After the war Kentucky union soldiers recanted their support for the union. Kentucky made up it's mind in 1864, but the damn war was already over. Lol. That's why they say we seceded after the war was over.
And it was not just Johnson. The whole north at that point hated the south. Even the southern states that didn't secede were still seen as rebel states. Simply for being southern.
Maryland was the same way in the eastern theater, neutral, but in the thick of it, including the single bloodiest day at Antietam/Sharpsburg. That battlefield is well preserved and worth a visit...parts look untouched...the sunken road and bloody lane gave me chills in 95 degree heat.
Johnson had the power and pulled the strings and at the time, there was no representation for the south in congress, so it was slam dunk without Lincoln to hold restrain them. Had Lincoln lived, I think things would have gone a lot differently.
Anybody else remember this show? loved it when i was a kid.I've read some crazy stories about NBF...galloped mistakenly right into the wrong cavalry encampment and rather than yielding, fought his way out covered with saber slashes all over his uniform but no wounds. Calvary pistols were notoriously inaccurate, which is why he was able to escape, and why troops were eventually trained to fight dismounted, especially when they had carbines.
Mosby was another one, he plucked a Union generals hat off his head and slapped him in the ass...the General asked for the sentry, who were CSA, to arrest him.
Mosby's most famous raid occurred in March of 1863, inside Union lines at Fairfax County Courthouse, when he captured Brigadier General Edwin H. Stoughton. Mosby found Stoughton asleep in bed. Awakening the General with a slap to the rear, Mosby asked "Do you know Mosby, General?" The General replied "Yes! Have you got the rascal?" "No," said Mosby. "He's got you!"
![[laughing]](http://l.yimg.com/j/assets/img/emoticons/classic/laugh.r191677.gif "Laughing [laughing]")
The Gray Ghost (TV series) - Wikipedia
-I think at Antietam there were 6,000 killed in one hour, like wtf? That’s wild.
-Breaking my own OP, my gpa flew (if I remember correctly), over the Battle Of The Bulge when they could finally see through the cloud cover with his P-38 and his wife’s brother was below in the infantry there waiting for that air support.
They both lived. Grand uncle, snagged 4 Purple Hearts without ever leaving the front, lucky dude.
First time I met him in SC he was on a treadmill at 82.
Granddaddy was the baddest dude I ever met. 150 sorties and was sent home.
All those dudes were next level.
-Breaking my own OP, my gpa flew (if I remember correctly), over the Battle Of The Bulge when they could finally see through the cloud cover with his P-38 and his wife’s brother was below in the infantry there waiting for that air support.
They both lived. Grand uncle, snagged 4 Purple Hearts without ever leaving the front, lucky dude.
First time I met him in SC he was on a treadmill at 82.
Granddaddy was the baddest dude I ever met. 150 sorties and was sent home.
All those dudes were next level.
we are almost out of WW2 vets. And the worst part to me is that the vast majority of stories they will tell were never written in a history book. They are memories that will eventually be erased from history. My grandpa was wounded in WW2 after a kamikaze hit his ship. He never reported his injuries because when he went to get looked at he saw the bodies and the people missing limbs and decided he didn’t need to take anytime from people that needed emergency care.
That’s not in a history book. The USS Haggard is in the books, as is the kamikaze, but there are loads of stories from the sailors on that ship that eventually will be lost to history
That’s not in a history book. The USS Haggard is in the books, as is the kamikaze, but there are loads of stories from the sailors on that ship that eventually will be lost to history
My great-grandpa was also wounded. Flak 88 (german) shell hit near him, shrapnel went all into his body and he was in a wheelchair rest of his life. He died at 39. Entered service at 21.
All of the main civil war generals were taught at west point. They were taught old napoleon era tactics. Problem is, the technology was ahead of the tactics. So those line formations and direct frontal assaults worked in the 1700s, 1600s, with old smoothbores. Problem is, rifled cannons, muskets, and other technological advancements made those tactics suicide. Both the CSA and USA realized this (albeit 3 years too late) and you see in 1864 late 1863 it shifted toward a trench warfare style of war. My 1st cousin (and an uncle) both threw out a artillery shell of their rifle pit before it exploded in GA defending it from Sherman's army. He was from barren county, and enlisted in the 6thKY infantry CSA.
Hell during WW1 most of the old civil war vets tried to tell the gov to not get involved in ww1 because they had seen trench warfare 60 years earlier.
Same gpa that flew the P-38 Fighter also had mid mission a AA she’ll come through his windshield and was a dud. Stuck about 2” behind his head. Finished the mission because those dudes were touching badasses and flew it back to base.
WW2 vets were badasses. Had a cousin with the same last name as me in the marines in WW2. Can only imagine what he had to go through.
His story when he landed the plane and was freezing cold with his windshield having a huge hole in it was his CO said you should be dead, you’re a lucky SOB. He said that’s great and all but can I get some chow and take a nap? We’ve been flying and getting the shit shot out of us for 10 hours.
I mean, those dudes were a different breed.
I mean, those dudes were a different breed.
I always liked the Marine stories from WW2. Saddest video i've ever watched is a former marine from ww2 in his dress blues, white hair, wrinkles. Sobbing over the country today compared to in 1942 when he enlisted to go fight for it. He kept saying those boys didn't die for this.
My mom hates guns and leans left. I always tell her the reason she’s allowed to feel how she does and hate guns is because a bunch of dudes with guns risk their life by killing other people that would happily kill her if those dudes didn’t exist. Facts.
We’re all protected by 20 something’s with deadly weapons, never forget that, and those dudes kill people every day. Otherwise those people that they’re killing are knocking on your door.
We’re all protected by 20 something’s with deadly weapons, never forget that, and those dudes kill people every day. Otherwise those people that they’re killing are knocking on your door.
Good post. My dad and his brother were in WW2. His brother was basically a bootlegger prior to the war. He saved the lives of a number of fellow soldiers during a battle. When he came home, he spent the rest of days as a preacher. The history books can't and won't tell those kinds of stories.
I just don’t understand how people don’t get it. 20 of those kids kill themselves on average every day. Volunteering to make sure you can hate them or the police or whatever and making you have zero worries when you go to bed every night.
Like the quotes in A Few Good Men;
Because they stand on a wall, and they say, ' Nothing's gonna hurt you tonight, not on my watch.
You don't want the truth because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall. You need me on that wall.
^the last one is the real deal.
Like the quotes in A Few Good Men;
Son, we live in a world that has walls and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You?
I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom.
Because they stand on a wall, and they say, ' Nothing's gonna hurt you tonight, not on my watch.
You don't want the truth because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall. You need me on that wall.
^the last one is the real deal.
Sergeant Jake McNiece (May 24, 1919 – January 21, 2013) of the 101st Airborne Division ready to drop into Normandy for the D-Day invasion (June 1944). He was a member of the original "Filthy Thirteen", a group of paratroopers who would loosely inspire the movie THE DIRTY DOZEN. A member later remarked, "We never washed a piece of clothing. We never shined any shoes or boots, and we didn’t salute officers. We didn’t go for any of that malarky, you know?" McNiece made four wartime combat jumps, the first as part of the Invasion of Normandy in 1944, Operation Market Garden in the Netherlands, at the Siege of Bastogne, part of the larger Battle of the Bulge. His last jump was in 1945, near Prüm in Germany. During fighting in the Netherlands, he was promoted to demolition platoon sergeant. After the war he worked with explosives at Pine Bluff Arsenal.
They had a little help from their friends - like 80K natives that had a beef with their Aztec overlords.
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