WWII Veterans And Military Museum Representatives Speak To NHS Students

By Eliza Hallabeck

Newtown High School students heard the perspectives of World War II veterans, and learned about the era from Military Museum of Southern New England representatives on Tuesday, May 11.

“Let’s start with what took place 60-some years ago, for me,” said William Duncan, the Military Museum of Southern New England director and a veteran of the 10th Mountain Division, to begin the day’s presentations.

From 8:30 to 1 pm, the school’s lecture hall seats filled with rotating classes of students as Mr Duncan; Howard Layton of the British Royal Air Force; Robert Morrison, whose brother was killed in action during the Italian campaign of WWII; Harold I. Rochette, an 8th Air Force B-17 co-pilot; Richard Jaccarino, a recipient of the Purple Heart and two Bronze Stars for Valor; Alex Sawchyn, a B-29 pilot for the Army Air Corps; Dick Egan, with the Army Air Corps; Fran Bressnan, who served with the United States Army in New Guinea, Philippines, and Leyte; and Lee Rudd Ryan, who served her time during WWII with the American Red Cross, shared their memories of the war.

Other presenters for the event included Samuel Johnson, executive director of the Military Museum of Southern New England, on Park Avenue in Danbury; Lois Barber, a board of directors member for the Military Museum of Southern New England and the establishment’s director of public relations; Luke Barber, a Rutgers University history major; Tom Bellows, a museum volunteer; and Lauren Longyear and Mathew Ames of the Arthur Murray Dance Studios in Danbury, who demonstrated some popular dance steps of the era.

This was the second year the presentation was provided by the Military Museum of Southern New England. Last year the program was brought to the school through the efforts of NHS teacher Anthony Metz and Ms Barber, who both oversaw the presentation this year also.

Mr Duncan told the students when he was their age, he was proficient at skiing and mountain climbing from doing both since a young age.

“Now, along comes Pearl Harbor,” said Mr Duncan, “and a letter from the director of the National Ski Association, who said what would happen if England gives up. The Germans would have the alliance of Britain, and so forth, but they would also have Canada.”

President Franklin D. Roosevelt agreed with the assessment, Mr Duncan said, and established the first United State Army Ski Mountain Troops.

Trained And Trained And Trained

Some More

“It was a volunteer outfit,” Mr Duncan said. “Everybody else who got drafted in those days, especially students, were allowed to finish out their terms to graduate. I got a letter, because I volunteered for this thing. I got three letters of recommendation, all kinds of stuff, and it told me I had to report in three weeks. You realize what that says? No prom. No pictures. No nothing.”

After reporting for duty, he was sent to Colorado for training.

“We did everything. We trained, and we trained, and we trained some more,” he said.

He wound up in a task force, he said, and was sent to the Aleutian Islands, Alaska.

“We supported the 7th Division that was actually assigned to this,” he said. “So we were like helpers. The interesting thing, at that point, the Japanese still thought they were going to win the war. The troops up there wanted to die for their emperor. We did not take prisoners. The ones we couldn’t take were jumping off the cliff at the end of the alley. I will never understand that. Never. How come the emperor is still walking around over there?”

After returning to training, Mr Duncan was eventually sent to Italy. German troops were stationed at the top of Riva Ridge, and Mr Duncan’s division was assigned to take the area.

“On February 18, 1945, we climbed the darn thing,” said Mr Duncan. “We were counting on the fact the Germans would think that nobody in their right mind would climb the darn thing.”

Nobody on the American side or the German side was killed in the process, according to Mr Duncan.

“That’s what happens when you get trained, and you follow orders,” Mr Duncan said. Speaking to the high schoolers, he continued, “You may not have to go through that kind of training, but everything that happens here is training. Put your guts into it, because you never know when you are going to need it.”

Artifacts

Luke Barber spoke next, sharing artifacts and more from the Military Museum of Southern New England’s collection. With the assistance of ninth grader Jason Sherwood, Mr Barber held up Germany’s war flag.

“This was used by their military,” Mr Barber explained. “Their conventional civil flag was kind of like this, except it didn’t have this cross in the corner, and it didn’t have these black lines on it. It was just a white circle with a black swastika on the red background. If you saw this flag here, flying off a building, it meant that building belongs to the German military.”

Holding up a photo of her father, who lives in Florida now, Lois Barber introduced the next speaker, one of two authors who attended Tuesday’s presentation. Her father served in the 8th Air Force, and Ms Barber said it was a pleasure to welcome Hal Rochette, an 8th Air Force B-17 co-pilot, to the high school.

“The 8th Air Force lost more men than the other ten air forces all put together, double,” said Mr Rochette. “Imagine that. They lost more than any one of our armies, any one of our navies, and more than the whole Marine Corps lost in the whole war… Yet, I spoke to a high school group in Meriden, and the teacher gave me a copy of their history book. In the history book, when I read it, it mentioned Iwo Jima, it mentioned D-Day, the Battle of the Bulge. All those were in there, but it never mentioned the 8th Air Force.”

The top three important Germans captured during the war, according to Mr Rochette, all said it was the 8th Air Force that won the war in England.

After a suggestion from television journalist Tom Brokaw, who also authored The Greatest Generation, Mr Rochette said he started putting his book together based on a diary he had kept during World War II and research.

Mr Rochette’s book, 8th Air Force Lottery, is available on Amazon.com for $25.

“I have seen hundreds, and I mean hundreds,” he said, “of planes get shot down.”

While there was a danger of planes colliding midair over England, Mr Rochette said there was also a danger of being shot down and surviving. Pilots, he said, could be attacked by local farmers and pitch-forked even when they landed safely.

The second author who spoke during the presentation, Howard Layton, who served with the British Royal Air Force, said the second training was completed he was sent to the North African desert.

After a confrontation during a raid, “they had shot us to bits,” he and the pilot in the plane managed to return to their base by gliding across the Red Sea. While gradually gliding, the plane also managed to skim over a mountain by about 50 feet. When they reached the shore of the Red Sea, the plane was only about 500 feet off the ground, and Mr Layton said he expected the pilot to bring the plane down.

“We kept on going across this miserable dangerous water regardless,” he said.

The pilot, Mr Layton said, just had faith the plane would make it across the sea to their base camp.

“And in the end, it did,” Mr Layton said. “With a sigh of relief, we saw our base.”

Later he added, “I stooped down and kissed the sand of that far off outpost of my homeland.”

While the flight was one of his earlier experiences in the war, Mr Layton said his book, Love and Sand, which can be purchased from www.threespirespublishing.com for $24, looks back on many more events during his service.

 The presentation by the Military Museum of Southern New England to Newtown High School students is expected to be an annual event.