I have an amazing story (well at least it's amazing to me). I am delighted to share this with you. Talk about coincidences... This is a letter I sent to the webmaster of the 167th Engineers.
Hi:
Was talking to one of my customers in my country store this morning (Alger, MI), and a gentleman who I had met before brought his return bottle slip to the counter. I looked down and saw the number 540. I said out loud, "That was my dad's unit in WWII". The gentleman looked at me and stated, "I was with the 167th. I was a combat engineer." Wow, "So was my father. He was a 540th Combat Engineer", and the conversation carried on.
We talked about where they both were and started discussing crossing the Rhine. I just happened to have an article published in Army Engineer Magazine this month, and showed him the front cover, a bridge over the Rhine. Told him I had a website and was producing a documentary on "my boys". He stated there was a book on his unit, but he wasn't sure where one could be procured. I asked him his name and company and he said he was Alfred Pappalardo, Co B. I told him I would get on the Internet and do some fishing after he left. He said he would be back in two weeks.
Well I found your site and I found his name in the Co B rosters. He will be SO THRILLED. Thus, I am writing to you today. I will pass along the info to him the next time I see him. I will also get his address and phone number too. Too bad I didn't do that this morning. I look forward to hearing from you, and I shall place your website link on mine in a couple of minutes.
Warmly, Marion J Chard Proud Daughter of Walter (Monday) Poniedzialek
Here's the correspondence I received this a few days later and the attachment too. Ain't this great?
Hi Marion -
Thank you for contacting our website. I am sending you a copy of our summer newsletter in the hopes that you can get a copy of it to Alfred Pappalardo.
We sure would like to invite him to attend the upcoming reunion.
I am also putting some contact information for some of the key people in charge of the reunion - men from the 167th that Alfred may remember.
Howard A MacCord (804) 272-2128
Sam C Brown Jr. (901) 860-0804
Jesse L Hicks (865) 922 22473
The newsletter is attached.
Thanks for your help,
Deborah Ziegler
(daughter of Orpha Theldon Ziegler)
Hi Marion -
I think I found the address for your customer, Alfred Pappalardo. Will mail a hard copy.
Received an email this week from Bloom, Troy A CIV USA IMCOM
Sgt. Specker was not the only Engineer to receive the CMOH.
What about Pfc. Junior Van Noy? Thanks
I wrote this letter back this morning. Below my letter are some links regarding Pfc Van Noy. I always appreciate hearing from folks about our great engineers!
Dear Troy:
I truly appreciate the heads-up on Mr Van Noy. I will be more than happy to add the facts to our forum later this morning. However upon re-reading any references to Sgt Specker on my forum, I see no indication from either Al Kincer (may he rest in peace), nor myself, making any claims he was the only one. (your subject head: MOH incorrect info)
Rank and organization: Private, U.S. Army, Headquarters Company, Shore Battalion, Engineer Boat and Shore Regiment. Place and date: Near Finschafen, New Guinea, 17 October 1943. Entered service at: Preston, Idaho. Birth: Grace, Idaho. G.O. No.: 17, 26 February 1944. Citation: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty in action with the enemy near Finschafen, New Guinea, on 17 October 1943. When wounded late in September, Pvt. Van Noy declined evacuation and continued on duty. On 17 October 1943 he was gunner in charge of a machinegun post only 5 yards from the water's edge when the alarm was given that 3 enemy barges loaded with troops were approaching the beach in the early morning darkness. One landing barge was sunk by Allied fire, but the other 2 beached 10 yards from Pvt. Van Noy's emplacement. Despite his exposed position, he poured a withering hail of fire into the debarking enemy troops. His loader was wounded by a grenade and evacuated. Pvt. Van Noy, also grievously wounded, remained at his post, ignoring calls of nearby soldiers urging him to withdraw, and continued to fire with deadly accuracy. He expended every round and was found, covered with wounds dead beside his gun. In this action Pvt. Van Noy killed at least half of the 39 enemy taking part in the landing. His heroic tenacity at the price of his life not only saved the lives of many of his comrades, but enabled them to annihilate the attacking detachment.
We simply entered the camp and wandered about on our own. There were lots of individual former prisoners wandering around in their prisoner garb. One of the first things we witnessed was the beating of a former German guard. He was kept in a small building near the edge of the camp. Every hour they, the former prisoners, would bring him out and beat the hell out of him with a hard rubber truncheon.
Next, I wandered into the detainee barracks. The inmates were lying on what amounted to wooden shelves, packed rather closely together. I took a couple of pictures and labeled them in my album as "The Living Dead." We were told that some died every 24 hours. Most of the dead had already been removed or hidden from view. There still was an odor of death.
The next place I visited was the crematorium. This is my best recollection: They dropped those who were to be cremated thru a hole in the floor above about 16 feet on to a concrete floor. (It could have been less than 16 feet, but that number sticks in my mind.) Then they would hang them from "meat hooks" against the wall until it was the individuals turn to be put into one of three ovens. We were told that the last 18 men hung and cremated were British airmen. (No proof of that.)
You could see against the wall where these men were hung the marks of their heads, shoulders, buttocks and feet.
My next stop was in the hospital. We saw the evidence of some horrifying experiments.
The camp was dirty. The barracks were more or less disgraceful.
On one wall along one edge of the camp, painted in big letters was the following: "Swine hund".
My guess is that we were there for about four hours.
I was back at Buchenwald in 1996. There is no trace of any of the original buildings. There is a monument...a fairly tall structure with a lot of symbols, outside, of the inmates, with "evidence" of the torture they experienced. You can find up-to-date pictures of Buchenwald on the Internet. I can't recall if there is any accompanying text. I was the only one at the site when I visited in 1996. I took pictures and more or less cut that visit short because I was afraid that my rental car might be stolen. Cars were being stolen left and right all over Europe at that time, and I was in a total of 12 countries during that visit.
During that visit I met a cousin who was one year older than I, whom I never knew about until a couple of years earlier. I was in the house that my great grandfather built, where my German grandfather was born. (I also had a British grandfather.) When I told a professor at Stuttgart in 1996, that the German/English grandparents were the worst possible combination, he diplomatically said, "No, that was hybrid vigor!"
This is a letter I sent to the webmaster of the 167th Engineers.
