Thursday, January 15, 2009
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My father, Pfc. William W. Taylor Jr. served in the 100th. Infantry Division, 399th. Regiment, Co. A. His Division saw duty in France and Germany spending 185 consecutive days on the battle line. He wrote nearly 300 letters home chronicling his service to our country. Like so many combat veterans of the War he spoke little of his experiences, but these letters tell the story.
My Hero
As a young boy my heroes were from books. Fighting men like Captain Horatio Hornblower and Francis Marion "the Swamp Fox" fired my imagination. More than anything I wanted to be like them, strong, brave, and heroic. One day, while rummaging around my father's closet I came upon a large box. Arranged within the box were 5 or 6 dusty, dirty cigar boxes. Inside the boxes were hundreds of old letters. They were numbered, in sequence and in the original envelopes. I opened the first letter and started to read. From that day on, my hero became not Horatio Hornblower or Francis Marion, but Pfc. William Wellington Taylor, Jr., my father. The letters were his letters home from World War II.
NOTE: The letters in this collection appear in reverse order. To read them in chronological order starting with the first letter go to the link at the bottom of this page entitled "Read letters in order starting with Letter 1"
NOTE: The letters in this collection appear in reverse order. To read them in chronological order starting with the first letter go to the link at the bottom of this page entitled "Read letters in order starting with Letter 1"
About Me
Blog Archive
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2009
(368)
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January
(18)
- Letter 9- October 27, 1943
- About Letter 8
- Letter 8- October 24, 1943
- Letter 7- October 23, 1943
- About Letter 6
- Letter 6- October 21, 1943
- About Letter 5
- Letter 5- October 20, 1943
- About Bill the Sketch Artist
- About Letter 4
- Letter 4- October 19, 1943 (Camp Abbot, Oregon)
- About Letter 3
- Letter 3- October 18, 1943 (Camp Abbot)
- About Camp Abbot
- "Tommy"- by Rudyard Kipling
- About Letter 2
- Letter 2-October 15, 1943 (Camp Abbot)
- About Letter 1
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January
(18)
Followers
100th Infantry Division
100th. Infantry Patch
Read letters in order starting with Letter 1
Read the letters in this collection in the order they were written, from first to last in my new website at:
http://wwiiwwtaylor.wordpress.com/
http://wwiiwwtaylor.wordpress.com/
We have a family friend who lost at eye in Normandy in 1944 and was hospitalized in England. When he was well enough, the medics put him to work cleaning latrines. This disgusted him so much that he and a buddy deserted the hospital and made their way back to France and their unit. Such was the pull between men who have shared combat.
ReplyDeleteThe bond between soldiers in combat is truly the glue that hold an army together. I think that the latrine duty my father talks about in this letter may have pushed him over the edge. Even though he had yet to experience combat it is clear that he yearns to get back to the men of his company
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