Clearing the Fog of War

Trip on for oldest woman veteran, 108

The nation's oldest woman veteran, Lucy Coffey, has dreamed of making one last trip to visit her favorite monuments in Washington, D.C. Come Friday, she can check that one off her bucket list.

At 108, the longtime San Antonio resident will board a commercial airliner and fly to Washington, where she will see the World War II Memorial, Arlington National Cemetery and the Women's Memorial. “I want to go, I want to see it,” she said.

Still, this journey almost didn't happen. Veterans' supporters in San Antonio and Austin worked to fly the ailing Coffee, who is on oxygen and frail after suffering a stroke, to Washington without overtaxing her.

Everyone thought things were set late last week when an Austin aviation broker agreed to charter a plane, but the firm dropped its plans because of legal concerns. That didn't stop a pair of retired Marines in Austin and San Antonio from pressing on, and with help from the  Texas General Land Office, they struck a deal.

Pending final medical approval, American Airlines will give Coffey and her caregiver free first-class, round-trip tickets to Washington. A tour of the monuments is scheduled to begin Saturday and end with a visit to the White House.

Read more here: http://www.mysanantonio.com/default/article/Trip-on-for-oldest-woman-veteran-108-5635457.php

Oldest woman veteran, 108, gets her wish to go to Washington

SAN ANTONIO — A San Antonio woman who is the nation's oldest female veteran wanted one last trip to Washington, D.C., and thanks to a pair of veterans groups and an Austin firm, she's going to get her wish.

Lucy Coffey, 108, will fly out of San Antonio on a chartered plane next week and go the capital. There, she'll visit the Women's Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery and other monuments, and may even see the president or vice president while in town.

“Everybody's just really excited to be able to honor her in this way. She's a pioneer. Her service has really opened doors for future generations of women,” said Bexar County veterans service officer Queta Marquez, adding that Coffey is serving her country even as a centenarian. “By virtue of her taking this trip, she's actually highlighting military service, and military service for women.”

Read more here: http://www.expressnews.com/news/local/military/article/Oldest-woman-veteran-108-gets-her-wish-to-go-to-5629411.php

Oldest woman veteran, 108, wants one more trip

SAN ANTONIO — When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, Lucy Coffey had left the farm in Martinsville, Indiana, spent time in Chicago and finally settled in Dallas, where she worked at an A&P supermarket.

After quitting the A&P in 1943, she joined the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, a call to service that would take her to Japan before she returned and settled in San Antonio.

Now, at 108, the nation's oldest woman veteran has one more trip to make, this time an Honor Flight, an all-expense-paid salute to World War II veterans. The destination: Washington, D.C.

“I'd like to go to see things that are there that were not there before,” Coffey said 

Read more here: http://www.expressnews.com/news/local/military/article/Oldest-woman-veteran-108-wants-one-more-trip-5610408.php#/0

 

Five Pearl Harbor veterans honored at annual lunch

Richard Anderson and his best friend, Eugene Whitcomb, joined the Army and Navy together and somehow wound up in the same location after boot camp — Honolulu.

When they got liberty, they'd spend time together at their respective duty stations, and it was Anderson's turn on Sunday morning, Dec. 7, 1941.

“I couldn't go that particular day because I had duty in the day room. We used to take turns cleaning up the day room, and it was my day,” he explained. “Otherwise, I'd have been on the Arizona when it sank.”

At the head of a long table seating 15 people, with his daughter, Sharon Gregory, at his side, Anderson was one of only five Pearl Harbor veterans at an annual lunch at the Barn Door restaurant — and one of only 14 survivors of the legendary battle still alive in the San Antonio area.

The local chapter of the now-defunct Pearl Harbor Survivors Association has been around for decades — just how long or how big the surviving members can't say, though retired Army Col. Gene Camp, a sergeant in charge of an antiaircraft battery that day, was a member 20 years ago. There may have been 100 members, but that figure is a bit fuzzy.

Organizers Irene Hernandez and Ron Botello, whose father, Raynaldo Botello, died in 2005, started Friday's ceremony with a moment of silence at 11:55 a.m. to mark when the attack began.

“My dad looked forward to this,” said the 66-year-old Botello, a San Antonio financial adviser whose father was on the USS Detroit. “When he would come (it) would be the only time he would talk about the attack on Pearl Harbor, when he was amongst those other gentlemen and ladies that were there with him.”

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/military/article/Saluting-five-Pearl-Harbor-veterans-4100878.php#ixzz2Gz5O7Noi

As Pearl Harbor was attacked, routine job turned surreal

As duties went, the one given Seaman 1st Class Richard Cunningham was routine: Take a small boat from the USS West Virginia along the Southeast Loch at Pearl Harbor and tie up at an officers' club landing 10 minutes away.

Halfway there, his ho-hum job turned surreal.

“At 7:55, we heard a loud explosion and we turned around and looked toward Ford Island and saw a plane peeling off, and saw two meatballs (the Rising Sun insignia of the Empire of Japan); so we knew immediately that we were at war,” he said. “And then we turned around, and the torpedo planes were coming in.”

A relative handful of Americans were on the ground floor 71 years ago today for the nation's entry into World War II, and Cunningham had a front-row seat.

His 28-foot-long officers' boat was well into the loch when the first Japanese torpedo bombers roared past.

The aircraft swooped 20 feet over the channel on their attack runs, releasing torpedoes that came close to the boat but miraculously missed.

Cunningham, 91, of the small town of Hewitt, near Waco, can still see the faces of the pilots as they delivered a body blow to an American fleet that included eight battleships — all sunk or badly damaged.

“They had these tight leather helmets and these goggles, and you could see them grinning real wide, ear to ear,” he said. “They were enjoying it. It was a success for them.”

Surprise was the critical element in the attack, which sank or damaged 19 U.S. ships, killed 2,403 Americans and left 1,178 wounded.

Japan lost 29 aircraft, five midget submarines and 129 men in a lopsided victory but missed the biggest targets — four aircraft carriers that were out to sea.

Many more could have died, Cunningham among them. He had close calls as the torpedo planes took aim. One explosion was so close it singed his eyebrows and the hair on his hands.

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/military/article/As-Pearl-Harbor-attacked-routine-job-turned-4097620.php#ixzz2Gz8V7lnt

Bataan's survivors are almost gone

Joe Lajzer is far into a long life and his memory isn't what it was, but folks who know him might think he'd never forget the Bataan Death March or life as a POW.

There are gaps in his recollections and long pauses as Lajzer ponders his past, but old visions come back to mind with some gentle nudging.

“Dad, did you have any pets in the prison camp?” his daughter, Katie Mason, asked while talking of the march that began 70 years ago today.

“I had a pet at the prison camp,” he replied, thinking of a puppy that slept next to his head, “but they ate him.”

At 93, Lajzer speaks softly and isn't easy to understand, but his story is still being told. Mason, 62, of Canyon Lake and others in his clan continue to share his tale.

A small cadre of Americans determined to preserve the history of troops who survived the death march and brutal Japanese POW camps is doing the same thing.

They're telling the stories because most of America's World War II veterans are dead. The VA projects that 1.5 million veterans out of 16.1 million who served will be alive in September.

Caroline Burkhart, vice president of the Descendants Group of the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor, said 200 or so survivors of those battles might be alive.

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/military/article/Preserving-history-a-hero-s-legacy-3467642.php#ixzz1yl9U3UvW

 

The 'perfect soldier'

Retired Maj. Clarence Sprouse was a soldier who never worried about dying and never got hurt, even in hand-to-hand combat.

As one war blurred into three, the legend grew. Gen. William DuPuy, a highly decorated veteran who played a key role in restructuring the post-Vietnam Army, called him the “perfect soldier.”

“He told me I was the bravest guy that he's ever seen and, really, I wasn't,” said Sprouse, who received a battlefield commission from DuPuy while serving as the 1st Infantry Division's command sergeant major in Vietnam. “I was just as scared as everybody else. I didn't show it at all, but I didn't hesitate.”

A paratrooper who was the first soldier in the 11th Airborne Division to make 100 static line jumps and held more than 80 decorations when retiring here in 1968, Sprouse received two Silver Stars, five Bronze Stars for valor, 18 Air Medals for assault landings and three Combat Infantry Badges.

He's still fit at 86, and his memories of war in the Pacific, Korea and Vietnam are as clear as if they happened yesterday. His voice is that of a soldier given to using colorful language that includes politically incorrect references to old enemies.

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/military/article/The-perfect-soldier-2518105.php#ixzz1ykdi4OUJ