"It Was the Bravest Thing We Ever Saw."

Task and Purpose:

U.S. Army 1st Lt. Garlin M. Conner and his wife Pauline,
sitting on the porch of Pauline’s parents’ home in 1946.

Fox News:  "“You know, in World War II and Korea, they didn't recognize PTSD like they did in Vietnam,” Pauline said at the Pentagon. “But I've always said if anybody ever had PTSD, he did. Because many of the times, he'd wake up in the night, you know, with nightmares. And after I would wake him up, and he would go outside, sit on the porch, smoke cigarettes for hours at a time.”

However, her husband still never spoke about what happened to him overseas.

On Jan. 24, 1945, Conner’s soldiers – 7th Infantry, 3rd Battalion – were facing a counterattack from 600 German troops armed with tank destroyers. Instead of retreating, he chose to run forward into enemy fire with a telephone in order to direct artillery fire in hopes of ending end the attack. He stayed in an irrigation ditch for three hours until the battle was won as swarms of German soldiers moved toward his battalion.

“He’d just come back from being wounded. He wasn't even supposed to be there,” said Erik Villard, digital military historian from the Army Center of Military. “But he came back to his unit and ran forward and volunteered the mission, and did what he did.”

“Today we pay tribute to this Kentucky farm boy who stared
down evil,” Trump said. "He was indeed a giant, larger than life, he will never ever be forgotten."".......

When we played "war" as little kids, it wasn't just mindless violence we were parroting. We hoped that someday, we would be as heroic as Lt. Conner. Few of us ever do--but that's why they're called 'heroes'.

I grew up in the shadow of these giants.

And so did you.

Honor