Heroes: the Army
"...Harry A Thompson Jr. died just a few hours ago. He left a tale to be told. I wish we found this web site a little sooner..."
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Plea for Assistance!
The following is from a message that I received on 8 May 2004 and the last line caught my immediate attention.
It read:
Harry A Thompson Jr. died just a few hours ago. He left a tale to be told. I wish we found this web site a little sooner.
It was sent by the son of Harry A. Thompson, Jr., Harry A. Thompson III.
I then received the following message dated on 5 June 2004 which read in part:
Hello Joseph,
Thanks for the email you sent about my Dad's passing. I recently received some of my Dad's letters home and other documents about the war including one of Lt. Stookie Allen's prints of the Roer River Crossing. I found a document letter addressed to Lt. Col. Herschel E. Linn from General Collins that gives the 237th Combat Engineer Battalion.
My Dad's battles didn't stop with the war. He (we) battled the VA all my lifetime to get the proper benefits he needed. I didn't start asking him about the war until ten years ago at the 50th anniversary of D Day.
If you would like to read some of the stories, I have attached a letter that I wrote to my congressman for help. Which didn't help. The last thing that my Dad asked me was if I had heard from the VA yet.
Attached to the message was the following letter addressed to Congressman Tim Holden.
Harry A. Thompson
Wyomissing, PA 19610
10 June 2002
Congressman Tim Holden
147 N Fifth St. 1st Floor
Reading, PA 19601
Re: WWII Veteran Harry A. Thompson Jr.
VA Case File No. C 10 490 221
Dear Congressman Holden:
I am writing to you for help with an appeal to the Veterans Administration. The case is with my Father, Harry A. Thompson Jr. My Dad is a World War II veteran who has been in and out of mental hospitals since 1950, the beginning of the Korean War.
My Dad's story is simply incredible. From the beginning to the end of his enlistment, he was part of the 237th Combat Engineer Battalion, Company C, and 1st Platoon. This is a story that we (my Family) were never allowed to let my Dad talk about. We were not allowed to ask or talk about the War with my Dad. So we never knew how special he was. The years were too many to know exactly what day, month or even seasons. But he remembers the battles. I will begin the story with the main person who had the most influence with my Dad's life at the time.
Lt. Samuel Benjamin Kent was their Platoon leader. He was also their mentor, teacher and big brother. He had blond hair and blue eyes and was 27 years old. He was a Sergeant prior to the war stationed in Panama. Then he transferred to Fort Benning for officer training and became the leader of "The Boys" as my dad remembers. (My Dad seems to remember everyone by name and where they lived.) Lt. Kent and The Boys, the ones who survived and the ones who died all around him, fought together throughout his entire plight from H-5 hour of the Normandy invasion to shooting at the Russians at the Elbe River, where the Lieutenant and Lt. Colamar (spelling?) were killed by a tank mine while scouting in a Jeep for a bivouac area for their platoon. Their body parts were scattered all over the road; his blond hair was scalped from his decapitated head.
They were in Eisleben, Germany at the Battle of Bienstatt. It was near the end of the war. My Dad was sickened; what will we do without the Lieutenant were his thoughts. Their Platoon Sergeant, Carl Keeter became a Lieutenant took charge until they got to the Elbe River. Then Lt. Coon took over as Platoon leader and told my Dad who was on century "no Russians". So when the Russians came asking to take them to his Head Quarters, my Dad started shooting at them. Two weeks later they were relieved and sent to Paris, France to come home.
Letter to Congressman Tim Holden, page 2
The Normandy Invasion, H-5
Company C of the 237th Combat Engineer Battalion landed on Utah's Green Beach (my Dad's quotes not certain if it was Green or Red Beach). They were joined with the 8th Infantry. The Engineers carried 40 to 50 pounds of dynamite. The landing crafts landed at the same time about 20 feet apart. When the doors opened, they jumped out into the surf that was up to their chins. The German machine gun from the pillbox at the wall was fixed on 3rd Platoon's craft. Lieutenant Basset and his men were killed before they could get off. They were to the left of my Dad's Platoon. The machine gun started firing on the 1st Platoon and Corporal Neiswinger and Private Jimmy Keane were killed in front of my Dad, but he keeps running and made it to the wall. He threw the dynamite against the wall. Lieutenant Kent who was the first to reach the wall said to my Dad, "your no coward" and ordered him to wave the rest of the guys to get up to the wall.
Lt. Kent arranged the explosives and set it off. As they laid in the sand, the blast lifted them this high off the ground, around three feet. Forty-five of them made it to the wall.
The tanks arrived and waited for the wall to be breached and the special demolition team followed the tanks through the holes and joined with the 4th Division. They were the first to reach Hitler' s Wall and the first to put a hole in it. Private Keane was my Dad's good friend.
The Battle of the Bulge:
This is a story that my Dad tried to tell us many times but we weren't allowed to listen.
Corporal Paul Sellers and Private Harry A. Thompson Jr. were scouting near the Aachen Castle after capturing it from the Germans the first time before the Battle of the Bulge. While walking together talking, Paul tripped a mine. A Bouncing Betty shot up head high. Both of them were blown back, but Corporal Paul Sellers' head took the blast of shrapnel and most likely shielded my Dad from injury. My dad stayed with him by his side until the others came. He died as he stared up at him. My dad was feeling battle fatigued and asked for leave. He was granted 30 days leave, but he was told not to go because they needed him when the Germans countered. He just wanted to go to Paris and buy some things to send home.
The battle got worse; they had to retreat back to Malmandy, France to the Meuss River.
While crossing the river, a bomb fragment hit his backpack which was full of dynamite. The blast knocked him into the water. He ditched his backpack to keep from drowning, and as he watched it float away, it exploded. This was a low point in moral because they didn't know if they could win. As the battle turned around, Lt. Kent and his men re-took the Aachen Castle.
There were many more battles in between as the war continued. The237th was the point of the arrow (in the front) from H-5 of the Normandy Invasion to the end of the war. They had no time to think about anything but survival. Lieutenant Samuel Benjamin Kent was a most remarkable hero. He was "tough but fair to his men". My Dad loved him. He was going to make my Dad a Sergeant. When he died, my Dad didn't care what happened. He's sent home when he started to shoot at the Russians.
Letter to Congressman Tim Holden, page 3
The Battle of Nerves:
It was reported by my Grandmother, Sara Thompson, that my Dad was suffering from a nervous condition when he returned from the War. But my Dad went back to his job, met my Mom, married and had two children. During this time he joined the Naval reserves. Then the unthinkable Korean War started. For sure, Dad would be called up to fight again.
On September 3, 1950, I turned 2 years old. It is my earliest memory. A commotion in the kitchen occurred. My Dad ran out and picked me up into his arms. Everyone was yelling. And then everything changed for our family. Bombs started going off in my Dad' s head at night, and my Mom would wake my Sister and me to get out of the house. Thunderstorms would have the same effect. Then my Dad got too violent and went away to the hospital. They zapped his brain constantly with electricity and drugged him until he was like a zombie. He was a perfect specimen for experimentation. They treated his symptoms but never looked to the cause. They knew it had something to do with the War because they told us not to mention or talk about the War with my Father. It will upset him and cause him to regress.
Because his symptoms weren't recorded one to two years after his discharge from active duty, the Veterans Administration has not nor will not agree that it is war related. The VA would not allow payment for private hospitals and the Naval Hospital had no room mental patients because they were filled with physically wounded veterans.
Even today when we talked to the doctor at the Philadelphia's VA Hospital we get a similar story. He has a double whammy: post trauma from being on the front lines throughout the war, and he has schizophrenia, so the doctor said. The doctor even said that post traumatic stress has similar symptoms as schizophrenia.
The final analysis is that the Post traumatic stress disorder is once again denied.
The VA is friendlier as reported in the news.
And the VA is reducing its backlog as reported in the most recent news. But they do so by simply making quick and unjustified decisions without looking into the history. It is so typical of today' s management style. It is faster and easier to just say no.
Letter to Congressman Tim Holden, page 4
I am now begging to you for help. This battle with the VA has been going on for 52 years now, and my Family and Father can't win.
Enclosed are copies of letters from my Grandmother pleading for help. The are from the VA's files. Also there is a memo from the Fuller Osteopathic Hospital and a copy of the latest memo from the VA showing their denial. And I included a copy of my Dad's separation paper.
I was never ashamed of my Father or of his condition, because I always knew he was a war hero. I knew because, as a kid, I loved putting on his "Ike" jacket with all those glorious metals: Battle Stars with a bunch of clusters, the Arrowhead, the blue colored Presidential Unit Citation, the red colored (unknown to me) citation, etc.
When I returned home from the Army in 1971, my Mother, who suffered the most through this, gave away all of our military souvenirs including his uniform with his metals.
Finally, Mr. Congressman, when I was asked my Dad about his story; there were tears in his eyes. I don't know what the ramifications will come about by asking my Dad these questions, but I needed to know.
Thank you,
Harry A. Thompson III
Enclosures
The materials depicted on this page were reprinted with kind permission of the son of the subject of this essay -- Harry A. Thompson, Jr.
We, at the World War II Stories - In Their Own Words web site wish to offer to Mr. Thompson III our most profound THANK YOU for his father, Harry A. Thompsom, Jr's poignant story of his personal experiences -- during World War II and especially for allowing us to share those memories. We will always be grateful for Mr. Thompson's contributions to the war effort and to the countless other men and women who put forth their "finest hour".
Original story transcribed from e-mail messages received on 5 June 2004.
Added to web site on 15 June 2004
Here are some interesting links that are related to this story:
National World War II Memorial
Veterans
Survey Form
September 5,
2002.
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