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THE GIFT OF FREEDOM

December 1999

This holiday season we will celebrate the One who came to give hope and give salvation to the world, Jesus Christ. It will also be a time when each of us shares with our loved ones gifts and appreciation. I think it would be a great time and opportunity also to give special thanks to our veterans.

My most vivid remembrance of a war soldier was of my two cousins during their visit from the battle field. Very young at this time, I did not understand anything concerning war or the reality of it even happening. My cousins came into the house fully dressed in brown wool soldiers uniforms with bloody hands, headed straight to the kitchen. It’s really strange that I remember this, but at that moment thinking of family, death, uniform, and blood, something clicked inside of me, even at an early age, the reality of all four. As they saw my interest, they voiced a joke concerning war and how they had bloody hands. Later, I found out that they had run over a rabbit and had field dressed it outside the house. As to my personal and family life, we never experienced the effects of war as many have.

Please understand what I’m about to say. I honor and thank the men and women who unselfishly gave their lives for our country and freedom. But, I believe that somewhere along the way, maybe because of the types of conflicts of this generation, we are forgetting the sacrifices that were made by our veterans who laid the foundation of the freedom we are enjoying today.

Chad, a young acquaintance, and I recently covered a live broadcast that changed his life. As he heard the story off our freedom, from veterans, he expressed a patriotic revelation of he men and women who gave it all. He never realized, as a young man, what really happened for him to have freedom. "My interpretation of war and freedom is constantly diluted by TV and movies. It wasn’t until I heard first hand from those who were there the seriousness and dedication it actually took. Real people really fought and lives were really given so that I, Chad Boggan, could live in a land of freedom, " says Chad. This statement should open the eyes of young and old to get back to the patriotic value of our countries’ freedom. There is no way I can imagine what it must have been like to pay the price. Only from the heart and spirit of those who were there can it be said correctly. The following was from the heart of one such man.

Gene Allen , World War II Veteran, who entered the service in June of 1943, at the age of seventeen. He just graduated from high school at a time most of the young men were either in or going into the service for our country which was the patriotic thing to do. With two older brothers already in the service, one going in the Air Force in 1941, and the other (a Marine in 1942) was wounded on Marshall Island. Mr. Allen wanted to follow. He took basic training at Camp Adair in Oregon, completing in six months. He was on his way to North Africa, and then to Italy. Landing at Naples, Italy, his unit was put on amphibious landing crafts and sent to Anzio Beachhead.

Gene recalls what it was like: " I was never given a furlough until the war was over. Going in the service, I looked forward to coming home on leave, showing off my uniform, proud of being a soldier. But that privilege never came. When we took care of our business, we would be transferred over to another group who needed help. This is what infantry did: we fought. I was part of the 91^st infantry division which was initially committed to action at Anzio, participating in 208 days of combat in the Italian theater in World War II. At the age of 18, July 13, 1944, during a German mortar attack, front line action, trying to cross the Arno River, I was wounded. The shell that wounded me also took the lives of my two buddies. I managed to crawl into a shallow ditch where I remained several hours until help arrived. After a medic got to me I was brought by jeep to a field hospital and then later flown back to Rome aboard a C-47. The Italian Campaign was the longest campaign in World War II, lasting over 21 months.

Our living conditions weren’t good. We slept in foxholes or wherever you could find cover from the enemy. There was snow in the winter, mud in the spring, and dust in the summer. We were issued four days of K-rations at a time and no water to wash our hands before we ate.

Last year wife and I re-visited some of the places I had been during the war in Italy. My wife, Billie, and I visited a German cemetery at Futa Pass where more than 33,000 German soldiers were buried. While there I came upon a grave that had the date of death the same day I was wounded. I could not get away from the thoughts that I could have been the one who took his life, or maybe he was the one who wounded me. On the front line even if wounded, you kept fighting as long as you could, and I did. On my trip overseas in April of 1944, we were 20 days on a Liberty Ship. On my return trip last year we were in Rome in eight hours traveling by air on a 747.

I feel that my faith in God sustained me during those times. Father Bill Cummings, a Catholic Priest, wrote, "There are no atheists in a foxhole." I still have two church bulletins which I had mailed home to my family. They were given to us only on special occasions: Easter Sunday, 1945, and Thanksgiving Service, 1944.

We are told that World War II Veterans are dying at a rate of 1,000 a day. I am thankful for all the years I’ve had since the time I was on the battlefield during the war. Even now, I think about all the young men who lost their lives. They never had the chance to have all the blessing of this life that I now enjoy. The Lord has blessed me with a wonderful family and many, many friends. I thank Him daily. "Now at 74 years young, Gene Allen is one of the youngest Veterans of World War II. We do not have too much longer to give our support and thanks to the ones who offered themselves even unto death for us to be free. Truly, it is a Gift Of Freedom.

We thank Gene, and all the Veterans who laid the foundation of freedom.

For you who would like to contact Gene Allen you may by giving him an e-mail at gblallen@juno.com

Some of the best times of growing up was during the summer. My sister, Martha, and I would have many opportunities to visit family in Mississippi. Throughout our childhood, there were many trips t Aunt Gladys' and Uncle Wessies' house. Aunt Gladys was our mother's sister. They lived in a small rural town in Mississippi called Sandy Hook. This town consisted of a church, a grave yard, and a country store that had the only gas pump within thirty miles.

The people in this town were different from anyone I had ever known. Every time we went there it was like we had entered a foreign country. They acted differently, talked differently, ate differently, and it was not uncommon to see them squatting instead of sitting, which was rather awkward to us.

There are several things that made a lasting impression on me. One was the "outhouse". Now, that was an experience for me. They did not have inside plumbing, and this was what we would call a bathroom. It was a two-seater, which meant that, if necessary, two could have their daily constitutional at the same time. Personally, I nor my sister, intended to share this with anyone at anytime. There was the Sears and Roebuck catalog lying on the seat, and lots of "The Farm Bureau" newspapers, and always lots of spider webs, with an incredibly large spider to watch carefully while trying to hurry with the business at hand. Heaven forbid, when the urge came at night, and you had to walk down the long, dark path with only the light of the moon for light, (and you always prayed for a full moon), and already knowing, or "not knowing", what was in there ahead of you. As bad as the idea of using the "slop-jar" was, somehow it was better than having to deal with the "outhouse" in the middle of the night.

We, naturally being "city kids", were especially fascinated by the ritual of the milking of the cows twice a day, everyday, seven days a week. Uncle Wessie insisted that everyone was in bed and quiet by 8:00 p.m., which was unheard of with us. We soon learned it was to our advantage, because at 4:00 a.m., we would be awakened with him "calling in" the cows from the front porch. After climbing out of bed, still hearing the deafening sounds of the night in the country, we would make our way to the barn in the darkness of the early morning. Cows were everywhere, some waiting to be milked, while eight or ten were lined up on each side of the milking barn with their heads fastened in the feeding trough, and still others, that had already been milked (before we got to the barn), waiting to be released into the pasture. They did have two milking machines, but with over a hundred of cows to be milked, more had to be milked by hand than by machine. Of course, there were always milk fights. If you were really good, you could aim the cow teat with precision and squirt anyone within twelve feet with a stream of warm milk that a cat would only dream about.

After we would finish milking and cleaning up the barn, the sun would barely be up and we would then head for the house where Aunt Gladys would have a breakfast fit for a king: hot biscuits. butter with homemade butter, homemade pork sausage from the smokehouse, fresh eggs and lots of fresh milk. By 6:30 a.m. it was time to head to the bean field or pea patch or the dreaded corn field, which ever one happened to need harvesting first. It was hard work, but there were always stories to listen to and lots of laughter to make it seem almost like fun.

Then it was the cotton patch. If you have never picked cotton, you have again missed something in you life. Like the vegetables, you had to be in the field by sun up, if not before. You always carried a mason jar filled with water and ice, and placed it in the shade of a tree, reasonably close to where you would be picking cotton. There were these canvas sacks that were eight feet long, and held one hundred pounds of cotton each, with a strap on it, to be placed around your neck and over your shoulder. You dragged the sack along behind you as you picked the cotton. There was this area in the field where everyone would bring their cotton to be weighed after their sack was full. Each sack was weighed, emptied, and recorded in a book, and the worker was sent back into the field to repeat the same procedure, until the sun began to set. When our turn came, to say the least, you could hardly even find the cotton in that long sack, mush less weigh it. Uncle Wessie would weigh it anyway, and write down in the book what our pay was for the amount of cotton picked, and at the end of the week, we received our pay just like everyone else, 4 cents per pound. We never knew, until weeks later, that he added to our pay, just so we would get a little money.

I could go on and on, but each experience helped mold our lives. I believe our young people would enjoy such experiences if given a chance. I hope, that in some way, parents might have an opportunity to expose their children to this type of life. Maybe another time I'll share the corn crib, hay loft, and the watermelon patch. God bless and have a great summer. Need a place to go?