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Former WWII prisoner hosts French familyContinued from page 1trip.“It was a great, great day, said Josette. “I’ve never had such a great time in my life.”Close encounterAfter his plane was shot down, Henry received help from the French Resistance, which provided him with food, shelter and medical care for five ribs that were broken after bailing out ofthe plane.Henry helped the Resistance gather weapons dropped by British planes for them and was shuffled among families who were willing to hide him.Many people helped Henry, but the generosity, hospitality and bravery of the Dardenne family made the biggest impact.Irene Dardenne was the first one to contact Henry's family to tell them that he was alive after lie was declared missing in action. Henry spent about three or four weeks at the Dardenne home. 1 le was able to go out at night occasionally, and he claimed that there was never a shortage of good wine, but food was scarce.“They went to the countryside and bought from farmers,” he said. “They couldn’t shoot game because they weren’t allowed to have guns.”Josette peeled potatoes for men in the Resistance and even though they were risking their lives, she wished her family could have done more.I lenry was provided with some books written in English and read those during times of boredom, but some days were pretty intense. Like the time German soldiers came into the house while Henry was using the outdoor bathroom.“While 1 was in there, I heard voices, said Henry. “1 noticed they were German voices. ’jThe men eventually got so close to the bathroom that I lenry could hear them urinating along the building. Henry’s mind was racing while he tried to devise a plan. He thought about leavingthe h:ithmmn ;imi•You knew all thetime that if you made it through the day, you were lucky.”— Robert I lenry, former WWII ROWFrench to the soldiers. He had been provided a fake identification card from the French Underground, but decided to wait in the bathroom. Henry was terrified that any sound could alert the troops and endanger theDardennes.“I was sitting there thinking if I had to cough or sneeze, they would have rushed in and got me, lie said. They’d know that I was hiding and blame me for spying on them, and they would have gone in the home and shot those people.The soldiers left after Henry spent about an hour hiding.“You were scared to death all the time,” I lenry said. “You knew all the time that if you made it through the day, you were lucky.” The final close call occurred when the French Underground got word of a planned invasion of France and alerted Henry. He fled before German soldiers en tered the home to find the bed that lie had been lying in still warm. Somebody had tipped tin* Germans off about Henry ’s loca9tion, and the family remainedwdefiant even after being told to start digging their own graves. “They threatened to kill my•4k Ifuncle if he was holding an American,” said Josette.I ler uncle claimed that his son was in the bed and had just leftfor school.“If Robert stayed at home onewhour more, I think we would be no more,” said Josette.Ties that bindHenry was captured by the Ciermans in Spain near the country’s border witli France in May 1944. He was kept in prison camps in France and Germany.At riimn hr* nf-ficially categorized as a U.S. prisoner of war and was able to write a brief letter home. At another camp he was beaten by members of the Gestapo, who knew his plane had been shot downand he had been hiding in France. I hey wanted the names and addresses of people who had helped him and beat him with clubs when he refused to tell. “They beat me 11 hourswstraight,” said 1 lenry. ‘ From 11 at night to 10 in the morning. There wasn’t a square inch of my body that wasn’t black and blue.”1 lenry was freed on May 2, 1945, after the German soldiers surrendered to English troops, but it wasn’t before hi* was led on an 87-day walk during a winter that Henry claimed was one of the coldest in German history, lit* arrived home in Cherry Tree Oil July 5, 1945.wHenry, a retired mail carrier and farmer, is reluctant to talk about the emotions he felt during his return home, or how he feels now.‘‘1 never show any emotion. I think the war kind of takes that out of you.”Despite Henry’s guard, his daughter, Sandy Fairman of Indiana, who has accompanied him to I ranee, knows how importantJosette and her family are to him; sht* helped arrange their visit.“I wanted him to be able to see his friends again,” said Fairman. “ They respect each other. They care for each other so much.Henry is equally important to Josettes family. Ghislain can’twspeak English, but was excited to In* in the United States.“I le was the first to tell me, ‘we go, we go, ” said Josette. “We’d like to come more often, but we are becoming older and older.” “When we arrived in France, when we went in with Dad, one of the things Mrs. Dardenne said was now that she has seen Robert, she could die,” said Fairman. “It was an awesome time. When we went over there in ’97; their hospitality was awesome.” “I think since the war, the family ol Robert’s is our family,”b »vi»l 11 • s.ni I
Newspaper Details
Indiana Gazette
Indiana, Pennsylvania, US
Sat, Aug 02, 2003
Page 12
Full Page
Clipped by
Candie H.
USA 16 Mar 2019
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