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For POWs(Continued From Page Al)able to recognize anyone in the family, mistaking them for hostile Japanese and threatening them with bodily harm.Captured when the island of Corregidor in the Philippines fell to the Japanese on May 6, 1942, he has catalogued in his memories three bleak Christmas Days at the mercv of his cold-blooded captors. His wife, Anna, a registered nurse, has been providing him with the constant extra health care that his condition demands.Today, at 2 p.m., his ex-POW associates will gather at his home for a yuletide get-together, during which time an official presentatiQn will be made of the POW medals they received through the mail. Doing the honors will be retired Navy Capt, Gerard (Jerry) Calhoun of Frostburg.“I don’t know if Damon will be up to it,” says Mrs. Wright. ‘‘The occasion will be a surprise to him because I have not told him of the plans, fearing the anticipation might trigger a setback.” The Wrights have three daughters and a son as well as 12 grandchildren.Members of Maryland West who have signified their intentions of attending are William Heyl Ack of McCoole, commander of the chapter; Graydon Broadwater of Lona-coning; Paul Chaney of Frostburg; James P. Dickel of Mount Savage; John S. “Jack” Evans of Midlothian; Delmar Kilmer of Cumberland; and Elmer Smith of Corriganville. “Maybe some others will make up their minds at the last moment to attend,” said Mrs. Wright.Ack, along with Elmer Propst and Chauncey Friend, both of Cumberland, were presented with their medals in a ceremony at Aberdeen, while Clyde Turner’ also of Cumberland, received his at the VA Center inMartinsburg, W.Va.James P. Morgan of West-ernport is a member of the chapter but dislikes talking about his internment. “Just say I was a prisoner of war in theETO,” he said.Robert L. “Bob” McGreevy of Cumberland has divorcedhimself of everything connected with thoughts of his past as a POW. He spent what hedescribes as “33 months ofhell” as a prisoner of ChineseCommunists during the Korean War. Thirty-six years ago, after being repatriated, McGreevy, who had been an All-City football player at LaSalle High School, consented somewhat reluctantly, to talk with me about those “33 months of hell.”That was the last and only interview he ever granted on the subject. “I want to put all of that in the back of my mind and start living a normal life again,” stated McGreevy who went on to become a star distance runner in his age group and still can be seen almost daily running along local streets and highways.It was more than 25 years after World War II ended thatChauncey Friend would permit himself to discuss his experiences as a POW. He was on his 19th mission as a belly gunner on a B-24 Liberator, a heavy bomber, when the plane was knocked out of the skies over Hungary en route to a target in Austria. The pilot, bombardier and tail gunner were killed, while Friend and five other members of the crew parachuted from the shot-up plane.That was August 22, 1944. April 26, 1945, the 104th Infantry, Timberwolf Division, liberated him and others from Stalag Lust 4, northeast of Berlin. Friend, who was wounded in the right hip by flak when he bailed out, lost 60 pounds during his time, eight months and four days, as a prisoner. “Up until that memorable day in 1945, I never thought I would want to meet a timberwolf face to face,” he said. “But a Wolf in GI clothing was a sight I shall always cherish.”Maryland West commander Ack, a member of the 4th Armored Division, helped liberate the late Thomas B. Finan of Cumberland, an Army captain who had been captured in Northern Italy during World War II, but was later captured himself and spent almost six months as a POW in the ETO.Capt. Finan was a prisoner for approximately a year and upon returning to civilian life became prominent in state politics. He was attorney general for five years, a candidate for governor in 1966 and a judge of the Maryland Court of Appealsfrom 1966 until his death in 1972.Ack spent Christmas Day 1944 in Bastogne, Belgium, where the Battle of the Bulge had come to a crisis. Several days later, however, he was takenprisoner.That Christmas was “just another day” in the lives of those who were prisoners of war during the yuletide is shown in the following capsule highlights of ex-POWs living inAWegany and Garrett counties :JOHN S. EVANS MIDLOTHIAN A prisoner for 28 months in North Korea, Evans said the men in his camp knew then it was Christmas even though no one in the group had a calendar.They tried not to think about their families gathering at laden tables, where golden turkeys waited to be carved. “Thinking about that,” he said, “would have created moreemotion for us. We knew thatthe menu that day would be the same as any other day — rice, sorghum, millet, soy beans and Russian black bread. That’s if we were lucky. There was a stretch one time when we were given frozen turnips for 93straight meals.”Evans pointed out that medical care was non-existent forthe prisoners. There were 2,500 in his camp and towards the midpoint of his 853 days behind barbed wire, he had just about given up on ever seeing home again. Prior to being captured,he was twice wounded, first time when hit in the shoulder and back with shell fragments and the second time when white phosphorous penetrated both of his eyes.Temperature dipped to as much as 30 degrees below zero during the winter and the men, 12 to a clay hut, slept on the floor of the 8-by-10-foot room fully clothed and huddled against each other to keep warm. Of the 7,000 prisoners in his camp, approximately 4,000 died as prisoners.Evans, 60, is a retired auto mechanic and has many of the KZ Syndrome symptoms — fail-ing memory, traumatic dreams, nervousness anddepression. He takes nine different medications daily and lost over 80 pounds while a prisoner.JAMES P. DICKEL MOUNT SAVAGE A member of the 24th Division, he spent three Christmas Days as a prisoner and was in the same camp, Changson in North Korea, as Evans. Their paths didn’t cross there and even though both returned to the states on the same troopship, the USS Pope, they never met until after getting back home. “To me, Christmas came when we received a Red Cross package,” he said. “But that was very seldom.”Dickel, who works as a fireman at Mount Savage School during the fall and winter seasons, lost 88 pounds. He still has flashbacks and receives counseling every week from Mrs. Peggy Melloti, head of the volunteers at the Finan Center. He, accoring to Melloti,is victimized by intrusivethoughts as a result of theordeal he went through.GRAVDON BROADWATER LONACOMNGCaptured Sept. 11, 1944, while serving with the 80th Division, 305 Engineers in the ETO, he remembers his Christmas din-poor, very poor. I think we were served the same food that was on the menu any other day,” he said. “Like sauerkraut and brown sour bread. I know our diet lacked nourishment because I lost 50 pounds during the seven months I was in prison camp.”Broadwater, who came out of World War II with nothing more than a bullet burn on his cheek, will never forget the circumstances connected with his liberation by the 10th Armored Division. A member of the 10th in that “freedom party” was Vernon Warnick from Moscow, just a few short miles from Lonaconing. He and Broadwater went into the Army together July 15, 1942. Broadwater was discharged Armistice Day, 1945.DELMAR KILMER CUMBERLANDA squad leader with the 110th Infantry of the 28th Division, he fought in campaigns of Central Europe, the Ardennes and the Rhineland before being captured Dec. 16, 1944, and spent the next four months as prisoner of the Germans in Stalag 4B at Muhlberg on the Elbe River. Being placed behind barbed wire wasn’t his idea of an ideal Christmas gift. He did, however, share with 14 unarmed comrades a Red Cross package Christmas Day.The German guards at Stalag 4B, he said, fled the camp in late April, realizing that the war was over for them, and April 23 Russian troops moved to free the American prisoners.Kilmer, who hails from Schenectady, N.Y., entered the Army Jan. 7, 1942, and was discharged Sept. 30, 1945. Married to the former Gladys Mewman of Cumberland, he worked 45 years for The General Electric Company, helping to install power plants all over the world.ELMER SMITH.ner at .Stalag 7 A as a POW asCORRIGANVILLE Captured Dec. 18, 1944, in theBattle of the Bulge while serving with the 106th Infantry Division, he spent Christmas Day in a boxcar without food or water. While en route to Stalag 4B, British bombers blew up the tracks. “We had to camp out for two weeks while the tracks were being repaired,” he recalled. “It was bitter cold one night and we slept on top of each other to take advantage of the body heat.”Smith was “wounded,” not on the battlefield, but while in prison camp, A saw he was using while being assigned to work in a furniture factory,slipped and severely damaged one of his fingers. When the war ended, he was released by the Russian Army.DAVID EVANS, LONACONING A member of Armv Engin-
Newspaper Details
Cumberland Sunday Times News
Cumberland, Maryland, US
Sun, Dec 10, 1989
Page 50
Full Page
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USA 28 Jul 2020
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