When history mixes with personal stuff

[Caliga]

 

I was just doing some more geneology work and found my great grandfather's pension application from WWI.  I had forgotten he was in the US Navy during the war... and I never knew until now that he was on a ship (the SS Montanan) that was sunk by a U-Boat in 1918.  I can't believe nobody in my family ever told me that.   Don't worry people, he survived long enough to reproduce and hence I exist.

[Eddie Teach]

He could have knocked up great grandma before going off to war.

[Zanza]

I know where my grandfathers served during WWII, but while I know some of my ancestors were in WWI, I have no clue about details.

[Caliga]

He could have knocked up great grandma before going off to war.

Unless she was an elephant, unlikely, as my grandmother was born three years after the sinking.

[Admiral Yi]

Elephant chicks can get knocked up before they're born? 

[Admiral Yi]

Never mind. 

[The Brain]

Elephant chicks can get knocked up before they're born? 

No.

[Pedrito]

Sorry for the long-windedness, but this personal family story really helps putting things into perspective for me. I mean, he was just one of 4000 on his side only, and only on that part of the front on that day, and I know (vaguely) how his wife was left alone to raise 3 boys, and arguably failing at it, at least two of them (including my great-grandpa on that line) becoming alcoholics and drinking away the little farm poor great-great-grandpa managed to save together before dying in Italy for absolutely no reason whatsoever.

Did you ever stop to think how weird it is that you can just go to Italy any time you like with no problems now, but back then you would have been shot?

I sometimes think that when travelling between South and North here, though usually I do that between Kentucky and Indiana and it was by no means a black and white thing like that during the Civil War around here.

For sure. Also I have a few Italian colleagues. It is perfectly conceivable that our great grandpas were shooting at each other merely a hundred years ago, and here we are now.

One of my greatuncles disappeared in Russia during WWII; he was part of the extremely successful ( ) ARMIR, the Italian Army in Russia.
Either he has become part of the permafrost, or, showing typical Italian adaptability, he disappeared to avoid returning to Mussolini's arms, married an Ukrainian chick and became the grandfather of Malthus' wife.

L.

[Queequeg]

I avoided going to Bosnia because my cousin died in a mass shooting by a Bosniak.  I don't really like Bosniaks still, at all.  I hate to say it but it's probably one of the reasons I identify with Serbs and hate the Ottomans so much, though I was a Byzanteen long before my cousin was murdered.

[Threviel]

My grandfather died a few weeks ago. He was born in '26, so he was pretty young during the war. When he started to get old enough to serve he applied to the navy and got to serve on the u-boats. Thankfully for me he had a heart condition that was discovered before he was sent out in the atlantic.

He got transfered to a mine-sweeper and served in the baltic for much of the late part of the war. He was unlucky enough to get transfered into Königsberg just before the soviets surrounded it. They gave him a rifle and put him in the nearest infantry unit.

He told me a few months ago, quite chillingly, that that was he first time he was under artillery fire. His unit tried to break out towards Danzig, there were some veterans with the unit and apparently they had a flak vierling, so they had some success. In the end they were wiped out and my grandfather got to spend five years shuffling coal in the Ukraine and White Russia.

Coming home to Hamburg, very sick and malnourished he told me that it felt very bitter to see all the girls with american soldiers whilst he himself had nothing. Eventually he migrated to Sweden, met my grandmother and had a good life.

[barkdreg]

My grandmother on my dad's side was a refugee from the Spanish Civil War. Put on a boat and shipped to Belgium when Franco captured the town. Her older brother fought in a "elite" unit of the regular army still loyal to the Republican regime.
After the defeat he fled to France and ended up in the Vichy forces in northern Africa where defected to the British.
Joined the paratroopers and fought in both D-Day and Market Garden. After the war was given the British nationality and ended up living in Edingburgh and married another Spanish refugee.

[Berkut]

My grandmother on my dad's side was a refugee from the Spanish Civil War. Put on a boat and shipped to Belgium when Franco captured the town. Her older brother fought in a "elite" unit of the regular army still loyal to the Republican regime.
After the defeat he fled to France and ended up in the Vichy forces in northern Africa where defected to the British.
Joined the paratroopers and fought in both D-Day and Market Garden. After the war was given the British nationality and ended up living in Edingburgh and married another Spanish refugee.

Damn, that dude was a serious bad ass. Or really lucky.

He was either Chuck Norris, or Flashman.

[barkdreg]

I've always been told that out of the 100 men in the paratrooper unit only 7 or 8 survived.
He also lost two brothers in the SCW.

[Caliga]

I avoided going to Bosnia because my cousin died in a mass shooting by a Bosniak.  I don't really like Bosniaks still, at all.  I hate to say it but it's probably one of the reasons I identify with Serbs and hate the Ottomans so much, though I was a Byzanteen long before my cousin was murdered.

One of my good work friends (though the bastard recently defected to another company) is a Bosniak refugee.

[The Larch]

My grandmother on my dad's side was a refugee from the Spanish Civil War. Put on a boat and shipped to Belgium when Franco captured the town. Her older brother fought in a "elite" unit of the regular army still loyal to the Republican regime.
After the defeat he fled to France and ended up in the Vichy forces in northern Africa where defected to the British.
Joined the paratroopers and fought in both D-Day and Market Garden. After the war was given the British nationality and ended up living in Edingburgh and married another Spanish refugee.

You are part Spanish and you never told. ¡A mis brazos, hermano!

Your tío-abuelo's route was a bit unusual though. I had the understanding that most Spanish Republicans who slipped to France after the SCW ended up in the Free French forces, rather thna in the British army. They're an interesting bunch of people, those veterans.