Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience Archives : Page 2 of 3 : Operation Homecoming:

Victor Davis Hanson, “A Ring” (WWII)

Classics professor and military historian Victor Davis. Hanson has written extensively about ancient Greek and modern warfare. His uncle, who was also his namesake, fought and died in World War II, two intent on uncovering the last moments of his uncle’s life. Hanson was surprised to find several living members of the 29th Marines in the sixth Marine Division, which had taken heavy casualties at Okinawa. Here is an excerpt from one of his many correspondences with his uncle’s former comrades. Dear Victor, you simply must overlook the blatant familiarity reflected in this salutation. I plead only the overwhelming emotion with which I’ve been attempting to cope for the last 40 hours since the arrival of your startling letter. Thank you for enabling …

Will D. Campbell, The Return Of The Enola Gay (WWII)

Will Campbell also had the unique experience of seeing the return of the Enola Gay after its fateful bombing run over Hiroshima. So I was on side panel know when the war ended. In fact, I saw the Enola Gay land. I didn’t we didn’t know what had happened, but we knew something big had happened because our CEO, Oliver, said he didn’t know what it was, but he knew it was something very unusual. And. And the next day we heard that they’d dropped the first atomic bomb. We never heard of atomic bomb. Course. And, because we were when we saw the plane come in, we would go out every afternoon and watch them come back from their bombing raids. And …

Will D. Campbell, “A Christmas Gift” (WWII)

In World War II, two young American men who had never traveled a hundred miles from their homes suddenly found themselves thousands of miles from their own nation. Private Will Campbell was one such soldier, known today as a courageous minister in the civil rights movement and award winning author. Campbell enlisted in the army at 18 and was stationed at Saipan as a medic. Here, Campbell relates his experience crossing the Pacific in a Liberty ship. It was December 1943, and we were on a crowded troopship bound for the South Pacific. Most of us were in our teens, seasick, homesick, and a little afraid. I had asked my best pal, Herman Hyman, what he was going to send his girlfriend for …

Tobias Wolff, From In Pharaoh’s Army (Vietnam)

Vietnam War veteran Tobias Wolff translated his military experiences into an acclaimed memoir, In Pharaoh’s Army. I was sent off to language school to learn Vietnamese. I was gone for over a year, 13 months, and I was in civilian status that whole time. I never went to a base. That was how I spent the 13 months before I left for Vietnam. And that’s what begins this passage. Here is my orders for Vietnam. And then my year of grace ended at the end of it. Scared, short winded, forgetful of all martial skills and disciplines. I was promoted to first lieutenant and posted back to Fort Bragg to await orders. Just after I got there, I was assigned to a training …

James Salter, From Burning The Days (Korea)

Award winning novelist James Salter. From fighter jets in World War Two and the Korean War. In this selection, from his memoir Burning the Days. Salter describes a dogfight with a MiG in Korea. The first good weather in a week. The fighter bombers are going north again in strength. To someplace up near the border. The briefing room is crowded and electric. It’s max effort. Everything they can fly. 600 enemy aircraft have encountered on their fields. We’re sending up 40 far beneath us. The silver formations were moving slowly, it seemed. Across barren hills. Enemy flights were being announced. One after another. And then someone saw them along the river at 30,000ft. Blood jumping after the idle days, we dropped tanks …

Barry Hannah, From “Testimony Of Pilot” (Vietnam)

Barry Hanna is recognized as one of our nation’s finest contemporary writers. Here, Hannah reads an excerpt from his story Testimony of Pilot. Who had Barry escorted B-52s on bombing missions in North Vietnam. He was catapulted off the bottom. Richard in his suit at 100 degrees temperature, often at night, and put the F-4 when all it could get. The tiny cockpit, the immense, long, $2 million fuselage, wings, tail and jet engine quad. Barry, the genius master of his Dragon flying up to 20,000ft, had to be cool. All his trips want this easy. He’d have to blast out in daytime and get with a B-52s, and a Sam missile would come up among them. Two of his mates were taken …

Bobbie Ann Mason, From In Country (Vietnam)

Bobby Ann Mason’s famous first novel, In Country, explored the public reaction to the Vietnam War and its veterans in the mid 1980s. The novel’s protagonist, Sam, is a 15 year old girl whose father was killed in the war. In this excerpt from the end of the novel, Sam makes a pilgrimage to Washington, D.C. to visit the Vietnam War Memorial with her grandmother, mama, and her uncle Emmett, who was also a veteran. Here, take the camera, Sam, get his name. Mama has brought Donna’s Instamatic. No, I can’t take a picture this close. Sam climbs the ladder until she’s eye level with her father’s name. She feels funny, touching it and scratching on a rock. Writing something for future archeologists …

Shelby Foote, From Shiloh (Civil War)

Shelby Foote served in the U.S. Army in the Marine Corps during World War Two. In this selection from his Civil War novel Shiloh, he follows one Confederate soldier into battle. When we were halfway up the rise. I began to see black shapes against the rim where it sloped off shore. At first I thought they were scarecrows. They look like scarecrow. That didn’t make sense. Except they look so black and stick like. Then I saw them move and wiggling and a rim broke out with smoke, some of it going straight up and some jet and jaw. It all lined rolling and jumpers pitch up from east in the north. I’m in like walks past my ears. I thought aloud …

Sullivan Ballou, Read By Edward Gero (Civil War)

Major Sullivan Ballou was in his early 30s when he joined the Union Army’s Rhode Island Volunteers. At the outbreak of the Civil War. Actor Edward Jarrow reads from Major Blue’s now famous letter to his wife. July 14th, 1861. Washington, D.C. my very dear Sarah, the indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days, perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write you again, I feel impelled to write lines that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more. Our movement may be one of a few days duration, and full of pleasure, and it may be one of severe conflict and death to me, not my will, but thine. Oh, God, be …

Samuel Cabble, Read By Ed Bishop (Civil War)

Whether sent by email from a Navy carrier today or by a letter courier in the American Revolution. Love letters home are a constant across the centuries. Writing his wife in June 1863, Samuel Campbell of the Massachusetts 55th Volunteer Infantry expresses his love for his family and his determination to end slavery here. Ed Bishop reads the escaped slaves letter home. June 1863. Dear wife, I have enlisted in on. I am now in the state of Massachusetts. But before this letter reaches you, I will be in North Carolina. And though great is the present national difficulties, yet, I look forward to a brighter day when I should have the opportunity. A career in the full enjoyment of freedom. I would …