Ever talk to any World War 1 Vets?

[geoff40]

Our member Vytoland posted a thread which can still be found near this one titled "talking to a World War 2 Veteran". Yes indeed, I have known quite a few of them in my time on Earth. It got me thinking, though, about the first Great War, World War 1, and the Vets who fought that one.
I don't want to hijack anyone's topic, so I am starting this one. Did you ever meet or know any World War 1 Vets in your youth? For me the answer is yes. As a kid I met several old guys who were Veterans of the first one. I didn't know any of them well, and I was about the last person any of them would confide in.

But recently I posted a thread about a guy who never spoke. He was a patient in a mental hospital where I worked, his mute state a result of his experiences of WW2.
On the same unit this man lived on, there were also 3 guys in their 90s who were WW1 Vets, and all 3 "survived" mustard gas attacks. The resulting permanent neurological damage landed these men in to a locked asylum for the rest of their lives. I was little more than a kid when I knew these 3 men, long ago now. Talking to, or getting to know any of these 3, was at best difficult, very challenging, rather impossible. The damage was bad.
All I can say is that if the same opportunity came about today, I know I would try and put forth more effort in those 3 men than I did at the time.
So, my question us, who here ever knew WW1 Vets, or had family members there, and what sort of experiences or conversations were you part of with them?

 

[the ringo kid]

The only one I knowingly knew who was a WWI vet that I spoke with--was Captain Richard Cole. This Gent passed away when I was around 6.

 

[Brian41]

My Grandfather was a WWI vet with the Scots. I never met him or even saw a picture of him as he died long ago before I was born. He was a stone mason and developed what was similar to black lung but at the time he was diagnosed with TB and sent to a sanitarium. Family didn't argue the point and he was cared for until he died there. Granny got a pension for his service but was very little.

My other Grandfather was too young for WWI but told me some about it he knew from family and friends. The trenches and gas attacks seemed to be the worst and many died from respiratory problems from the gas or suffered from it for years.

 

[cmort666]

One of my grandmother's brothers served in a segregated Black U.S. Army unit attached to the French army.

I believe that he was one of the ex-doughboys who raided the National Guard armories to arm themselves to defend their neighborhoods during the race riot of 1919.

Based on his experiences in WWI, he didn't trust semi-auto pistols. Despite this, he gave my grandmother a Luger he brought back. She used to go out on her back porch on New Year's Eve and shoot it. When she started working as a seamstress for the various shows at the downtown Chicago hotels, he traded her a Colt Detective Special for it. The Colt was a better choice for carry in her coat pocket.

He later became a Chicago cop.

When I was a child, he lost one of his feet to a combination of previous trench foot and diabetes.

 

[Tex1001]

My grandfather was in the Army, 1913-1919. He was battalion sergeant major, busted sneaking booze onto camp for his C.O. Worked back up to buck sergeant. He was first alternate on the army rifle team, scheduled to go to the 1916 Olympics. Shipped out late 1917. On the fringe of a mustard gas attack, then shipped home to Texas. Married my grandma. became a Texas Ranger (Co. D) for a while. Joined the KKK in 1921 and became their Kleagle (Local instructor). In the teens and twenties the klan presented itself as a social network association. Found out what the Klan's racial policies really were and resigned the klan in 1923. He suffered financially for the rest of his life because of their blacklist, but never regretted quitting. He passed in Nov. 1966, when I was 17. He had many stories about WWI and his later life, but I was too busy to listen to most of them. I was too soon old and too late smart. He was truly one of a kind.
_______________________
I don't have Alzheimer's- My wife had me tested.

 

[feralmerril]

I can think of 4 or 5 I knew as a kid but never talked to them that I can remember about the war. One had been gassed. Another gave me his helmit. Looked like a wash pan. Dont know what I done with it. Also dad had a older half sister who was married to one but I never talked to him about it. I had one great uncle who was in the russian army (grandma`s brother) about 1910. I think she also had more in as probley my grandpa did too. Her first husband also was a solider but he was killed or died and left her with one small boy and she came to this country with her brother that had just got out, met my grandpa a 12 year older than her widower with six, immediatly they got married and 9 months later dad was born the first of ten more! They both were german settlers from the same area of the now ukraine.

 

[galena]

Growing up in a small Colorado mountain town in the 1950s we had several WWI Vets in the community. One who lived just down the street from me died in the mid 1960s. Late in life he lost a leg due to WWI wounds. I can't remember the whole unit ID on his VA tombstone but he was a PFC assigned to the 10th Wagon Company. One strange situation. We also had two Vets who fought in the same battle, on different sides. I still remember Clay in his red bandana and Franz in his bib overalls sitting along the wall in the pool hall drinking beer together and telling stories. IIRC they all agreed that the fear of gas attacks was the overriding concern. I do remember one who said he couldn't change his socks for over three weeks and they rotted off his feet in the water in the trenches. All war has terrible things but the trench warfare of WWI must have been pretty bad. They are all gone now but not forgotten by some of us. I have the honor every Memorial Day through my VFW Post of placing American Flags on our Veterans' grave in our several local cemeteries.

 

[johngalt]

My grandmother had a brother who served in WW1. He survived the war, only to be accidentally shot and killed by a nitwit turning in his rifle which he thought was unloaded.

 

[STCM(SW)]

A WW I vet lived two doors down when I was a kid in the mid 1950's.
He was gassed is all I ever found out about him.
Did some yard work for him and he did pay me I believe.
Also put insulation up in his attic once.

 

[tekarra]

Back in my school days there were still a number of WWI vets around town. Most of the only spoke of the war to other vets and it was impolite to ask them about their experiences.

 

[Mule Packer]

My grandfather was a 1st Lieutenant in the Army Corps of Engineers during World War I.

He died when I was 22 years old. I used to ask him about his experiences during the war, but he never said much. Said he served under Pershing, but that was about all he said. Of course, all of them served under Pershing, if you want to be literal about it.

He did his army calisthenics every morning right up until the day he died.

He was a man's man, yet always a gentleman. He gave me my first pocket knife for my sixth birthday. He taught me how to sharpen a knife when I was eight. I remember cutting my thumb with my pocketknife after sharpening it that same day while I was in my grandmother's kitchen.

He taught me how to shoot and how to set traps. I still have a plaster cast of a racoon print that we made together when I was eight.

My grandmother had a picture of him in his army uniform. I wish I had a copy of it.

 

[Kinman]

My Great Uncle Ira Kinman was in the trenches of WWI. He was a sweet old guy that lived on a farm when I was little kid in the 50's. My grandfather said shortly after he got over there and was in the trenches he got gassed, while he was recovering from the gas in the field hosital he came down with pnuemonia, he was so close to dying from all those complications they sent him home. Grandpa remembered picking Uncle Ira up as he got off the train in Spokane, he was dressed in a long grey bathrobe that had a big red cross on it. Grandpa said he was off his feed for quite awhile but recovered in time, never talking much about his experience in the trenches. I never met any other WWI vets besides my uncle Ira, grandpa was just a little too young for WWI and a little too old for WWII. Many of the local men got deferrments due to farming or the logging industry.

 

[Calaveras Slim]

My great uncle was in the trenches in WWI. I was able to talk with him when I enlisted in the Army, He lived for a couple of years afterward. I came home from my first tour overseas in June 64 on leave enroute to FT Wolters TX. He passed that fall. Didn't talk much about things, tho I tried.

 

[shouldazagged]

Though I never spoke to one who lived near me when I was a boy of eight or nine, I was one of a pack of evil little buggers who taunted him and called him "the Crazy Man". It makes me feel terrible today when I think of if. Hurts my heart.

He suffered from what then was called "shell shock", probably due to the unimaginably hellish artillery barrages that usually preceded the enemy coming "over the top" in a major attack.

He walked oddly, sometimes twitched, and talked to himself. We little monsters would stand out of reach and scream, "Crazy man! Look out, he's a crazy man!" And he would flap his arms wildly and yell and pretend to chase us, only running a few steps.

What vicious little pre-humans children can be!

 

[BLACKHAWKNJ]

In 1974 I talked to a college classmate's grandfather-he said he was in the Army for all of five months in 1918.

 

[CO_Kid]

I knew one. An old neighbor who died at about the beginning of my memories. I was too young to talk about, or even know about, the war. Later my dad told me that he was in it.

 

[Jessie]

My grandfather was in the Navy in WWI on a sub tender. He died in 1975 and I was too young and dumb to ask him much about it.
I do have some interesting old pictures of his from the war though.
He had the obligatory anchor tatoo on his forearm.

 

[arjay]

My grandfather was there.I never met him,he died in 1939

 

[30-30remchester]

My neighbor while growing up was a WW I vet. I never knew anything about his past till his death. He was crazier than a loon. He used to shoot at us kids with a shotgun at a distance that did nothing but sting. He shot at and hit my father once. I never knew what happened but I never saw him shoot at anything again after my father had a discussion with him. He used to chop off a finger now and then when he needed money. After his death we learned that he had been shot, gassed, and left for dead for 3 days in no mans land. No wonder he was crazy.

 

[PlaytheAces]

My grandad was a WWI vet. He was a great guy, taught me about camping, shooting, the outdoors in general. Also a survivor of the Frisco quake. His birth certificate was destroyed in the ensuing fire.

Here's one of his photos I have hanging over my shoulder.