Herald and Review from Decatur, Illinois • Page 30

E2 LIFESTYLE Decatur, Illinois Sunday, June 5, 1994 Saw horror, glory reunions bring back a v. It ft I 2 rl cancer and another's had heart bypass surgery." The reunions are so important because they are about much more than merely swapping old war stories. The ex-soldiers say talking becomes a kind of group therapy for veterans who've survived fearsome operations like D-Day, the Allied invasion of Europe. "You can never forget what you saw, but being able to talk about it with others is a real help," says Weber, a retired postal clerk. "The destruction and human cost of war is something that always stays with you once you've seen it.

There are times, even now, when I wake up in a cold sweat from my dreams." One way to risk triggering a flood of nightmares is to actually go back again, to revisit the battlefields of your youth. Taylorville veteran Bill Smith, 69, will do just that in August. He's going on a two-week tour that will take in the foreign fields he last saw as a 19-year-old during the D-Day onslaught. "I had some apprehension about the trip bringing back too many bad memories," says Smith, who served in the combat engineers. "And I think it will give me some bad nights but, well, I'm prepared for that.

This will be SMITH: Taylorville man will revisit D-Day sites this fall. i Rowland Clemens, 74, Decatur "What I remember most is the massiveness of the invasion; it was completely beyond belief. As we left England the sea was just solid ships as far as you could see. And there were constant flights of aircraft going over "There were still times, though, when I doubted it would work. We took some heavy casualties on some of them beaches." BOB Rowland Clemens was an Army sergeant serving on a motor tug launch that maneuvered large floating harbors called "mulber-rys" into position.

These harbors became the invasion's main artery, feeding men and supplies onto the shores of France. per saying 'D-Day casualties had been lighter than McCracken says. "Well, what the hell did they think they were gonna be? I've never seen so many dead people in all my life. We landed on what was called Utah Beach and the whole damn place looked like it had been carpeted with the dead." The fierce fighting in France earned him his first Purple Heart when a shell ripped the top out of his steel helmet. "I didn't even know I was wounded," he recalls, "until one of the guys said 'what the hell's the matter, you got blood running all down your He got his second Purple Heart 10 months later in Berlin as the cornered Nazis made their last stand.

"I was riding in a tanklike vehicle and, whatever it was the Germans hit us with, it just blew the whole side off the thing," he recalls. "We lost a lot of men in that vehicle, and I suffered the spinal injuries that are giving me trouble right now McCracken shifts a little in his chair as he talks, trying to get comfortable. He's parked behind a desk in the Christian County courthouse in Taylorville, where, despite his health problems, he holds down a part-time job as a Board of Review member. "I review complaints from people about their property tax assessments," says McCracken, a former two-term mayor of Pana. His one big regret now is that his illness ruled out any chance of traveling to France for Monday's 50th commemoration ceremonies honoring D-Day.

So the old soldier will stay here instead and honor the occasion in his heart, his own intense feelings paying special tribute to those who suffered even more than he. "We lost a whole lot of people over there," he says. "And it's important to remember them, to remember them all." Steve Rinehart, 75, Decatur "I remember our planes bombing a French town called Saint-Lo damnedest thing I ever saw. The bombing was continuous and so intense the percussion from the explosions would blow Rinehart Bridge builder our clothes against our bodies and we were watching from more than half a mile away." A sergeant with the Army's combat engineers, Steve Rinehart built bridges and cleared barbed wire and other obstacles for the D-Day invasion troops. Roy Lee, 68, Decatur "We arrived in broad daylight.

I could see vehicles burning on the beach, and there was a destroyer exchanging fire with a German pillbox. The air was filled with aircraft, and there were ships of every kind everywhere." Roy Lee was a gunner's mate on a Navy landing craft that ran incoming troops right up onto French beaches. Continued from El then his injured past began catching up with him. "Things started falling apart in the last five years," he says. "My condition went downhill; I got circulation problems, and now I'm confined to a wheelchair.

I don't have a left leg anymore; the doctors had to take it off." Reason enough, surely, for John McCracken to be angry as he reflects on the patriotic service that first destroyed his youthful dreams and then, finally, shoved him into a wheelchair for good. But the full measure of this brave man is that he carries no rage and no festering bitterness. A long search for any trace of hate in his intense brown eyes is destined to come up empty. "There was nothing I could do about what happened to me, and I've just kind of accepted it," he says, leaning forward in his seat. "And I know we had to fight that war, to stop them those Nazis were taking over the whole of Europe, grabbing up everything.

They had to be defeated." McCracken was assigned to the First Army as a forward observer with the field artillery. In the buildup to D-Day June 6, 1944 he was stationed in England and billeted in a genuine castle, enjoying beer parties thrown by the Duke and Duchess of Norfolk. "Good times," he smiles. On June 5 he was waiting to cross the English Channel with the invasion force and getting a VIP send-off. "I shook hands with General Eisenhower, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Ambassador Kennedy, the father of all them Kennedy boys," recalls McCracken.

"There was also lots of nice food for us, but I didn't want to eat it. I felt real worried." The horror he found in the Normandy region of France lived up to his worst expectations. "Afterwards, my mother sent me cuttings from the pa- Jim Casner, 72, rural Oconee "We were under fire before we got off the landing craft. It was light small arms fire at first, but then it got very bad and we suffered heavy casualties. Looking back now, I see D-Day as a very bad experience, but it was only way to take western Europe back from the Nazis." Jim Casner served with the 146th Combat Engineer Battalion.

He was attached to a special demolition team which cleared obstacles such as minefields and barbed wire. The battalion received a Unit Citation for heroism. ROY LEE: Sailor was a gunner's mate. By TONY REID Staff Writer TUSCOLA Elmer Weber and his comrades waited too long, they realize that now. The World War II GIs mem bers of the 101st Airborne didn't start having regular reunions until 1980.

"There had originally been 60 in our reconnaissance platoon," says Weber, 76, who was a sergeant. imni 'n i Weber In wartime "But we'd waited too long to get back together and there was just 12 of us there for that first reunion; I really regret that." Time had taken its toll as men had either died or moved and drifted out of contact. "This year we'll have our 15th reunion and there are i Weber Today only eight of us left now," sighs Weber. "One of those guys has WILLARD LYDA: Was based in England servicing aircraft used in D-Day invasion. 0 Willard Lyda, 83, Decatur "On D-Day, everything that could fly was put in the air.

We were working eight-hour shifts, 24 hours a day. And our airbase, you've never seen anything like it it was as big as Macon County. It was so big that officers going from hangar to hangar would travel by plane." Lyda was an Air Force sergeant based in England at the time of D-Day. He worked with crews who assembled and serviced aircraft used in the invasion. JOHN YAOOH: Soldier, right, served in a battalion that suffered heavy casualties.

i fO Jlf KfflL I ff! ilic 3 atfi -W-sw "Hi my first, and last, return visit and I want to go." Smith is taking wife Ethe-lyn, 71, with him. "It's a chance to show her all those places I've talked about over the years," he said. The couple had been married for three months when Bill was drafted in May of 1943. Barely a year later he landed in France on a stretch of beach codenamed "Omaha." "At first I wasn't as scared as I thought I would be," recalls Smith, trained to do jobs like clearing minefields and building bridges. "But then I got off the landing craft, got in and got pinned down.

It didn't take long for me to become so scared I became almost numb with fear." In the 11 months of European war that followed, Smith was knocked out several times by shell blasts and shot in the hand. "They wanted to give me the Purple Heart for that bullet wound," he says. "But I refused. I felt my scratch didn't deserve the same medal given to all those poor guys who were getting killed." But the bloody cost of D-Day and the tremendous carnage of the entire war has never dented E.J. 'Army' Armstrong, 70, rural Tuscola "Halfway across the English Channel you could see the English coast and the French coast and just thousands and thousands of ships in between.

And I remember all the aircraft, too. We were used to flying in big formations but, on D-Day, there was just so many planes you can't imagine it if you didn't see it." Armstrong, an Air Force technical sergeant serving as flight engineer and top turret gunner on a B-17 bomber, flew two missions on D-Day and 33 missions throughout World War' II. JESSE KALE: He made 44 round trips across the English Channel. BILL for the C- -A1 Smith's pride in having fought his country. Looking back, semi-retired appliance technician sees World War II as a giant battle of good verses evil.

"I remember getting to look round one of those Nazi concentration camps," he explains. "Afterwards, when you come home, you can only feel good about having served in a war that put a stop to things like that." Clemens Army sergeant JIM CASNER: Was with a special demolition team which cleared obstacles. Jesse M. Hale, 72 Mount Zion "I remember getting on shore and seeing just part of this soldier's hand and part of his arm lying on the beach. I dug a hole with my foot and covered it up a bit; I felt like I had to do something Jesse Hale was a motor machinist's mate second class on Navy LST 350, a ship used to ferry men and equipment during D-Day.

Over several days, Jesse made 44 round trips across the English Channel. ifi iy aSS E.J. ARMSTRONG: Flew two missions on D-Day. John Yadon, 70, Decatur "Looking back now, after all these years, it seems kind of a dream now, hard to believe I was there. But then I get to thinking and I remember a lot of things I remember being scared to death and just trying to stay alive." Yadon served on ammunition and supply trucks with the 743rd Tank Battalion.

During the course of the war, his battalion suffered more than 40 percent casualties. 3 World War II dates to remember Sept. 17: First Allied Airborne Army units dropped on Holland (Operation Market-Garden) Oct. 20: U.S. Sixth Army lands on Leyte Oct.

23: Battle for Leyte Gulf (to Oct. 26) Nov. 7: Franklin Roosevelt elected to fourth term as U.S. president Nov. 24: United States begins B-29 raids on Japan Dec.

13: U.S. Army completes capture of Metz Dec. 15: U.S. Army lands in Mindoro Dec. 16: Germans attack in Ardennes (Battle of the Bulge).

as a World War II Commemorative Community. Here is a chronology of significant World War II dates in 1944: June 6: Allies land at Normandy (Operation Overlord) June IS: U.S. Marines and Army invade Saipan June 19: Battle of the Philippine Sea (Great Marianas Turkey Shoot) DECATUR As part of its commemoration of the 50th anniversary of World War II, the Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution, Stephen Decatur Chapter, wants people to remember significant dates in addition to D-Day. Through the DAR's efforts, the Department of Defense has designated Decatur July 21: U.S. Marines and Army land on Guam July 25: U.S.

Third Army breaks out at Saint-Lo (Operation Cobra) Aug. 1: Warsaw Uprising begins Aug. 9: Elsenhower establishes headquarters in France Aug. 15: Allies land In southern France (Operation Anvil-Dragon) Aug. 25: Paris liberated Sept.

15: U.S. Marines land on Peleiu.