Meet another member of the Greatest Generation

Meet Bert. Ninety two years old and a resident of an assisted living facility I visit.

Bert has many interesting stories to tell but I'll begin with the one about his WWII service.

Bert was a member of Patton's 3rd army. Specifically the 243rd Field Artillery Battalion. I found this to be particularly interesting because I was in a field artillery unit in my service days and my uncle also served in an artillery unit with Patton's 3rd army.

So Bert and I had many connections.

The most interesting story so far is one he recently told me. It seems Bert was a mess sergeant. For the uninitiated, 'mess' means food service. As a sergeant Bert was in charge of getting all the troops fed.

Toward the end of the war, Bert actually had German prisoners working for him. I didn't realize we did that as a matter of policy during WWII but Bert said it was not unusual. I asked him if he ever felt in danger or if the captured Germans presented a problem since they were now working for their enemy.

Bert said to the contrary. Toward the end of WW II, the German army was suffering terribly. Half the men were starving. Because of that and other issues, they were more than happy to work for us--if for no other reason than to get fed and generally taken care of.

The really interesting part of all of this is that one of the prisoners was an 18 year old German army deserter named Joseph Ratzinger. You may know him by his more familiar name: Pope Benedict XVI.

It seems the current Roman Catholic Pope had been inducted into the German army at a very young age, learned of some of the horrible things being done and deserted. He was ultimately captured by Allied forces and eventually assigned to Bert's team.

Bert has a lot more to tell me as does Ed, another member of the Greatest Generation I'll be talking to soon.

Come back.