This is one of six stories that David T. Daniel has added from his time in the Army during World War II
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6
4. MILITARY
A SHORT STAY AT HOME
I arrived from Europe at home in later June, 1945. My mother, a very stern person, never commented to me by letter, anything she heard about me. My sister, who lived nearby my folks, gave me a story which was all new to me.
My folks received, in mid-December, a War Department telegram stating that I was “Missing in Action”. A few days later they received another War Department wire stating, I “was seriously ill, not expected to live.” My sister said my mother was not hurt but angry and threw the two wires into the fire. She said the next communication was a letter from me saying I would be arriving in about 10 to 12 days where I described being in England in an army hospital. She said I was all ”chippy” talking about these beautiful English nurses. They all knew with this letter that I was not at the point of death. I do not remember writing the letter.
The “Missing in Action” did confirm that I had not been hallucinating back in that small truck. In the infantry, if you are missing you are usually either dead or captured. I was not captured, but I believe 2 enemy soldiers picked up an unconscious American soldier and dropped him off at an advantageous place. This will forever by a mystery.
Also I figured out one other event which prompted the second wire. While lying on that hard table in Metz hospital for hours and hours, the doctors had written me off until one got the bright idea to puncture my spine.
David T. Daniel
Southbury, CT © 2013
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