When I moved to California as an immigrant in 1954, I had to have a job to go to, money to live on and health clearance. This Memorial Day I would like to pay tribute to the brave service men and women, and the country in which I have lived, worked, raised my family and made my home for 50 years.
At this time every year, as long as I can remember, I weep. I weep for the soldiers who gave their lives for me. I was a young kid in London in September 1939 when Hitler marched into Poland.
I remember the GIs who came to Britain in 1942, shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor and the U.S. entered the war. We were in bad shape in Europe. For the next four years, the GIs were based in Britain. On June 6, 1944, D-Day, they all left in the night, along with the rest of the Allied troops, to liberate the continent of Europe.
In London, we had endured bombing night and day for six years. As a small child, I collected hot shrapnel to take to school to compare with those of my classmates. We were sent home from school if we forgot our gas masks! One day I counted 21 air raids. We slept on the floor. We had little to eat, and were grateful for the canned food America sent us on ships, through German submarine-infested waters. All the able-bodied men had gone to war.
One year after D-Day they had defeated the Nazis. Europe was liberated. We rejoiced! The Americans were generous to a fault, and the people loved them. Hundreds of thousands of young GI soldiers, sailors and airmen died, or were maimed for life in that war. It wasn’t a popular war in the U.S. Why should Americans go 3,000 miles to help Europe? It wasn’t popular in Britain either. Why should we help Poland? The French cried, “Negotiation, negotiation,” after each country was invaded by Hitler. Without the help of the USA, Britain would have likely fallen to the Nazis, and then, allied with the Japanese, their next target would have been America. Most people speaking out today on the present war were either a small child, or most likely unborn when World War II happened.
I am so thankful for those unknown soldiers. I will never forget them.
Wendy Steen-Olsen