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In reply to the discussion: Check in if your dad was in The Big One! [View all]wial
(437 posts)Because he was a historically and philosophically informed intellectual he just didn't believe killing young men to make old men richer was a good cause. For his bravery, gangs of nasty English schoolgirls would give him white feathers, implying he was a coward. When he was told to march right, he would march left and get weeks of KP for his insolence. He was given a true/false test to see if he qualified for clerk duty, but he felt that would aid the war effort, so he got every single answer deliberately wrong. He said the examiner gave him a long look but couldn't do anything.
Canadian infantry were billeted near where he was. When they too questioned his courage, he would fight them vastly outnumbered back to back with my uncle after whom I am named, who later died in Burma after he was spurned by the family of the Jewish girl he had fallen for, and subsequently enlisted out of a broken heart.
One thing though, you couldn't pop balloons around my dad. After bomb disposal, loud noises like that would make him jump out of his skin.
Although I honor the spirit of service that makes people risk their lives in combat roles, I'm damned proud to be my father's son.