And World War II, too, for some of us.

#28 War – And World War II, too, for some of us.

The two previous posts discussed Drums who went to war, whether across the Escout River or in the Battle of Cedar Creek. However, some of us never even left the banks of the Little Nescopeck!

As we shall see in the next post, a number of the Drum Tree members never saw military service or, thank goodness, battle. Elmer’s son, Harry, although of age to be drafted during WWII, was one who never was in the military, not during WWII or the Korea Conflict.  That is not to say that no members of the Drum Family Tree served during WWII or other wars/actions/engagements over the years.

Two Drums who went and, thank Goodness, returned, were brothers Edward and Joseph Drum^{(Raymond, Milton, Jacob, George, Jacob, Philip)}. Until quite recently, I was unaware these brothers were in the war but it pays to go to the cemetery right after the cemetery guys mow to find things out. The flags still there from Memorial Day helped as well. Wondering over whose graves these two flags at the edge of the cemetery flew over, I approached to find these markers placed in the ground. Of course, the cemetery in question is the St. Johns Cemetery so it figures that I’d find Drums from Drums WWII soldiers there. It made me wonder who else from the tree served that I’m not aware of. Stay tuned. There may yet be more to come on this front (pun sort of intended).

However, most of the folks I am aware of from “our” family tree who served during WWII are members of the “Extended” Drum Family Tree. Following are some photos of these “extended family folks”. Most of the WWII vintage photos below are glued into one of my mom’s scrapbooks. That explains why one has a part of another photo on top of it. Mom. SMH.

Sgt. George Balliett stood proudly in his uniform for these photographs, probably taken in the back yard of Elmer’s house. I THINK George was Harry’s First Cousin Twice Removed but maybe not. Honestly, this whole cousin-designation-thing has me just bamboozled. So, to put it as my mom would have put it, “He was some relation.” 

Two of Harry’s cousins, Gordon and Marvin Yoch, also served. This time I’m sure “cousins” is the correct term because they were the children of Harry’s aunt, Christine Drum Yoch.

Here is a photo of Gordon. He was a Sargent. 

And here is one of Marvin. 

Both of my mom’s brothers, Nelson and Clayton Shearer, also served during WWII, both in the Pacific. Nelson was an Army Sargent and Clayton served with the “SEABEES”.

Clayton was my namesake. I believe the “MME 3/C” written below his photo means “Machinist’s Mate (Engineman) 3^rd Class Petty Officer”; a Navy designation that I believe is equivalent to an Army Corporal. The E in his name stands for Elton, named after his father.

“Clayton” is written on the bottom of the smaller photo in the upper right of shirtless Clayton. Under it, in her scrapbook, Mom wrote, “bed behind bench”. Apparently, she was pointing out where Clayton’s bed is in the photo! The name “Clayton” written below that identifies who is in the photo under it.

So, yes, that is Clayton in for a swim.

Next is a photo of Nelson. This was one of my mom’s favorite photos.

Across the bottom of this photo Nelson wrote:

“With Love

to Sis

Sgt. Nelson W. Shearer”

Below that, in pencil, is written:

Cpl. Nelson W. Shearer.

I think Nelson wrote that as well.

I’m not sure when the photo was taken but it may have been taken around the time when he got himself into a bit of trouble. He wrote about this “trouble” in a short, unpublished memoir he produced in 1989 about his WWII Army experiences. He says it was June of 1944 when the trouble began, but I’m sure he meant to type 1945. He and a buddy, Larry Woodall, went on a two-day pass to Dagupan and surrounding towns in the Philippians, “drinking and seeing the sights”. They probably should have seen more sights and drank a tad less because they drank too much and, in his words, “When we woke up we found out that President Roosevelt had died[1] and we had been AWOL for a couple of days.” They caught a ride on a truck and did some walking but managed to get back to their camp, walking in around 5am or 6am. When their Sargent saw them, he told them he “didn’t know whether to kiss us or kick our backsides.” While they were gone, the Japanese had attacked their camp and two men had been killed, but not identified. Apparently, according to Nelson, they were “pretty badly mauled and one had glasses. The authorities checked all units in the area and they found we were the only ones missing. They were about to send telegrams to our homes…”  Of course, Nelson and Larry were arrested.

According to regulations, at least what the Warrant Officer who passed judgement on them told them the regulations stated, soldiers going AWOL in a war zone could be imprisoned or shot. Nelson writes, “Unfortunately, we were in a warzone.”

However, since it was a first offense, they suffered nothing so drastic. Larry was reduced in rank from Private First Class to Private, fined $10, and restricted to Camp for a month. Nelson was fined $25.00, restricted to camp for a month, and “reduced in rank from a corporal to a private.” After a month had passed, “I got a T4 rating (SGT. 4^th)”.

His memoir mostly tells stories of manual labor such as loading and unloading ships and trucks as well as drinking, focusing their attention on girls, playing pranks, and similar such hijinks; just what you’d expect from a late-teens/early 20’s kid away from home for the first time trying to remain sane in a war. The memoir, however, also speaks to the war; talks of combat (“You could still hear the big projectiles going over your head there was no doubt about it”). In one story he tripped over “…a leg with a sneaker on the foot” as he ran to help secure one of the guns during a night battle. It must have been a terrible fight. When lights finally came on “you could see the damaged guns and the body parts laying around.” Later they learned a Japanese suicide squadron had been the cause of the trouble. The Japanese soldiers had wrapped themselves in explosives and then detonated the explosives when close enough to the guns to damage or destroy them.

I imagine the others; Ed, Joe, George, Gordon, Marvin, Clayton; each had stories much the same.

Of course, when it was over, the joy these families, the country, the world, felt was all encompassing. If Nathan and Mary hugged at the end of World War 1, the whole world hugged at the end of World War 2. My wife's parents, who both served in the war as well, certainly felt that joy. They saved the newspapers to prove it. Since the war was fought in two main fronts, Europe and the Pacific, it required two newspapers to cover the whole story. Germany surrendered first. In the following photo we see how the newspaper Stars and Stripes announced the news in their May 8, 1945 London Edition.

Then it was Japan's turn. The New York Sun chose "War Over" for their August 14, 1945 edition. The popular magazine Yank celebrated by putting a civilian suit on the front cover of their September 7, 1945 "V-J Issue". The soldiers were coming home.

Happily, joyfully, Nelson, Ed, Joe, George, Gordon, Marvin, Clayton all came home safely. They all lived at least into the 1990’s with Marvin being the last to die on April 20, 2015 at the age of 90.

Both of my wife’s parents, Joseph and Mary Dupuis, also both made it home safely although I suppose that goes without saying. However, Joe did carry bits of shrapnel in his shoulder for the rest of his life, an injury that also robbed him of full use of his left hand, almost the hand itself, but introduced him to his future wife.

On June 1, 2017, Joseph Warren Dupuis, Jr., passed away at age 92. He had lived most of his life in West Springfield, MA. On April 7, 1948 he married Mary Brause, that Army Nurse he met during WWII. Joe served as a member of CO A, 5th Medical Battalion, 2nd Infantry Regiment, 5th Infantry Division. He saw action from Normandy to Germany, including the Battle of the Bulge. As a combat medic, he received a Bronze Star Medal with Oak Leaf Clusters, a Purple Heart, and a Combat Medic Badge. He was laid to rest in Arlington National Cemetery on July 31, 2017.

On February 7, 2019, Mary followed Joseph. She was 98 years old when she died. Mary attained the rank of Captain during WWII serving with the 122 General Hospital in England, at Camp Atterbury (IN), Halloran Hospital (NY), and Fitzsimmons General Hospital (CO). She was laid to rest beside her husband on April 9, 2019. 

April 9, 2019. Arlington National Cemetery. Note the bugler on the left side of the photo, standing among the headstones, saluting Mary.

We salute them all.

At the start of this post, it was mentioned that my dad, Harry Drum, never went to war. In our next post we learn more about why this was the case, about the Draft of the 1970’s, and of a successful 4-H collaboration with the U. S. Air Force at the turn of the century. Its goal was to learn how to establish sustainable 4-H programs on Air Force installations. While that effort was rolling forward, the United States experienced one of its worst days in its history, September 11, 2001.

Return to the Drums of Drums, PA on July 15, 2019 for this next chapter entitled, Some of us never went to war.

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[1] FDR died April 12, 1945 in Warm Springs, GA. I suppose it may be possible that word had not reached these solders fighting in the Philippians until two months later. It is, however, what Nelson wrote.