Lost an amazing gentleman yesterday

[Ultradave]

For background, I served in the 82d Airborne Division Field Artillery. Many years ago. But I and many others are members for life of the 82d Airborne Association. We gather once a month for camaraderie and food and drink. We march in parades. We post at funerals of former paratroopers. We are all ages from WW2 vets to recent returnees from Iraq and Afghanistan and everything in between. Veterans from peace and war and for most of us, some of each. And that's the part that doesn't matter. Once a paratrooper, always a paratrooper (I'm sure Marines can identify with this too :-)  )

Walt Hughes was a WW2 paratrooper and member of a neighboring chapter in NY (the Walter Hughes Chapter!). Sadly, he passed away yesterday. He was a wonderful man, full of life. He'll be greatly missed by many people, but he lived a long life, and the majority in peace. BUT, he was in the Battle of the Bulge, in the 504th Parachute Regt, at Cheneux, as you'll see from the picture.  One of the scenarios in FB. Here's the caption for the picture :

NAKED COURAGE. Cheneux, Belgium. No helmet. No body armor. No Sherman tanks or Hellcat tank destroyers to seek protection from. Yet here, on 21 December 1944, Walter Hughes of the 82nd Airborne Division, armed with nothing more than a Tommy Gun, is storming into a hail of fire in the Ardennes as his 504th Parachute Infantry takes on the Waffen SS of Kampfgruppe Peiper, a lethal armored force determined to break through to the Meuse River. This is one of the Battle of the Bulge’s classic images. And it remains one of the clearest and most impressive illustrations of naked courage to have come out of this epic and ferocious winter battle. Hughes, a Brooklyn native, survived the Battle of the Bulge and the war. In an interview in 2013 he said, "If I died today, I would have little regret. It's been the real deal.”

We'll miss Walt. It was an honor to know him.

I thought everyone might be interested in a little of the reality that accompanies the games.

[Ultradave]

One more picture. Walt as he appeared recently. This is a great picture. He ALWAYS looked like this (not always so dressed up :-) 

[Wingman47]

Thanks for the post. I have seen that picture but never knew the background.These amazing men are dying off everyday. I am blessed to have known several of them.

 

[Heinrich505]

Ultradave,

  Thanks so much for this posting.  I've always thought it important for us to remember who the figures represent when we move them around on the maps while playing the battles in this game. 

  Mr. Hughes is one of all those men responsible for making possible the great lives we can live today in this amazing country. 

  I've seen that picture too, and never knew who the man was until now.  It means that much more now that I know of him and can remember him to others.  We keep alive the people we know, love, and respect by the telling of their stories to others, and in that way, they never really leave us.

Heinrich505

[MOS:96B2P]

AIRBORNE!!! ALL THE WAY!!!  RIP Paratrooper.

[Ultradave]

One thing that's kind of fun at each of our meetings is that we go around the room. Everyone states the unit(s) they were in, the years. That's so if there is anyone new, they quickly get to know everyone's background. One of our WW2 vets, who passed away about 3 years ago, would stand up and in his deep gravely voice, say:

"John Grossi, 82d Airborne, 509th, 508th, 504th parachute infantry, North Africa, Sicily, Salerno, Normandy, Arnhem."   

How do you follow that?  :-)

[c3k]

Thank you for this.

[sburke]

1 hour ago, Ultradave said:

One thing that's kind of fun at each of our meetings is that we go around the room. Everyone states the unit(s) they were in, the years. That's so if there is anyone new, they quickly get to know everyone's background. One of our WW2 vets, who passed away about 3 years ago, would stand up and in his deep gravely voice, say:

"John Grossi, 82d Airborne, 509th, 508th, 504th parachute infantry, North Africa, Sicily, Salerno, Normandy, Arnhem."   

How do you follow that?  :-)

Simple- "Thank you sir" and then scurry out taking your new found feelings of humiliating inferiority with you. 

 

[Buzz]

Salute ? to Walt Hughes & ALL 82d Airborne ?

Buzz

[A Canadian Cat]

Thanks for sharing.

[Pekische]

THX for sharing this!!

[Splinty]

Airborne All the Way! My first duty station was Ft Bragg with the 82nd. I didn't go to war as a paratrooper, but I had the honor of being one for a while. Men like Mr Hughes were the examples we tried to emulate. And although my combat experience was in leg units I always tried to maintain a paratrooper's attitude.

[Yskonyn]

Thanks to all who served and are serving to protect our freedom.

Ultradave, thank you for sharing this great piece of background.