Barbara Huffman
As kids we could see my dad’s amputated thumb, and knew that he had lost it in war.
Drafted at nineteen, my dad, Private Landis, returned to the United States in 1945 after being wounded in a farm field in Germany. He was rushing to take out a German anti-aircraft gun.
“Some guy said he saw a tank’s gun sticking out of a barn, and the captain says, ‘How can you get a gun of that size on the second floor of a barn?’ I open my big farm boy mouth to explain what is called a back barn, that is, a hill to the second story of the barn used to get production out. So, he gave me instructions with two other guys to check it out. I went first, and raised my hand to signal the others to hurry when a shot rang out. I’m blown up in the air and then landed down on the ground. You don’t pity yourself; you do what you’re trained to do. My thumb was gone. You cry, but you have to keep going.”
Two soldiers quickly came to assist. A second sniper’s bullet hit my dad on his right side. Bullets hit the two men in their hearts on their left, killing them instantly. “I never learned their names and I feel terrible about that.”
For two years, he endured the darkness of war. Battle of the Bulge, digging and sleeping in foxholes, riding the choppy waters of the English Channel in a small boat to cross into France, running across the railroad bridge crossing the Rhine River dodging bullets from the planes above, throwing grenades at tanks, marching, cold, wet feet, death. The fear he might go to hell for killing the enemy.
After the war, with his amputated thumb and Purple Heart, Private Landis kept going, as a soldier is trained to do. Like many other soldiers, he attended college under the GI Bill, married his sweetheart, and built a happy life of family, work, church. Middle class, business success. Two cars, four-bedroom house. Domestic stability. Upward mobility. The American Dream.
One night in his eighties, he started to cry at dinner, “Twelve-year-old SS boys stood up and shot at us, killing some. I could not kill any one of those boys. I ran a few yards and dropped as though I was shot and laid there on the ground until it was all over. Our guys killed the boys. That will stay with me to the grave, but I did not kill any of the boys. Each guy was on his own, mentally with God.”
Later, my brother requested, “Dad, why don’t you dictate your memoir?” Dad’s story described the life of a man of the Greatest Generation. A life well lived.
Private Landis died at age 90. Among his possessions was an inscribed watch from his employer that said “Robert H Landis - Donaldsons 25 years”. He continued to build good even after experiencing evil.