Always Remember - World War II Through Veterans Eyes

During the 1990s, 140 veterans of World War II, including 20 Medal of Honor recipients, shared their stories of valor and sacrifice with the author who promised to keep them alive through the classes he taught and the pages of this book.Iwo Jima, 1945.“How bad am I hit?” Sergeant George Barlow questioned his buddy, John Snyder. Barlow had just saved the lives of everyone in the squad by throwing himself on a grenade the Japanese had hurled into the GIs machine gun emplacement. As he cradled Barlow’s head in his arms, Snyder told him he’d been hit pretty bad. Barlow’s lower torso had been blown away.“You’re not going to leave me here to die?” Barlow asked softly. “No, George,” Snyder promised. Snyder knew that without help, Barlow wouldn’t last till morning. With the Japanese entrenched everywhere, Snyder set off in the black night to find the company medic. Though he managed to find G Company’s Captain McCarthy, Snyder was told it was too dangerous to risk a corpsman’s life to go back with him to help Barlow. Dejected, Snyder somehow made it back to Barlow, and was by his side when, just before daybreak, Barlow died. Snyder was the only member of his squad to survive the hell of Iwo Jima. Snyder honored his promise not to let Barlow die on Iwo Jima by telling Barlow’s story to anyone who would listen.The voices of World War II have grown silent as the greatest generation has all but slipped away. Through the pages of Always Remember - World War II Through Veterans’ Eyes, 140 veterans speak again, their stories of heroic sacrifice kept alive, never to be forgotten. Together their first-person narratives tell the history of World War II when the future not only of the U.S., but of democracy itself, laid in the balance. As long as their stories are told, the veterans of World War II will never die.This revised edition includes additional photographs of the veterans and a Discussion Guide for book studies. Check out the reviews on the Kindle version.