LETTER #64 - 14 FEB 1945 & LETTER #65 - 21 FEB 1945 - Pope Field, N.C.

Letter 1, page 1

Letter 1, page 2

Letter 2, page 1

Letter 2, page 2

My Little Notes:  The first letter here was written one day after the last letter I posted previously, so not much new other than he flew for the first time today.  Sounds like lots of missions and flight training at this point and being like Big Shots for being a radar man!

The second letter is dated a week later.  He talks about how they dropped the paratroopers in the right location and what a sight to see!  He also mentions about my grandmother working at a bakery.  I had no idea she did.  She never worked while they were married to my knowledge, but maybe because of the war efforts?  Something new I learned.  Also, what a devoted son to send back money to pay back for the money he spent while recently visiting them and also hoping to get in one more furlough before going overseas...

WWII Army Air Corps Flight Uniform, probably similar to what Uncle Louie was referring to.

WWII Poster for Paratrooper enlistment.

Not dated.  British paratroopers in a transport plane before landing in Holland.  WWII

Paratrooper 1942

Parachutes open as paratroops land in Holland during operations by the 1st Allied Airborne Army - Sept. 1944.

LETTER #63 - 13 FEB 1945 - Pope Field, N.C.

"Greetings from Fort Bragg, N.C." postcard

My Little Notes:  Well he finally arrived at Pope Field/Fort Bragg, North Carolina.  Interesting that he was was one of the few radar men in the group.  I believe this is his final training phase.  He talks about the German POWs doing the KP duties and how he is worried about his upcoming mission.  Lots of history on Pope Field and Fort Bragg.  Check links below.

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Pope Field (from http://www.visitfayettevillenc.com)

Home to the 440th Airlift Group and 43rd Airlift Wing, along with Air Force Special Operations and training units.

 

Pope Army Air Field, formerly known as Pope Air Force Base, has played a leading role in the development of U.S. tactics and air-power throughout history. Missions at Pope range from providing airlift for Airborne and Special Operations Units to humanitarian missions flown all over the world.
 

The War Department officially established Pope Field in 1919, and it ranks as one of the oldest installations in the Air Force. It is named after First Lieutenant Harley Halbert Pope who was killed on January 7, 1919, when the JN-4 Jenny he was flying crashed into the Cape Fear River. Original operations included photographing terrain for mapping, carrying the mail and spotting for artillery and forest fires.
 

MORE LINKS BELOW:

Very informative link to POWs in North Carolina.

Link to a letter written from a German POW around the same time my Uncle was there.



More info on Prisoners of War at the Bases here in the States.

Fort Bragg, Date unknown

New recruits at Fort Bragg, circa 1941.

Jeeps at Fort Bragg, WWII

LETTER #62 - 29 JAN 1945 from Private Raymond Kubick Jr.

My Little Notes: 
Not much to add to Ray's letter to my grandparents.  He is still a private and just arrived at Boca Raton, Florida for his continued training.  He sounds so polite and sincere in his letters.  Sorry to say we won't be hearing from Ray for the rest of 1945.  It won't be until 1946 that we will hear from Ray again.  However, Uncle's Louie's other Army buddy, Alvin Lloyd has some letters coming up soon.


Here are some current events that were going on in WWII around the same time as this letter:  

• January 17 – WWII:
  • The Soviet Union occupies Warsaw, Poland.
  • A Soviet patrol arrests Raoul Wallenberg in Hungary.
• January 18 – The Holocaust: The SS begins evacuation of Auschwitz concentration camp. Nearly 60,000 prisoners, mostly Jews, are forced to march to other locations in Germany; as many as 15,000 die. The 7,000 too sick to move are left without supplies being distributed.
• January 20 – Franklin D. Roosevelt is inaugurated to a fourth term as President of the United States, the only President ever to exceed two terms.
• January 23 – WWII
  • Hungary agrees to an armistice with the Allies.
  • German Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz orders the start of Operation Hannibal, the mass evacuation by sea of German troops and civilians from the Courland Pocket, East Prussia and the Polish Corridor.
• January 24 – WWII: AP war correspondent Joseph Morton, nine OSS men, and four SOE agents are executed by the Germans atMauthausen concentration camp under Hitler's Commando Order of 1942 which stipulates the immediate execution of all captured Allied commandos or saboteurs without trial, even those in proper uniforms. Morton is the only Allied correspondent to be executed by the Axis during the war.
• January 26 – WWII: Infantry action at Holtzwihr, France, for which Audie Murphy is awarded the Medal of Honor.^[1]
• January 27 – The Holocaust: The Soviet Red Army liberates the Auschwitz and Birkenau concentration camps.
• January 28 – WWII: Supplies begin to reach China over the newly reopened Burma Road.
• January 30
  • MV Wilhelm Gustloff, with over 10,000 mainly civilian Germans from Gotenhafen (Gdynia) is sunk in Gdańsk Bay by threetorpedoes from the Soviet submarine S-13 in the Baltic Sea; up to 9,400 are thought to have died – the greatest loss of life in a single ship sinking in war action in history.
  • WWII: Raid at Cabanatuan: 121 American soldiers and 800 Filipino guerrillas free 813 American prisoners of war from the Japanese-held camp in the city of Cabanatuan in the Philippines.
  • Adolf Hitler makes his last public speech to be delivered personally, on broadcast radio, expressing the belief that Germany will triumph.
• January 31 – WWII: Eddie Slovik is executed by firing squad near Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines for desertion, the only U.S. soldier since the American Civil War ever executed for this offense.