This is video we took of Dad sharing with us his war experiences after we spent time studying World War II with mom and him.
Enjoy Part 1 and Part 2 (below)...
More to come about his childhood... stay tuned. P-
Cari's contribution is well worth posting for you to read...
I emailed dad from the Eastern University computer lab to ask him a series of questions: “What was your motivation to fight? Did you ever ‘soil your armor’? What was the food like?” I was writing a paper for my history class, and I wanted to draw more out of dad about his World War II experience than what I already knew:
that he was a tail-gunner on a B-24 Liberator that dropped bombs over Germany on his 18th birthday,
and that he and his five brothers involved were dubbed “The Fighting Flynns” in their neighborhood of Montello and hometown of Brockton, Massachusetts.
This project also motivated emails with my father’s eldest brother, Paul, the only other surviving member of “The Fighting Flynns,” but allowed me, through their stories, to get to know the others: Joe, Ray, Larry, and “Tiger.”
Dad even unearthed a page written by Mama Flynn, in October of 1943:
I closed my eyes tightly and said a silent prayer as I began to open the telegram. “We regret to inform you,” I read, and could read no more. Papa was home and we both tearfully read the telegram through. It was Lawrence. Killed in action in the South Pacific. Friends came and wrote, and were very kind to us.
Some, too, had sons or brothers killed or missing in action.
The following weeks have seemed to be like a dream…a bad dream that just doesn’t seem to be true. Virginia, Lawrence’s favorite sister, got out all of Lawrence’s letters. Lawrence was always so faithful in writing home. There were those written at Quantico, Guantanamo Bay, and from all the other posts he had been stationed. He had matured from that first letter he had written at Quantico, when he could not disguise his homesickness.
It was in his next to last letter that he said that he and the boys had been talking it over, and that they made a solemn promise to each other, their families, God and country to win this World Conflict and to also take an equal part in winning the Peace and keeping the Peace. “Men, families, and countries must be guaranteed freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom from want. These were God given rights,” he said, “and must be preserved.” And he was then only twenty-two.
Tears came into my eyes again and I brushed them away. I opened his trunk that hadn’t been opened since his departure two years ago this coming first of January. All of his knickknacks were exactly as he had left them so neatly packed away. There was a stack of cards carefully laid in one corner, and it all came back to me that he had collected and saved every bit of poetry, verse or proverb that met his eye and fancy. “Junk,” the rest of the family had called it, but not Papa and I. I picked up the pile and selected one slip which seemed different from the rest. There was his message as if in prophecy. It read
“Do you thou the things that I died too young to do.”
It seemed more improbable than his untimely death,
but there it was in his own handwriting.
But he was gone and could do no more.
When it was finished, my father proudly photocopied and shared “A Boy’s War,” with the rest of the family. Since then, I have been determined to write and publish a book about “The Fighting Flynns” before I die.
So help me, God!
Cari
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I emailed dad from the Eastern University computer lab to ask him a series of questions: “What was your motivation to fight? Did you ever ‘soil your armor’? What was the food like?” I was writing a paper for my history class, and I wanted to draw more out of dad about his World War II experience than what I already knew: that he was a tail-gunner on a B-24 Liberator that dropped bombs over Germany on his 18th birthday, and that he and his five brothers involved were dubbed “The Fighting Flynns” in their neighborhood of Montello and hometown of Brockton, Massachusetts. This project also motivated emails with my father’s eldest brother, Paul, the only other surviving member of “The Fighting Flynns,” but allowed me, through their stories, to get to know the others: Joe, Ray, Larry, and “Tiger.” Dad even unearthed a page written by Mama Flynn, in October of 1943:
It was three months ago today that the telegram from the Navy Department arrived. I can still feel the sudden chill that came over me when I began to open it. With five boys serving their country in practically all corners of the globe, any mother would have felt as I had….
I closed my eyes tightly and said a silent prayer as I began to open the telegram. “We regret to inform you,” I read, and could read no more. Papa was home and we both tearfully read the telegram through. It was Lawrence. Killed in action in the South Pacific. Friends came and wrote, and were very kind to us. Some, too, had sons or brothers killed or missing in action.
The following weeks have seemed to be like a dream…a bad dream that just doesn’t seem to be true. Virginia, Lawrence’s favorite sister, got out all of Lawrence’s letters. Lawrence was always so faithful in writing home. There were those written at Quantico, Guantanamo Bay, and from all the other posts he had been stationed. He had matured from that first letter he had written at Quantico, when he could not disguise his homesickness. It was in his next to last letter that he said that he and the boys had been talking it over, and that they made a solemn promise to each other, their families, God and country to win this World Conflict and to also take an equal part in winning the Peace and keeping the Peace. “Men, families, and countries must be guaranteed freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom from want. These were God given rights,” he said, “and must be preserved.” And he was then only twenty-two. Tears came into my eyes again and I brushed them away. I opened his trunk that hadn’t been opened since his departure two years ago this coming first of January. All of his knickknacks were exactly as he had left them so neatly packed away. There was a stack of cards carefully laid in one corner, and it all came back to me that he had collected and saved every bit of poetry, verse or proverb that met his eye and fancy. “Junk,” the rest of the family had called it, but not Papa and I. I picked up the pile and selected one slip which seemed different from the rest. There was his message as if in prophecy. It read “Do you thou the things that I died too young to do.” It seemed more improbable than his untimely death, but there it was in his own handwriting. But he was gone and could do no more.
When it was finished, my father proudly photocopied and shared “A Boy’s War,” with the rest of the family. Since then, I have been determined to write and publish a book about “The Fighting Flynns” before I die.
So help me, God!
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