My father and his brother-in-law both joined the army in 1940. Dad was told by the sergeant to flatten up against the wall. His sway back was so obvious that he was made pay master at a Canadian POW Concentration camp. My uncle George had taken some engineering courses, so, being fit as a fiddle, he was assigned to the European theatre. Along with the British 8th Army, he inched his way up the Italian boot. Each liberated town afforded him an opportunity to go with his bomb disposal buddies to de-mine it. He was 22 years old -- and, as he described it, "very, very scared every time." In one town, his best friend decided the fastest way to get back to the front line was to take a German jeep, that still had the keys in it. Before George could say, "No! Don't do it.", the boy was blown to pieces. A pressure mine under the front tire. The boy (for, like George, he was basically just a boy) must have missed that lesson during training.
Later George was seconded to the British army that liberated Bergen Belson, the notorious Geman concentration camp. He simply said to my childish inquiries to tell all, "You really don't want to know what I saw." When pressed a bit more, he told me that when they examined the open pits, teams of Canadian and British troops went door to door in town in an effort to track down the guards and administrative staff. "When they found them, they shot shot them down like rats. Because they were lower than rats."
For years I shared my father's opinion that George was a callous brother, when mother was dying of cancer. He came once. Now, looking back on it with a more mature reflection, I wonder if George had simply seen too much death. I don't know the truth of this, I just know that I will think of George this Remembrance Day. George died at 58, a full-blown alcoholic. Maybe General Dallaire would understand George better than I.
