Author Topic: WWII veteran remembers Japanese surrender 70 years later  (Read 431 times)

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rangerrebew

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WWII veteran remembers Japanese surrender 70 years later
« on: September 10, 2015, 06:07:53 pm »
WWII veteran remembers Japanese surrender 70 years later
The Va. veteran recalled that when the fighting stopped, work was far from over

    September 2, 2015
 

By Ali Rockett
Daily Press

NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — Few remember that World War II didn't end until Sept. 2, 1945.

Over the past 70 years, the date has been overshadowed by May 8, known as Victory in Europe, or V-E Day, commemorating the day Nazi Germany surrendered, and Aug. 15, which marked the end of fighting in the Pacific theater, called V-J Day, for Victory over Japan. But a formal surrender wasn't signed by Japanese officials until Sept. 2, according to the National Archives.

That was the same day that Gen. Tomoyuki Yamashita, the Japanese Army commander in the Philippines, surrendered to the 128th Infantry Regiment of the 32nd Division.

Hampton resident Ken Bernstrom, now 89, was a member of that regiment's A Company and spent weeks following the surrender in foxholes he'd dug in the Philippine mountains waiting for the last of the Japanese forces there to surrender. While the fighting had stopped, Bernstrom's work was not over.

He was 19 at the time, a staff sergeant.

"We waited a long time before they started coming out. Us old guys, we were 19 years old," he said with a bit of sarcasm. "We played pinochle. I had never played cards in my life, pinochle especially. But we played pinochle day after day after day out there. And then we played double-deck pinochle. When we finished up with our job, I never played pinochle anymore."

Japanese soldiers surrendered to American soldiers, who took turns in groups of three escorting them down the mountain.

"We didn't have radios and stuff. No communications. We couldn't talk to each other at all to stop there," he said. "I was the trail man coming along, and there was a dead Japanese over on the side of the trail. He'd had his neck cut with a machete. I couldn't call anybody, so I just followed. Another hour or two and there was another dead Japanese along the trial."

Bernstrom said he saw one more body before their march had ended. He suspected a Filipino guerrilla fighter had killed the Japanese soldiers — "the Filipinos hated the Japanese," he recalled. On their way back up the mountain, the bodies were gone, Bernstrom said.

"That was after, you know, the war was over."

The last man killed in action in WWII served in Bernstrom's company. Ed Mullins was killed 15 minutes after Japan's initial declaration of surrender on Aug. 15, according to an article from the Cincinnati Enquirer, a newspaper near Mullins' hometown of Morrow, Ohio.

Bernstrom wore a belt buckle Monday, red with silver lettering that said "combat infantryman."

"That means shot at and missed," said Bernstrom's wife, Jean.

Three of Bernstrom's brothers — he had 10 siblings — served in the Army at the same time. Bernstrom was drafted in 1944, but received a three-month deferment to help his father, who he called Paw, bring in that season's crop on their farm in northern Minnesota.

His brother Harold had joined the same regiment as Bernstrom, thought the two were in different companies. In fact, the two — Harold was four years Ken's elder — had been drafted at the same time and went overseas together, landing in Manila in February 1945.

Bernstrom remembers one night during a three-week stint on the front line when he thought he heard his brother calling out in the distance.

"We were here, the Japs were there, and there was no man's land in between," he said. "Sitting there at nighttime, I heard this 'Help, help, help' out in the no man's land. I thought, 'Gee, I wonder if that's Harold.'"

That wasn't the last time he'd ask himself that.

After that stretch on the line, as Bernstrom called it, there were only four from the platoon of 36 left.

"I was in that foxhole area — oh, I dug a lot of foxholes," he said with a groan. "I was in that area for 21 days, I don't know exactly the days. I didn't keep a record. But those 21 days were very, very, very hard."

He emphasized the last word like it was a knot in his throat.

The brothers were reunited soon after. Harold died in April, Bernstrom said. He was 92.

Along with pictures, newspaper clippings and other memorabilia, Bernstrom had a list of about 20 men he'd served with. Each one had a story attached to it. Most of the time, he could only remember their rank or last name.

"I didn't make very many friends, really, good friends. I made a lot of acquaintances," he said, telling the story of a medic he'd cared for who had been shot in the chest. "I don't know if he lived or died. I don't even recall his name"

Jean, who is Bernstrom's second wife, said she's often gone to reunions with her husband.

"What amazed me was these men — who had been through the things he's telling you about — didn't talk about that," she said. "It was, 'What are you doing today? Where have you been? What are you doing? How are the grandkids? How many kids?' ... It was all about what's more in life."

Bernstrom was discharged in December 1945 but didn't arrive home until 1946. He finished his last year of high school and attended college with his brother Harold.

Bernstrom went on to a 30-year career with the U.S. Postal Service. After 17 years out of the service, he went to a Air National Guard recruitment meeting. It was the 1960s during the Vietnam War and "they needed bodies," he said. So he joined and served another 19 years.

It's a good thing, too, Jean Bernstrom said. His benefits have helped him battle through a quadruple bypass surgery after a heart attack about eight years ago and Hodgkin's lymphoma cancer. He's four years clean, his wife said.

"We tried cancer — we didn't like it," she said.

Today, he proudly wears a hat emblazoned with "World War II veteran" in bright gold thread.

"I want the world to know I'm a World War II vet," Bernstrom said.

He collects rare $2 bills and passes them out to children to remind them that they met someone who lived through the world's second great war, he said.

Copyright 2015 the Daily Press

http://www.military1.com/military-heroes/article/1535725014-wwii-veteran-remembers-japanese-surrender-70-years-later
« Last Edit: September 10, 2015, 06:08:55 pm by rangerrebew »

Offline truth_seeker

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Re: WWII veteran remembers Japanese surrender 70 years later
« Reply #1 on: September 10, 2015, 06:35:54 pm »
One thing that I do know for certain: Very few Americans today realize the magnitude of WWII.

So it is good that a few still make the news from a time when war held the objective of unconditional surrender. Few even know what that means.



"God must love the common man, he made so many of them.�  Abe Lincoln