Thomas F. (hardtack) -
An excellent memoir of a Virginia boy who grew up real fast. He enlisted in the National Guard when he was 16. By the time he was 20, and a sergeant, he was a combat veteran who had fought from the Normandy beaches on D-Day and into Germany.
There are too few memoirs written by World War II enlisted men who let us know what the war and serving in the military was really like. Slaughter lets us know what the commanders did right and what they did wrong. For example, the Army's replacement system---placing inexperienced men into combat units--- as I've also read elsewhere, was a terrible disaster. Whoever organized it should have been shot.
While Sergeant Slaughter gives us an excellent narrative of war at his level, he doesn't do as well at the strategic and division level, through no fault of his own. For example, while still in the U.S., he states the 29th Division served as the "opposing enemy" for U.S. Marines landing on an "enemy held shore." And that those Marines then sailed to the Pacific to fight in the Japanese-held Philippines. While the Marines fought in many places in the Pacific, the liberation of the Philippines was an Army operation. Fortunately, his remarks at this level are few and far between.
There are too few memoirs written by World War II enlisted men who let us know what the war and serving in the military was really like. Slaughter lets us know what the commanders did right and what they did wrong. For example, the Army's replacement system---placing inexperienced men into combat units--- as I've also read elsewhere, was a terrible disaster. Whoever organized it should have been shot.
While Sergeant Slaughter gives us an excellent narrative of war at his level, he doesn't do as well at the strategic and division level, through no fault of his own. For example, while still in the U.S., he states the 29th Division served as the "opposing enemy" for U.S. Marines landing on an "enemy held shore." And that those Marines then sailed to the Pacific to fight in the Japanese-held Philippines. While the Marines fought in many places in the Pacific, the liberation of the Philippines was an Army operation. Fortunately, his remarks at this level are few and far between.
