Time to Honor A Hero Named "Shifty"!

[Book of Jeremiah]

A must read

And think of the media circus, flags at half staff, and all the things that were said of Whitney Houston when she died.

This hero died with barely anyone's notice.

No Comment required



"Shifty" By Chuck Yeager


Shifty volunteered for the airborne in WWII and served with Easy

Company of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, part of the 101st

Airborne Infantry. If you've seen Band of Brothers on HBO or the

History Channel, you know Shifty. His character appears in all 10

episodes, and Shifty himself is interviewed in several of them.


I met Shifty in the Philadelphia airport several years ago. I didn't

know who he was at the time. I just saw an elderly gentleman having

trouble reading his ticket. I offered to help, assured him that he was

at the right gate, and noticed the "Screaming Eagle," the symbol of

the 101st Airborne, on his hat.

Making conversation, I asked him if he'd been in the 101st Airborne

or if his son was serving. He said quietly that he had been in the

101st. I thanked him for his service, then asked him when he served,

and how many jumps he made.

Quietly and humbly, he said "Well, I guess I signed up in 1941 or so,

and was in until sometime in 1945 ..." at which point my heart

skipped.


At that point, again, very humbly, he said "I made the 5 training

jumps at Toccoa, and then jumped into Normandy . . . do you know

where Normandy is?" At this point my heart stopped.

I told him "yes, I know exactly where Normandy is, and I know what

D-Day was." At that point he said "I also made a second jump into

Holland , into Arnhem ." I was standing with a genuine war hero ...

and then I realized that it was June, just after the anniversary of

D-Day.

I asked Shifty if he was on his way back from France , and he said

"Yes... And it 's real sad because, these days, so few of the guys are

left, and those that are, lots of them can't make the trip." My heart

was in my throat and I didn't know what to say.



I helped Shifty get onto the plane and then realized he was back in

coach while I was in First Class. I sent the flight attendant back to

get him and said that I wanted to switch seats. When Shifty came

forward, I got up out of the seat and told him I wanted him to have

it, that I'd take his in coach.


He said "No, son, you enjoy that seat. Just knowing that there are

still some who remember what we did and who still care is enough to

make an old man very happy." His eyes were filling up as he said it.

And mine are brimming up now as I write this.



Shifty died on Jan. l7, 2012 after fighting cancer.


There was no parade.

No big event in Staples Center .

No wall-to-wall, back-to-back 24x7 news coverage.

No weeping fans on television.

And that's not right!


Let's give Shifty his own memorial service, on line, in our own quiet way.

Please forward this email to everyone you know. Especially to the veterans.

Rest in peace, Shifty.

Chuck Yeager, Maj. General [ret.]


P.S. I think that it is amazing how the "media" chooses our "heroes" these days...

Elvis, Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston & the like.



"SHIFTY" - an incredible American hero.

Please do me a favor and pass this on so that untold thousands can read it.

We owe no less to our REAL heroes.

 

[waltky]

Army chaplain to get posthumous Medal of Honor...

Soldier priest to get ultimate medal
April 10th, 2013 - Capt. Emil Kapaun served in the U.S. Army in World War II and Korea but he didn’t carry a rifle and never fired a shot. His weapons were a Bible and his faith.

Capt. Kapaun was also Father Kapaun, a Roman Catholic chaplain who will be awarded the Medal of Honor on Thursday, 60 years after his death while a North Korean prisoner. The Medal of Honor is the highest award for valor in the U.S. military. Kapaun was born and raised in Pilsen, Kansas. After high school he attended Conception Abbey, a Benedictine monastery in Missouri. After the abbey, he studied for the priesthood at Kenrick Seminary in St. Louis. Kapaun was ordained in 1940 and that same year became a U.S. Army chaplain. After serving at several posts in the United States and India, he left the Army and went to the Catholic University of America in Washington to earn a master's degree in education. After getting the degree in 1948, he returned to the Army.

In June 1950, Kapaun was ordered to Korea as the war was in its earliest stages. Supporting the soldiers of the 8th Infantry Regiment, Kapaun found himself in the heavily contested Pusan perimeter. Army documents supporting his nomination for the medal say he would bike from position to position so he could minister to soldiers, hearing confessions, performing last rites or administering Holy Communion. Army photos from the war show he often celebrated Mass using the hood of a Jeep as an altar. Three months after arriving in Korea, Kapaun was awarded the Bronze Star for valor for running through enemy fire to carry wounded soldiers to safety.

In November 1950, his unit went on the move. But Kapaun stayed behind to minister to the wounded soldiers, knowing he was putting himself in danger of capture by the enemy, his nephew Ray Kapaun said. That is exactly what happened. North Korean and Chinese troops marched Kapaun and the other captured troops nearly 100 miles north in the bitter winter weather. When Chinese soldiers tried to kill wounded POWs who were slowing the march, Kapaun risked his own life to stop them, and then persuaded unwounded POWs to help the wounded, according to his nephew.

Kapaun was imprisoned with 200 other soldiers at a camp near Pyoktong, North Korea. While there he would sneak through the camp ministering to other prisoners. "He would come around saying hot coffee and give hot water to all of us,” said Mike Dowe, a fellow prisoner at Pyoktong. “That may not sound like much today but it sure meant a lot under those circumstances.” To keep his fellow POWs from starving, Kapaun would break out of the camp at night, steal food and sneak back in to give it to those who needed it the most, his nephew said. That earned him the nickname “The Good Thief” from the other POWs. Eventually, the people who ran the camp took action to move him to a nearby hospital. Whether it was for treatment for an injured leg or to remove his influence over the prisoners will never be known, but Dowe and others tried to stop the North Koreans from taking him away.

More Soldier priest to get ultimate medal – CNN Belief Blog - CNN.com Blogs

 

[TheOldSchool]

Bless him.

[YOUTUBE]FgecqttxoQg[/YOUTUBE]

This one without the song - [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oa-H_EIfjoc"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oa-H_EIfjoc[/ame]