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Scanned some pictures of my Grandpa from WWII. This is James D. Mertz of Minnesota. He was welding in the ship yards in Washington state. He had already joined or tried to join the Navy, but keep getting deferred because he was needed as a welder. He got tired of getting in fights because people kept asking him why he wasn't in the service. So he joined the Army. When he found out you could make $50 more a month, he joined the Airborne. He was 26 years old with two children at home. Ultimately, he went to France with the Co. F, 515th PIR. He was an automatic rifleman and carried the 1918 BAR. I have several more pics of him in France with the BAR, but have to enlarge them. Here are the few that I have...
Grandpa is in the middle of the picture of them relaxing in a field somewhere in France. He is the one kneeling in the middle of the photo posed in the doorway of an 8x40 train car. That's him laying on the sidewalk behind the BAR.
Sadly, my Grandpa passed in January of '97. Grandma is still with us and just celebrated her 96th birthday last January. Remarkably, she has no health issues and we expect to celebrate her 100th in the future!
Grandpa is in the middle of the picture of them relaxing in a field somewhere in France. He is the one kneeling in the middle of the photo posed in the doorway of an 8x40 train car. That's him laying on the sidewalk behind the BAR.
Sadly, my Grandpa passed in January of '97. Grandma is still with us and just celebrated her 96th birthday last January. Remarkably, she has no health issues and we expect to celebrate her 100th in the future!
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