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Welcome to Veterans Chronicles. I'm Greg
Crumbus. Our guest in this edition is

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Paul Bud HADDICKI. He is a
US Army Air Corps veteran of World War

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Two, where he served as a
bombardier on a B seventeen crew flying missions

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over Europe. And Bud, thank
you very much for being with us.

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You're welcome. Where were you born
and raised, Sir? I was born

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and raised on the northwest side of
Chicago, Illinois. Tell me what that

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was like at that time. Well, I grew up about a mile and

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a half from Rigi Ley Field with
a Cubs ploy and like one of my

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grandkids said, Grandpa, your backyard
is like a postage stamp. We lived

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in a three flat totally different than
today, but it was great and I

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lived there until I went into the
service in nineteen forty three. Had there

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been a history of military service in
your family. No, I was the

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first one, and then my dad
missed World War One by about a year,

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and then my older son Michael went
to Vietnam. That's quite a legacy

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right there. So you mentioned that
you lived there in the Chicago area until

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you joined the service. Tell me
how you heard that Pearl Harbor had been

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attacked. How did you learn that
news? I was sitting in a mall

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shop, I believe it was December
eighth, with a buddy having a mault

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after church on Sunday, and over
the radio a voice came A state of

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war exists between the fire of Japan
and America. Franklin Delano Roosevelt. And

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I said to my buddy. I
remembered, so, well, oh,

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we're only sixteen. We'll never get
in little did it? I know?

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So you're sixteen? And when did
you join the service? My eighteenth birthday?

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I got my draft notice May thirtieth, Memorial Day, and I was

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in camp July nineteenth, not even
two months later. This is nineteen forty

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three. Nineteen forty three, correct, What was your training like? Well?

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I went to seventeen different camps if
you count them all in the service

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before I went overseas and back.
Initially I went to Camp Grant, Illinois,

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which was induction, and then they
asked anybody in rested in the Air

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Force, and of course some of
us held our hands up, and we

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were just kids wanted to be fighter
pilots, you know. And then I

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was sent to Jefferson Barracks, Missouri, now where my wife is buried,

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where I have a son and daughter
living. Didn't think of that at that

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time, and I take Cadet Basic
there. I'm not too sure about this

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now. And then I think I
went to Lowry Field, Denver, Colorado

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for armaments school. And then I
think I went to Kingman, Arizona for

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EDDI ground gunnery, then to Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, and then from

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there El Paso, Texas Biggsfield for
eddaground gunnery, flying practice missions, and

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then back to Lincoln and then the
Camp Miles Standish in Boston overseas to deepen

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Green Airfield. The Eighth Air Force, which it says on my CAP had

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forty A lot of people don't know
this, forty bomb groups. Each bomb

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group could put up about thirty six
to forty planes. So you take that

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times forty, you're looking at fifteen
hundred to sixteen hundred B seventeen's and B

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twenty four's, and we're going to
talk about that very fact in just a

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little bit. Is there a particular
role you wanted out market? Oh?

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Yeah, I wanted to be a
fighter pilot. I mean, and there

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wasn't a kid that didn't want to
be you know, in the movies or

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what. But various positions in the
service, whether it be infantry, Air

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Force, Navy, what have you. It was like quotas, and if

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that quota was filled, they didn't
need pilots, but they needed this.

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And in my case, they didn't
need fighter pilots. They needed bomber crew

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members. And you took what they
handed you. As the guy said,

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when they said jump, you said
how high? When did you head overseeth

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I believe it was December. I
think of forty four, right after Christmas.

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Well, they delayed us. They
let us stay, believe it or

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not, go home for Christmas,
and then we came back and we were

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shipped overseas. I didn't fly over. I went over on the ill de

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de France, which was a French
luxury liner. Came home on the Queen

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Mary. Not too bad, Bud. Yeah, didn't fly. Now,

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before you engaged in your missions,
you did practice missions over Ireland and Scotland.

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Is that correct? Yes, very
good. Yeah, we had to

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fly. I would think more soul
for the navigator who did a lot of

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celestial navigation, meaning with the stars, and we would fly at night a

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lot. I don't know why,
but we went to Scotland and Ireland,

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not on the ground, up in
the air, and I believe it was

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to get used to, you know, going to a specific target and then

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the day came when we were picked
to go on an actual bombing mission.

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Did that training help you as the
bombardier a lot? Kind of yeah,

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I would say the thing had helped
the most was getting used to being up

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at altitude, being on oxygen,
and being a mission in the war itself

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was eight tens at sometimes twelve hours. Now. I talked to a fighter

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pilot and many and a lot of
them, and I'm taking anything away from

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them, but they flew twenty thirty
forty sixty missions, but many of their

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missions were two three hours because they
flew twice as fast nearly if they didn't

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escort us, and they went to
specific targets, but they could go to

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the target. Example, when we
got escorts, the fighters wouldn't take off

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for at least two hours after us, and they caught up with us very

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quick because with a full bomb load, I flew at about one hundred and

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fifty five to one hundred and sixty
miles an hour. Now, one thing

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I think it's important to clarify.
When you're the bobadier, do you have

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some independence on when to release or
are you just following orders when people say

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time to release? Another good question. During the war, when it started

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way back in forty two, that
is, in bombing Germany, they use

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the Norden bomb site exclusively every plane. But then in late forty four most

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people don't know this, the Powers
to be decided to go away with precision

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bombing. Now what's precision bombing?
Bud that is a specific target like the

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Empire state building, the arch in
Saint Louis. We were losing too many

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men and we went to pattern bombing, or it was called many other things.

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What was that We would watch the
lead ship in our squadron when he

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opened his bombay doors, we would
open ours. When his first bomb came

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out, I would release mine.
We dropped on the center of Berlin,

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the center of Munich or what have
you? Not nice? We killed thousands

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of people, but in actuality it
ended the war about a year sooner.

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Germany. Those historians that really looked
into it was totally flat, totally.

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The only example I could give you
is nine to eleven when the twin Towers

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were hit. I remember a guy
was talking to me at an air show

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and he said, isn't that terrible? I said, very terrible, But

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I said, how would you like
the entire city of Chicago to look like

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that? And he said, are
you kidding? And then I told him

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about Germany and it was the knockout
electricity water anything that's Paul bud Headikee a

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US Army Air Forces veteran of World
War Two who served as a bomber deer

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for twenty three missions aboard a B
seventeen bomber in the European theater still to

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come. In this edition of Veterans'
Chronicles, Hediqie offers more detail on what

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went into a bombing run, what
it was like to suffer through enemy anti

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aircraft fire or flak, and the
missions of mercy he was part of in

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the Netherlands at the very end of
the war. But when we come back,

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we'll get to Bud's first mission,
which may well have been his most

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harrowing mission. After all, his
B seventeen was badly damaged and headed to

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the ground, and the pilots were
doing everything they could to avoid landing behind

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enemy lines. I'm Greg Corumbus and
this is Veterans Chronicles sixty seconds of Service.

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This sixty seconds of Service is presented
by T Mobile. T Mobile offers

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Network. Visit t mobile dot com
slash military to learn more about how they

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support our military community. From Jamestown, Tennessee, two students from su NY

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Jamestown Community College and their advisor attended
the Student Veterans of America National Convention this

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month in Nashville. Edie Bishop and
Matthew Adams, along with Dono, coordinator

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of Accessibility Services, and Military and
Veterans Club United advisor, were able to

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share ideas and best practices with student
veterans, military connected students, and other

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supporters, as well as corporate,
government, and nonprofit partners. The annual

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convention offered facilitated sessions on topics ranging
from running a successful student Veterans chapter to

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effective strategies for recruiting and engaging fellow
veterans. For more great Veterans stories,

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just go to National Defense Network dot
com. This says Veterans Chronicles I'm Greg

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Corumbus. Our guest in this edition
is Bud Heddekee, who served as a

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bombardier aboard a B seventeen bomber as
part of the four hundred and fifty second

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bomb Group in World War Two.
Now it's time for Hedikee to share the

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story of his first mission, and
it may be the most harrowing of all.

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From his twenty three bombing runs,
I didn't even know of this.

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There were times when six, seven, eight hundred planes would come over a

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specific target, the same target,
the same day, and it would take

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a half hour to forty five minutes
for all those planes to cross over that

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city and drop their bombs. Can
you even imagine, you know, those

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people bled just like we did.
Can you imagine those people down there with

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bombs raining down for not five minutes, but nearly an hour, and we

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would form first, we'd take off
with our own group, which consisted of

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about thirty six planes. Now,
if you took forty bomb groups, I'm

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not too sure what would that come
to three six and twelve fifteen if all

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bomb groups went up at once.
Now that didn't happen, I don't think.

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But there were times I mentioned six
seven eight hundred, so we would

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have to form. You didn't just
go up and go, and that's where

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a lot of crashes occurred. The
weather in England was very bad, very

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cloudy, hazy, not too many
sunshine days, and planes collided. Example,

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one day we missed a plane.
That was one of my jobs up

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in the nose to keep my eyes
out for other planes, and we missed

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a plane by about fifty feet and
that's a bit scary. In fact,

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that's why I lost my hair joke
joke. Once we formed, then we'd

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continue on and meet another group and
form and another group took a long time.

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Then we crossed the North Sea or
English Channel and went to the specific

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target. And that target you didn't
deviight. You were on the IP in

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Michell Point. You had to because
of the guy using the Norden bomb site.

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Once you dropped the bombs, you
headed straight home hopefully amazing, So

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you got to be a ten hour
flight. But the actual bombing the couple,

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I kept a log, just one
of those kooks that I kept a

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log on how many hours were type
of bombs, how many holes in the

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plane from German eighty eight millimeter and
a couple guys on my crew this is

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the truth, said, what are
you doing that for a head of che

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We're not going to make it.
Guys were very fanatic. Well, they

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said, if you flew six ten
twelve missions, you were on borrowed time

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and back to our first mission.
We you had to earn your way.

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When you flew there was a high
group, a medium group, and a

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low group, and we got the
low group. And by the time we

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got there, the Germans were zeroed
in pretty good and they shot out two

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of our engines. And a B
seventeen is not made to stay up on

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two engines. So where were you
when you were hit over ham Ham and

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Germany? And how far into Germany
is that? I can't tell you on

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miles. In fact, we were
going to bail out, meaning parachute,

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but the pilot, thank god,
said maybe we can make it and not

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be poled up. He is prisoners
of war. We weren't sure where the

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German lines were, but they were
right near the Rhine River and we made

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it across the Rhine into Belgium.
That's why I told you last March.

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I went back to where we crashed
outside of a town called Saint Royden,

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Belgium, February sixteenth, nineteen forty
five. Did you ever figure out how

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close you were to the front and
on the good side? Not really,

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if I may. When we crashed
and we used up a fighter field,

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a fighter field like is this long? A bomber field is much longer.

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So we went out into a field
and nosed over. I opened the window

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and this guy came out, which
was an American, and if I may,

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I remember this, he said,
what are you doing here with that

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big ass bird? And I said, what are all those German signs?

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And he said, we left them
up for sentimental reasons. The crowd said,

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left there probably six seven months before. Now that might sound like a

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long time, but it really isn't, you asked me, Miles. A

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couple hundred maybe, So if this
had happened earlier in the war, you

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would have followed in the wrong Well, if we would have crashed sooner,

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we probably would have crashed under German
lines. Yeah. Take me into your

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mindset when you find out that you've
lost two engines. You're not going to

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get back to England in this plane. You're hoping not to be a prisoner

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of war. Really helping to get
behind allied lines. Still your plane is

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headed down, So what's going on
in your head? I was very scared.

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If you ever meet anybody, I
don't care who, whether it be

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in the infantry, air force,
or what, and they tell you they

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weren't scared, they're full of prunes. I was scared every mission, every

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mission. And think about it,
if somebody shoots at you right here on

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the street, wouldn't you be scared. The Germans fired eighty eight millimeter cannons.

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That was their gun, and they
could fire up to twenty five thousand

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feet five miles. And at first
maybe when you saw the black puffs of

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smoke, that's after their shell explodes. But the shell explodes into one hundred

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pieces, one hundred and fifty,
no exact number. I dug flak out

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of our plane. I've got it
at home. And of course if it

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hits you here, you're gone.
But many guys lost arms, legs,

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what have you? We never got
wounded. I set a prayer God every

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mission. I happened to be a
Christian man, I prayed. I had

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a small book, prayer book with
me. My grandma gave me. In

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fact, I gave it to my
son when he went to Vietnam. It

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was scary, of course. What
was the impact like when the plane hit

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the ground. I could give you
a story. I don't remember. It

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was only seventy nine years ago.
I mean, I don't remember what I

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was last month. But it had
to be scary, but thankful that we

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made it. And I have a
great granddaughter who we're going to see later

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today, who is my son's granddaughter, who is in her fourth year at

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Annapolis, who wants to be a
jet pilot, who has made two hundred

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and seventy some parashoe jumps, and
she's going to meet us today. And

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I told Wes Smith Saturday night,
she, my son and I will all

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be sitting together three generations. That
is a family legacy right there. It

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is. It is such a wonderful
thing. Okay, so you're safely on

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the ground, relatively speaking. Is
it easy to get out of the plane.

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Are you stuck in the plane?
Get out and try to figure out

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where you are? What happens?
No? Good? Quick. We got

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out of the plane and they had
a truck there, and this truck took

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us to a schoolhouse for shotdown cruise. We weren't the only one, you

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know, through the war that got
shot down and we stayed there four days,

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and then a C forty seven that's
a transport plane was sent from England

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to Belgium to pick us up and
they took us back and then I flew

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twenty two more combat missions. That's
Paul Bud Hedike, a US Army Air

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Forces veteran of World War Two who
served as a bombardier for twenty three missions

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aboard a B seventeen bomber. He
was a member of the four hundred and

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fifty second Bomb Group in the European
Theater. You just heard the story of

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Bud's first mission and how he crash
landed. Thankfully, he and his crew

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were okay, but there were twenty
two more missions that would follow, and

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that's where we'll pick up the story
in just a moment. I'm Greg Corumbus,

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and this is Veterans' Chronicles. This
is Veterans' Chronicles. I'm Greg Corumbus.

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Our guest in this edition is Bud
Hedike, who served as a bombardier

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aboard a B seventeen bomber as part
of the four hundred and fifty second Bomb

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Group in World War Two. You
just heard the story of Bud's first bombing

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mission, which was very nearly his
last one still to come. Bud shares

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why he is so proud of his
military service and the details of a vital

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mission to keep the Dutch people fed
at the end of the war after the

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defeated Germans inflicted completely unnecessary cruelty against
them. But first there were more bombing

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missions, including the awkward feeling of
getting back into a bomber after being shot

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down on his first mission. Again, it's too long ago they exactly remember,

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but I'm sure with some hesitation and
fear, it didn't really matter.

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Of the twenty three is an example. I bomb Berlin, Munich, Townsend,

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know Hamburg, Dresden, Frankfort,
Cologne, Keel, and there's others.

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But the rest were smaller towns.
But why smaller, Bud, because

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they probably had a factory there,
or oil refinery or what have you.

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Sure major infrastructure that helps the German
war machine you need, right, we

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didn't choose them. They told us
where to go, and my log it

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says Marshaling yards. That's railroad yards. If you could cripple the railroads,

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couldn't you know, transport anything as
you said to slow down the Germans.

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Now were all of your crew members
uninjured? Everyone was never hurt. They're

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all gone now. I'm the last
of the Mohicans. But we were a

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blessed crew. We really were.
Because I had a guy when I went

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back to Deefngreen in eighty four,
we were at Maddingly Cemetery, which is

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a American cemetery donated by the English, and Stars and Stripes is a newspaper

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and it's still in existence. And
they were interviewing him and he said,

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you don't want to interview me.
And the guy says, why not?

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He said, I only flew half
a mission. I says a half,

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right, He said I got to
the target and we had a bail out.

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And he said I was a prisoner
of war nearly two years. So

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my point is some guys flew a
half, won two missions. Others like

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mine, I flew twenty three.
You didn't know. You didn't know.

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My last mission was somewhere latter part
of April, and then the war ended

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two weeks later. You were a
couple of missions away from being done anyway,

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then, right, No, they
increased it to thirty five from twenty

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five, and We were all real
happy about that. And when I went

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home, I was told I needed
twelve more missions and after my leave I

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would go to the Pacific. And
I remember telling my dad about that,

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and boy, he really got it. Well, I mean his kid,

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you know. And when I was
on home on leave, the JAP surrendered

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and I was one happy guy because
you know you, like you say,

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how far can you push your luck? You mentioned how tight you were with

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your crew. Did you have the
same crew for all your missions? I

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flew two missions with another crew.
Why because that position the guy got sick.

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That happened quite often. But other
than that, the same crew.

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Now, as the bobadier, let's
talk about what you did on a regular

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basis. What would you be doing
as the bomberder before the flight took off,

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Well, we all kind of did
the same thing. We had nothing

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to do with the bombs. The
ground crew loaded the bombs, did all

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that. We picked up the fifty
caliber machine guns, I remember that,

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and brought them out to the plane
and put them in the whatever receptacle.

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We would check our oxygen to make
sure it worked. I don't know if

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you know this or not, but
every position had its own oxygen tank.

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And if an oxygen tank got hit, which it did many times, a

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guy wouldn't even know it. But
what would happen. He'd go to sleep

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and he'd be dead in about five
minutes from an oxyo. So one of

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my jobs was to check for oxygen
to make sure they had it. If

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they didn't, my position would unplug
our line, put a portable bottle and

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go to that position and administer oxygen. I never had to do that,

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but we had. I'm sure I
can't remember all of them little responsibilities.

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I mean, you didn't just get
on the plane and suck your thumb.

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You had to do something. Sure, Now, as you approached the bomb

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site, what would you be doing? Well, as I told you,

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we didn't use it. We watched
the lead ship. It was there if

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we needed it. But we dropped
when he opened his doors. But what's

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the mechanism to do it? What's
the mechanism to drop it? How did

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you physically drop the bomb? Well? I don't remember all this stuff.

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I do remember a thing called interveolometer. I could set it at how many

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bombs. Hypothetically, Let's say we
carried which we did one hundred founders two

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fifty five hundred or one thousand.
We never mix the bombs. And when

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I speak in schools, I ask
kids, if we carried forty one hundred

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pound bombs yesterday and we wanted to
carry the same weight today and they were

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one thousand pound, how many would
we carry. It's kind of cute.

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And somebody had say four. I'd
say, teacher, give them an a.

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My point is we never mix them. There were general purpose and sindiary.

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We even dropped napound bombs to burn
out the Germans out of a fort

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Every bomb had a fuse in the
back. If you see and when you

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hear in a movie the the bombs
going down that said fuse spinning out countercli

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00:31:00.079 --> 00:31:06.079
lotwise. Once it's out, now
the bomb is armed and when it hits

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detonation, it explodes. And on
two missions where we got lost, I

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had to go back in the bomb
bay, which is about that wide,

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and put the cotter pins back in
the bomb. Why because when we landed,

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if the bomb was live and we
had an accident, it exploded.

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But by putting the cotter pin back
in, the bomb was safe. If

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you could go down on the bottom
of the North Sea or the English channel.

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You would see many be seventeens that
didn't make it. They thought they

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could and they ran out of gas. We would carry two thousand, four

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00:31:53.119 --> 00:32:00.240
hundred gallons of gas. Compared to
your car that carries fifteen to twenty.

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00:32:01.240 --> 00:32:10.079
We would burn fifty gallons of gas
per hour per engine. Four engines,

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we'd burn two hundred gallons of gas
per hour under good conditions. Now,

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if you're hit and there's trouble,
just like your car, you don't get

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00:32:23.440 --> 00:32:32.240
the mileage. But two hundred into
what I say, eighteen hundred miles enough.

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Yeah, for about Berlin was about
sixteen hundred miles. So under good

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conditions you'd come back with a little
gas. But there were times when you

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were leaking gas. Most of the
gases in the wings that's where they kept

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00:32:52.319 --> 00:32:58.000
it. And if you were losing
gas, the guys all of a sudden

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00:32:58.079 --> 00:33:02.839
run out and down go. They
had a fuel gauge. But there were

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number of guys so I heard that
were gong ho. They were going to

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make it home and they didn't.
We landed Brussels once in Paris to refuel

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because we knew we wouldn't make it
home. But was there always one target

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permission or were there mole we would
have a secondary Another very good question.

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Why got to remember god radar was
in its infancy at that time, and

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if it was a total overcast,
you're guessing. So I don't remember how

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many, but we hit secondary targets, meaning you couldn't see the first one,

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so you hit something else. Once
the bombs were away? What was

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your job the rest of the mission? Home? Let's go home? No?

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Really, I mean if you can
visualize bombs away and then you would

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00:34:10.119 --> 00:34:19.119
the planes would and going to a
target you would go to throw the Germans

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off. If you went direct,
they would be you know, kind of

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no, but it was amazing they
knew anyway. They had their spies just

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like we did. So you're in
these large formations, so it's every plane

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doing that zig zag. Yeah,
the group would fallow in one another.

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And then if you had wounded on
board, which many many did, they

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00:34:50.719 --> 00:34:57.719
would shoot a red flare off and
they got priority to land first. Why

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00:34:58.480 --> 00:35:02.519
to take the guy into ah hospital? Was there more chaos during takeoff or

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during landing? I would probably say
takeoff because we had a load of bombs.

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Remember I said to you, now, the pins were not pulled.

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My job is if you pull the
pins before takeoff, you're asking for trouble.

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So once we got airborne, I
have no idea what hell. I

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00:35:24.719 --> 00:35:30.639
had to go back and remove the
cotter pins, but that was scary.

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And then of course coming home,
I remember they used smoke pods because the

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weather was soap you couldn't see,
so if the smoke or fire were We

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00:35:46.079 --> 00:35:52.519
came in once where we didn't even
use the runway. We just used grass.

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00:35:52.119 --> 00:35:59.400
You couldn't see. Planes were zig
zagging across from one another. Pretty

353
00:35:59.440 --> 00:36:06.599
dangerous. But coming home was the
exciting part because you knew you were home

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00:36:07.480 --> 00:36:12.000
when you saw and you know,
Hollywood, but when you saw the white

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00:36:12.039 --> 00:36:17.679
Cliffs of Dover, you knew you
were home. Let's talk about the resistance

356
00:36:19.000 --> 00:36:22.719
that you faced on these flights.
Now, talk about how you dealt with

357
00:36:22.880 --> 00:36:28.639
flack and whether there's any particular memory
of flack that stands out to you.

358
00:36:29.000 --> 00:36:35.559
We probably got flack, I'm again
guessing a little, but probably on two

359
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thirds at least of our missions.
We had a couple which were called milk

360
00:36:39.679 --> 00:36:45.239
runs. What does that mean?
No fire or no flack, went to

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the target, dropped the bombs,
went home, it was just an easy

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flight. But generally speaking, the
Germans would move guns in, meaning somehow

363
00:36:59.719 --> 00:37:02.519
I don't don't know how they knew, but we were going to this particular

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00:37:02.719 --> 00:37:10.440
target and maybe it wasn't fortified.
They'd moved guns in overnight. We did

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00:37:10.480 --> 00:37:17.599
not get much fighter opposition when I
flew, but we did get attacked by

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00:37:17.679 --> 00:37:24.840
the German jet EM two six two. Give you an example, America,

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we had blueprints. Their scientists were
so far ahead of us, and I

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00:37:32.960 --> 00:37:43.360
mean Germany was known for brilliant scientists. Example, the war ended Russia England,

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00:37:43.679 --> 00:37:51.719
America fought for the German scientists.
Who did we get Werner van Brown,

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00:37:52.199 --> 00:37:58.079
our father of the space program at
Nassau. He believed it or not

371
00:37:58.760 --> 00:38:06.480
was a German science to developing jets
years before. I used to think,

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00:38:06.519 --> 00:38:12.679
wait a minute, that was our
enemy. The German jet was a total

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00:38:12.800 --> 00:38:17.079
surprise to me. They came in
so fast we didn't even know what it

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was. And they could only make
one pass, meaning they couldn't keep going

375
00:38:23.199 --> 00:38:29.239
around. They made one hand of
land, but they were very effective.

376
00:38:30.840 --> 00:38:37.880
But our P fifty one Mustangs history
records shot down German jets, but German

377
00:38:38.000 --> 00:38:45.000
jets shot down P fifty one Mustangs. Also, I'm guessing you feel fortunate

378
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that you had fighter escorts when you
were on the bombing run. Yeah,

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00:38:49.880 --> 00:38:53.599
we didn't have them, and I'm
not saying this to be critical. You'll

380
00:38:53.639 --> 00:38:59.880
hear a guy say, yeah,
we got escort Bologne. Well, sometime

381
00:39:00.480 --> 00:39:07.280
we didn't. Why generally because they
couldn't go in that far they would carry

382
00:39:07.599 --> 00:39:14.760
they being a P fifty one Mustang. When I flew wing tanks, extra

383
00:39:14.960 --> 00:39:22.920
gas tanks because the initial tanks wouldn't
give them enough mileage to continue with us

384
00:39:22.960 --> 00:39:30.199
to Berlin or Munich. Munich was
way down by the Swiss Alps near Italy.

385
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Just a couple questions left Bud.
First of all, what are you

386
00:39:35.199 --> 00:39:42.400
most proud of from your time in
service? Making it as you got older.

387
00:39:42.519 --> 00:39:46.719
I'm ninety eight and a half now. When I was twenty five or

388
00:39:46.800 --> 00:39:53.159
thirty, I didn't even think about
it. I mean, I'll be retired

389
00:39:53.400 --> 00:40:00.519
forty years February twelfth, and I
have still formed my salesman call me,

390
00:40:00.679 --> 00:40:07.599
which is really sweet. But we
didn't talk about it like this event.

391
00:40:07.760 --> 00:40:13.840
Here we are being so honored and
it makes you feel good. When we

392
00:40:13.840 --> 00:40:19.800
were on a plane coming from Boston
to here. My son and I sat

393
00:40:19.920 --> 00:40:25.239
right up in the first seat in
regular right behind first class, and this

394
00:40:25.320 --> 00:40:30.079
guy comes wanted to shake my hand, and he said, I just admire

395
00:40:30.400 --> 00:40:36.039
anyone on. He said, I
want you to take my seat. I

396
00:40:36.119 --> 00:40:40.559
said, no, no, you
stay where you're at. But the honor

397
00:40:43.159 --> 00:40:47.400
of these events, the honor of
being taken back to Europe last March,

398
00:40:49.239 --> 00:40:54.360
I'm very thankful to that that people
remember. But you know who really remembers

399
00:40:55.119 --> 00:41:01.320
the people in Europe. Everybody there, kids, they weren't even born.

400
00:41:02.039 --> 00:41:07.320
Thank you for our freedom. And
I said, how would you know?

401
00:41:07.519 --> 00:41:10.440
You weren't even born. Yeah,
but I got a mom and dad and

402
00:41:10.599 --> 00:41:17.360
grandparents, and they told me about
it. The Germans not all I found

403
00:41:17.400 --> 00:41:25.159
that out when we went, but
occupied the Netherlands, Amsterdam, the Hague,

404
00:41:25.599 --> 00:41:32.000
the Delt, not all of Holland. And they knew the war was

405
00:41:32.079 --> 00:41:37.280
over because this was the end of
April and the war ended May eighth.

406
00:41:37.840 --> 00:41:43.480
So what did they do to be
nice guys? They blew up the dykes

407
00:41:44.360 --> 00:41:50.519
and Holland was inundated, flooded.
And I didn't make this up. They

408
00:41:50.559 --> 00:41:55.360
were starving at five thousand a week, eating tula bulbs, to stay alive.

409
00:41:57.320 --> 00:42:04.320
And I believe Eisenhower and Churchill,
who they put plywood floors in the

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bombay, loaded it with k rations
and instead of flying at twenty five thousand,

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can you imagine coming intot two hundred
feet dropping the food written on the

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rooftops by the people in flowers.
God bless you boys. It was a

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beautiful way to end the war.
And yet of that one hundred and eleven

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thousand tons of food, fifty percent
was confiscated by the Germans. Those people

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have not forgot, and I suppose
we wouldn't either if we were attacked.

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You know, we are a very
blessed country, and this is what I

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wish and hope and pray. Whoever
sees this realizes how blessed we are.

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And I in my talks every time
the eighth therefoce we lost a little bit

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over twenty six thousand guys nineteen to
twenty eight. Think about this. They

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00:43:19.559 --> 00:43:24.920
gave their lives. They never became
husbands or dads, They never came home.

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00:43:25.679 --> 00:43:30.599
And I tell these young people,
when you go home tonight, you

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00:43:30.719 --> 00:43:37.039
say a prayer thanks to God for
those men that fought for you and gave

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00:43:37.159 --> 00:43:43.519
their lives. We could be talking
a different language. I'm not saying we

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00:43:43.519 --> 00:43:47.079
were, but we could have.
Now that's what I'm proud of that I

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00:43:47.119 --> 00:43:53.800
was able to do something for my
country. But it's an honor always to

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00:43:53.840 --> 00:43:58.199
speak with you. Thank you for
your time, and truly thank you for

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00:43:58.519 --> 00:44:01.119
all you've given for our country.
Thank you so very much. We've been

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00:44:01.119 --> 00:44:06.400
speaking with Paul budd Hedike. He's
a US Army Air Corps veteran of World

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00:44:06.440 --> 00:44:09.840
War Two, where he served as
a bombadier on twenty three missions part of

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00:44:09.840 --> 00:44:15.000
a B seventeen crew flying over Europe. I'm Greg Corumbus. This is Veterans

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00:44:15.079 --> 00:44:29.559
Chronicles. Hi, this is Greg
Corumbus, and thanks for listening to Veterans

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00:44:29.639 --> 00:44:34.960
Chronicles, a presentation of the American
Veterans Center. For more information, please

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00:44:35.039 --> 00:44:39.800
visit American Veteranscenter dot org. You
can also follow the American Veterans Center on

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00:44:39.880 --> 00:44:45.920
Facebook and on Twitter. We're at
AVC update. Subscribe to the American Veterans

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00:44:45.920 --> 00:44:52.159
Center YouTube channel for full oral histories
and special features, and of course,

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00:44:52.360 --> 00:44:57.960
please subscribe to the Veterans Chronicles podcast
wherever you get your podcast. Thanks again

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00:44:58.000 --> 00:45:00.679
for listening, and please join us
next time. Four veterans' chronicles