Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the
Colonial Office
LogoSophia Magazine
– A Pilgrim's Journal of Life, Literature and Love
Where
my Parents were on 29 April in 1944
"...and the war will be forgotten..."
Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front
My mother was a young war widow
in Kingsville, Texas
Raising a child with no
assistance from the state
For her husband was only missing,
you see
And a Merchant Marine, and so
didn’t count
My father was breeching the gates
of Dachau
His tank destroyer was the
“Razzle Dazzle”
With a naked lady painted on the
side
Among the stench and smoke, the
dying, the dead
My father told me that someday
there would be people
Who would deny that such things
ever were
Cf.
602nd
Tank Destroyer Battalion
SS Muskogee
Some years
ago whatever authorities see to such things worked to remedy the neglect of our
Merchant Marine widows and so they received some small assistance at last.
