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Episode #594 of Hometown Heroes, airing September 19-23, 2019, joins the National World War II Memorial in marking the 75th anniversary of battles in both the European and Pacific Theaters, featuring memories from five different World War II veterans.

The first voice you’ll hear from is Major General Mark Schwartz, who was the featured speaker this week in our nation’s capital in events simultaneously commemorating Operation Market Garden in the Netherlands, as well as the September 1944 battles for Angaur and Peleliu in the Palaus.

Click here to watch the feed of that ceremony, or read the official Department of Defense release on the observation, which includes this quote:

“We can’t ever forget the sacrifices and the leadership that was demonstrated by those that have served before us.”
–Maj. Gen. Mark Schwartz

Schwartz started his remarks with a description of Operation Market Garden, the attempt by the Allies to drive Nazi forces out of the Netherlands in order to hasten the end of the war in Europe. He mentioned the parachute and glider units, as well as the work of U.S. intelligence outfits in tandem with the Dutch Resistance. We’ll hear examples from all three of those facets of the operation, starting with glider pilot Morris Bennett, who experienced a bit of a rough landing on that mission. Click here access Bennett’s complete original 2012 interview on Hometown Heroes. We hear the paratrooper’s perspective from 82nd Airborne veteran Hugh Wallis, thanks to a live feed from the Best Defense Foundation, which flew Wallis and other Operation Market Garden veterans back to the Netherlands for the 75th Anniversary.

Watch the video above for more from Wallis, whom you’ll hear discuss the daring crossing of the Waal River.

Another perspective on Operation Market Garden comes in the form of John Cardinalli’s account of a secret OSS mission across the Rhine. You can order his book by clicking on the cover image, or link to his full-length interview from 2017 here.

Moving from the European Theater into the Pacific, this episode shifts to the contemporaneous battles of Peleliu and Angaur, two islands just six miles apart in the Palau group, east of the Philippines. Officially lasting from September 17 – October 22, 1944, the fight for Angaur was essentially decided in the first four days, and saw just 260 Americans killed. The much more challenging capture of Peleliu took nearly ten weeks, with almost ten times as many U.S. soldiers killed in action. 94-year-old Chuck Monson of Ruston, Louisiana remembers being on Angaur with the 154th Engineer Combat Battalion when the call came for volunteers to help the 1st Marine Division on Peleliu’s “Bloody Nose Ridge.”

“About forty of us volunteered to go,” you’ll hear Monson mention, adding that a company history referred to that group as “the forty fools.”

Not long after arriving on Peleliu, the 19-year-old was wounded, with bullets striking both of his legs. Some fellow soldiers constructed a makeshift stretcher, taking some small trees, and threading them through their jackets before carrying the injured Monson down the ridge to safety.

“Both of them went right into the bone,” you’ll hear Monson explain, pointing to scars on the front of his legs. “I’m kind of proud of this because it shows I wasn’t running away.”

You can listen to Monson’s complete original interview from 2011 here, and also follow his creative and frequently updated blog here.

Finally we hear from one more of the nearly 11,000 American casualties on Peleliu, Francis Cauwels, who fought there with Company C of the 321st Infantry Regiment, 81st Infantry Division. Like Monson, Cauwels would be wounded on Bloody Nose Ridge, where a hollowed out tree atop one hill served as a Japanese observation post.

“They put out the order that we had to take it at all costs,” you’ll hear Cauwels explain. “Every day, they put a new regiment in there to try and take that position. That’s why there were so many casualties.”

Listen to Hometown Heroes to hear Cauwels describe how one trip up the ridge left him as the only member of his squad unharmed, as well as how trying a different approach led to his squad capturing that higher ground, and how challenging it was to hang on to that territory. You’ll also hear how a grenade box and a penny saved his life in two separate instances, and how the wounds he suffered could have been much worse.

“I just figured the Good Lord took care of me many, many, many times,” you’ll hear Cauwels express before detailing other close calls. “I was just blessed.”

Francis Cauwels passed away in 2015 at the age of 93. You can access more of his original interview here.
—Paul Loeffler