This is Fred home on the only leave he got in December 1944. Delay
enroute to Fort Ord to ship overseaes. He met his namesake for the
first and only time until he came home in July 1946. We were both
18 years old.
We lived in Philadelphia, and that picture was taken in front of a
Baptist church on the corner of
28th
Street and Lehigh Avenue. It was a favorite backdrop for photos
compared to the rest of the neighborhood of row houses.
After the war Fred was a salesman, and a good one! He died at age 63
in 1989. He had heart disease and was going in for bypass surgery.
Before they took him into surgery he looked up at me and said, "Take
care of yourself, kid." He knew. The surgeons couldn't repair his
paper-thin vessels. The stitches wouldn't hold. He died in surgery.
Marion Hess
Decatur, Georgia
24 Aug 2000 and 14 Oct 2000 |