Where There's a Will There's a Way
I arrived in New York on the Queen Elizabeth on 9 August 1945. We docked at 9AM and got off the boat at 5PM...no fuss by anyone. The Red Cross offered us drinks and I asked for a cold glass of real milk which I hadn't had in almost 2 years. There were 17,500 troops on board the ship. At 6PM we were on a ferry to Camp Kilmer where I called my fiancee and asked her when we were getting married and she advised all was set for 5 days after I showed up in Omaha, Nebraska. Following the wedding, we went on a 3 week wedding trip, then I went back to Ft Leavenworth with orders to proceed to Rapid City, North Dakota for deployment to the Pacific. At Leavenworth they told me the war was over and that I could go home. My footlocker had gone to Rapid City already and I never did get it back.
I had enlisted in 1942 in Detroit, Michigan and when I was commissioned I got 10 days leave in Nebraska to visit my fiancee and my family. However, when I got out they only paid my way to Norfolk, Nebraska, stating that this was my enlistment point as an officer and that's all that the military rules allowed. When I got ready to go back to Detroit I was still in uniform and I went to the Railroad station to get tickets to Detroit. I told the ticket seller my gripe about the military policy and he said, "No problem.....you are still in uniform....I can sell you the tickets at military rate.....round trip...even tho you don't plan to return.....when you get to Detroit mail the return tickets to this address and ask for a refund....you'll get your money back and your trip to Detroit will in effect have been free. Where there's a will there's a way.
John D Bentz, 334th BS