Southern-Style
A Downhome Perspective on All Things Southern

Earl Register by Robert Register

World War II


My Daddy Earl along with the rest of his Dothan gang, was drafted by Mrs. Helen Kennedy on Valentine's Day of 1942. Nobody in my Daddy's gang volunteered because all the their daddies had volunteered in WWI & had lived to regret it.

He did basic I think at Camp Gordon, GA & studied a business course in Colorado Springs for the Army Air Corps. He took a night train from there to Miami. On the way to Miami, he was told that he'd be shot if he deserted the train & two cats with Thompson subs stood between every car to pop anybody who jumped. The civil defense in the area of the killing would bury the deserter and his parents would be given a bunch of bull.

When the train got to Midland City north of Dothan, Daddy made it to the engine and asked the engineer to radio Dixie and say "Will Young needs to come to Dixie." Daddy had worked that out with the family as a code so they could come down to the tracks for a last look before he shipped out for Africa. The engineer refused. Boy, that man regretted that for the rest of his life.
That poor man was the only person my Daddy ever held a grudge against.
Daddy never forgave him and always hurt him every way he could & always delighted in that man's misery.

Anywayzzzzzzzzzz... he was in the invasion of North Africa and it wasn't any fun. He got two V-mails on the same day telling him that his 18 yr. old brother had died of Hodgkin's Disease & that his favorite uncle had died. He told me he contemplated suicide on the beach that night but after tasting the barrel he declined. Later on, he contemplated suicide again when he walked into his commanding officer's office and said, "I want to volunteer to fly all the time, sir!"

"Why's that, Earl?"

"I want you to kill me just like you kill everybody else!"

"No, Earl, we need you."

Daddy never had to fly again.

After 16 campaigns, my Daddy celebrated V-E Day in Northern Italy.
He saw the secret rooms of Pompeii & witnessed the last great eruption of Vesuvius.
(ed. note:"Son,there's nothing new under the sun." ~ Earl)
He photographed Mussolini & his girlfriend's bodies but my Mother destroyed the pictures 'cause she didn't want us to see it.

Anywayzzzzzzzz...It's V-E Day and Daddy's partying his ass off & his commanding officer pulls him over and says, "Hey Earl, save your strength because you're gonna need it when we ship out for the Pacific."

Daddy said, "If you don't send me home right now, I'm gonna fuck up everything I touch & you'll never know I did it."

Daddy had to agree to give up all his prizes of war which included a two and half ton Mercedes Benz Truck with the words "The Rebel" and a Confederate Flag painted on both sides.

He and two friends of his choice were given passage on a Norwegian freighter.

When he got to New Jersey, he was supposed to be debriefed but on the first morning he went to breakfast, he didn't like the way the POWs slopped his food on his plate. He looked around and asked all the draftees in line if they were treated with that kind of disrespect all the time and they all said, "All the time." so Daddy jumped over the lunch counter and inserted his GI cup in the offending POW's mouth. This produced a frenzy among the draftees and they decided to do the same thing. It was an incident my Daddy always regreted starting but the good thing about it was that he caused so much trouble his first morning back in the states that they gave him an honorable discharge and sent him back home to Dothan.