This was clipped from an old Mudcat Memorial Day Thread. I hope you all will not object to my posting it again

The two young men walked in line with the thousands of others like them, tired men in mud-caked uniforms who plodded and slid along a sodden road in Western Germany. The sun had finally come out after two days of near constant rain, and the air was filled with rising mist from the swamp-filled potholes and streaming ditches. The men lined both sides of this road, as a river of green trucks, jeeps, and personnel carriers rumbled and shifted gears down the middle, throwing geysers of mud in the air. The men's mood was lighter after the end of the rain, though, and they laughed and catcalled to the unlucky ones caught in the sprays of muck. Some sang snatches of popular songs..Drinking Rum and Coca Cola or Lily Marlene.. and others would take up the tunes momentarily. Cigarette smoke wafted down the long line, mingling with the smell of exhaust and sweat. Despite the slogging, there was a feeling of gladness among them. The Spring was beginning, and the War was winding down. The enemy was routed, the bloody battles in the past, and soon they would be going home.
The handsome, sturdy soldier held out a pack of Camels to his buddy, the tall, lanky kid with the good-natured comical face. They lit up with the tall kid's Zippo lighter and moved on through the marshy road. They smiled and joked with the easy camaraderie of men who had waded the same surf, crouched in the same holes, dodged the same bullets, slept in the same tents, and watched others fall by the wayside in the long 11 months since D-Day. The tall kid swung his M1 up onto his shoulders, letting both arms hang through the strap, the cigarette in his left hand, near his mouth. A mess-truck lumbered up behind them, downshifting as it slipped sideways in the mud, engine suddenly roaring. "Out o' the way!" barked the Supply Sergeant at the wheel.

As the men moved away from the truck, the tall kid slipped in the muck falling against the truck. The handsome soldier, quite used to his friend's clumsiness, laughed out loud and grabbed the tall kid's arm, but the arm was pulled out of his grasp by the truck. He saw the problem instantly. The tall kid's rifle-strap had hung up on a tie hook on the side of the truck. Stumbling, ungainly, laughing in embarrassment, the skinny kid slipped along in the mud trying to keep his feet. "Stop the truck!" yelled the handsome soldier, but his shout was swallowed in the sound of engine roar and gear surge. The tall kid fell and was swept under the rear wheels of the truck.

The convoy halted, the curious foot-soldiers bunched up, and the handsome soldier cut loose the strap, pulling the mud-covered form of his friend away from the truck. When the medics arrived, the kid had stopped breathing. They quickly lifted him into a jeep as a First Lieutenant ordered the convoy forward. The handsome soldier watched the jeep travel back down the column, dodging marching men. It was four days before he heard the news that his friend had died.

The handsome soldier returned from the War, married, raised a family, endured sleepless nights, drank too much, and when he drank too much, he sometimes spoke of the war, but mainly of the friend who was taken from him on the first Spring Day at the End of the War. He died an old man, 48 years after the tall kid was buried in a field in France.


Just a note of explanation. The soldier who survived was my Dad. I have forgotten the name of the soldier who died. I honor the memory of them both.