We
are so excited to announce the winner of our trip to Normandy,
Suzannah Kirk-Hacker. She recently shared her excitement and all
kinds of family military history and we thought you would be
interested. “I am so excited to be the winner of the trip. I put
my Great Uncles name on the ticket. His name was Charlie and he was
actually in WWI. I put him down because I knew him and spent
time with him as a child.”
“I
wanted to share a little bit about myself with you. I grew up
in Oak Ridge Tennessee, the secret city, which was important in World
War II called the Manhattan Project. I used to go to the
American Museum of Science and Energy as a kid and there I learned a
lot about WWII and the war effort. Many of the scientists that
lived in the city during WWII stayed in Oak Ridge so some were my
parent’s friends or our neighbors. The National Labs at ORNL
still bring in scientists from all over the world. As a result
I met children from numerous countries and was lucky enough to
establish friendships with a few.”
“My father retired from
the air force as a Lt. Colonel in 1975 and we left California for
Delaware and South Carolina before finally settling down in Oak Ridge
TN. He was a pilot in SAC after MAC. He tells me he flew
the big planes. He flew all over the world. He carried
the bomb when in SAC and was on call 24/7 with the rest of his crew.
When in MAC he carried cargo in both Korea and Vietnam.”
There
are too many members of Suzannah’s extended family with service to
our country from WWI on to mention here but we especially liked one
story her mother shared with her:
“Charles
Cravens was a tech Sargent with the engineer and was in every major
European campaign and awarded medals. He never fought with Patton,
but at the end of the war he was one of the first to come back after
the prisoners were sent home so he was back way before everyone else.
Charles landed in Normandy on Omaha beach in the early morning hours.
He was in the campaigns that took him through the Bouchage in
France then the Hurtgen Forest in Belgium. He fought in the Battle of
Aiken. He was located outside of St. Vith Belgium when German army
came and he was told to get out of there if he could escape being
taken as a prisoner and meet up with his unit. He was able to do so.
He was in the Battle of the Bulge the Ardennes campaign. He
helped build the bridge of Ramagen. Charles was one of the
first engineers to get there and work on the bridge. While working on
the bridge at some point he fell into the Rhine.The Rhine flows north
and no one thought he would survive. He did, got out of the river,
and walked back to camp. He was one of the men chosen to meet
De Gaul and De Gual kissed him on both cheeks and my mom believes he
got a medal. This embarrassed him a lot to tell because he was kissed
by a man. He was a farm boy uneducated but good with dynamite.
When the ground was frozen he made fox holes with his dynamite
and he had it on him all of the time.”
Please
join us in congratulating Suzannah.
