Army

By David M. Ramirez

On June 6, 1944, Staff Sergeant Adolfo Roberto “Rusty” Ramirez was a member of the largest invasion force in all of recorded history. He was assigned to the 29th Infantry Division, 116th Regimental Combat Team’s 121st Combat Engineering Battalion. The 29th and 1st Infantry Divisions had been given the mission to assault Omaha beach in Normandy, France. Of this 55,000-man combat force assigned to Omaha beach, the 116th Regimental Combat Team of the 29th Infantry Division was assigned to land at Zone “Dog Green.”

By Rachel Fleischman

Before he was 20 years old, Joel C. Mojica had fought in one of the bloodiest battles of World War II, and had a Purple Heart medal to prove it.

Mojica was an Army sergeant during the war, and, like many young men of his generation, was drafted when he was only 18 years old. After he was called up on Oct. 29, 1943, Mojica was sent to Hampton, England, where he trained for battle on a daily basis. His role in the Army was as a replacement soldier; his unit sent personnel to companies needing men to take the place of wounded and dead soldiers.

By Caprice Padilla

Turned away on his first attempt to join the Army because of a bad eye, Marshall Vasquez’s determination and will were fierce. Sitting next to his serviceman photo and an array of framed medals, Vasquez, who by showing courage and leadership overseas, proved he was as good as, if not better, than soldiers without a disability, told us his story.

By Kayla Young

Peering through the door he’d just kicked in with his combat boots, the Manuel Camarillo serving on the front lines of World War II Germany was a different man from the one he’d been back in South El Paso. Back then, he’d started fights just for fun.

“I spent my time fighting. I wanted to fight anybody,” said Camarillo of his early teen years. “My oldest brother would get two or three guys in the morning. He would get them so I could fight with them. I went in [the alley] and I gave them a good whipping.”

By Jared Hill

Manuel Perez was one of the hundreds of thousands of Latino citizens forced by way of selective service to join the military after the United States joined World War II following the bombing of Pearl Harbor. And just like many other Americans, Perez had to put his own life on hold to serve his country, even though he never stepped foot on the battlefield.

Mexican immigrants Antonio Jasso and Genoveva Ramirez Jasso, who picked cotton in South Texas, would see five of their sons go off to war.

Their granddaughter, Evelyn Jasso Garcia, set out to record their story, and that of her father and uncles. An associate professor at San Antonio College, she regrets she wasn't able to interview her uncles, but gratified her dad, Jose "Joe" Jasso lived to see the fruit of her research.

By Angel Flores

From a cardboard box, Albert Nieto rummages through old newspapers, postcards and other keepsakes that bring back memories from his days of service in the Army. One of the artifacts he pulls from the box is a sightseeing guide of the “Playground of the Orient” in the Philippines.

By Cheryl Smith Kemp

Of the many memories Braulio Alonso has of World War II, none stick out more than those tied to the liberation of Italy’s capital.

After Allied forces flooded Rome on June 4, 1945, some members of the 328th Field Artillery Battalion, part of the 85th Infantry Division, traveled from slightly south of Rome into the city.

“We took our driver and went into Rome,” said Alonso, who was Captain of Battery A.

By Eunmi Christina Lee

One September night in 1942, Amos Pacheco and Gloria Robles both happened to be at Bergs Mill Platform, a San Antonio, Texas, dancehall with a music box and bar.

“I was dancing with this other girl and she said, ‘I’m too old for you; go dance with her.’ So I went up to her and she was a little girl, 14 years old with pigtails and with white socks,” recalled Pacheco of seeing his wife for the first time when he was 16 years old. “I didn’t know how to dance very well, but I asked her to dance and that’s where the trouble started.”

By Cheryl Smith Kemp

For World War II veteran Delfino Guerrero, who grew up in the urban jungle of Chicago during The Great Depression, three of the big “musts” in life were speak Spanish at home, English at school and the Boys Club; run around acting tough with friends from “the neighborhood;” and correct anyone who disrespects you.

“That’s the way it was,” said Guerrero, who was an Army medic with the 38th Infantry Division in the Pacific Theater from December of 1941 to Dec. 5, 1945.