Ray H. Richards Sr.
A WWII VETERAN’S STORY
OF COMPASSION IN THE MIDST
OF PURE EVIL
In the spirit of honoring our Veterans through the month of November, I want to tell you a story about five World War 2 Veterans and how they found compassion in the middle of all the hate, fear, and death that was WWII.
It happened in Germany during the middle of some of the heaviest fighting in the war. These five infantry soldiers along with the rest of their “outfit” had just arrived at this small depot in a small nameless town after a long march, fighting their way forward mile by mile. Late evening allowed the soldiers to stop for a short rest before moving forward again.
He and his four battle-hardened military brothers went into a train depot to warm up a little and really just do a little looking around out of curiosity as much as anything else. Anything that took their minds off the war was a welcomed blessing.
They saw this young German woman named Helen inside holding a small child about 2 years old. They could tell she was homeless and from the looks of things, hadn’t eaten anything for some time. The little boy child was crying, and the mother was trying to console him.
Mother, Helen. Photo was given to that soldier for helping her and her son that day.
This Veteran who was telling the story said after being in the war for over 2 years, he had learned some broken German. He asked her where she was going. With the look of both fear and confusion, she didn’t give an answer. He tried again. Are you hungry? He and his fellow soldiers gathered the rations they had among them and gave them to her. She smiled, fear still visible on her face, and nodded to them. Both she and the 2-year-old boy immediately began eating what was given to them, and he could tell how hungry they were by the way they were devouring the food.
Our Veteran asked her in broken German where her house was. Sadly, she responded that they had no home. She had lost the house that they had been renting because she could not pay the rent. Her husband was a German soldier and she had not heard from him in a very long time. The soldiers looked at each other with a sad sense of compassion and wondered what they could do for this poor young woman and her son.
After some conversation among themselves, they decided to ask her to take them to the house she had been staying at before being evicted. She did so. It was nearby and the landlord was there. The young soldiers pooled their money together and came up with enough money to pay the rent for the entire next year. With a serious semi-threatening tone, as only a battle-hardened soldier could manage, this soldier told the landlord that they would be coming back this way and they had better find the young woman and child happy and healthy living still in the house… He promised that she would be. (The soldiers knew they would not be back that way, but the landlord did not know that.)
The five soldiers went back to the unit but couldn’t get the young woman and child off their minds. They had solved the problem of shelter for them, but they knew there was no food to be found and they had only given her enough to last them a few days. How could they help her with the food problem?
Then, one of them remembered the dairy farm they had passed earlier. He said, “You know, we passed a dairy farm about ten miles or so back. We could take one of the cows and give it to this woman. The farmer wouldn’t miss one cow. He has so many of them.”
“How could she feed it?” said another soldier.
“Hey, I saw a big beet field a way back. We could take some beet tops for the cow to eat. That’d keep it fed through the rest of the cold spell until the grass starts growing again,” said another.
The soldiers knew they would be staying at this location overnight and with a little luck they could “borrow” one of the officer’s jeeps and retrieve the cow and the beet greens and still be back before morning. Nobody would even notice. These 18 and 19-year-old soldiers now had a plan.
After darkness fell and the place was silent, they put their plan into action. With the help of the young guard in that area, they pushed the jeep down the road until it was out of hearing distance. Then, they proceeded to the dairy farmer’s place. They opened the gate near the road and quietly roped and led one of the dairy cows out of the field, tied it to the back of the jeep, and drove away into the night.
Next stop, the beet farmer’s field… Knowing this would allow the weary cow a break, they hurriedly cut the tops off a large area of the outer corner of the field where they would not be noticed and gathered all that they could fit in the back of the jeep. It was piled high, he said.
Mission accomplished; the young soldiers began the slow journey back to the young woman’s newly re-rented house. Arriving a few hours later, they tied the exhausted cow to the fence and unloaded the beet greens as quickly as they could.
They wished they could have seen her face when she found the special gifts that they had bestowed on her but knew that they had to get back and redeposit the jeep where they had found it without being caught.
The old gentleman looked at me with knowing eyes and said, “God was on our side because our mission was just. We didn’t get caught; the young woman could provide milk for her son; she could now barter for other goods with the excess milk the cow produced. We were all pretty proud of ourselves that night. For a few hours, we were doing something constructive. It was a good feeling.”
I said to him, “Her husband was a German soldier, maybe one that had been trying to kill you. Still, you all decided to help her?”
He matter-of-factly answered, “He was probably just some poor young son of a gun who didn’t want to be there any more than we did, and like us, he didn’t have a choice either. Don’t you think he’d have rather been with his wife and son? Anyway, it didn’t matter. She was a mother who just needed someone to care for her. We cared.”
With some hesitation, the gentleman told me not to tell the story because he might still get into trouble with the military for what they did. I reassured him that the statute of limitations had long since run out on this over-60-year-old event, but he wasn’t convinced.
“You don’t know the Army,” he said.
I promised that I would not say anything until he left this world for the next one, and I have kept that promise.
The old gentleman who told me this story awoke often screaming for one of his soldier brothers named Joe after more than 60 years. He would sit up on the edge of his bed dripping with sweat, clearly shaken by the nightmare. The doctors at the VA Hospital told him that they could give him medication to help him sleep without the nightmares.
Through his tears, this strong brave man replied, “No. I have to see their faces. Someone has to remember them. I’ll be the one remembering them. I don’t want to stop seeing them.”
The story I just told was the story of one of the finest men I have ever known. His name was Ray H. Richards Sr. I am so proud to say that he was my father. He died on December 15, 2014. I can now share his story without breaking my promise. May you rest in peace, Dad. I’m honored to be your daughter.
God bless.
Patricia Richards Harris
Doddridge County Historical Society