Have you ever met a war hero?

I have....my father!!....he was in the desert rats who many regard as being the biggest of war heroes because without them,we would now be under Nazi rule.

nope none .........

Yes, several of them in the past.

Lots of them including my father.

My Italian father in law, had the most amazing story..........he was conscripted to fight for Italy......but was a devout Catholic, and wanted no part of killing anyone.......but had to go.  They shipped him off to Trieste on a troop train.-------------and just as he arrived at the camp........he was JUST In time for a massive  ALLIED bombing......which obliterated the camp. 

He said he stepped off the train....... with a friend.......heard the bomb failing,   his friend was vaporized,  and he was blown into another bomb crater,  smashing his watch, at the exact time of the bombing........10:47  .

He considered  47 his lucky number the rest of his life. 

In all the chaos, and confusion.....he decided that was all of war he wanted to see...... left his rifle.........and turned around and just started WALKING.........

and walked all the way back , clear across the country,  to his hometown in Liguria......avoiding train stations and check points where he might be caught and forced to join another unit. 

Afraid his own home would be the first place they would look for him......(assuming anyone came looking for him)........he walked up into the nearby mountains  and lived in an abandoned old stone hut, for 3 years until the end of the war. 

His girlfriend at the time, made the miles long trek  every day,  to bring him whatever food and drink she could and spare clothes and whatever he needed. 

After the war was over.......naturally, he married her . 

Yes actually I have last year apparently. And they talked to us haha kinda wanted to be left alone at start though as didn't know them, old guys and I was on a night out turned to be ok though.  

My Father was career military that served in WW II, Korea and Vietnam,,, does that count.

My grandad used to drop bombs out of an airplane during the world wars 

Yeah my late Father-in-law - he claimed to have 'done nothing brave in the war', but that was apart from signing up in 1939 into the unknown, which included being amongst the Allied Forces that entered Hiroshima after the war.

RIP Dennis Kent