France
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I have mixed feelings about the story of Marcel Pinte. I didn’t think that any child, especially a child as young as six, should ever be used in a war situation. However, I have also never lived in a wartime situation. Marcel was born on 12 April 1938 in Valenciennes, France. He was the youngest…
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During World War II, many medical advances were made. Surgery techniques such as removing dead tissue resulted in fewer amputations than at any time. The treatment of bacterial infections with penicillin or streptomycin was administered for the first time in large-scale combat. In the beginning, plasma was available as a substitute for blood. By 1945,…
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I am open to correction for this, but I am pretty sure that Bastille Day is foremost the public holiday in France. The French National Day is the anniversary of the Storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789, which was a central event of the French Revolution. For obvious reasons, it wasn’t celebrated during…
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World War II was one if not the darkest era in history, Unprecedented death and destruction, and genocide. However, there were lighter moments during the six years of war. The photograph above is of French children playing with the U.S. mascot in Normandy. An American soldier and his pet fox made friends with two small…
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A diary is the most personal possession someone might have. It is a journal of their wishes, fears and often their secrets. It is therefore extremely important when a diary becomes public it is treated with the utmost dignity and respect, especially those that were written during the darkest era of mankind. Diary of Susi…
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This is one of those amazing stories of resilience and perseverance. Odette Sansom, aka Odette Churchill and Odette Hallowes, code name Lise, was an agent for the United Kingdom’s clandestine Special Operations Executive (SOE) in France during World War II. She was born on 28 April 1912 in Amiens, France. She met an Englishman, Roy…
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Willem Jacob van Stockum was born on November 20,1910 in Hattem,the Netherlands. Willem moved to Ireland in the late 1920s, Where he studied mathematics at Trinity College, Dublin, where he earned a gold medal. He went on to earn an M.A. from the University of Toronto and his Ph.D. from the University of Edinburgh. The…
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Although the tide had already turned for the Nazis , June 6-1944 was to become the final push for the allied troops to free Europe from the Nazi regime. Theodore Roosevelt Jr., son of former US President Theodore Roosevelt,was the only general on D-Day to land by sea with the first wave of troops. At…
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A Stolpersteinplural Stolpersteine; literally means “stumbling stone”, metaphorically a “stumbling stone” is a sett-size, ten-centimetre (3.9 in) concrete cube bearing a brass plate inscribed with the name and life dates of victims of Nazi extermination or persecution. Created by the artist Gunter Demnig in 1992, Stolpersteine is brass-topped cobblestones embedded in the pavement outside a…
History of Sorts 