[Vision2020] Fw: Final Toast.

[Sue Hovey]

The following is from a friend of ours who was in the Navy during WWII.  He 
is 93 and doing pretty well.  I thought some of you might appreciate it.

Sue Hovey

-----Original Message----- 
From: OL' DOUG
Sent: Sunday, July 07, 2013 5:15 PM
To: undisclosed-recipients:
Subject: Final Toast.

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>> Subject: Final Toast.
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>>         The cup of brandy that no one wants to drink.
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>> Recently, in Fort Walton Beach, Florida, the surviving Doolittle Raiders 
>> gathered publicly for the last time.
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>> They once were among the most revered men in the United States. There 
>> were 80 of the Raiders in April 1942, when they carried out one of the 
>> most courageous and heart-stirring military operations in this nation's 
>> history. The mere mention of their unit's name, in those years, would 
>> bring tears to the eyes of grateful Americans.
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>> Now only four survive.
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>> After Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, with the United States reeling and 
>> wounded, something dramatic was needed to turn the war effort around.
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>> Even though there were no friendly airfields close enough to Japan for 
>> the United States to launch a retaliation, a daring plan was devised. 
>> Sixteen B-25s were modified so that they could take off from the deck of 
>> an aircraft carrier. This had never before been tried -- sending such 
>> big, heavy bombers from a carrier.
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>> The 16 five-man crews, under the command of Lt. Col. James Doolittle, who 
>> himself flew the lead plane off the USS Hornet, knew that they would not 
>> be able to return to the carrier. They would have to hit Japan and then 
>> hope to make it to China for a safe landing.
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>> But on the day of the raid, the Japanese military caught wind of the 
>> plan. The Raiders were told that they would have to take off from much 
>> farther out in the Pacific Ocean than they had counted on. They were told 
>> that because of this they would not have enough fuel to make it to 
>> safety.
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>> And those men went anyway.
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>> They bombed Tokyo, and then flew as far as they could. Four planes 
>> crash-landed; 11 more crews bailed out, and three of the Raiders died. 
>> Eight more were captured; three were executed. Another died of starvation 
>> in a Japanese prison camp. One crew made it to Russia.
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>> The Doolittle Raid sent a message from the United States to its enemies, 
>> and to the rest of the world: We will fight. And, no matter what it 
>> takes, we will win.
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>> Of the 80 Raiders, 62 survived the war. They were celebrated as national 
>> heroes, models of bravery. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer produced a motion picture 
>> based on the raid; "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo," starring Spencer Tracy 
>> and Van Johnson, was a patriotic and emotional box-office hit, and the 
>> phrase became part of the national lexicon. In the movie-theater previews 
>> for the film, MGM proclaimed that it was presenting the story "with 
>> supreme pride."
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>> Beginning in 1946, the surviving Raiders have held a reunion each April, 
>> to commemorate the mission. The reunion is in a different city each year. 
>> In 1959, the city of Tucson, Arizona, as a gesture of respect and 
>> gratitude, presented the Doolittle Raiders with a set of 80 silver 
>> goblets. Each goblet was engraved with the name of a Raider.
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>> Every year, a wooden display case bearing all 80 goblets is transported 
>> to the reunion city. Each time a Raider passes away, his goblet is turned 
>> upside down in the case at the next reunion, as his old friends bear 
>> solemn witness.
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>> Also in the wooden case is a bottle of 1896 Hennessy Very Special cognac. 
>> The year is not happenstance: 1896 was when Jimmy Doolittle was born.
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>> There has always been a plan: When there are only two surviving Raiders, 
>> they would open the bottle, at last drink from it, and toast their 
>> comrades who preceded them in death.
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>> As 2013 began, there were five living Raiders; then, in February, Tom 
>> Griffin passed away at age 96.
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>> What a man he was. After bailing out of his plane over a mountainous 
>> Chinese forest after the Tokyo raid, he became ill with malaria, and 
>> almost died. When he recovered, he was sent to Europe to fly more combat 
>> missions. He was shot down, captured, and spent 22 months in a German 
>> prisoner of war camp.
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>> The selflessness of these men, the sheer guts ... there was a passage in 
>> the Cincinnati Enquirer obituary for Mr. Griffin that, on the surface, 
>> had nothing to do with the war, but that emblematizes the depth of his 
>> sense of duty and devotion:
>> "When his wife became ill and needed to go into a nursing home, he 
>> visited her every day. He walked from his house to the nursing home, fed 
>> his wife and at the end of the day brought home her clothes. At night, he 
>> washed and ironed her clothes. Then he walked them up to her room the 
>> next morning. He did that for three years until her death in 2005."
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>> So now, out of the original 80, only four Raiders remain: Dick Cole 
>> (Doolittle's co-pilot on the Tokyo raid), Robert Hite, Edward Saylor and 
>> David Thatcher. All are in their 90s. They have decided that there are 
>> too few of them for the public reunions to continue.
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>> The events in Fort Walton Beach this week will mark the end. It has come 
>> full circle; Florida's nearby Eglin Field was where the Raiders trained 
>> in secrecy for the Tokyo mission. The town is planning to do all it can 
>> to honor the men: a six-day celebration of their valor, including 
>> luncheons, a dinner and a parade.
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>> Do the men ever wonder if those of us for whom they helped save the 
>> country have tended to it in a way that is worthy of their sacrifice? 
>> They don't talk about that, at least not around other people. But if you 
>> find yourself near Fort Walton Beach this week, and if you should 
>> encounter any of the Raiders, you might want to offer them a word of 
>> thanks. I can tell you from firsthand observation that they appreciate 
>> hearing that they are remembered.
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>> The men have decided that after this final public reunion they will wait 
>> until a later date -- some time this year -- to get together once more, 
>> informally and in absolute privacy. That is when they will open the 
>> bottle of brandy. The years are flowing by too swiftly now; they are not 
>> going to wait until there are only two of them.
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>> They will fill the four remaining upturned goblets.
>> And raise them in a toast to those who are gone.
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>> PLEASE SEND THIS ON, ESPECIALLY TO THOSE WHO WERE TOO YOUNG TO KNOW ABOUT 
>> THESE GUYS. THIS SHOULD BE READ BY EVERY KID IN GRADE AND HIGH SCHOOL SO 
>> THEY KNOW OUR HISTORY.
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