Excerpt



My army career was, as I anticipated, alien to my spirits. No one spoke to me or walked with me. At meals, the other men sat away from me, gabbing with their friends, but never with me. I suspected it was either because I was a New Yorker, or that I was Jewish, or both.

The basic training was rough and physically enervating: running through tires, climbing ropes. One day we were instructed on how to place the bayonet onto the rifle. For hours we went through a routine of charging forward, slowly at first and then with all or our might, screaming, Charge. Then duffel bags were hung in front of us. Now we had to charge and pierce the duffel bag with all of our might. What seemed to be blood spattered all over my uniform, my face, my hands, and my body. It was though I had killed a man. It was a shocking moment. I had killed a man. I could not move from the spot. Behind me I heard laughter.

One man said, Serves the Jew right for killing Jesus.

The laughter turned to mockery and taunting insults were thrown at me. When I returned to the barracks, head and hands smeared with blood, the soldier in the next bunk looked at me and said he was sorry for the way I had been treated. They replaced my uniform. I took a shower, but could hear the gawking sounds of more laughter.

One soldier said, Look, hes got his dick cut off.

I wanted to get dressed and run, run anywhere from this misery and obvious hatred that surrounded me.

I did manage to make a few friends, but they were very cautious never to be seen with me or they would have been called Jew lover. In effect, I was alone, stranded, exiled, a sorry object of tawdry jokes about being a Jew. Oh, how I remembered this sort of treatment from when I was a child. And now, here, looking ahead, to have to endure this painful treatment for who knows how long? Maybe for years. On the drills, I was in rhythm, on the short hikes I marched in step, but the rest of me was an anomaly, a nobody.

The greatest trauma of this occurred one day when I walked into the latrine. A rope hung there, twisted into a hangmans knot. Written on a sign was: ANY GODAMN NIGGER OR JEW WHO COMES IN HERE WILL BE HUNG ON THIS ROPE.

I began to wonder why I was in the army and why I was here trained to fight the Nazis or the Japanese. I screamed aloud, The enemy is here in these barracks, right here in this army! Why do we have to be shipped overseas to fight them? They are here, right here. On these ropes, on these gallows!