T-4 Chester Yates & Gilbert M Bush

[Walt's Daughter]

The continuing saga of Angie and her dad. This is a "doozy". I dare anyone to read this and not say, "WOW!"

 

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Hi Marion,

 

You know how delighted I was when I received a copy of my dad's signature

and you understood how much it meant, well read on:-

 

Two days ago I was reading e-mails from AWON members telling everyone of

their prized possessions belonging to their dads. I sat there so green with

envy and thinking, why haven't I got things to treasure, it's so unfair.

 

This prompted me to tell them the following story from my childhood.

 

Dear All,

 

For those of you that aren't familiar with me, I thought I would take this

opportunity to tell you all a little story.

 

I was born in London five months after the death of my dad in Germany on

V.E. Day and for the first few years of my life my mother and I were pushed

from pillar to post along with thousands of other homeless people in the

capital.

 

We were eventually given a council flat in south London, I would be about

seven or eight at the time.

 

You have to remember that at this time my mum had married my step-father and

I had no idea of my roots.

 

As children do, I went out playing one particular day and a group of us came

across a bombed out church. We thought it was fun searching through the

rubble and picking up pieces of partly burned hymn books and jumping up and

down on the remains of a grand piano.

 

Then I noticed buried amongst the bricks and mortar something green. I

peered down and managed to pull out a small German stein. There was

something magical about this find, but, I had no idea at the time the

implications.

 

I took the stein home to mum and there it stayed on the mantlepiece.

 

For some reason that little stein followed me all my life, most of the time

it was used to keep loose buttons or bits of rubbish in. It has a crack in

it and no lid, the sort of thing you would soon tire of and probably dump, I

never did!

 

Now to bring you all up-to-date.

 

Two years ago I finally found where my dad was buried and have since been on

the trail for information (as so many of you have) and I have recently

discovered the cause of my dad's death - methyl alcohol poisoning. He

accepted a celebratory drink from a young Russian soldier wanting to toast

the end of the war and sadly the German whiskey was poisoned, consequently,

my dad, some of his buddies and a large number of Russians all died that

night.

 

Now I ask myself, did my dad send me this little German stein? Yes he did!!

 

So, when over the last couple of days I have told you all that I have

nothing belonging to my dad, then that isn't strictly true - is it?

 

My little stein has an inscription which reads "Drink gut u.reitt".

 

Any german translators out there?

 

Angie Christian

Proud daughter of Pvt. Gilbert Manny Bush

313th Infantry Anti Tank & 175th Infantry Co M .......cont.....

 

The response was tremendous, everyone came back with suggestions. Everyone

agreed that it meant Drink good and .......the last word caused a problem.

 

I then scrutinised the inscription and realised it actually read Trink gut

u. rein. This I typed into Bable Fish and the translation came back

.................wait for it..........Drink well and purely. Purely, wow

it's a message from dad telling me about the poisoned whiskey.

 

I'm still in shock Marion. He must really, really love me.

 

I'll send a picture of my little German stein for you to look at.

 

Love Angie.