LT Tunis Vanden Berg, Navigator, 1943-1945

Extracted from a letter dated October 25, 1993, to the 456th Bomb Group History Book project.

Cerignola, Italy, 1944

My name is Tunis Vanden Berg, a former member of the 745th Squadron of the 456th Bomb Group. I enlisted in the Army Air Corp in June 1942 and was called to active duty in January 1943.

I was sent to the classification center in Nashville, Tennessee and took all of the tests and exams and was found to be best qualified to go to navigation school.

I went to pre-flight training at Ellington Field, Houston, Texas, and after completing pre-flight was sent to Navigation School in San Marcos, Texas.

I was graduated from navigation school in September 1943 and was commission a 2nd Lt.

I was sent home on a 2-week leave and then to gunnery school in Boise, Idaho. From Boise I was sent to Muroc Army Airfield in California, in December 1943. I was put on the crew of Lt. Roy Lassiter as the navigator.

We stayed at Muroc for about a month and then to Hamilton Field near San Rafael in California to pick up our B-24 bomber. From there we flew to Italy with stops at Palm Springs, California, Midland, Texas, Memphis Tennessee, and West Palm Beach, Florida. From West Palm Beach we flew to Italy with stops in Puerto Rico, Georgetown, British Guiana, Brazil, Dakar, Marrakech, Morocco, and Tunis, Tunisia.  We then went to our base in Stornara, Italy.

We arrived the first part of February 1944. We started flying combat missions soon after arrival. On our 8th mission we crashed in Italy returning from a bombing mission to Vienna [Budapest]. Our crew never flew together again.

I completed 35 missions and received the Air Medal with 5 oak-leaf clusters, the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Purple Heart and also some unit citations. About halfway through my tour of duty I was appointed squadron navigator which meant that I flew in the lead ship or near the lead on my missions. I stayed on in Italy with the 456th Bomb Group, managing the Officers Club after my missions were completed. Somewhere along the line I was promoted to 1st Lt. I arrived in my hometown of Grand Rapids, Michigan in July 1945 sand was subsequently discharged in October 1945.

In January 1946 I resumed my pre-medical studies at Calvin College in Grand Rapids and then went on to Wayne State University Medical School in Detroit in 1947.  I was graduated in 1951 with the M.D. degree and did post-graduate studies at Butterworth Hospital in Grand Rapids. I began practice in Fremont, Michigan in 1952 and retired after 32 years of Family Practice. We moved back to Grand Rapids in July 1994.

I was married in 1949 to my wife Bernice. We have five children and five grandchildren.

Letter from Paris 27 April

Late morning we took the Metro "downtown" heading for rue Sainte-Anne and a dish of noodles for lunch.

After exiting the Metro we walked through the Palais Royale heading in a rather roundabout way for "Japantown" and the score of noodle bars in the area.

The two of us ate lunch at Noodle (54 rue Sainte-Anne 75002) after which we walked to Opéra Garnier where Susie got on the Metro line 8 to go to school and I got on the 3 to head east for an afternoon of "working" at Père-Lachaise.

Later that afternoon while in the cemetery I received a message from Verizon saying I was being charged $25 for overages on my data usage. Our plans, we each had one for our phones, allowed us 100 minutes of talk, 100 outgoing texts and 100mb of data. Apparently I had eaten through the 100mb of my data plan for the month already (and Susie would too soon after).  I failed to notice that we had always used iMessage for texting (thus using data).

Anyway,  I assumed that Susie was receiving my texts (I had turned off my cellular data at this point). I sent her a note saying I was exploring the environs of Place de la Concorde and would come to LCB and pick her up after school. But no response. Hmmmm.

When I exited the Metro at the Tuileries on rue de Rivoli walked up the street to W. H. Smith bookstore to browse a bit.

Afterwards, I walked across the street and near the western end of the Tuileries came across a curious group of plaques along the wall beneath the Jeu de Paume and close to Place de la Concorde: They were memorials to nine men and one woman who died near the corner of rue de Rivoli and the Place during the liberation of Paris on 25 August 1944.

I then made my way into the Place de la Concorde to look for another piece of French history: the location of the guillotine used to execute Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, Princess Élisabeth of France, Charlotte Corday, Madame du Barry, Georges Danton, Camille Desmoulins, Antoine Lavoisier, Maximilien Robespierre, Louis de Saint-Just, and Olympe de Gouges.

Place de la Concorde

execution of Louix XVI

same view today

Internet rumor had it there was a marker somewhere near the statue dedicated to the city of Brest and close to the Hotel Grillon. I found the statue of Brest -- it's one of 8 placed at the corners of the Place. But no marker.

Oh, and in front of the Hotel Crillon I saw this bit of French automotive history (thinking of Richard Horsman now):

Leaving the Place I walked up the Champs d'Élysées to the metro at Champs-Élysées–Clemenceau and headed off to Le Cordon Bleu.  I arrived at the school right about 8pm and sent her another text saying I was in the lobby. Twenty minutes later no Susie and no other students either and ominously no response to my texts.  Hmmmm. So I called her.

Turns out they had been let out early and she was already home! She had tried to text me but I wasn't receiving her iMessages (of course). So it was back to Metro (10) to Austerlitz and then we met on the street soon after and went in search of a late dinner. (OK pizza but great atmosphere at Café d'Italie, 76 Avenue des Gobelins, 75013, off Place d'Italie).

The upshot is now we use "text message" only and leave iMessage off. Cellular data is still turned off until we need it for the highway. That's right kids, we're renting a car to drive to the Netherlands. But more about that next week.

May 15 Oradour sur Glane, the Martyred Village

After a leisurely morning lingering over breakfast and lively conversation with guests Eric and Monty and hostess Amanda, we packed up, loaded the car, paid the bill (€54!) and headed off toward the Martyred Village. We parked the car near the entry into the village and although the overcast skies promised rain, as we strolled about the village we found only chilly temps, fitting perhaps for the feelings evoked by such a disturbing place.

For more than three hours in the afternoon of June 10, 1944, a unit of German Waffen SS soldiers rounded up groups of men, women and children in Oradour sur Glane and summarily shot them, in some cases right where they were found, and set fire to the village.

At the end of the war the French government decreed that the village would remain untouched as a stone testimonial to the banality of war.

There is a museum, as well as a bookstore below the large entryway sculpture on the other side of the village itself. The village cemetery located next to the destroyed village is also worth a visit since it lists many of the victims who were subsequently interred there in the family plots. The memorial in the cemetery, surrounded by photos of many of the victims is moving and touching in the extreme.

Strolling about should take you about an hour. For more information and details, including an excellent timeline, visit www.oradour.info.

entry to the memorial village

individual tales of a person's final moments are found everywhere

weddings, funerals, how many lives that began and ended in this space?

girl's school

the doctor's car

memorial to the dead in village cemetery

May 14-15 Oradour sur Glane

As promised, our two bags arrived safe and sound on the next flight. After we collected them off we went through the maze of Charles de Gaulle in search of the Avis rental desk, which we found easily enough in Terminal 2C (lower level if you must know).

Ten minutes later we left the lower level of the airport and found ourselves in the Avis carpark looking for a silver Opel Meriva. Bags in the back, Susie in the passenger seat with maps in hand, we pulled out of the lot and eventually found our way to the A1 south to Paris.

From there we picked up the Peripherique east to the A6 looking for the A10 in the southern suburbs of Paris. We missed that connection once, turned around -- easier than it seemed at the time -- and eventually found ourselves on the A10 in search of the A71.

It was about this time that we tried our credit card to pay the toll. I can safely say that US credit cards, even the ones with the magic chip, at least ours, will NOT work at the tolls booths on the French autoroutes. Seemingly unable to go any farther, one of the toll booth workers took pity on us and helped us work through our frustration. Please note, however, that many of the toll gates have NO one woking the booths at all. We were lucky.

Cruising down the A71 to the A20 we got off just north of Limoges at exit 28 for Oradour sur Glane, our first stop on the trip. We took backroads to the N141 west to the D9 and then up through the village of Oradour sur Glane a few kms north to our bed and breakfast, "Le Moulin de la Fauvette."

common room and dining room

Located on a rambling piece of property along the Glane River, we were greeted by hosts Amanda and Michael, a pair of Brits who have operated the B and B for five years or so. Since it was quite late by the time we arrived, after dropping our bags off we got recommendations for dinner, settling on the Auberge de Veyrac, in Veyrac just south of Oradour. So we double-backed through the village, stopping off at the post office to withdraw cash from a hand ATM and returned to the D9.

Seated in a glass-enclosed terrace overlooking the rotary (actually nicer than it sounds) we ordered an aperitif and toasted our arrival in France.

We spent a quiet evening enjoying the fact that we were in France: the food was delicious, the service pleasant (French only) and we took a leisurely drive back the the b & b. Certainly the key benefit of going right from a night flying to driving halfway down the middle of France was we established a rhythm straightaway; no jet lag, no sleeping for three hours in the middle of the day. 

guest for dinner

house red

chevre salad

mayonnaise eggs

Limousin beef avec frites

The night was dark, cool and quiet in the sleepy hamlet of Le Fauvette as we tucked ourselves in for the night.

NEXT: Oradour sur Glane, the Martyred Village