U.S. World War II Army Enlistment Records, 1938-1946
about Melvin R Van Gundy Jr
Name: Melvin R Van Gundy Jr
Birth Year: 1921
Race: White, citizen (White)
Nativity State or Country: Florida
State of Residence: Florida
County or City: Duval
Enlistment Date: 22 Jun 1942
Enlistment State: Florida
Enlistment City: Orlando Air Base
Branch: Air Corps
Branch Code: Air Corps
Grade: Private
Grade Code: Private
Term of Enlistment: Enlistment for the duration of the War or othereme rgency, plus six months, subject to the discretion of thePresident or o therwise according to law
Component: Army of the United States - includes the following:Voluntar y enlistments effective December 8, 1941 and thereafter; Oneyear enlis tments of National Guardsman whose State enlistment expireswhile in th e Federal Service; Officers appointed in the Army of
Source: Civil Life
World War II Prisoners of War, 1941-1946
about Melvin R Jr Vangundy
Name: Melvin R Jr Vangundy
Race: White
Residence State: Florida
Report Date: 21 Jun 1944
Latest Report Date: 18 Jul 1945
Grade: Second Lieutenant or Nurse or Dietitian or Physical therapyaide
Grade Notes: Second Lieutenant or Ensign
Service Branch: Army
Arm or Service: Air Corps
Arm or Service Code: Air Corps
Area Served: European Theatre: Germany
Detaining Country: Germany
Camp: 033
Status: Returned to Military Control, Liberated or Repatriated
Report Source: Individual has been reported through sources consideredo fficial.
U.S. Public Records Index, Volume 2
about Melvin R Van Gundy
Name: Melvin R Van Gundy
Birth Date: 5 Jan 1921
Address: 27 Village Walk CT
City: Ponte Vedra
State: FL
Zip Code: 32082-3542
U.S. Public Records Index, Volume 2
about Melvin R Van Gundy
Name: Melvin R Van Gundy
Birth Date: 5 Jan 1921
Address: 1612 St Michel CT
City: Ponte Vedra Beach
State: FL
Zip Code: 32004
Published Saturday, May 14, 2005
60 years later, he recalls it all vividly
By Maggie FitzRoy
Shorelines staff writer,
Sixty years later, the memories are still vivid, running like moviesce nes across his mind. He can see the enemy's bullets strafing thesky, h is B-17 bomber twisting and turning and falling toward theground. He c an see himself pulling out his parachute as he's falling,the German fa rmer who found him and held him at gunpoint, theinterrogators and guar ds at the prison camps where he was taken.
Melvin Van Gundy of Ponte Vedra Beach is surrounded by memoribilia ofh is experience as a prisoner of war in World War II 60 years ago.MAGGIE F ITZROY/The Times-Union
And he can see Gen. George Patton riding into camp atop a Shermantank, c oming to the rescue, two pearl-handled pistols at his side.
"It was the day of deliverance, never to be forgotten," Melvin R."Van" V an Gundy of Ponte Vedra Beach said this week as he recalledthe events o f World War II that shaped his life as a young man.
April 29, 1945, was Van Gundy's day of deliverance by Patton and hisTh ird Army. May 8, 2005, marked the 60th anniversary of the Nazisurrende r, V-E Day.
Van Gundy, who was a prisoner at the Stalag Luft III North Camp, saidh e will never forget what happened then and it's important that theworl d doesn't either.
"People can't make judgments on current affairs if they don't knowhist ory," said his wife, Helen, who recently accompanied her husbandto a r eunion of flying officers who are ex-prisoners of the war.
Van Gundy gets around well, but many of the 130 men attending theevent i n Tucson, Ariz., last month were using wheelchairs, walkers orcanes.
"We were supposed to have our last reunion in 1995," he said, on the50 th anniversary of the end of the war. But since then, they've hadthree . Those who can, plan to meet again in two years.
"A bunch of old guys, we want to be together again," Van Gundy said.At t he reunion, "they still enjoyed telling their stories. And eachone is d ifferent."
A member of the Florida First Coast Chapter of American Ex-Prisonersof W ar, Van Gundy also socializes regularly with others aroundJacksonville .
Fellow member Carl Creamer, who is the organization's historian, saidh e is proud of having been a prisoner of war. His plane was shot downov er the Bering Sea and he spent 3 1/2 years in a Japanese prison. Hesai d the only reason he is still alive is because he was a POW.
He thinks often about those who were shot down with him who died thatd ay, although he says he doesn't dwell on their fate.
Melvin Van Gundy (second from left) stands with fellow officers beforet heir flying mission over Berlin in World War II. Of those pictured,onl y Van Gundy and his co-pilot, Harold Lerum (right) survived themission a fter their B-17 collided with another plane during themission. They we re both captured by the Germans. Special
"That's why we're living free today, because people gave their lives,"h e said.
Van Gundy was taken as a prisoner of war on June 21, 1944, after hispl ane collided with another American B-17 during an air battle overBerli n. He piloted the aircraft that held nine other men. Only VanGundy, hi s co-pilot, Harold Lerum, and two others survived.
In the other plane, only the tail gunner survived and, he was takenpri soner with the others.
The farmer who found them "was shaking worse than I was," said VanGund y, who had broken his ankle in the fall.
"I was glad to see someone, 'cause I was hurting," he said.
Van Gundy was born in Jacksonville and grew up there. He graduatedfrom A ndrew Jackson High School in 1939 and then went to work forTurner Elec tric.
But when the war started, he wanted to get into the Army Air Corps,sin ce he was interested in flying. He had earned a private license in1940 , but didn't qualify for the Air Corps at first since he did nothave t wo years of college. So he joined the Glider Program to flyaircraft wi thout engines.
Halfway through that program, he ended up qualifying for the Air Corpsa nd went for B-25 training in Colorado. After further training to flyB- 17's, he picked up a crew in Tampa in January 1944 and by thatApril, w as in Scotland.
He flew two missions within 24 hours on D-Day, June 6. On June 21, hew as taken prisoner during a special mission targeting an aircraftassemb ly craft in Berlin.
"None of us wanted to go to Berlin," he said. It was a tough target,we ll protected. It was his 13th mission and his last.
He said he doesn't remember how he was ejected from the plane. Theywer e flying at 33,000 feet with no oxygen. By the time he had hischute re ady, he had fallen to 15,000 feet. He said everythinghappened so fast, h e didn't have time to be scared.
Found by farmer
The farmer who found the survivors took them via horse-drawn wagon toa l ittle town 60 miles north of Berlin. The farmer held the gun; hiswife a nd daughter supported Van Gundy because he was injured. Oncethe Americ ans were turned over to authorities, they were placed in alittle count ry jail for two days with no food or water.
"I started counting the cracks on the wall," Van Gundy said. "I had tod o something besides breathe."
After that, Van Gundy was placed in a shed behind a hospital, withothe r wounded Americans. As his ankle healed, he and the others werebitten b y bed bugs every night. They were "eating us up," he said.
He never forgot the kindness of his orderly, a Polish prisoner, whohel ped him survive. When Van Gundy left, he wanted to give theorderly som ething, but had nothing. Except a U.S. dime that he foundin his pocket .
"You'd think I had given him $1,000," Van Gundy said. "I wish I couldh ave given him more."
Van Gundy was sent to Frankfurt, where he was interrogated, then to ah ospital, then to Stalag Luft III at Sagan, near the Russian border.It w as the fall of 1944; he shared a room with eight other guys. Itwas the c amp where months earlier, 77 men had escaped by tunnelingout. All but t hree were recaptured and 50 were killed by the Germansas an example to t he others. Those events were portrayed in the movieThe Great Escape.
Forced march
In January 1945, Van Gundy and the others were forced to march toNurem berg, traveling 50 miles in bitter cold. Many of the men gotfrostbite. T wo of the German guards collapsed from fatigue and died.
In March, they were force-marched again to Moosburg, near Munich.There , they gained weight, because they were permitted to go into thecountr yside to scrounge for food. Many townspeople were generous andhelped t he Americans "kriegies," the German word for prisoners. Onefrau, or ho usewife, gave them a ham, said Van Gundy, who lost about55 pounds duri ng his stint as a POW.
Van Gundy said there was no reason to try to escape because they knewf rom secret British radio broadcasts that the war was nearly over.
Van Gundy said he wanted people to know what happened to thousands ofa irmen so their sacrifices would never be forgotten. After the war,he r eturned to Jacksonville and became a sales engineer. He marriedhis swe etheart June; they were married for 53 years and raised fourchildren. A fter June died of cancer, he married Helen, a widow, in2000.
He said he would have liked to go to college or become an airlinepilot . He didn't qualify to fly for the airlines because he lackedthe flyin g time -- since he spent so much time as a POW. But he saidhe has no r egrets.
Occasionally he looks through a scrapbook he put together after thewar . It contains his POW tag, the number 2047 is rusty and faded. Itconta ins letters he received from home when he was a prisoner. He hasphotos o f himself and those who flew with him -- those who lived andthose who d idn't.
In the front, long ago, he listed all of their names and penned thesew ords:
"I dedicate this page in memory of the members of our crew not asfortu nate as we."
Staff writer Maggie FitzRoy can be reached at (904) 249-4947,extension 2 0, or via e-mail at maggie.fitzroyjacksonville.com.
