I got to know Shirley and Eddie Sessions of Carrollton when they were having some trouble with their subscription to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Thanks to the work of our dedicated delivery and customer service folks, we were able to straighten things out, and now the Sessions are regularly receiving their daily paper.
But in the course of our back-and-forth correspondence, I was lucky enough to learn a lot more about them.
It turns out that Eddie is a veteran, a private who served in the U.S. Army during World War II.
Eddie is among the 16 million Americans who were members of the armed services during that war. About 1.5 million are still living, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs. About 33,000 of those surviving veterans live in Georgia.
With all of them well into their 80s, the VA estimates that about 250,000 die each year, including more than 5,000 in Georgia.
As our nation has become more aware of how quickly we’re losing people from our “greatest generation,” many programs and initiatives have emerged to honor them and capture their memories before they die. The Honor Flight Network transports veterans to Washington D.C. to visit the World War II Memorial. Georgia Public Broadcasting has an oral history project in which veterans’ experiences are recorded.
Eddie Sessions was part of a group of veterans from the southeast who were recently honored by the French government with the Legion of Honor.
The French have been honoring American veterans who participated in liberating France during World War II. According to information provided by the French consulate, the National Order of the Legion of Honor is the highest honor in France. It’s the oldest award France bestows, and it’s given for “eminent services to the French Republic.”
At the ceremony, newly appointed Consul General of France in Atlanta, Denis Barbet, awarded the medals to a group of veterans at the consulate’s building in Buckhead.
The ceremony, attended by about 150 family members and friends, was moving and included some brief comments by the veterans after their service careers were recounted.
A couple wore military hats. As they received their medals, many struggled unsteadily to their feet. Several cried.
One, who had served as a medic, described treating young wounded German soldiers in the aftermath of a battle in France, emphasizing that they were young boys too.
One veteran described how, as his unit fought its way across France, the people in French villages would ring church bells to let the Americans know that the Germans had evacuated their town.
Through tears, another said he accepted his medal “for those who never came back.”
Eddie Sessions joined the Army on Dec. 31, 1943, and about a year later joined the 95th Infantry Division in eastern France.
He served in the 95th during its liberation of Metz, where the division earned its nickname, “Iron Men of Metz.”
In a conversation after the ceremony, with family alongside, Sessions shared some of his experiences in the war.
As seems typical of these men, he matter-of-factly recounted an episode that would seem to be one of the most dramatic moments of his life.
He said that while his unit was battling the Germans in France, they ran out of water, a crisis for those in combat.
He decided to do something about it. So during the night, he simply grabbed two plastic, five-gallon buckets. He sneaked across the German lines and filled his buckets with some of the enemy’s water, and brought it back to his unit.
It was one of several dramatic stories of his time in the war.
As I spoke with Sessions and his wife that day, they thanked me for my efforts to help with their newspaper delivery. They love reading their newspaper and keeping up with the world. I was happy to help and thankful to know Eddie’s story. Without the service of Eddie and other veterans of WW II, the world today would be a very different place.
