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The Second World War

The phrase War is hell derived from General William Tecumseh Sherman's speech of 1880 at the Ohio State Fair where he stated, "There is many a boy here today who looks on war as all glory, but boys, it is all hell", depicts a general description of war (American Voices). The experience, difficult to describe if you were not actually in the environment, leaves effect. It not only affects the soldiers who combat war, but also the civilians who are inadvertently subjected to the effects of the battle. General Sherman referred to the Civil War in his speech, but any war - is hell.

Home front is the name given to the activities of civilians in a state of total war. During World War II, in America, women joined the work force in jobs that the men overseas used to occupy. There was a scarcity of food. To achieve their needs people would grow victory gardens to help supply necessary nutrition from vegetable gardens. There was a limit on food, as well as clothing. They were given what is called ration stamps to limit their availability to food, gasoline and clothing. Sugar and coffee were especially difficult items to get as well as silk - ladies' stockings (Hoopes, 1984). The Depression dates were 1935-1945 it was something very much on everyone's mind. Men going to war worried about the provisions for their family they left behind. Nearly 1/3 of all Americans had been out of work. Those who were working were working part-time or at a reduced pay.

Those who suffered from war were not only Americans, British, or Jews, but everyone in the countries involved and in the countries who had soldiers fighting for them. Sadly enough there were the young who had to include this strife into their lives. Innocent children unaware of the details of what occurred, or what would occur. There were the famous accounts by Anne Frank (Frank, 1996) and James Graham (Ballard, 1987), but little was heard from others who experienced the chaos.

Patricia Hardy was eight years old when war was declared. She lived in London, England distinctively remembered the day war was declared as it was on her birthday. She thought Adolf Hitler did it to spoil her birthday party. It was thereafter when she seemed to realize what had happened in her small world. Air raid sirens were being tested. The people were fitted with gas masks that "smelled awful", and didn't fit properly. However, she did remember what was thought to be an exciting thing at the beginning of the war. Volunteers were recruited to portray victims in a pretend raid. All the children would gather to have their arms, heads, legs and other parts of their body bandaged. They would then be carried off in a stretcher. The children would also go around looking for pieces of shrapnel - each trying to get the biggest piece - the experienced typical childish behavior. There were rations of meat, bacon, butter cheese, sugar and tea. Seasonal produce was preserved in bottles (which was most prevalently available) that contained plums, tomatoes, pears. A piece of "fried bread with bottled tomatoes" was tasty, Patricia remembers. Her memories of war had effect, but to other adolescents it was more horrific (Hardy, 1997).

A fictitious aristocratic British youth, James Graham, had been separated from his family at the start of World War II after the Japanese Army invades British controlled areas of China. His life had previously been privileged. He was spoiled and of a wealthy family who resided in pre-World War II Shanghai. As the story continues he found himself separated from his parents, fighting for food and living on the street. Survival was taught to him from a soldier-of-fortune. James now learns how to fend for himself without a retinue of servants at his beck and call. He was eventually captured and taken to a Soo Chow confinement camp for British civilians, next to a captured Chinese airfield. During the war he was amidst sickness and food shortages in the camp. He attempted to reconstruct his former life as he brought our spirit and dignity to those around him. He learned to be street smart and developed intestinal fortitude to regard his imprisonment as an exciting adventure. His story ends during the 1945 liberation when he is 13, on the verge to manhood. From the struggle of war he has learned to survive - and is appreciative that he doesn't have to be pampered no longer. The Empire of the Sun of which he is the main person exemplifies a story of morality. It is a true story based on the authors own childhood experiences at Lunghua during World War II (Ballard).

The most devastating stories of wartime is that of a young Jewish girl who writes her memoirs in a diary - the memorable Anne Frank. Anne's diary was written during the years 1942-1944. These were the toughest of times of World War II in Europe. It was when Hitler's army spread the poison of anti-Semitism and race hatred. Among other notorious rules, Jews were not allowed to marry or work with non-Jews. They were forced to wear a yellow star in public so they could be recognized by German police and non-Jews, and were segregated into their own schools, businesses, neighborhoods, and were banned from public facilities. Hitler implemented his "final solution" for the Jews - extermination. Many of the Jews were rounded up and sent to concentration camps in Poland and Germany. They were worked to exhaustion and then gassed, shot, or left to die from one of the diseases that often ran rampant through the camps. Anne Frank had written her account in this climate. She knew if her family was captured by the Nazis they too would be sent away to a camp for death. Her eyes centralized on growing up and looking for the good in human beings (Harris, 1975).

The Frank family went into hiding trying to escape their destiny. They hid in a building on the Prinsengracht, which is alongside of one of the most beautiful canals of Amsterdam, Netherlands. It had consisted of two parts, a front house and a back annex. Otto, Edith, Margot, and Anne, the Frank's, had their hiding place in the uppermost floors of the back annex. Later they were joined by the Dussel's, the family of the local dentist who had a son Peter. This was their sanction for 2 years. Anne's diary began on her 13th birthday of which she writes as any normal teenager would. She speaks of school, friends and even discusses a boy of whom she is fond.

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