US Army

Fallen soldier

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"The enemy? His sense of duty was no less than yours, I deem. You wonder what his name is, where he comes from, and if he really was evil at heart. What lies or threats led him on this long march from home, or he would not rather have stayed there... in peace? War will make corpses of us all." (Quote from The Lord of the Rings, written by J.R.R. Tolkien, WWI veteran) Pvt. Mitchell Elmo Chafin of Holden, West Virginia, an US Army engineer, covers the face of a dead German soldier following the attack on Mount Trocchio during the Allies' push to Cassino and the Gustav Line. Mortally wounded, the soldier had been left behind by his comrades as they pulled back from their defensive positions between Mt. Prochia and Mt. Trocchio, Italy. January 15, 1944. Mitchell Chafin survived the war and returned to West Virginia, married his sweetheart Katherine and raised a family, a son and three daughters. His family moved to Aiken, South Carolina in 1961 where Mitchell worked for a fiberglass company and as a barber, finally retiring from barbering in 2002. He loved boating and gardening in his free time. Mitchell passed away on January 25, 2005 at the age of 84. He was the son of Tom and Lou Emmie Chafin and brother to five siblings.The German soldier's name is unknown, as is his story and political allegiance. He too was someone's son, he was possibly a brother, maybe even a husband and father. Had he survived, his life could very well have followed a similar path to Mitchell's: marriage and raising a family, working a decent job, enjoying favourite pastimes, living a long full life before it ended peacefully in the presence of loved ones. But he was not as fortunate as Mitchell; for war made a corpse of him, and the life that could have been ended on a bloody and lonely patch of ground far from home and peace. taken from fb/Christina Boody/Official WW2 historians & buffs