My dad, Francis E. Burns, was one of those brave soldiers who landed on the beaches of Normandy. He was very young and yet he had expertise in communication codes. He never spoke much about it, but years later, when I came along, we went to a movie called "The Longest Day." We saw it as a rerun, years after it first came out.

My dad sat in silence and then I had the courage to ask: "Daddy, were you on that beach?" He looked at me and said with reverence, "Yes, Bobby, I was there." I said: "Daddy, you are very brave."

He looked at me with tears in his eyes and said, "Every man on those beaches was brave. But the chaplains were the bravest. It made no difference what your religion was, but they went to every man dying and wounded and exposed themselves to unrelenting bullets and bombs. They never took cover. They had no guns. But every man looked to them for help and consolation and prayers as they were dying."

From the beaches my dad went on to fight in other battles, including the Battle of the Bulge, and his men liberated the Nazi death camp, Buchenwald, where he met and befriended a young Elie Wiesel, who later became my friend, too. My dad went on to fight in other wars, too numerous to mention, and yet he was never bitter and never one to hate. He was part of the Greatest Generation.

Robert E. Burns


The writer is a professor of communication and media at the University of Rhode Island.