Continuing a series on how horrible my generation is compared to those who fought in World War II, this week, I interviewed a gentleman who is both a World War II veteran and Holocaust survivor.
Ralph Hockley was born in Germany in 1925. His family noticed some things starting to change [and, at the risk of editorializing, not for the better], so they moved to Marseille, France. His dad spent time in a concentration camp, and at the age of 14, Hockley started volunteering as an interpreter for the American Quakers in Marseille because he already knew French and German.
After defeating the Germans, Ralph Hockley decided to retire to Texas. He had already survived the Holocaust, after all, and the Quakers had to negotiate his dad’s release from the concentration camp.
And by “retire,” I mean “join the U.S. Army on his 18th birthday.” He wound up back in Paris on DDay.
He went to Korea in 1950. Hockley went with the U.S. Army and worked with a French battalion to direct artillery.
Hockley spent 25 years in the U.S. Army, spending much of that time in Germany as a U.S. intelligence officer, working with the U.K. and France.
The French consul general from Houston came to the Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum this week to present him with the Legion of Honor.
Hockley said it was “totally unbelievable” to hear from France, calling the medal a “great act of generosity.” Never mind that after escaping the Nazis, he found his civic duty to be to go back because his homeland was still under attack.
The rest of us, meanwhile, are still arguing about pronouns and vaccines. Hockley gently urges us to “be nice to each other, not to look for what makes them different from us.”
Hockley said he’s glad for museums and for the chance to tell his story of what happened in the Holocaust, saying the same principles can be applied today. He came to the U.S. as a refugee himself, after all.
Loyal Scaiaholics will recall my fascination with hearing instructions in both French and English. Hockley did that during his acceptance speech. The words of Yogi Berra have never sounded so unifying.
