Stratford man awarded Legion of Honor

Ralph Martire says he isn't brave.

But his modest raised ranch in Stratford is covered with medals, citations, official declarations and pieces of memorabilia from his time fighting in World War II as a member of Gen. George S. Patton's 3rd Army, 90th Infantry Division.

There's the Croix de Guerre, which he was awarded by the French government for liberating France.

There's the Purple Heart he was awarded after being wounded by a mortar explosion that left shrapnel in his left leg.

There's the Bronze Star for valor he won for saving the lives of four of his fellow soldiers while under Nazi machine gun fire in Thionville, France.

And, just a few weeks ago, Martire was honored again for his selfless heroics by the French government

with its highest award, the medal of the Legion of Honor — an award instituted by Napoleon Bonaparte.

Yet despite all these — and the dozens of other honors he's earned in his 83 years — Ralph Martire says he's not particularly brave.

"The brave ones are lying in France," he said.

***

Martire was 18 years old when he was drafted in 1943, a new graduate of Bridgeport's Central High School.

He had a part-time job at Underwood Corp. building Venetian blinds. He loved to play basketball. He was in love with one of his former classmates at Central, Rose Tuccio.

He was a typical teenager.

But once President Franklin D. Roosevelt instituted the draft, he was shipped off to Texas for basic training, California for desert training and then Louisiana before ending up at Fort Dix, N.J.

"They say that my dad was a carefree guy in high school," said Ralph M. Martire, Ralph's son. "He had a different perspective, to say the least, when he came back."

Not long after arriving at Fort Dix, he was again shipped out, this time to Birmingham, England, to train for the Normandy invasion at Utah Beach, that took place 63 years ago today. That training lasted several months.

After training, all Martire and his company could do was wait. For four days, they sat aboard the Excelsior in the middle of the English Channel, waiting for Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower to give the word to launch the attack.

Aside from training for a beach landing, Martire says he and his buddies had no idea what they were about to face.

"When we actually hit the shore, that's where we started to realize what we were getting into, because men were falling all around you," he said.

At that instant, the carefree, fun-loving Ralph Martire from Bridgeport was changed forever.

***

Leaping from the boat after landing on the beach between Pouppeville and La Madeleine, holding his rifle high above his head to keep it from getting wet, Martire was overwhelmed by the vast openness of the beach. Utah was the westernmost of the five beaches the Allies stormed that day. By comparison, the carnage at Utah was minor. About 700 Allied soldiers were killed on Utah Beach, compared to 3,336 at Omaha Beach.

"The other beaches, some of them had it worse than we did," Martire said. "But it was bad enough on Utah Beach."

The Nazi soldiers were holed up in bunkers, separated by about 100 yards of open land. In front of each bunker were some of Normandy's infamous hedgerows — small walls of shrubbery designed to leave invading forces brutally vulnerable to German fire.

Martire climbed through each hedge, one by one.

"When we hit the hedgerows, that's when we started to have problems," he said. "It was like going through Hell, one step at a time."

Death was all around him.

"When you see your buddies die and ask for help," Martire said, his voice trailing and his eyes welling up with tears.

He took a long pause. Finally, the silence was broken with a sharp inhale.

"It's no joke."

***

For nearly a year after D-Day, Martire and his company crisscrossed Europe, taking control of village after village, town after town.

He fought in the Battle of the Bulge. He took part in the Rhineland and Ardennes campaigns. He cleaned out the ovens at the Buchenwald concentration camp.

Along the way, he had dozens of nearly fatal experiences, such as the time the 90th was called to take the town of Avranches, France. He was one of the unlucky few chosen to go on the preliminary patrol of the town and report back.

"They told us we had to return with a scouting report, 'at all costs,' " Martire said. "We always hated it when they said that."

The patrol was quiet, and he and the five other soldiers almost returned without incident. On their way back to camp, the Germans opened fire on his patrol, with massive M-42 machine guns — 45mm, semi-automatic anti-tank guns.

Three were hit and killed instantly. Martire and the other three returned fire and ran.

He was back at base when he noticed the singed bullet hole in his shirt.

"That made me a little nervous," he said.

Then there was the time when, crawling on his stomach, an anti-aircraft bullet missed his ear by a few inches. Once he realized what had happened, he dug the bullet out of the ground and put it in his pocket.

Now, it sits on the wall of his living room, on the bottom of the display case that holds his Purple Heart.

***

After the war, Martire devoted himself to his family.

He had only one trip back to Connecticut during his stretch in the Army, and it lasted four days.

During those four days, he and Rose were married. They went on to have four children, three girls and a boy.

"He was a great dad," Martire's son said. "He was very loving and very hard working, a great example for us kids."

Martire held a few manufacturing jobs until, in 1962, he left his job at Vitramon Corp. in Newtown and went to school to become an embalmer — "I think all the blood and guts I saw in Europe prepared me for it," he said — at McAllister School of Embalming in Manhattan.

For a year and a half, Martire worked from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m., took a train for class at 9 a.m., took the 4 p.m. train back to Stratford, ate dinner and took a nap before starting all over again for work at 11 p.m.

After he graduated, he served a two-year apprenticeship, which was "basically unpaid."

All this with four young children to provide for.

"It wasn't easy," Martire said. "I had to feed my family in the middle of all this."

When his son Ralph went to college, Martire and his wife divorced.

"They waited until all the kids were grown," the young Martire said. "I think, like many of the people of that generation, whether your marriage was working or not, you stuck with it for the kids."

Over the years, Martire worked as a director for several area funeral homes and founded a livery service. He kept involved in as many things as possible to provide his kids the best childhood he could.

***

Martire retired in 1987 and has spent the last 20 years focusing on his other passions: maintaining an immaculate yard, his pets, writing poems and singing.

"My mother wanted me to be a singer," he said.

He's even recorded an album for friends and family of a cappella renditions of standards from the '40s and '50s. His favorite song is "Angel in Heaven" by Lou Monte.

"I love the song, but when I sing it I change the lyrics to 'angels in heaven,' " Martire said. "I feel like we all have a few angels up there."

He credits his girlfriend of 25 years, Judith Gulia, for helping him stay active.

"She's been very helpful to me," Martire said.

He still mows his lawn once a week, the same lawn he's mowed every week, when the weather is nice, for the past 53 years. He just laid down mulch under some shrubs last week.

But his left leg — the one with the shrapnel — has been acting up over the past 10 years. He has had three operations on it.

"It still hurts," he said. "The doctors told me if I wanted to get it all out, I'd be left with a lot less mobility, and I can't lose that."

It's just another reminder of the places he's been and the things he's seen. A literal, relentless reminder.

Martire still thinks about the war every day.

"When you see the things we saw, it doesn't leave you. It sticks with you," he said.

Keith Whamond, who covers regional issues for ConnPost.com, can be reached at 330-6388.