Edward Riedl was born in November 1920 in New Orleans [Annotator's Note: New Orleans, Louisiana] and grew up there. He had five brothers and five sisters. He was number six. They grew up during the Great Depression [Annotator's Note: Great Depression; a global economic depression that lasted through the 1930s]. His father was mixed up in politics, and then he was a plumber. Bread only cost a nickel for a loaf, and butter was 35 cents a pound. They had no beef, only veal. Veal rounds were ten cents. They could not afford chicken. There was very little money. They could get a lot of candy for a penny. Salaries were small. People worked for ten to 12 dollars a week. They could rent a nice house for eight or ten dollars a month. Riedl's parents owned the house he was born in. His father served in the Navy during the First World War [Annotator's Note: World War 1, global war originating in Europe; 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918]. Riedl went to junior high and then he got a job at a silk company. He did not finish high school. The Japanese stopped sending silk so Riedl went to work for a trucking company as a clerk. When he was 21 years old in November 1941, he had to register for the draft. Two weeks later, Pearl Harbor was bombed [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. Riedl was notified of his examination to be classified. He reported to Camp Beauregard in Alexandria, Louisiana. After his examination, he went to Oregon for training.

Edward Riedl was waiting for his girlfriend to come out of her house when he was told Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941] had been bombed. He did not realize that Pearl Harbor was part of the United States. As the evening went on, they heard Roosevelt's [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States] speech [Annotator's Note: Day of Infamy Speech; President Franklin D. Roosevelt to a Joint Session of the United States Congress, 8 December 1941]. He knew he would be going into the service. He was drafted. He did not want to be in the Navy or the Marines. He was satisfied with the Army. When he got to Camp Beauregard in Alexandria, Louisiana, he had to get in line, strip down, get shots, and then he was issued his uniforms. Out in the Pacific, the weather was mild. He did not want to be in the Navy because he did not want to die in the water. As far as the Marines, he would be just as satisfied in the Army and he did not want to have a military career. [Annotator's Note: Riedl tells a story about his wife's brothers dying in the war.] Riedl left in September or October 1942. On his first furlough [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time] in June 1943, he got married. He went on leave [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time] for Christmas in 1943 and he was in Washington state at Fort Lewis. He was married for 67 years. [Annotator's Note: Riedl talks about his wife.]

Edward Riedl played baseball in the 1930s. His goal was to be a professional baseball player. New Orleans [Annotator's Note: New Orleans, Louisiana] had several professional and semi-professional teams. When he was 12 years old, he was the bat boy for the Red Rocks. For another job he had, he earned seven dollars a week. Wives did not work in those days. He worked for a trucking company for 15 years. In Roosevelt's [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States] speech [Annotator's Note: Day of Infamy Speech; President Franklin D. Roosevelt to a Joint Session of the United States Congress, 8 December 1941] when Pearl Harbor was bombed [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941], he named three cities: New York [Annotator's Note: New York, New York], San Francisco [Annotator's Note: San Francisco, California], and New Orleans. When the war started, they built up the port in New Orleans. Higgins [Annotator's Note: Andrew Jackson Higgins, founder of Higgins Industries] was building landing boats [Annotator's Note: Landing Craft Personnel, Large, or LCP(l); later the Landing Craft Vehicle, Personnel or LCVP; also known as the Higgins boat]. The boats were designed to make landing on beaches easier. Riedl went in on a Duck [Annotator's Note: DUKW; six-wheel-drive amphibious truck; also known as a Duck]. They could go on water or land. The beach at Leyte [Annotator's Note: Leyte, the Philippines] had a wire for the Duck to get traction to get on the beach. The Higgins boats would go to land and drop the front.

Edward Riedl remembers that the Duck [Annotator's Note: DUKW; six-wheel-drive amphibious truck; also known as a Duck] had an A-frame on top of it. They were lowered down and left with their guns and the rest of their equipment. The LSTs [Annotator's Note: Landing Ship, Tank] had to go all the way to the beach to let the trucks out. Leyte [Annotator's Note: the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the Philippines; 23 to 26 October 1944] was one of the last naval battles against Japan. Once they won the battle, they had complete control of the Pacific. There was a lot of fighting on Leyte. It was the first island in the Philippines that MacArthur [Annotator's Note: General of the Army Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander, Southwest Pacific Area] hit. Riedl was in control of the men and everything to do with the firing. When they would move, the number one gun would zero in on the targets. They had their forward observers send messages to the gunners. The other three guns would take the reading from the number one gun. The Japs [Annotator's Note: a period derogatory term for Japanese] were always after the big guns on Leyte. Riedl's right-hand man got shot by a Jap who had broken through the line. Riedl took the man back to the beach, but the boats had been pulled back. The sniper that got him was gone. They got the sniper before he could shoot anyone else.

Edward Riedl shipped out around April 1944. They stopped on Eniwetok [Annotator's Note: Eniwetok Atoll, Marshall Islands] and got eight beer cans each. They drove from the state of Washington all the way down to San Diego [Annotator's Note: San Diego, California]. They had their training at night in Hawaii. They did practice landing along the west coast. They did the most training in Hawaii at night. They saw a couple of planes crash. Riedl felt lucky to be in the same division the whole war. The night before they landed on Leyte [Annotator's Note: Leyte, the Philippines] they were on an LST [Annotator's Note: Landing Ship, Tank]. They were told that if they saw anything move in the water to shoot it. When they landed on Okinawa [Annotator's Note: Okinawa, Japan] there were no shots fired. At Leyte, there were battleships firing at them and planes. The problem at Okinawa was the coral reef. Riedl had to lie on the front of the boat and guide the driver to land. They did very little firing on Okinawa. They built a hospital across from their position. The head doctor of the hospital was from New Orleans [Annotator's Note: New Orleans, Louisiana].

When Edward Riedl went ashore [Annotator's Note: during the landing on Leyte, Philippines], Zeros [Annotator's Note: Japanese Mitsubishi A6M fighter aircraft, referred to as the Zeke or Zero] were flying around. The men were told not to smoke in the open at night. They would hear screams all night every night. The Japanese were after the big guns. The Japanese would throw a grenade to get the attention of the guns to find their positions. They moved in as far as they could. They stayed right behind the infantry. Their main job was to protect the infantry. They also had to look for the enemy's big guns and knock them out. It rained every day on Leyte. Riedl would never be directly under the coconut trees because the vibrations from the guns would cause coconuts to fall from the treetops. Riedl would not fire in the dark because they did not want to give away their position. There were three sets of artillery fire. Riedl's number two man was the only one on the guns who was killed. They saw a lot of civilians. The food consisted of coconuts, fish, and rice. They used bamboo poles for running water. Their women would bathe with clothes on so no one could see anything.

Edward Riedl thought the people [Annotator's Note: he is referring to the people on Leyte, Philippines] seemed primitive and different from the lifestyle he knew. They had something called the Filipino squat where they squatted on their legs all day. They set up stands and sold American cigarettes to their people. He does not know how they made a living. They made wine. Riedl was there because he was drafted to fight. He went there to win. The lack of physical hygiene was the worst part. He went there to fight and win for his country. Some men did not go overseas. They would get three pieces of chocolate, one for each meal. When the war ended they left Okinawa [Annotator's Note: Okinawa, Japan] on a small infantry boat. They dropped the atomic bombs [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 6 and 9 August 1945] when they were on their way back to the Philippines. They were scheduled to land in Japan in November [Annotator's Note: November 1945].

Edward Riedl remembers that Okinawa [Annotator's Note: Okinawa, Japan] was different than Leyte [Annotator's Note: Leyte, Philippines]. The terrain was different. Okinawa was all Japanese people. The civilians were told to stay in at night. They were told that the Americans would torture them. They were only a few miles from Tokyo [Annotator's Note: Tokyo, Japan]. Okinawa was mountainous. More soldiers and Marines landed on Okinawa than at Normandy [Annotator's Note: D-Day; the Allied invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944]. They were firing all their guns. Some of the guns sounded like a train going over their heads at night. Smoking cigarettes was their only pleasure. There was a range finder on Riedl's gun. At night, they would see a flash and then zero the gun in on that area. They would fire at the guns in the mountains. The Japanese were committing suicide and they were told the military was too. A lot of civilians were killed at night. The Japanese had a lot of horses. They landed on Easter Sunday, 1 April [Annotator's Note: 1 April 1945]. The artillery had to stay in position because they were afraid of the suicides. They had 160 planes that volunteered for suicide missions [Annotator's Note: kamikazes] to go after the American ships in the harbor of Okinawa. Riedl only saw one battleship while he was at Leyte. It was carrier warfare in the Pacific. He had gotten used to seeing dead people. It was kill or be killed. They were in a little village that had all grass huts.

Edward Riedl felt that if they did not kill, they would be killed themselves. The Japs [Annotator's Note: a period derogatory term for Japanese] were loyal to their emperor. They thought nothing of it after the atomic bombs [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 6 and 9 August 1945] were dropped. There were dead Japanese and they were bloated. There was a guy on a bulldozer digging a hole to put the bodies in. When the bodies popped, they had to put their gas masks on to keep the smell away. They knew that they would be part of the invasion of Japan. They had their training in the United States. Once they got overseas, they were on their own. When they finished their battle on Leyte [Annotator's Note: the Battle of Leyte, Philippines; 17 to 26 December 1944] they were between Bataan and Corregidor [Annotator's Note: Bataan and Corregidor, the Philippines] where the Bataan Death March [Annotator's Note: the Bataan Death March was the forcible transfer by the Imperial Japanese Army of 60,000 to 80,000 American and Filipino prisoners of war who were forced to march until they died, beginning 9 April 1942] happened. Riedl remembers they were relaxing while their guns were being changed. Then they found out that they would be going to Okinawa [Annotator's Note: Okinawa, Japan]. All the Japanese people were supposed to defend their country. They needed to fight using anything they could find for weapons. Riedl was leaving Okinawa when he heard about the atomic bombs on the radio. Roosevelt [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States] died [Annotator's Note: on 12 April 1945] while they were on Okinawa. They were concerned about Roosevelt dying. When Truman [Annotator's Note: Harry S. Truman, 33rd President of the United States] took over, everything continued the same. They went back to the Philippines to get reequipped for the invasion of Japan. There was a treaty to end the war after the bombs were dropped. It had to be unconditional surrender. The emperor decided to do the unconditional surrender. They were happy the war was over. They could not believe they were going to go home. It was a quiet time.

Edward Riedl had to count his points [Annotator's Note: a point system was devised based on a number of factors that determined when American servicemen serving overseas could return home] in order to see if he could go home. Riedl's daughter was a year old when the peace treaty for Japan was signed [Annotator's Note: on 2 September 1945 aboard the USS Missouri (BB-63)]. He was discharged in December [Annotator's Note: December 1945] from Camp Tyler [Annotator's Note: Camp Tyler, Texas]. His family was waiting for him at the railroad station. Seeing the American flag made him feel at home. [Annotator's Note: Riedl gets emotional talking about the American flag.] When they came into San Francisco [Annotator's Note: San Francisco, California], a band was playing and people were clapping and happy to see them. The guys that won the war are still over there. Riedl was lucky. If they had invaded Japan, they had to be prepared to shoot children. He did not have trouble transitioning back to civilian life. The war never leaves you.