Joseph Hartmann was born in September 1925 in Patterson, New Jersey. He had two sisters that are younger. In the Depression [Annotator's Note: the Great Depression was a global economic depression that lasted from 1929 through 1939 in the United States] days, there was no work. His father worked in silk mills and would travel around to fix the leather belts in machines. They ended up in Columbia [Annotator's Note: Columbia, New Jersey] where he [Annotator's Note: Hartmann's father] met his mother. They lived in Patterson. His mother had an uncle who owned a barroom. His father worked part-time in a nightclub. When the uncle died, his parents were asked if they would run the bar. They did because they needed work. They moved to Columbia in 1939. His father ran the bar. Hartmann went to the eighth grade at Holy Trinity School. Then he went to Columbia High School. His sophomore year was in 1942. School was over and he wanted to join the Navy but he was only 16 years old. He begged his parents to let him join. His father thought they would not take him. He went to sign up and two weeks later he got the call. He went to Philadelphia [Annotator's Note: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania]. He had dislocated his shoulder, and he took his arm out of the sling to take the physical. He passed the physical. The man who looked over his papers saw he was only 16 years old and sent him home. Three days after he turned 17, he reported back to Philadelphia. He got sworn in and was transferred to Lakehurst Naval Air Station [Annotator's Note: then Naval Air Station Lakehurst, now Lakehurst Maxfield Field, in Ocean County, New Jersey]. He was assigned to the anti-submarine division. They worked 24 [Annotator's Note: 24 hours] on, 24 on standby, and 24 off. 24 hours they stayed in the hanger. There was no heat in the hanger. Between jobs, they slept in their clothes.

Joseph Hartmann did nine to 12 months of duty. The battleship USS New Jersey (BB-62) was being commissioned. They all wanted to go where the action was and they put in to transfer to the New Jersey. They were transferred to Long Island [Annotator's Note: Long Island, New York] to advanced amphibious training. They did not want amphibious training, they wanted to go to sea. They got orders in January 1944 and went to New York where they got on a troopship. They went over and landed in Wales [Annotator's Note: Wales, United Kingdom] at night. Then they went on a troop train to Scotland for more advanced amphibious training. He was sick on the train. They had huts with furnaces in the middle. His buddies got him wrapped up and put him next to the furnace. The next morning he went to sickbay. He had scarlet fever [Annotator's Note: a bacterial illness that develops in some people who have strep throat]. He was in bed for 30 days. By the time he felt good and they were going to release him, he contracted another sickness like pneumonia. All the other guys were out training and he was in bed. When he got out, he got one day on the rifle range and one day to learn how to throw grenades. Then, they were shipped to Plymouth, England. They walked into the barracks and the other guys called them the "suicide squad." They were there for two or three weeks. They were sitting on a hill and they could see bombs going off. Next, they went to the shipyard to board a British ship, the HMS Capetown. The crew was half American. There was a British flag flying on the ship. The Americans went up to the captain and told him they wanted to serve under the American flag. They flew an American flag as well after that. One night when they were sleeping they heard the engines start. The next morning when they got up they were right in the middle of the invasion [Annotator's Note: D-Day; the Allied invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944] fleet. Ike [Annotator's Note: General of the Army Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower, Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force; 34th President of the United States] told them they were like traffic cops. Their job was to direct the other ships where they were supposed to go.

Joseph Hartmann remembers that by 6:30 [Annotator's Note: on the morning of D-Day; the Allied invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944], "all hell had broken loose." Planes were flying overhead. They missed the target. They could see the men going down nets loading onto the LCVPs [Annotator's Note: Landing Craft Vehicle, Personnel or LCVP; also known as the Higgins boat], and then they would go in. The LCVPs would go down and then come up. They were being picked off by 88s [Annotator's Note: German 88mm multi-purpose artillery] right out of the water. They took all the big guns off the ship. It was a light cruiser. Life aboard the ship was horrible. They got one bucket of water a day to bathe and brush their teeth. The Germans would come over every night. At night they could not tell which planes were which. They were shooting down their own planes. The Germans would come over and drop flares and their bombs then head home. It got to a point when they would not set off the alarms when the Germans dropped their flares. They were no longer staying up for watching. The Germans would do it at night just to disrupt their sleep. One night when they were sleeping it felt like the ship jumped. Guys were tumbling everywhere. They were scrambling to get out to go to their post. Hartmann was born and raised in a white [Annotator's Note: Caucasian] German, Polish, Irish neighborhood. The bomb hit the freighter next to them. It blew that ship apart. When they got out to the deck, there were three Black [Annotator's Note: African-American] guys huddled in a corner trying to crawl under their helmets. He was disgusted by it. The next day they were using radar. It was a foggy day and they could not see other ships. The ships were communicating with their horns. Then, a large freighter almost hit them. They sat there for three months. They were there before D-Day [Annotator's Note: D-Day; the Allied invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944]. Then they went to England to get more supplies. They were using sonar to detect submarines. They sunk a submarine. Then they went back for three months. In the first three months after the beach was secured, they were going to send an LCVP in with officers on it for a meeting. They asked for volunteers to go in with them. He decided he would go in with them because he wanted to get off the ship. They went in and he sat on the Mulberry [Annotator's Note: temporary portable harbours developed by the United Kingdom during World War 2 to facilitate the rapid offloading of cargo onto beaches during the Allied invasion of Normandy in June 1944], the dock they had made to unload the boats. He saw the Pennsylvania division [Annotator's Note: 28th Infantry Division] and he thought he would see someone he knew. When he looked up he saw a pillbox [Annotator's Note: a type of blockhouse, or concrete dug-in guard-post, normally equipped with loopholes through which defenders can fire weapons] and decided to walk over to it. It was in a position to hold up the entire area. They could not get it from land. They sent a destroyer down with the coordinates. They unloaded and put a shell right into the opening on the pillbox.

Joseph Hartmann went back to England and was sent to Southampton [Annotator's Note: Southampton, England]. He was put on the USS LST-506. They would take troops, trucks, and supplies over to France then would bring back wounded Americans and German prisoners of war. Some of the prisoners were 12, 13, or 14 year old kids. He could not believe that. He can still see the kids looking up at him confused. They took them to England. They would beach the boat and then unload them. They knew if the tide went out the boat would get stuck, so they would take their time unloading. Then the men were given a piece of barbed wire to wrap around their hands. If the prisoners were not moving fast enough they were to whip them across the butt with the barbed wire to get them going. If they did not move they whacked them. Then they got orders to go to Le Harve, France. They were happy about that. Le Harve was a thriving city. They got liberty [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time] when they got there. He was the leading seaman on the USS LST-506. They went in and the French were giving them bottles of cognac. They were drunk going back to the ship. The next morning they were leaving by convoy to go to Norway. The Germans would not give up control of Norway. They sent a convoy of LSTs [Annotator's Note: Landing Ship, Tank] to Norway with minesweepers. One group went to the capital of Norway [Annotator's Note: Oslo, Norway] and the other group went to the western end. They were going to the North Sea and it was the most heavily mined area in the world. They were the first ships going through it. They were scared to death. The invasion was over and the war was over. They had minesweepers in front of them. They would cut the mines loose and if they were far enough away they would blow them up. They were going up the fjords [Annotator's Note: a long, narrow, deep inlet of the sea between high cliffs, as in Norway and Iceland, typically formed by submergence of a glaciated valley] and the Germans had gun placements and they thought if they did not want to surrender they were in trouble because they only had 40mm [Annotator's Note: Bofors 40mm antiaircraft automatic cannon] and 20mm [Annotator's Note: Oerlikon 20mm antiaircraft automatic cannon] guns. They tied up at a dock and Germans were walking around with rifles on their shoulders doing guard duty. The liberty slip came out and one side of the ship got liberty. When they got back, the other side of the ship would get liberty. His crew was restricted to the ship. They thought they needed to get ashore because they would never see Norway again. They had one Black [Annotator's Note: African-American] guy who was friendly with them. They were not allowed to go to shore. They asked him to help them. They put a rope ladder down the side and he needed to pull it up and put it back. They climbed down and went into town. They went to the University and talked to the students. Their guy was supposed to be waiting for them on the gangplank. They saw the rope ladder still hanging over the side and saw their guy on watch duty. He told them to come on up because they got them. They saw the rope ladder over the side and they called a muster right away. That guy did not pull the ladder up. They got court-martialed for that. They went for several days with only bread and water. But they had some buddies that got them some food. He was bitter about the situation. That guy never showed his face again. They would have thrown him overboard. That cost him a Good Conduct Medal, but he should not have gone AWOL [Annotator’s Note: absent without leave].

Joseph Hartmann was shipped back to England. They were going to be court-martialed and do their time in England. The ship was going to go back to the States. They wanted him to talk to their division officer and do their time on the ship. They did not want to miss the ship going home. He went and talked to him. They did their time on the ship and they headed back to the States. They were about three days out from seeing the shoreline and they hit the edge of a tropical storm. The ship was bobbing and the alarms went off. They scrambled into position. Turns out the cooks had chicken on the grill and with the ship pitching it caught fire. It was a relief. They told them in the next couple of hours they would see the coast of the United States. They were all on deck watching to see the shore. They had been overseas for 18 months. Everybody was whooping and hollering. They tied up at Norfolk [Annotator's Note: Norfolk, Virginia]. They had coffee and donuts with people there. They were happy. Then they went up to Long Island, New York to unload the tanks and troops. Then they went to the East Boston Navy Yard [Annotator's Note: Boston, Massachusetts] to be fitted for new armament to be ready to ship off to the Pacific. That was in July [Annotator's Note: July 1945] and then in August the Japs [Annotator's Note: a period derogatory term for Japanese] surrendered. He was discharged in Philadelphia [Annotator's Note: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania] before some of the other guys because he had so much more time in than them. He went home and that was the end of it. He went in because he wanted to make it a career. After the war, everything got GI [Annotator's Note: government issue; also a slang term for an American soldier] and there was a dress code and he was not used to that. During the war, they dressed how they wanted to. They would not wear shirts. They never had a dress code or inspections. When everything went GI he could not handle it. One of his officers told him he had been a seaman for a long time. When they were sitting outside Omaha Beach [Annotator’s Note: Normandy, France], he took a test to be a coxswain [Annotator's Note: person in charge of a small boat and its crew] and he passed it. However, they got transferred off the British ship and when they got back to Southampton [Annotator's Note: Southampton, England] he got paid, but he did not have his raise or his stripes. He went to the office to complain. They told him it did not count because he took the test on the ship. He would have to take the test again. He walked out. When they got back to the United States, twin 40s [Annotator's Note: Bofors 40mm antiaircraft automatic cannon] were mounted on the ship. He wanted to be a gunner's mate. The officer got him the books and told him to study which he did. They took him up to the double-mounted gun with the electric sight. After a while, the electricity went bad and he could not control it. The gun started to do its own thing going toward a plane. The guy told him to shut it down. If he had not shut it down, he would have shot the plane down. The war was over and he was eligible for release. He got out in February 1946.

Joseph Hartmann was in the "52-20 club" [Annotator's Note: a government-funded program that paid unemployed veterans 20 dollars per week for 52 weeks]. They gave them 20 dollars a week to acclimate themselves. It was a lot of money in 1946. When he got close to being 21 years old, his father started to break him into bartending. His father got sick and died so he took over running the bar for his mother. His mother told him she wanted out and she sold the bar to him. He took it over. In 1985, he retired. He sold the bar after he retired. He bought a house on the GI Bill [Annotator's Note: the G.I. Bill, or Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, was enacted by the United States Congress to aid United States veterans of World War 2 in transitioning back to civilian life and included financial aid for education, mortgages, business starts and unemployment]. His most memorable moment was seeing the LCVPs [Annotator's Note: Landing Craft Vehicle, Personnel or LCVP; also known as the Higgins boat] being blown up on top of the waves. All they saw were GIs [Annotator's Note: government issue; also a slang term for an American soldier] floating dead. The whole thing was covered in dead GIs. It looked like some of them were waving at them. They had life jackets on. There was a troopship that blew up and one guy was floating in the water and looked like he was wearing a turtle neck. It was actually his skin. His head had been ripped out of its joints. They could reach over and grab them. There were hundreds of them floating there dead. They were told not to reach over to retrieve the GIs because they could have been booby-trapped. It was horrible. He witnessed the landing [Annotator's Note: D-Day; the Allied invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944]. They saw the Rangers trying to get up the cliffs. They had to have guts climbing ladders knowing a guy at the top wanted to shoot them. If the Germans had an air force, Omaha Beach [Annotator's Note: Normandy, France] would not have been a success. All the nonessential personnel had to be ready to warn them and send them ashore. The bombers were supposed to hit the shore before the troops did but they missed their mark. Every day they got a briefing about where the troops were and how they were advancing. When they got to Saint-Lo [Annotator’s Note: Saint-Lô, France], they were losing 100 troops a day. Saint-Lo was a break-out point. They wanted to get to Cherbourg [Annotator's Note: Cherbourg, France] to get to the port. He took a seabag and he made a map of the beach. He put on canvas how the war was going. One day it disappeared. He had everything they were doing painted on the seabag. He had the casualties and where they were on there. He does not know what happened to it. When he went into the Navy he was a 16 year old kid that never cursed, never drank, and never had a girlfriend. He was a nice, Catholic-raised kid. When he came out of the Navy he thought he was a tough guy. He was completely changed. He drank, cursed, and fought. He used to be a nice guy. He grew out of it because he realized he had to change. He got to be a nice guy again. He was looking for trouble and he got into fights. When they were in Southampton [Annotator's Note: Southampton, England] they would climb the fence and walk up to the pubs. He had a girlfriend and one night she was sitting with some sailors. He looked over and she was sitting there crying. He went over and told the guys they better leave. He and two GIs were standing outside when the guys came back with six more sailors. He turned around and the GIs were gone. He fought them. They could have killed him. He woke up in the gutter bleeding from the mouth. He woke up to MPs [Annotator's Note: Military Police] pulling up in a jeep. For a week he had to sip through a straw.

Joseph Hartmann thinks if the United States had another situation like World War 2, he does not think the young people today would respond the way they did back then. They are in college and have warped minds. They do not know about politics or the country. He thinks they should show pictures of the death march [Annotator's Note: Bataan Death March; the forced march of 60,000 to 80,000 American and Filipino prisoners of war carried out by the Imperial Japanese Army in April 1942], and the people in the concentration camps. He thinks kids today do not believe in that stuff or that it happened. He thinks they should have two years of mandatory service to the United States. He thinks it would make them better people. He would tell them they have to be honest and truthful. They need to assess things and not just jump off. They need to get along with people. The biggest problem in the United States is that there is too much separation. They are all Americans. They need to let the ethnicity go and work together. They need to stop the separation of everybody. They got to be all Americans. He does not consider himself a German-American. He is an American. When he got out of the Navy he fought for the underdogs. He was in Germany with his wife and they encountered a brawl. He wanted to help the guy that the bikers had ganged up on. They were in New York and some guy was putting down the United States and he wanted to go put that guy down. When he had the bar, he was shot at and stabbed at. He was hit across the eyes by a pool stick. He went after that guy. A guy pulled a gun on him and missed him. He is a cat with nine lives on his tenth life.