Joseph Taliancich was born in Louisiana in 1920. His father came over from Yugoslavia and went into the oyster business. His mother was from southern Louisiana. Eventually, his father got his own boat and moved the family to New Orleans [Annotator’s Note: New Orleans, Louisiana]. He had five brothers and one sister. The kids walked to grammar school. They would ride bikes to go to grocery stores and drug stores. They went to several different schools. In May 1941, he went to work for Higgins Industries [Annotator’s Note: Higgins Industries was a company which designed and manufactured several naval vessels, based out of New Orleans, Louisiana]. Taliancich was working on a boat when the president declared war [Annotator's Note: Day of Infamy Speech; President Franklin D. Roosevelt to a Joint Session of the United States Congress, 8 December 1941]. On 9 March 1942, he was drafted.

Joseph Taliancich did basic training at Camp Beauregard [Annotator’s Note: Camp Beauregard, Louisiana], then he was sent to Illinois and joined the 443rd [Annotator’s Note: 443rd Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion]. He was shipped overseas from Norfolk, Virginia. He was placed in C Battery. He was a technical corporal. The guns they were put on had an electrical system. He was the gunner and the driver. He drove all through Italy. The weapon he used was a T-28 [Annotator’s Note: T28 Super Heavy Tank] for antiaircraft or against the infantry. [Annotator’s Note: Taliancich describes how the gun worked.] General Patton [Annotator's Note: US Army Lieutenant General George S. Patton, Jr.] put the weapon together.

Joseph Taliancich would have firing practice over a lake at Fort Sheridan [Annotator’s Note: Fort Sheridan, Illinois]. Then they went to Norfolk [Annotator’s Note: Norfolk, Virginia] where they would practice firing at barrage balloons [Annotator's Note: barrage balloons worked as both a passive and active means of aerial defense]. Taliancich had two guns under his command. They were fortunate not to lose too many men in all four years of combat. They were with the 3rd Infantry Division and then the 36th Infantry Division. The 443rd [Annotator’s Note: 443rd Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion] had more combat experience than any other unit. They did not know where they were going until they were halfway there. They went to Casablanca, Morocco. They faced some opposition from the Vichy French and the Germans. A few German planes tried to knock them out before they got to shore. They would practice on the guns to see how far they would move on their own time. They took care of the guns and made sure they were maintained.

Joseph Taliancich remembers the rugged and sandy terrain [Annotator’s Note: of North Africa]. The weather was hot and cold. They were on the coast in Casablanca [Annotator’s Note: Casablanca, Morocco]. They were in the Battle of Kasserine Pass [Annotator’s Note: the Battle of Kasserine Pass, February 1943; Kasserine Pass, Tunisia]. A lot of their tanks were destroyed, as well as German tanks. It was a dangerous area. The people were glad to see them, but would not talk to them. Rommel [Annotator's Note: German Army Generalfeldmarschall, or Field Marshal, Johannes Erwin Eugen Rommel] and the British were on the same side. They were fighting the Vichy French, Italians, and Germans. They went to Sicily [Annotator’s Note: Sicily, Italy] next and kept their guns on deck.

Joseph Taliancich was attached to two divisions. He believes he was with the 3rd Infantry Division in Sicily [Annotator’s Note: the Allied invasion of Sicily, code named Operation Husky; 9 July to 17 August 1943; Sicily, Italy]. Many of the people there were not looking to fight anymore. They went through four different countries in Africa. Once they got on shore in Sicily, they went right on up. It was mountainous. There were more Germans in Sicily. They got stalled by the Germans in Cassino [Annotator’s Note: Cassino, Italy]. Eisenhower [Annotator's Note: General of the Army Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower, Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force; 34th President of the United States] did not want to bomb the monastery [Annotator’s Note: the monastery on Monte Cassino, a rocky hill near Rome, Italy]. The Germans could see all the movement on the river below the monastery. After Anzio [Annotator’s Note: the Battle of Anzio, 22 January 1944 to 5 June 1944], they moved up past Rome to Florence [Annotator’s Note: Florence, Italy]. The Italian planes were easy to shoot out of the air. Most of the civilians were happy the Germans were being driven out of the country. They got rid of Mussolini [Annotator's Note: Italian fascist dictator Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini; also known as il Duce]. The Italians were liberated from themselves. He did not care for the Germans because they started the war.

Joseph Taliancich remembers they would get a break in between individual battles. When they were going through Rome [Annotator’s Note: Rome, Italy], someone in a bank fired at them. When they got to Florence [Annotator’s Note: Florence, Italy] they did not meet any opposition. They went south to Naples [Annotator’s Note: Naples, Italy] and boarded a ship headed for southern France. There was little opposition when they landed [Annotator’s Note: the Allied invasion of Southern France, code named Operation Dragoon; 15 August to 14 September 1944; Provence, France]. Then they got into a big part of the war. Eisenhower [Annotator's Note: General of the Army Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower, Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force; 34th President of the United States] was put in charge of the whole operation. He was in charge of Patton [Annotator's Note: US Army Lieutenant General George S. Patton, Jr.]. Patton liked to ride in the top of a tank. He had coffee with Patton once on the side of the road in Germany. They fired ahead of the infantry and artillery. There were 16 guns in the battalion [Annotator’s Note: 443rd Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion].

Joseph Taliancich landed in Marseille [Annotator’s Note: Marseille, France during the Allied invasion of Southern France, code named Operation Dragoon; 15 August to 14 September 1944]. The Vichy French were around, but they did not face too much opposition. They liberated the town of Lyon [Annotator’s Note: Lyon, France] and then met up with the troops from Normandy [Annotator's Note: D-Day; the Allied invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944]. They went through the Siegfried Line [Annotator's Note: a series of defensive fortifications roughly paralleling the Franco-German border built by Germany in the 1930s]. He was involved in nine campaigns. He fired at things he could see besides airplanes. He carried .45 submachine guns [Annotator's Note: perhaps a .45 caliber Thompson submachine gun or a .45 caliber M3 submachine gun, also referred to as a grease gun]. He had an M1 rifle [Annotator's Note: .30 caliber M1 semi-automatic rifle, also known as the M1 Garand]. When he saw them running, he would fire some shots. The French people they met were happy to see them. They would get a few days off between attacks. The only time he remembers taking a shower was out in the open while Italian girls were walking by. They took advantage of every break they could.

Joseph Taliancich remembers his unit [Annotator's Note: 443rd Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion] got to the Battle of the Bulge [Annotator's Note: Battle of the Bulge or German Ardennes Counter Offensive, 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945] as they were clearing out the Germans. It was a different type of cold over there compared to south Louisiana. They shot down a few German fighter planes. They were almost to Berlin [Annotator’s Note: Berlin, Germany] when they heard the war was over. They had a couple of barrels of beer to celebrate the end of the war. They went to the port of Le Havre [Annotator’s Note: Le Havre, France] and stayed there for a few days in case they were going to be sent to Japan. He ended up being sent home. He was in combat for three and a half years. He excepted that he might not make it home. Christmas and any other holiday were just another day while he was serving. His ammunition guy had served in World War One [Annotator's Note: World War 1, global war originating in Europe; 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918].

Joseph Taliancich remembers his brothers and whether or not they served in the military during the war [Annotator’s Note: Taliancich discusses his brothers and their service.] His sister went into the service as well. The whole family took part in the war effort. [Annotator’s Note: Taliancich talks about newspaper articles.] The family lived in Metairie [Annotator’s Note: Metairie, Louisiana]. Taliancich returned to the United States in October 1945. They stayed in Germany for a little while. The war ended in May in Europe. They moved from Germany to Le Havre, France. Then the war ended with the two bombs on Japan [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 6 and 9 August 1945]. There was only one other guy from New Orleans [Annotator’s Note: New Orleans, Louisiana] in the group. He got along with the Japanese Americans. On the trip home he was treated well. He ate good food. He worked in the kitchen. He had the choice to help on his father’s boat or go to school. He decided to go to school. He was discharged from Camp Shelby, Mississippi in October. He was a corporal when he was discharged. He went to school for one year at LSU [Annotator’s Note: Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana] and then he went back to work for Higgins Industries [Annotator’s Note: a naval vessel manufacturer based out of New Orleans].

Joseph Taliancich went right back to working for Higgins Industries [Annotator’s Note: a manufacturer of naval vessels based out of New Orleans, Louisiana]. He met his wife there. She was working as a secretary. He knew Higgins from working there and through his father. [Annotator’s Note: Taliancich discusses Andrew Jackson Higgins, the founder of Higgins Industries]. He remembers seeing the Arabs riding their horses at night [Annotator’s Note: while participating in the North African campaign from 1942 to 1943]. One of the Arabs stole his shoes off his feet while he was sleeping. He does not think the war changed his life too much. He has been married for 62 years. He went to export and import school through Higgins. He learned about shipping. He enjoyed his work. He had been around boats his entire life. He fought because he was not a coward. He figured they needed him. He would like to give credit to his unit, the 443rd [Annotator’s Note: Battery C, 443rd Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion]. He stayed in touch with his men. He thinks the museum [Annotator's Note: The National WWII Museum in New Orleans, Louisiana] is nice.