Norman William Waldman was born in December 1924 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He served as a machine gunner in the 82nd Airborne, 507th Parachute Infantry [Annotator's Note: 507th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division], drafted in February 1943. [Annotator's Note: Several voices are audible in the background.] Waldman had a sister. His father was a master plumber and owned his own small plumbing business. They made it through the Depression [Annotator's Note: the Great Depression was a global economic depression that lasted from 1929 through 1939 in the United States]. After the Depression, Waldman's father took his money out of banks and kept it in cash in the house. Waldman was just a year out of high school when he realized he was needed and that everyone had to do their part. His father was a Marine in World War 1, and wanted Waldman to join the Marines, but he was color blind and the Army was the only branch that would take him. He heard about paratroopers while in basic training in Georgia, and that they received double pay. He applied and went to Fort Benning [Annotator's Note: Fort Benning, Georgia]. They had to pack their own chutes [Annotator's Note: parachutes]. He completed five jumps and was sent to the regiment in Alliance, Nebraska and learned how to be a machine gunner. He never fired this gun in anger. He knew those guys [Annotator's Note: enemy soldiers] were the same as he was, and that they were all only acting under orders. He did not like killing people, and that is what a machine gun is made to do. It creates horrible wounds.

The first combat jump Norman William Waldman and his regiment [Annotator's Note: 507th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division] ever made was on D-Day [Annotator's Note: D-Day; the Allied invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944]. They jumped at one o'clock in the morning, jumping at 700 feet which was very, very low. He saw flashes in the fields below him as he was going down, and was told they were anti-personnel mines sown by the Germans. Waldman saw a straight line and went for it, but it turned out to be a Hawthorne hedge full of thorns. He met up with a group of men, not from his regiment, nearly 20 miles from their drop zone. The 8th Air Force pilots were getting hit with a lot of antiaircraft fire [Annotator's Note: and hurriedly dropped the paratroopers outside of their drop zones]. He had a canvas equipment bundle containing his weapons and other tools. They faced the Wehrmacht [Annotator's Note: German armed forces] which was already battle-hardened. The Americans were terribly outnumbered. At night, the Germans focused on their heaviest weapons, a .30 caliber air-cooled machine gun [Annotator's Note: Browning M1919 .30 caliber air cooled light machine gun] and 60mm and 81mm mortars [Annotator's Note: M2 60mm mortar and M1 81mm mortar, a short smoothbore gun which fires explosive shells at high angles]. Waldman's ammunition bearer was hit and died. His assistant machine gunner was blinded. Waldman himself was hit with shrapnel. The Germans surrounded them and realized that Waldman could speak German.

Norman William Waldman [Annotator's Note: after being captured by the Germans after jumping on D-Day, the Allied invasion of Normandy, 6 June 1944, Normandy, France, with the 507th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division] was sent to a camp near Limburg and Muhlberg [Annotator's Note: Limburg and Muhlberg, Germany]. They soon got word that they should prepare to move, as the Russian Army was approaching. It was Ukrainian troops that eventually freed them and Waldman went with them to Berlin, which was in ruins. They headed for the demarcation lines and went into American-controlled territory, and were put into hospital. When they were liberated, they were in Czechoslovakia [Annotator's Note: modern-day Czech Republic or Czechia]. As a prisoner, he was not far from Dresden [Annotator's Note: Dresden, Germany] and the prisoners were paid to help civilians in the area. [Annotator's Note: Voices are audible in the background.] At Christmastime [Annotator's Note: of 1944] they bought a barrel of beer with the money the earned. All of their guards were in their 70s, because they were unfit for combat. They shared their beer with the guards, who became almost their friends. Waldman was in a POW [Annotator's Note: prisoner of war] camp near Dresden when the city was bombed [Annotator's Note: between 13 and 15 February 1945, Dresden, Germany was bombed by American and British aircraft using a mix of high-explosive and incendiary bombs that devestated much of the city]. The prisoners had built their own air raid shelter and used it during the bombing. The British firebombed the area, then the 8th Air Force came in with 500 pound bombs. It was awful. The main part of Dresden, except for one church, was destroyed. Every town the Ukrainians went through, they pillaged and took whatever they could. Waldman and his fellow liberated prisoners were treated at a hospital outside of Dieppe [Annotator's Note: Dieppe, France], and then he went back to the United States. He suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder [Annotator's Note: post traumatic stress disorder; a mental health condition triggered by a terrifying event either experienced or witnessed] from seeing what machine guns do to the human body. When he got married, his wife, Marie, told him that he would act out in his sleep, but he got good care. After the war, he transferred to the Air Force and continued to serve stateside.

Norman William Waldman remembers people celebrating that the war was over [Annotator’s Note: the war in Europe ended 8 May 1945, VE-Day or Victory in Europe Day]. There are no real winners in war. There will never be an end to war as long is there is greed in the world. Hitler [Annotator's Note: German dictator Adolf Hitler] did not need to go into Russia or Poland, but he had a need for power. Waldman was a POW [Annotator's Note: prisoner of war] for a year and two months. They all did what they were ordered to do in combat, but no one should be proud of killing someone. When they were captured, the Germans gave them D-bars [Annotator's Note: Army Field Ration D; chocolate bar intended as snack food]. VE-Day was incredibly joyful. While in the POW camp, they only got baths once a month. Waldman was so anxious to get through the war that he never thought he would not. In combat, the only thing that saved their lives was the training they got. He was happy the war was over, but saddened by the loss of the lives of innocent people. During the war, he was most scared of the firing of the enemy's armament against them. He was just a kid and had a life to complete, and he thought he might not be able to complete it. Waldman is a Christian. It was hard to be a soldier and keep up Christian values. The real heroes are the men buried overseas.