Vails Gate, N.Y. – Cpl. Robert Frink was captured in Germany during the final months of World War II. He and two comrades were forced to swap uniforms with their Waffen SS captors, lined up and shot in the back of the head.
Miraculously, the bullet entered Frink’s neck and exited his cheek without shearing his spine or jugular vein. He even felt a German kick him as he lay bleeding.
“Believe me, I played dead,” he said.
After his captors left, Frink fled, found some Canadian troops and was saved.
The wound earned him a Purple Heart.
Sixty-one years later, it is earning him an entry on the “Roll of Honor,” a database being compiled for a museum honoring Purple Heart recipients. When the museum, the National Purple Heart Hall of Honor, opens in November, visitors will be able to search out facts and stories about soldiers wounded or killed.
New York officials heading the project think – though no one knows for sure – there are up to 1.7 million soldiers who belong on the list.
So they’re putting out a call: If you or a family member has been awarded the Purple Heart, they want you.
More precisely, they want your information for the most comprehensive list of American military sacrifice.
“Somewhere, in every family tree, this is going to hit home,” said state Parks Commissioner Bernadette Castro.
The Hall of Honor is being built at a woodsy historic site north of New York City where George Washington’s army camped toward the end of the Revolutionary War. It was here in 1782 that Washington created the Badge of Military Merit, which he decreed would be “the figure of a heart in purple cloth.”
The badge fell into disuse after the war but was reintroduced as the Purple Heart in 1932. Thousands of World War I veterans received Purple Hearts retroactively – as did a few very old Civil War veterans. In 1942, Purple Hearts were restricted to those “wounded in action against any enemy.”
How many have been awarded, no one knows. But a tally of the wounded and dead from World War I on is about 1.7 million, most from World War II.
It’s impossible to find and verify every single award. But the modest staff at the state historic site is trying. After quietly collecting information for years, parks officials in March put out a widespread plea for veterans and families to share stories and materials for the hall.
There’s a sense of urgency because the number of surviving World War II veterans is shrinking quickly. Ironically, members of that legendarily stoic generation are providing a lot of the stories.
Project workers think older veterans realize it’s finally time to talk.
Frink, for instance, barely mentioned his near-miss execution in Germany since coming home to California in 1945. Now 81, he still chokes up recalling how his comrades were killed. He finally wrote down his story recently and e-mailed it to a veterans website.
Find details and contact information for the Purple Heart Hall of Honor online at nysparks.state.ny.us/heritage/purple_hrt.asp.
