My Uncle who died in the war

 Charles Hilbren Bunch

December 9, 1918 - January 27, 1945

Uncle Hilbren is close to a mythical hero in my own family. He was My Uncle who was Killed in the War.

He was the third born, the second boy. All the kids knew their parents had favorites. Clifton, their first, was grandpa’s favorite boy. Eunice was his favorite girl, second born. It was thought this was because he delivered her. If you wanted a yes from dad, have Eunice ask. 

Hilbren and Pauline were Mom’s favorites. My mom, Minnie Myrtle, was the baby. She said she was outside the circle of favorites. I suspect, as the baby, she was more cherished than she knew. 

Like all the kids in the family, Hilbren was tall. I never heard his exact height, but at least a few inches over six feet. He was a strawberry blond with a red head’s completion. In the summer, his outdoor work turned his face bright red and freckled while bleaching his eyebrows stark white. People would stop and stare when he walked into town. If he let his beard grow in, it was a dark red. 

When they made the epic Depression move to California he ended school. He was determined to work to help support that family. I know he had farming experience and worked for a beekeeper in the Antelope Valley. 

Then WWII started. My grandma told me her version, though my mom would remind me he was her favorite. 

“He came to me and said ‘Mom, I know they are going to draft me, and if they do I won’t have any say in what I do. When they see how good I can shoot, they will use that. I just don’t know if I could shoot a person. So I’m going to enlist so I can try to do some other job.’”

He joined in 1941. He died in The Philippines in January 1945, I’m uncertain of the battle. It is said that he had a disagreement with an officer and so was put on the front line. He probably indeed had a gun in his hand. 

People we love tend to be remembered as flawless when they are gone. It is unwise to correct those who loved them most and who carry that loss for years. My grandma believed with all her heart that somehow, sometime, Hilbren secretly finished High School or they wouldn’t have let him join up. Because my grandma didn’t get to have much schooling, it was very important to her. But it was wartime; my mom thought it was unlikely the Army cared. 

This is how family stories become myths. We tell the best and brightest stories through the memory of love. We often don’t tell the hard stories because of the pain of the trauma. Still, the trauma is passed down. Each generation grows in the shadows of what their parents and grandparents can’t bring themselves to talk about. 

We teach our children with stories, we always have. The stories of the hard lessons are as vital as the stories of hope. Some people would like to erase inconvenient history. As I write this I hear that great true stories are being removed from official records in our country. Tell all the stories you can. We need all the heroes we can get.