Survivors cherish artifact returned from WWII
CENTER TWP — Sue Rapp always has been proud of her late father's service during World War II as a survivor of the Battle of the Bulge.
She hoped her descendants would continue that pride, but passing years can obscure important memories.
Thanks to a fortuitous event 20 years ago, Pfc. John T. Rakoci will forever remain his family's hero.
Rapp explained that in 1999, a man called her late mother to report that a museum in Belgium had a mess kit cover it had retrieved from the hallowed ground of that battle that was hand etched with “Rakoci” and the last four digits of a military serial number.
The museum curators had researched the name and number and discovered it belonged to John T. Rakoci of West Middlesex, Mercer County.
The curators connected with a man in the U.S., who contacted John's widow Edna Rakoci, Rapp's late mother.
Edna got in touch with the museum curator in Belgium, who asked her if she wanted the cover or if he should continue to display it in his museum.
Edna replied that she would love to have the artifact and would pay to have it shipped, but the man replied that Pfc. Rakoci had already paid for it with his courage during the Battle of the Bulge.
Rapp then took over the work of having the cover mailed to her so she could take it to her mother.
Six to nine months after the initial phone call and dozens of letters back and forth, a package arrived at Rapp's Center Township home from Waimes, Belgium.
“I called my mom and said 'Guess what came in the mail from Belgium?' ” Rapp said.
Rapp drove the surprisingly well-preserved tin cover to her mother's house.
“She cried,” Rapp recalled. “She was just so happy to have it.”
Edna Rakoci had the cover mounted and placed under glass along with a newspaper article on the event that was published in 1999.
“It hung in the hallway until the day she died,” Rapp said.
The cover now rests in a display case in Rapp's home, which affords her the opportunity to think about her kindhearted father every day.
“I feel so proud of him,” Rapp said. “He's been gone 42 years.”Rapp doesn't have to wonder if her grandson, Camron, who she adopted when he was a toddler after her son died, will treasure the cover when she is gone.“Whenever I see it, I think this is the closest I've ever been to meeting him,” said Camron, 18. “He held this. He was issued this from the Army.”Camron wonders what his great-grandfather used to etch his name into the mess kit cover.“Maybe his bayonet, but I don't think so,” he said.Camron is a fount of World War II facts and is particularly interested in the Battle of the Bulge.He promises to treasure the family artifact when he takes ownership of it.“Not only is it a part of my family's history, it's a part of World War II history,” he said.Camron figures the mess kit cover survived for more than a half-century underground because Belgium has a colder climate. He wonders whether his great-grandfather lost it during the heat of battle or accidentally dropped it.Rapp said she is not surprised her father etched his name onto the tin, as he was an engraver at the tombstone company he owned.She said her father, who never talked about the war, enlisted in the Army in 1942 after the bombing of Pearl Harbor.He served in Company H, 394th Infantry Regiment, 99th Infantry division.Rapp has a letter written by her father that lists each of the many moves his company made in the European theatre.Rapp was honorably discharged in November 1945, but not before displaying impressive courage on the battlefield.A letter, written by an anonymous Army source, details an event during one battle in which Rakoci and three other soldiers leaped into a German dugout during a storm of artillery fire.“The four men were feeling fairly secure when a near-miss set fire to the wicker covering on a pile of .88 ammunition outside the entrance to the dugout,” the letter reads. “There they sat, with the 88s popping like firecrackers, praying for rain to put out the fire.”When a dozen of the stacked shells exploded, the concussion from the blast put out the fire and the four men were able to make their way to safety.To think the tin might have been carried by Rakoci during that frightening episode makes it all the more cherished.“If it were not for that man (at the museum), we would have never known this cover existed,” Rapp said.She is glad her mother lived to receive an artifact from her husband's brave service during World War II.“She and my dad were two peas in a pod,” Rapp said.
