But this one, I knew, was coming in our direction.
So I'm running down the road telling them,
"Hit the ditch, dammit!
Hit the ditch, hit the ditch!
They're coming in!"
And I knew one was coming toward me.
Throughout the duration of World War II
the continental United States was never in any real danger
and those who served in the armed forces
were determined to keep it that way.
So when the U.S. was finally drawn into the fight,
Melvin Young's response was simple.
I enlisted.
I enlist for everything.
Said, if they're gonna do it, let's do it over there.
Mel chose the United States Army.
But when it came to what his role would be, the Army chose for him.
Well, they had us all lined up.
They decided, "You're gonna be this - doot, doot, doot - and the rest of you are medics."
That's how I become a medic.
But when we got the special training and stuff, then we become specialists.
We went to special schools and stuff to take people right on the front lines.
Not when they get back to the aid station.
When I get done with them, if I could save them,
then I would send them back to the aid station.
You out there and you get blown up, whatever might happen,
I take care of you right now.
So I become a specialists, a surgical technician.
Mel joined up with the 94th Infantry Division, and in September of 1944,
entered Europe by way of Utah Beach at Normandy.
D-Day and the fighting on the beach had concluded months earlier,
but as the 94th made their way across the French countryside
Mel got his initial introduction with the enemy.
We was sitting there
and some guy hollered, "Hit it, Doc!"
So I fell down.
Rap of machine gun bullets went right down where I was sitting.
The Germans had sent a patrol up with a machine gun, they're gonna
harass you and take off again.
I mean, we didn't get no chance at them.
Everybody was trying to do everybody in for some reason.
Soon, Mel would learn not just to be on the lookout for German patrols,
but also for the traps they would leave behind,
a constant potential danger with every step.
Somebody said, "Hey, Doc."
I said, "Yeah?"
He says, "They need you over on the next hill, here."
I said, "Call Red and tell him I need a jeep."
We hopped on, went over, down , around, over, and back up around here.
I jumped off of this jeep and the guy hollered, "Hey, Doc!
Watch it, watch it!"
"Watch what?"
"Well, look down at your foot!"
He said, "You see that Bouncing Betty?"
I said, "Oh, I seen it!"
Hell, I didn't see that Bouncing Betty.
It's only a pin as big as a toothpick.
The Allied soldiers had a variety of nicknames for the many German weaponized innovations.
One of the most sinister was the Bouncing Betty.
You trip that thing and it shoots a mine right up to where your ding-dongs is.
And it'll blow you apart right there, Joe.
That's why they call them "Bouncing Betty".
Get up this way, then - bang!
We have more names and stuff for stuff like this, but that was a Bouncing Betty.
Bounce right up there and get you.
But I said, "I seen it."
No, I didn't see that damn thing.
As they battled their way across northern France and into Germany,
the 94th Infantry Division's tenacity and tough resolve
earned them the nickname, "Patton's Golden Nugget".
Still, they were no more immune to casualties than any other unit,
and perhaps none became as familiar with the horrors of war as the medics.
Big tank sitting right there on the corner.
Looked inside and there's a guy sitting there just like this.
No head.
There was
well
I don't know what you want to call it.
There was a torso.
I mean, blown up, you know.
No head, no arms, no leg.
Just a body is all that was laying there in the road.
Out here you're just walking over dead people.
I mean, you can't...
You can't explain it.
It's just like walking through a...
I mean, it was so common to us.
You had to walk through bodies.
It's just
one of those things.
People say, "Well, how do you do it?"
Well, I mean...
That was day and night.
That's all we had.
So it didn't make any difference to me.
You look to see who you can save and who you can't save.
Danger, chaos, and death were a constant presence.
But Mel had a job to do.
In the midst of battle, with shells exploding all around,
and the agonizing cries of his wounded men coming from every direction,
Mel learned to steady his nerves and focus his mind.
I can still do it.
That steady with it.
You look in there: who you gonna try to save?
So you had to make a lot of decisions, you wonder did you make them or didn't you.
So that's when I got to this point, here.
You had to get like this,
look at them and decide which way they're gonna go.
How many was right, how many was wrong?
You never know, you just
have it in your own mind you made the right decision at that time,
cause there's no way to tell.
Right or wrong you have to make it and you can't
can't go back on it.
I never did.
In January of 1945, Mel would face his toughest decision yet.
The 94th Infantry was brought into the Battle of the Bulge
to break up the German panzer divisions that surrounded the Allies.
One chilling day as the 94th stood in the face of German artillery,
Mel heard a familiar voice calling for a medic.
Braving the onslaught of enemy firepower, Mel raced towards the voice
and found Harold Pratt, his closest friend,
lying in the snow.
I said, "What's wrong, Harold?"
He was laying in snow about eh deep.
I got down on my knee.
I was looking at him, we was talking.
He said, "Boy, I'm..."
He said to me, "I'm aching and paining."
He said, "I don't know what the heck's wrong."
But he said,
"Man, it's horrible!
Horrible!"
I said, "Well, tell you what, Harold.
That ain't too bad.
Tell you what I'm gonna do."
I said, "I'll give you a couple shots, here and
It will take that pain and stuff away.
You won't have to worry enough."
His words seemed to calm Harold.
But Mel knew there was no way to get him off of the battlefield.
And from what Mel had seen,
he knew this would be the last time he would talk to his friend.
He got a little mark right back here on his hip, as big as the old silver dollar.
Something like that.
And he's complaining of his stomach.
And if you're just out there and got a hole in your hip, you shouldn't be complaining
of your stomach killing you.
So, a piece of shrapnel went up through his hip right there where I got my finger,
went up through there and tore his insides out.
So what are you gonna do with a guy with his insides tore all up?
Let him lay there and suffer for hours til somebody can get him?
He'd die in pain and misery.
So I gave him enough morphine to put him to sleep, simple as that.
A heck of a thing to say, ain't it?
"Put a man to sleep."
But I did.
As the winter season diminished, so did the strength of the German Army.
The Allies' progress toward Berlin was stronger and faster than ever,
but Germany was not yet ready to give up the fight.
Mel and the 94th soon encountered yet another of their enemy's deadly innovations:
the Screaming Mimi.
They made on hell of a noise when they come up through that hill.
And they sound a lot different coming at you than when they pass you.
Yeah I got up one time and a shell went off close to me.
That thing went off, man it slammed me up there like a rotten egg.
I'll tell you, it just - whomp!
I still feel my shoulder every now and then.
It was a close call for Mel that time.
But it wouldn't be his last encounter with a Screaming Mimi.
As Spring began to set it, the 94th took a short pause to rest and regroup.
For the moment, all was quiet.
They had sent a couple replacements up, that's what had happened,
about three days before.
They was out there someplace going down
a country road - blacktop - but it was just a short road.
And they started out
harassing us a little bit with some
Screaming Mimi's and stuff.
They'd send a shell off someplace, you had an idea of whether or not it was heading toward you, or
this way, or that way.
But this one, I knew, was coming in our direction.
Mel recognized the sound of the oncoming burst of rockets.
But the inexperienced replacements were frozen in confusion.
Rather than take cover for himself, Mel raced down the road
to warn the two younger men.
So I'm running down the road telling them,
"Hit the ditch, dammit!
Hit the ditch, hit the ditch!
They're coming in!"
And I knew one was coming toward me.
Mel dropped to the ground, and the exploding shell tore into his leg.
The two young replacements had lunged into a nearby ditch.
Only one survived,
and he called out for a medic.
Finally wiggled myself up,
wobbled over and I patched him up, gave him morphine and stuff.
Got him shipped out.
Then I gave myself a shot of morphine.
As Mel waited for his turn to be carried to the field hospital,
he became overwhelmed with the realization
that his service, alongside his brothers in the 94th Infantry,
was over.
I was useless to them.
I think that's one of the hardest things I ever had to do, was lay there against the floor
knowing I was gonna go out - had to go.
It don't make sense, but you just get so...
so tied in as your own group.
You just fit in, you just become one of the crew, and
go with them , eat with them, fight with them, or whatever might happen.
I wonder who ever took my place up there.
Not a single day goes by that Melvin Young doesn't think about the men he saved,
those he couldn't save,
and the tough decisions he had to make.
But after more than seven decades,
he remains confident that even in the most difficult of situations,
he made the right choice.
You say I got a lot to live with, but I wouldn't change any of my decisions.
It was just a job that I was to do and I just did it.
I never looked back as to whether it was right or wrong.
Just like Harold, I wouldn't hesitate for a minute to put him to sleep.
I ain't gonna let you lay there.
Hard hearted.
No, I'm kind-hearted.
I was a good doc.