A Soldier's Story: WWII Vet Remains a Neighborhood Guy

From the New Haven Register
Published: Sunday, October 25, 2009   See Article

By Ed Stannard, Register Metro Editor

Rembering My Dad - Click Above to see Video

NEW HAVEN — Salvatore Garibaldi expresses the dignity and humility of his generation, sitting in his kitchen on Wooster Street, in the neighborhood where he has lived his entire life.

They are known as the Greatest Generation, but to meet a veteran of World War II, none of them now younger than 80, is to realize that the scourge of fascism was defeated by men who left their humble neighborhoods behind, and then, if luck shined on them, returned to their family and friends.

“I look at it this way,” says Garibaldi, who is known to everyone as Gary. “World War II was won by the men and women of that age who were more or less deprived of going to school because of necessity at home. Particularly the Irish and the Italians. They had large families.”

Garibaldi is 90, born with his twin sister, Theresa, on Christmas Day, 1918. He grew up near his Wooster Street apartment, on Chestnut Street, “around the corner from St. Michael’s Church.”

Now he is attended to by aides and nurses from Connecticut Hospice like Mike Sweeney, a former New Haven detective and a veteran of three wars himself, who was astounded when he met the humble man and then saw the display of wartime medals encased with an American flag, the evidence of “such valor shown by one man.”

“In Connecticut Hospice we’ve had many, many World War II veterans we’ve taken care of … and I’ve never been so impressed with a veteran of the Second World War as Mr. Garibaldi.”

Inside the display case, given to him on his 90th birthday by another Wooster Square resident, U.S. Rep. Rosa L. DeLauro, D-3, are the Distinguished Service Cross, the nation’s second-highest service award, Silver Star with oak leaf cluster (meaning he received the award twice), Bronze Star with two oak leaf clusters and two Purple Hearts. It includes a U.S. flag that flew above the U.S. Capitol in his honor.

In an account of his service in Italy and France, Staff Sgt. Garibaldi told of the 36th Infantry Division’s 1944 attempt to cross the Rapido, a river south of Rome.

“The attack was doomed from the beginning,” he wrote. “Unknown to us the troops, the Germans had mined both sides of the treacherous river, and set up their guns that could puncture holes in the assault boats as they advanced.” Garibaldi wrote that 1,700 U.S. soldiers died in the assault.

Garibaldi distinguished himself throughout his two years in battle in several ways, according to his award citations. He ran into a house and threw a grenade into a German machine gun nest, killing two and capturing six. He single-handedly took out an 88mm gun and a machine gun, killing the German crew.

After the war, Garibaldi was often in the company of other decorated veterans, and got to be friendly with Audie Murphy, the most highly decorated veteran of World War II. “After a while, we became known to each other,” he says.

Does he consider himself a hero? “No. Because there’s others who did just as much or more but were not found out,” says Garibaldi.

AMERICAN PATRIOTS

But DeLauro points out that the Italian-American men of Wooster Square, some of them immigrants, willingly stood up to fight for their country: the United States. The names of the war dead are listed on the monument in the Wooster Street playground.

“Keeping in mind that we were at war with Italy and they were United States patriots,” DeLauro says. “The ties to the heritage are still remarkably strong, but their loyalty and their commitment and dedication to the United States was just writ large.”

Garibaldi’s son, Joe, remembers the flags and stars in the windows on Wooster Street, and the stories of the neighborhood veterans who returned. “You came home from war, you put the uniform in the closet and the next day you went to work.”

Gary Garibaldi went to work as a printer. One of his jobs was at the old Shartenberg’s department store, printing the lists of daily sales. He also worked in security for Yale University, where his son and grandson have followed. He and his late wife, Mary, had three boys: Bernard, Salvatore and Joseph.

DeLauro regards him as “part and parcel of the fabric” of Wooster Square. “I hope he knows how people regard his contribution and how well-respected and loved he is in the heart of the Italian community and Wooster Square, where he walked every day.”

Now, Gary Garibaldi has more to say than he has breath to speak; his words often trail off into whispers. But his eyes still sparkle and his smile is still quick as he talks about the good times with family and friends in the neighborhood.

He’s led more civic organizations than he has fingers to count them on, and there are monuments to his achievements that, characteristically, don’t bear his name: the refurbished veterans memorial, the cherry tree archway over Wooster Street that he helped bring into being.

Wooster Street sustains him, literally. Sweeney, his nurse, laughs as he recalls Garibaldi’s first supper after he returned to his apartment. “His first night he says, ‘Mike, get me the number for Tony & Lucille’s.’”

He was recently hospitalized but insisted on coming home to his apartment rather than going to Hospice. “He’s very accepting,” says Sweeney. “He out of the ordinary in a way.”

It’s estimated that more than 1,000 World War II veterans die every day. Garibaldi says, “There’s an old saying, ‘Old soldiers just fade away.’ ” But their legacy will not fade away, and Gary Garibaldi’s will last as long as the rest, on Wooster Street and the other neighborhoods where the sons of immigrants grew up to become patriots and heroes.