My mother recently told me about a radio interview that was conducted many years ago with a retired New Zealand surgeon who served in Italy during WW2.
Part of his incredibly difficult day to day job was to walk down the hall of the hospital where all the wounded and dying lay; he had to decide the priority of surgery or who was worth trying to save.
The surgeon recalled a soldier at the end of the line had received a very serious shrapnel wound to the stomach and was in a very bad way. The surgeon deemed him ‘un-savable’. As he walked away the soldier called out to him and said ‘Please Doctor, help me, I have a wife and 2 young girls back in New Zealand’.
The surgeon operated on him and saved his life. The soldier was my grandfather.
I remember the scars on his stomach they looked like a crazed map for the London Underground.
My grandfather heard this radio interview and tracked the surgeon down who was living in Dunedin and called him. Apparently they talked for a very long time, I can’t imagine the gratitude my grandfather must have felt.
I’m just grateful my grandfather had the strength to call out. He was a lovely man who went on to live a long and prosperous life thanks to this talented doctor.
I’ll be remembering my grandfather and all the other brave men and women who gave their all, so we could live the life that we do, this coming Anzac weekend.
