Alone & Unarmed: An Army Pilot Sharing the Skies with Artillery Fire in WWII Italy (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781546810261)

ERNEST E. KOWALIK was born July 6, 1918, in Runge, Texas. He stemmed from the first Polish settlement in the new world. One hundred families debarked at Indianola, Texas in the early 1800's at the mouth of the San Antonio River and made their way two-thirds of the way to San Antonio, stopping in Karnes County to build a church in Panna Maria, Texas. His father was Kleophas Kowalik; he quit a career as a schoolteacher and started in real estate by breaking up a large ranch and selling the land as farms. He died in 1922 of typhoid fever. His mother was Mary Magdellan Kolodiejczyk, who, after the death of her husband, took her three young sons, Chester, Ernest, and Raymond, and moved in with her parents on a farm. When the boys were of school age, she moved into town and started a room and board business. The business prospered. She cooked and she hired women to clean up and wait tables. After her sons went overseas in WWII, she remarried and became a housewife. Ernest became a Liaison pilot, assigned to the 88th Infantry Division, the first all-draftee division to see combat. Ernest entered the Army in July 1942, and was trained as a pilot. He had basic flight at Randolph Field, TX, and Liaison Pilot training at Ft. Sill, OK. From Fort Sill, Ernest went to the 88th Division, training at Camp Gruber, OK, thence to Fort Sam Houston, TX. On October 25, 1943, the 88th ID completed its' training and the Air Observation Section entrained for Camp Patrick Henry, VA, then on to Newport News, Virginia, by Liberty Ship and North Africa prior to entering combat in Italy. After returning from the war, Ernest finished school at the University of Texas-Austin, with a BA in Business, and went to work in the offices of TEXACO in Port Arthur. Ernest married Bobbie M. Parker, a stenographer at Texaco, on December 17, 1957. They had 2 children, Gene, born January 9, 1963, and Kathy, born July 13, 1964. After the war, Ernest wrote many letters to the Editor, had some 150 printed, many about WWII. His main reason for writing his memoirs was that he felt he made a significant impact on the war, made possible from his position aloft. He believed that his actions the Southern Front resulted in Italy surrendering a week before V-E Day, among other accomplishments. Ernest passed on in 2009.