DAR Salutes POW on National POW/MIA DAY

In honor and respect for National POW/MIA Day, the Mission Viejo Chapter, NSDAR, salutes World War II Prisoner of War Oliver “Bud” Guillot, who started life as a Texas farm boy. His family owned 65 acres of farm land and they lived in a small house on the farm. There was no running water, no electricity, no radio and no newspaper. His family raised chickens and grew corn, cotton and vegetables. They didn’t have a store nearby, and they lived completely off the farm, except for sugar, coffee and wheat that was delivered. <br>

The school was a small two-story building where grades 1-6 were on the bottom floor and the upper grades were on the top floor. Generally, teachers came and boarded with a family, and Guillot’s family often had a teacher boarded at their house. There was no electricity at the school, but it had large windows for light. When the days got dark, there was no school. After school, Guillot worked on the family farm, in the fields or fixing machinery.<br>

When he turned 18, he graduated from high school, and then met a man who said if Guillot would give him $10 for gas, he would take him to California to find a job. Guillot got into his $20 savings, paid the man $10, and took off for California. He found a job quickly at Douglas Aircraft Company as a riveter. He had never even seen an airplane up close before this. Actually, he had never even used a light switch to turn on a light. <br>

Guilott worked for Douglas Aircraft Company during the early part of World War II. He talked to a recruiter and wanted to join the Navy, but his employer convinced him he would be helping the war effort more by staying at his job. Then his draft notice came and the company tried to get him a deferment, but the draft board said no. Bud was off to the Army. His experience working on aircraft likely saved him from being a foot soldier, because he was placed in the U.S. Army Air Corps. After months of training and gunnery schooling, and flying as a backseat gunner in the A-6 bomber, crews were formed and Guillot was assigned as a left waist gunner on a B-24 bomber aircraft.<br>

His crew’s destination was England to aid in the liberation of Europe from Nazi occupation. Upon arrival in England, the commanding officer let all the airmen know that they most likely wouldn’t survive 10 missions due to the law of averages, and they would need to complete 35 missions to be sent home.<br>

Guillot made it through 10 missions. On the 11th mission, the B-24 was flying over Berlin, Germany. “The German fighters would always attack from 12 o’clock high,” Guillot recounted. “This time would be no different.” Looking out from his position, Bud saw the pilot and co-pilot in a plane to their left killed, and their plane veered towards his. “It clipped our wing, knocking off about a five-foot section,” he said. The pilots of Guillot’s aircraft initially thought they might be able to make it back to England, trying to get below cloud cover to escape the enemy fighters, but they were unable to maintain the aircraft’s altitude. The B-24 crash-landed in a German field, where three of his crew perished. The pilots were buried up to their chins in dirt as the plane stood on its nose with its tail up. <br>

The surviving crewmembers considered running into the woods but realized it would be futile. Guillot and his crew were soon captured by the Germans, searched, and interrogated. Eventually, they were placed in Stalag 17B, which was one of the most notorious German prisoner-of-war camps of World War II. Because the Russians had refused to sign the Geneva Convention of 1929, which required countries to treat prisoners of war humanely, the Germans treated the Russian savagely, killing many of them.<br>

Aircraft crews were immediately processed: shaved, deloused and assigned a prisoner number. They were then released into the compound where they were told to find a bed in one of the barracks. Guillot said, “We were never beaten over the head or anything like that, but we were starved.” He would spend the next year being kept in near starvation and in horrible, unsanitary conditions. He lost 40% of his body weight. He still has a souvenir of the very last meal that he had as a POW in Stalag 17—a hard piece of bread that was made mostly of sawdust. He says, “It looks about the same now as it did then.”<br>

After over a year of being in Stalag 17B, just trying to stay alive, Guillot’s last month as a POW was spent on a forced march at gunpoint to a location about 40 miles away from the prison. The Soviets were closing in, and the Germans were trying to escape with their prisoners. During forced marches, the POWs often wore worn-out boots or shoes made out of wood that were issued by the Nazis. Many men would have bloody, infected feet and excruciating pain. While on Guillot’s forced march, General Patton’s troops suddenly arrived to overtake the Stalag 17B captors and rescued the Prisoners of War. Patton arrived in person at the scene shortly thereafter, and then he and his troops continued on immediately to fight and put an end to the War in Europe.
Guillot earned two Purple Hearts and other medals for his courage and bravery during World War II. <br>

Today, at age 98, Guillot passes his time peacefully as an expert in the field of Plumeria plants and has discovered and named many varieties of plumeria, the first of which was Guillot’s Sunset. His yard is filled with large and very beautiful Plumerias that he and his friends and family enjoy immensely. He also enjoys art, creating beautiful paintings in oils and watercolors.
Thank you, Bud Guillot, for your service to our country. We are so glad you survived, and it was an honor to meet with you.