Essa was drafted into the war when he was just 18-years-old, having to leave his mother, father and six sisters. He was born in the United States in 1925 after his parents immigrated from Iraq. His mom came to the United States in 1908 and his dad in 1914.
Following his summoning into war, he then had to report for training along with other soldiers who’d been drafted. His first training base was Fort Custer in Battle Creek, Michigan, where he trained for two weeks before moving to Camp Van Dorn in Centreville, Mississippi. He said he was there for 11 months before the recruit training in Fort Meade, Maryland. His last training stop was Camp Shanks in Orangeville, New York, which was actually named “Last Stop USA.”
Upon arriving in Europe, Essa recalled a large ship coming into the harbor near the ship he was aboard, where he saw General Dwight D. Eisenhower, commander of the Allied forces, and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill preparing to give orders. Essa said they began to speak to the soldiers over a loudspeaker about an invasion and that’s when they knew something serious was coming.
As Zeina Jaafar explained in the Arab American News; They were preparing for “Operation Overlord”, also known as D-Day; the invasion of Normandy, France that commenced on June 6, 1944. Essa said this was his first day in combat and unbeknownst to him, the invasion in which he would be shot and wounded.
Soldiers were transferred to smaller landing crafts that took them closer to the shores of Normandy, where German troops were stationed in the distance. Essa said that as they reached the shoreline, they were dropped from the landing crafts into water up to their necks. With their rifles over their heads, he said they trekked through the water to reach the beach.
In the midst of fighting back, Essa was shot by a German wooden bullet in his left ankle. He immediately screamed for help and stated that the pain was so immense that he believed he would not make it. “When I got shot, I thought I was killed,” he said. Sergeant Durham carried Essa on his back to safety, where he was then taken by jeep to a field hospital and treated by the medics. Unfortunately, that sergeant was killed in combat shortly after, Essa said.
Following his treatment in England, he was then sent to Crile Military Hospital in Cleveland, Ohio. Here, Essa went through a total of six surgeries and was awarded the Purple Heart. He set the scene of being awarded whilst sitting in a hospital bed and still recovering from being shot. He was officially discharged from the war in 1945 as his injury was too severe for him to return.
His life post war of course looked much different than going into active combat. He used the GI Bill, which helps World War II veterans pay for school, and attended a butchers school. He then took a trip to Iraq in search of a wife. He then married a woman named Samira, from Baghdad, and moved her to the States, where they had five children.
Essa was also awarded the Bronze Star for his service and his wife recalled two soldiers appearing at their house in Metro Detroit asking for him. She said they saluted him as soon as he came to the door, and that alone brought her to tears.
Last November, Essa said he noticed pain and swelling in his left ankle, where he’d been shot 78 years earlier. Essa said that as the surgeon was cleaning out his wound, he started pulling wooden fragments out of his ankle with utter confusion as to what what those pieces could be. He then informed the doctor that he’d been shot with a wooden bullet in World War II.
Essa has carried a piece of the war with him from the day he was shot in the invasion of Normandy, but is fortunately now relieved of the pain that bullet cost him.
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