Part of the first wave of Marines onto Guadalcanal, Richard Greer saw heavy combat in his weeks on the island. One of the most pivotal battles during that time was the battle for Henderson Field, which his oral history describes with great detail—including the terrible moment of coming under Japanese attack in that brutal battle.

As a radioman and gunner on an SBD Dauntless dive-bomber, Don Hoff had a memorable view of one of the Pacific Theater’s most pivotal actions: the Battle of Midway. During the battle, American planes were trying (and failing) to locate the Japanese fleet in the vast Pacific waters—a search that seemed increasingly hopeless. Then they spotted the destroyer Arashi.

When Harold Ward joined the US Navy, few jobs were available to African American sailors. He was given a job in the kitchen and a battle station as sky lookout on the USS San Francisco (CA-38), where he witnessed the first waves of Japanese planes coming into Pearl Harbor. A year later, in the Solomon Islands, Ward witnessed one of the fiercest naval battles ever fought.

As a merchant mariner, Ralph Crump helped transport materiél to US troops around the globe—to Tasmania, Australia, Calcutta, and Alexandria, and more. This year, Crump is helping preserve the legacy of the Greatest Generation and of the US Merchant Marine by sponsoring the new Ralph E. Crump LTJG, USNR, US Merchant Marine Gallery, opening December 2015.

Japanese American Yeiichi “Kelly” Kuwayama served as a medic with the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. In his oral history, highlighted in the special exhibit From Barbed Wire to Battlefields, he recalls the feeling of fear that accompanied the first moments of combat, and the discipline it took to perform his assigned duties amidst the chaos of battle.

Along with other paratroopers of the 511 Parachute Infantry Regiment in the Phillipines, Phillip Schweitzer dropped 25 miles behind enemy lines to help rescue prisoners from the Los Baños prison camp. Schweitzer’s oral history recalls many refusing to leave without first returning to barracks to retrieve keepsakes and mementos. But Schweitzer and the 511th knew there was no time to waste.

Tank company commander John Rogers recalls tank battles, sniper attacks, and even friendly fire losses, as well as the interactions that convinced him of the righteousness of the Allied cause—from liberated French citizens cheering the arrival of American tanks to the somber discovery of emaciated prisoners too weak to celebrate their long-awaited liberation.

J.J. Witmeyer spent more than 200 days on the front lines of the Norman hedgerow country, and later in life could still remember notable battles blow by blow. But for this soldier, the most meaningful turning point in the war was far more personal.

The final months of the war the fire-bombing of Tokyo and other Japanese cities. As a flight engineer with the 9th Bomb Group, Dick Baile took part of those dramatic bombings. In his oral history, Baile recalls what it was like to fly over the Japanese mainland, including his role in the infamous March 9, 1945, bombing of Tokyo, and the intensity of the fires wrought by his bomb group on Japan’s capital city.

Born in Bratislava, New Jersey resident Charlotte Weiss is one of five sisters who were corralled in a ghetto, then carted from one concentration camp to another during the Holocaust. During this time they were imprisoned in multiple camps, including Geislingen (a sub-camp of Natzweiler-Struthof), Allach (a sub-camp of Dachau), and Auschwitz.

Raymond “Ray” Monpat served aboard the Navy destroyer USS Robley D. Evans, seeing action in some of the Pacific Theater’s deadliest battles—including Saipan, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa. In the Battle of Okinawa (pictured here), the ship survived bombing, severe flooding, and a fearsome kamikaze attack on May 11, 1945.

John “Lucky” Luckadoo was one of the original class of 40 co-pilots assigned to the newly formed 100th Bomb Group. Luckadoo flew with the “Bloody Hundredth” on some of their most harrowing and deadly missions. He completed his 25-mission tour of duty in February 1944, one of only five members of his 40-man class to do so.

Stationed in the China-Burma-India Theater, P-40 pilot Bob Liles learned to rely on his Chinese allies for help in nearly everything—from washing laundry to providing an early-warning system to guard against incoming Japanese aircraft. Unfortunately, the warnings didn’t always come in time.

On May 22, 1944, Barbara Pathe volunteered with the American Red Cross with a desire to work overseas. Two months later, she was in Great Britain serving doughnuts and coffee to American troops abroad, working in a Red Cross “Clubmobile”—a converted truck outfitted with a doughnut maker and coffee machine.

On December 7, 1941, Roy S. “Swede” Boreen woke before 0700, ate breakfast, and reported to the disbursement office—his post on the USS Oklahoma (BB-37) in Hawaii. At 0755 came a call to general quarters. Boreen was on the staircase when he spotted a bomber bearing the Japanese Rising Sun—an enemy plane attacking American ships—bringing World War II to America.