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September 24, 1999/14 Tishri 5760, Vol. 52, No.4
Memories remain fresh for surgeon, veteranTAMI BICKLEY
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 Samuel Hyman, 93, says this photo of himself, circa 1965, is the only one he has, and he won't allow any current ones to be taken. His reason: "I'm old." |
In a flower bed just a few feet from his door, two bright-orange mums stand as survivors of an intense battle with the raging sun.
"Oh boy, they really take a beating out here," Hyman, 93, says, gently touching a flower petal.
Nearly 60 years ago, Hyman recalls, he muttered that same line - only then, his concern was not wilting flowers, but American soldiers. It was 1942, in the thick of World War II, and Hyman was squatting in trenches during battles for Papua and New Guinea.
While hiding from flying bullets and bombs, Hyman, a surgeon, attended to wounded American and Japanese soldiers, noting the brutal effects of war on their bodies and souls, and doing what he could to save them, he recalls. He remained in the combat zone even after his fatigued unit was led out and another brought in; he was a potential replacement fighter if too many soldiers became wounded or killed.
"As I was going with the battalion to that hell, our colonel said, 'You're the last person I would expect to go (into the combat zone).' Maybe he thought I was just a little Jew and I would be too scared to go into that hell. And it was hell. There was no romance like in the movies. It was just bullets, bombs and death. People were falling and dying all around us."
Hyman has stored many war-related incidents in his memory, and 57 years later, his recollections remain fresh. His involvement as a doctor with the rank of first lieutenant and eventually, captain, impacted his life, he says. He made friends with comrades who were later killed. He helped people with whom he has since lost touch. And he reached out to some who were the enemy.
Hyman's journey through three years of war began soon after his graduation from the University of Michigan Medical School.
He had grown up in the Detroit area after his family uprooted from Russia - his birthplace - when he was 6.
Following medical school, Hyman trained to become a surgeon at a Jewish hospital in Kansas City, Mo. Acting on the advice of a fellow doctor, he enlisted in the U.S. Army as a reserve officer. After the war began, but before the United States' involvement, he was called to report to Camp Livingston, La., where he trained a small group of soldiers to assist with medical duties.
Before leaving for Louisiana, Hyman had married his wife, Cecelia, who then moved to live with her family in California while he was on active duty. "Every night the boys would go out on the town," says Hyman. "But since I was married, I just stayed in and trained vigorously."
Shortly after the United States entered the war, Hyman's young medics were sent to duty in Europe and he chose a new group of trainees from the 32nd Division.
Eventually, Hyman was sent to New Guinea to treat wounded soldiers. Food was scarce and conditions were brutal, he says. On one occasion, he recalls, the members of his battalion went without food for 24 hours, until a plane dropped cans of food to them.
"They dropped only pork and beans," Hyman says. "I had never eaten pig before."
As Hyman sat staring at the food, an officer asked him why he was not eating. When Hyman explained it was against his religion to eat pork, the officer offered him his own meal of beef and potatoes in exchange for the pork and beans.
Just two hours later, as the officer marched through tall grass, he was killed by the Japanese.
"I always felt terrible about that," Hyman says. "He had done a very good deed just before that and was killed outright. I asked God why. (I think) the answer was that this was war and we were at the sharp end of the sword of the enemy. That's just what was happening to people."
The following year, Hyman was promoted to captain after he courageously nursed a Japanese major back to health over bitter objections from "three high-grade officers." The major had been carried to Hyman's M.A.S.H. (mobile Army surgical hospital) in shock, as a result of a fractured femur.
Hyman's action was reported to Gen. Douglas MacArthur.
"MacArthur wasn't at all impressed with the American (officers)," explains Hyman. Instead, during a battle in New Guinea, MacArthur promoted Hyman to captain. Because the government "stashed documents because they had so many during that time," Hyman did not receive the official promotion document until five years later, after he had been discharged.
Hyman eventually fell ill with malaria and, along with other disease-stricken soldiers, was taken to Brisbane, Australia, where he convalesced, then worked at a medical clinic near MacArthur's temporary home. Hyman says he treated MacArthur's son, Arthur, on at least one occasion.
Hyman returned with his wife to Detroit in late 1944, and in February 1945 was discharged with a distinguished unit badge, American Defense service medal and Asian Pacific Theater ribbon with two bronze battle stars.
He says he never removes the circular gold defense service medal, attached to several gold chains, from around his neck.
After his discharge, Hyman worked as a physician and surgeon at Annapolis Hospital in Wayne, Mich. His most prominent memory is of the day he used an adrenaline shot to the heart to save a 15-month-old boy after the child had been declared dead.
Of the time he lived in Michigan, he says he is most proud of his past yearly contributions to the Jewish Federation of Detroit's Allied Jewish Campaign for Israel. From 1983 to 1994, he donated $110,000 total to the campaign, he says.
Hyman and his wife moved to Arizona five years ago. The couple have two daughters, who live in Chicago and Brookline, Mass.; and three granddaughters in Maryland, New York and California.
A member of Temple Beth Emeth in Scottsdale, Hyman recited the Haftorah portion during High Holiday services on the first day of Rosh Hashana last year, and on the second day of this year.