Goldstein, Ronald

Ron Goldstein was born August 16, 1923 , in London, England.  His parents, looking to escape the anti-Semitism and lack of opportunity, had immigrated to England from Poland in the years before the Great War.  They went on to raise a large family, and Ron was the 10th in a family of 11.  Ron left school when he was 13, and went to work, first for his father and then as a messenger boy for several news agencies:  he was 16 when the war began, and along with his parents and a number of his siblings Ron left London, fearing the bombing that was expected, and which would come to be known as the Blitz.  The family went to the Brighton area, but soon returned to London, and it was not long after that the bombing really began.  The family spent nights in their Anderson shelter, and Ron served as an air warden, waiting for his time to be called up.  That time finally came, and Ron headed off to training, where his skills on the wireless were recognized.  Within six months he joined an overseas draft and was in a convoy on his way to north Africa.  He just missed the fighting there, but in Sicily and Italy it would prove to be a different story.  In Italy in particular, Ron moved through Montecassino, where vicious combat took place; Ron was spared the worst of that though, given his signals training, which kept him and his team away from the front lines.  He saw the aftermath though, helping the wounded away from the battlefield.  Ron and the British army pressed into northern Italy, and then pursued the Germans into Austria, where the war ended for Ron.  He went on to be in the army of occupation, supervising POW camps and then monitoring the peace in the Trieste area, meaning that he would spend four years in Italy, learning the language along the way.  He returned home in 1947, soonafter meeting his future wife and settling into the rhythms of postwar life. Ron Goldstein was interviewed by Scott Masters via zoom at his home in London during the pandemic summer of 2020.