Alive And Well With 669 Stitches In His Body

COMBS

Posted By: Marilyn Holmes
Date: 7/26/2013 at 15:42:13

The Grinnell (IA) Herald-Register
July 5, 1945

ALIVE AND WELL
WITH 669 STITCHES
IN HIS BODY

Willard Combs, who was discharged from the army April 18 and is now assisting at the Starnes Station, is not going to forget this war in a hurry. Run over by a tank during the Sicilian campaign, Combs was so badly cut up that the nurses who cared for him had given him up for dead but the army medical corps, with its customary record of saving lives, had other ideas. When it was all over the doctor who performed the operation had taken 669 stitches in closing the cuts on the injured man's body. In spite of all this he recovered after a long period of hospitalization and is now able to do a good day's work with anybody. He is a living illustration of how the army takes care of its wounded men.