Stephen Colbert...shares emotional story of his uncle's D-Day service

http://thelead.blogs.cnn.com/2014/06/06/stephen-colbert-gets-emotional-about-d-day/

Stephen Colbert, as you’ve never seen him, shares emotional story of his uncle's D-Day service

By CNN chief Washington correspondent Jake Tapper


His grave at Arlington National Cemetery reads: ANDREW EDWARD TUCK III, 1st Lieutenant, United States Army. But to comedian Stephen Colbert he was Uncle Eddie, a hero of Normandy and his mother’s beloved younger brother.

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“There are letters in here that say, ‘Dad, thanks for the stiletto you sent me,’” Colbert says. “Because what they were doing at night was going into enemy camps and killing German officers in their sleep and then coming back without getting caught.” So a letter reads “'Sorry, could you send me another (stiletto), I left it in a German.’ … Those letters would go to my grandfather. And my grandmother would get the ‘Thank you so much for the socks.’”

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On the beaches of Normandy, Colbert’s guide challenged his sons to run as fast as they could up to the hills in the distance.

“And so they, of course, being boys … took off against each other to race to see who could get to the hills first,” Colbert says.

He turned to the guide and said, “that's cruel. That's cruel to make us watch that.”

Because Uncle Eddie “was only four years older than my son when he enlisted. And it - it made it very real. These were … sons just like we were, and we have. And the idea of … running into the teeth of that fire is unbelievably harrowing and unbelievably terrifying.”

Colbert pauses.

“You know, it's alive. It's not history. It - it's alive. I wish more World War II vets were still alive to tell us their stories.”