Traveling is Gold

Author: mgold9@gmail.com

  • About me

    Michael Gold at a stop on the cog train coming down from the Zugspitze in Germany.
    Michael Gold at a stop on the cog train coming down from the Zugspitze in Germany.

    I’m an avid traveler who  recently retired  from the Department of Defense/War. Additionally I am retired from the U.S. Army Reserve as a  Lieutenant Colonel.  My career has taken me from deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan to living in Stuttgart, Germany for five years. I’ve visited  50 countries around the world, some for work, some for pleasure 

    Now that I am retired, I want to share  my passion for travel by writing about my adventures and  highlighting interesting, historical and fun places to visit. Given my background, I do tend to focus on  places with historical and military significance.

    My focus will be on:

    • City travel and road trip exploration
    • Military monuments, sites and battlefields
    • Underground structures and bunkers
    • Food, wine, and local culture that define a region

    My first couple of posts will be on Singapore and Seoul including a visit to the DMZ

  • Aiding The Partisans: Air Force, Part 52

    There is a great article by Hugh Halliday that talks about my grandfather, Paul Stichman.  Hugh greatly assisted me in deciphering Paul\’s military records when I was doing the research on his life. The article is in Legion Magazine and here is the link:

    http://legionmagazine.com/en/2012/07/aiding-the-partisans-air-force-part-52/

    Here is the portion of the article about Paul:

    Sergeant Paul Stichman was born in Dobrinci, Yugoslavia, in 1909, but came to Canada in 1925. He was married and had a daughter when he joined the RCAF in Toronto in 1942. Trained as an armourer, he might have spent the war servicing bomber turrets, but by May 1943 authorities realized he spoke Serbo-Croat. His service record shows a series of attachments to British formations and intelligence units. He was an interpreter and was probably trained to operate radios. His last known posting was to “Headquarters, Middle East” on March 21, 1944. He was then swallowed up in the fog of war, killed in action on May 4, 1944, somewhere northwest of Zagreb.

    Prior to being dropped into Yugoslavia, Stichman had been under the command of Major James Broom Millar, MBE (British Intelligence). On Aug. 30, 1944, Millar wrote to Stichman’s widow. “He was a most efficient NCO and his great courage and unfailing good humour made him very popular with all men in the Unit. I was not present when he met his death and am sorry that I cannot describe to you the exact circumstances, as no other men from our unit were present at the time. Paul had been temporarily attached to an Allied Unit and was fighting with them. He became involved in an enemy offensive and we heard that he met his death on 4th May. I understand that he was killed in the thick of the fighting, and did not have to undergo any prolonged suffering. We are still trying to obtain details with regard to his funeral and place of burial, but this is proving unusually difficult as most of the men who were engaged in battle with him were killed at the same time.”

    Stichman has no known grave; his name is recorded on the Malta Memorial.

  • Announcement of the Death of Paul Stichman

    Royal Canadian Air Force casualty list, published in the Toronto Globe and Mail on 4 July 1944.

    Paul Stichman\’s death notice 4 July 1944

  • Interesting Links

    Here are some interesting links which mention my grandfather:

    Special Forces Memorial
    http://www.specialforcesroh.com/roll-11289.html

    Malta Memorial – the  memorial for those with no known grave in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations
    https://www.cwgc.org/find-records/find-war-dead/casualty-details/1533349/paul-stichman/

    Uncommon Courage: Canadian Secret Agents in the Second World War

    A book by Sebastian Ritchie which mentions my grandfather:
    Our Man in Yugoslavia: The Story of a Secret Service Operative
    http://www.amazon.com/Our-Man-Yugoslavia-Operative-Intelligence/dp/07146…

    Remembering Toronto\’s fallen from World War II
    http://www.openfile.ca/toronto/file/2010/11/remembering-torontos-fallen-world-war-ii

  • RCAF service photograph of Paul Stichman

    \"RCAF

  • My grandfather, Paul Stichman

    My grandfather, Paul Stichman, served with the Royal Canadian Airforce (RCAF) in World War Two and died behind enemy lines. This blog is devoted to his memory. My goal is to gather as much information as possible on Paul, his military service and his family for this blog.