Now in his 90s, Robert Capellaro, a resident at Good Shepherd Rehabilitation and Nursing Center, recalls being “Hell on Wheels.”

Capellaro was born in 1924 in Danbury, Conn., the 10th of 11 children. He had nine brothers and two sisters, all of whom have passed away.

“Something like that,” he says during a recent interview. “It was around there. You can’t remember everything, you know.”

After high school, he was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1942, during World War II.

“I was 18 when they took me. They wanted me right away,” he says. “What are you going to do? You can’t fight the Army, so you have to go in.”

He was a member of the Second U.S. Armored Division, otherwise known as Hell on Wheels. “I went to all the countries — Sicily, Germany, Holland.”

Belgium, mainland Italy and Africa are other places the war took him. Capellaro says he was never injured in battle or captured, but was awarded the bronze star.

“I was doing my duties and when you do your duties, that’s all you have to say. If they want to give [the star] to me, they give it to me,” he says. “I never killed hardly any. We hurt a lot of them. They give up after a while, they had to.”

Capellaro was awarded the bronze star for his actions on July 30, 1944, when during the heat of enemy fire he volunteered to return to an area from which the U.S. had recently withdrawn to help evacuate the wounded and the dead, according to the Feb. 2, 1945, issue of the Danbury News-Times. This presumably took place in Germany, but Capellaro isn’t sure.

“‘At risk of his life, under fire from the enemy and in danger of being hit by fragments from the exploding ammunition on the burning vehicles, Pvt. Capellaro assisted in giving first aid to the wounded men. He then made several trips back to the aid station as a litter bearer. By his actions, Pvt. Capellaro did much to save the lives of his fellow soldiers,’” reads the citation quoted in the Danbury News-Times.

“But, we made it, I made it home. I was a careful guy,” he says. “We had fun. We had good days and bad days.”

Capellaro says he remembers fighting young men his own age of different nationalities and upon his return home he doubted the U.S. would ever be at war again. Following the war, he was employed as a riveter, manufacturing planes.

“I got married. My wife passed away not too long ago,” he says, referring to Lorraine Capellaro. “She was a good wife. We got along well; no fights.”

Capellaro helped to raise his two stepchildren. “Those days are gone for me.”

Today, he says he enjoys socializing with people at Good Shepherd, but is beginning to feel the aches and pains of old age. He isn’t done with life yet, though.

“If I met somebody nice, I might get married again.”