Milton Hart is the only child of two only children. His service in World War II — as a combat infantryman with the 70th Armored Infantry Battalion, 20th Armored Division — gave him a sense of camaraderie.

The soldiers he served with, he said, were “as close to me as a brother would be.”

Hart has stayed in touch with his comrades in arms throughout his life and, at 94, is one of the few surviving.

He tears up when he remembers liberating Dachau, giving away his rations to the “walking skeletons.” He laughs when he remembers the celebration after the Armistice as German and American soldiers traded guns and, rather than shooting each other, shot tin cans together. “I guess they didn’t want a war any more than we did,” said Hart of the Germans.

His troop ship landed in New York City — the soldiers were set to train for an invasion of Japan with heavy casualties expected — on Aug. 6, 1945, the day the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.

“We figured that saved our lives,” said Hart.

He returned to his home in Berne, working at The Mill as his father and grandfather had before him.

The town’s long-gone Honor Roll, listing World War II veterans, was replaced with a replica in 2006, built as an Eagle Scout project. That monument is now in disrepair and Hart would like to see a more permanent monument, perhaps of Helderberg bluestone, to honor Berne veterans of all wars.