A Republican delegate from Stratford is back home Saturday after he was assaulted by anti-war demonstrators at the GOP's national convention, he says.

Fred Biebel, 82, got caught in the middle of a protest by a group he says was spewing anti-American rhetoric outside of the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, Minn. Biebel says a protestor ripped a set of Republican National Convention credentials from around his neck in an attempt to prevent him from entering the arena.

"It's disturbing to think that here in America you can't walk freely into a public building as a delegate without being attacked," Biebel says.

Biebel says he was tended to by Emergency Medical Technicians on the scene. Back home, his wife Violet wasn't surprised when she heard news of the assault. A delegate herself, both she and her daughters were attacked during the party's 1972 convention in Miami.

"I didn't like what they did here, they were vicious this time," she says. "They were bad enough back in the 70s."

Biebel says attending the GOP's national convention is a way of life for him. Biebel says he has been to 14 of them going back to 1956 and won't allow this year's experience to deter him.

"If the good Lord keeps me alive another four years, I'll be at my 15th national convention," he says.

Conn. delegates among protesters assaulted at RNC