American Valor Quarterly Issue 12 - Spring 2015 | Page 38

U.S. Army Center of Military History

I was born in Detroit, Michigan,
to parents that migrated north from
the Southern part of the country to
escape a life in the coal mines. I was
raised during the Great Depression,
learning how to hunt, trap and fish
at a very young age. With little
money to cover the cost of hunting
ammunition, I had to make every
shot count to put a meat on the table.
One shot, one kill. I did not know
then that this was to be my earliest
training in survival of the fittest.
On December 7th, 1941, my
generation was given a call to duty
that was answered loud and clear.
Volunteers lined up for the draft
in droves, sleeping on the street in
some instances, just to have a place
in line to join and serve our country.
Everyone wanted revenge against

the Japanese that had attacked our
country with the bombing of Pearl
Harbor. I enlisted and was sworn in
on my 18th birthday, later to become
a “Screaming Eagle” paratrooper,
just as my older brother, Elmer, had
before me.
I fought through the entire
European campaign. Being one of
the first to arrive on D-Day, my outfit
was dropped in Normandy, behind
enemy lines at 1:14 a.m. We had been
fighting battles for six and a half
hours before the beach landings came
in. One of our missions was to secure
and open the roads from the beach
for the invasion forces to move inland
into France.
Next we dropped into Holland,
where we battled for 72 days straight

in some of the worst fighting that I
had experienced throughout my time
in the war. We fought fierce hand-tohand combat, many times in water
up to our armpits. We were