SGT. JOHN C. VERNON

Twenty year old John Craig Vernon of Fairfield, Iowa was drafted into the U.S. Army in March of 1943. He took Infantry Basic Training at Camp Robinson, Arkansas and was selected for the ASTP (Army Specialized Training Program).  He was eventually sent to Rose Polytechnic Institute in Terre Haute, Indiana where he studied civil engineering until his freshman ASTP class was canceled by the Army.  Late in the fall of 1943 John was assigned to Company B of the newly activated 245th Engineer Combat Battalion at Camp Shelby, Mississippi.  John served with distinction with the 245th Com. Eng. Battalion during the war, and was awarded the Bronze Star for valor at the Kyll River on March 6, 1945. He was discharged from the U.S. Army in February, 1946 and spent the next 50 years as a successful licensed engineer working on various civil engineering projects for the Federal government and later the State of California.  John now resides with his wife in San Jose, California.

Humor is hard to find in recollections of WWII combat in Europe.  John shared a candid perspective on the life of a squad leader in combat when he wrote the following of his experience at Ehrang. 

"When my squad arrived in the town of Ehrang on the Kyll River, we immediately began searching the houses for the sturdiest one that we could find for shelter.  Although the town was still partially occupied by German forces, we quickly found a good house with a cellar, the ceiling of which was supported by heavy beams.  Within half an hour of entering the town, German artillery began shelling us.  I ran for the cellar stairs, but my foot became caught in a partially opened C-ration crate, and I fell on the floor.  The rest of my squad ran right over the top of me and down the cellar stairs.  When I finally arrived in the cellar, I had brought the C-ration crate with me.  Because I was the last one down, I had to sit in the potato bin, the least comfortable spot in the cellar.  As we waited out the barrage, we ate the C-rations."  John C. Vernon, July, 2000.