Bill Jones - Early Years and Military Service

William Calvin Jones Jr.

 William Calvin Jones Jr. 

            William Calvin Jones Jr., commonly known to his friends as "Bill", was born and raised in Sumner, Illinois. His parents, Jennie Lora (Travis) and William Calvin Jones Sr., welcomed their son into the world on May 21, 1917. Bill was raised as an only child, having one older sister who passed away at ten months old from whooping cough.
            After finishing high school, Bill spent some time working as a salesman at Wendell Winter's Drugstore. He was close with his parents and after several years of illness, he lost his beloved mother on January 14, 1944 when she was only 54 years old. She left a profound impact on Bill which is evident in the way he spoke of her in this letter to his father:

                "I'll bet there is a beautiful big bouquet on mother's grave today. I know that you haven't forgotten. This would have been her 56th birthday. Her life was short, but a mighty sweet and helpful one. A life that will always be remembered in the heart of those who care. As I have told her many times, she will always be alive as long as there is breath left in my body. Her teachings, and loving care in the past will help to guide my steps toward the right, as long as I am on this old earth."

World War II

Bill's WWII Draft Card

        Just two months after Jennie's death, Bill was drafted for World War II and enlisted in the U.S. Army on March 7, 1944 at the age of 26. His draft card described him as 5 foot 8 inches tall, 135 pounds with brown hair, blue eyes, and a ruddy complexion.

         After completing basic training in Florida, Bill had a ten day furlough at home before reporting to Fort Meade, Maryland on July 31st, 1944. He remained there for about one week before being taken to Camp Myles Standish, Massachusetts which was a few miles from Boston. He stayed there for ten days and then took a train to Boston Harbord on August 17th.

U.S.S. Mt. Vernon

        Once at the harbor, he immediately boarded a large boat. Built in 1932, it was originally a luxury ocean liner called the "S.S. Washington". It had been converted into a troop transport and given the war name "U.S.S. Mt. Vernon" and held between 8,000-9,000 men. Bill slept one deck below water and remarked that "If the ship had been sunk in a hurry, I would have been out of luck."

        At one point they were chased by a submarine and had to go 500 miles off course to shake it. This detour put them behind schedule in reaching their destination and when they docked at Liverpool, England they learned that their ship had been reported sunk.

94th Infantry Division Patch

        Taking an English boat across the channel, they landed in France on the still cluttered Omaha Beach on August 30, 1944. "Omaha" was the code name given for one of the five sectors of the Allied invasion of German-occupied France in the Normandy Landings on D-Day (June 6, 1944). Here Bill was shuffled between replacement pools before joining the 94th Infantry Division, Company F, 3rd Battallion, 301st Regiment on September 17th. This division was assembled back in September of 1942 and spent almost two years in intensive training but saw no combat. Bill joined the ranks just as that all changed...

        They joined the lines in the Brittany Peninsula where their first mission was to contain the German garrison in the submarine port of Lorient. This was later enlarged to include the St. Nazaire port as well. The 94th Division became responsible for holding more than 52,000 German troops, and was covering a 365 mile front - the longest in military history for a single division. They became known as "Patton's Golden Nugget" inflicting over 2,700 casualties on the enemy and taking 566 prisoners. 

        They spent four months dodging enemy artillery and patrolling the division sector with occasional exchanges of prisoners of war before receiving orders to move across France. On New Year's Day 1945, they loaded into trucks and moved 500 miles to their new position at the base of the Saar Moselle triangle, southeast of Luxembourg. Here the Germans had thrown up what came to be known as the Siegfried Switch Line, a deadly mass of concrete and steel, to protect the German border and act as a buffer to the rest of the Siegfried Line east of the Saar River. 

        By January 7th, the division had taken positions along a line that included Driesbach, John, Mittel, Borg, Wochern, and Besch. The 376th occupied the left zone, with a left flank base on the Moselle and the 301st (Bill's regiment) right, extending to the Saar where they served as a holding force. 

        On January 14th, the 376th Infantry launched their first attack on the Western Front, storming Tettingen and Butzdorf. In the following three days they seized Nenning, Weis, and Berg. Severe counter attacks followed, and it was at Nenning that the Germans gave the division its nickname "Roosevelt's Butchers" for stacking the dead bodies in houses and along roads and refusing prisoners, lacking the means to guard and transport them. Butzdorf, Berg, and most of Nenning changed hands several times before finally being secured on January 26th.

        Sent to halt the advance of the 94th was the German 11th Panzer Division. Through interrogation of PW's they learned that the German's assignment in the triangle was "Himmel-Fahrt Commando" translation: "The Gateway to Hell". This just spurred the US troops on and the 11th was hit so hard by the 94th's intensive and accurate artillery fire, that it was finally withdrawn and replaced by two infantry divisions. On February 2nd, the 302nd Infantry began the job of clearing the Campholz Woods, taking more than 150 prisoners. The 94th made a breakthrough of the Switch Line and German positions on February 19th behind a 15,000 round artillery barrage.

        On February 7, 1945 the 301st moved from it's line at Butzdorf and crossed the ridge line running between Borg and Oberleuken. Bill marked this day as his first real close call and in a letter to his father he said, "I thought I had seen plenty of 'hell' and had been through a lot up until then but I hadn't even begun to know the meaning of the word." Bill was walking through the woods when a German soldier spotted him. The enemy raised his gun and had Bill in his sights. But before the German could fire a shot, "Gramps" (who couldn't have been older than 35) took him out using a Browning Automatic Rifle.

        As the 94th advanced, they pushed the disorganized Germans to the bank of the Saar and by February 21st, the Saar-Moselle triangle had been completely cleared. The severe weather now taking its toll on Bill, he fell ill and developed frostbite on his feet. Little did he know, this was a blessing in disguise. The morning of February 22nd, Bill was evacuated to the hospital just as General Patton ordered Bill's regiment to cross the Saar River immediately, against the advice of many of his officers.

        Under command of Lieutenant Colonel William A. McNutty, the 94th's 3rd Battalion, 301st Infantry Regiment crossed the icy and swollen Saar on February 23, 1945. Lacking adequate intelligence, Lt. Col. McNutty performed his own reconnaissance under considerable personal risk. Despite his efforts, many men and materials were lost during the very ill-prepared Saar crossing. Two of the three crossing sites were eventually abandoned due to heavy and pinpoint German artillery and machinegun fire.

Sergeant Forrest Randall's
poem published in the
Sumner Press

        Bill spent his time in the hospital writing long letters to loved ones back home, drawing comics, and swapping jokes with Forrest Randall, the Sergeant in charge of the ward. He enjoyed reading the "Stars and Stripes" newspaper and listening to the radio. One of his letters mentions the son, "String of Pearls" which featured his favorite instrument, the saxophone. Bill's spirits were high and when he asked Sgt. Randall to write something to include in his letter home, he was happy to compose a quick poem about Bill's sense of humor. 

        After he recovered, Bill rejoined his division on March 31st where, after 200 days of consecutive fighting, the 94th left the Third Army and moved north to assist in reducing the Ruhr pocket and enforcing military government. April 1st was Easter Sunday and they spent it on a train traveling through five different countries: Germany, France, Belgium, Holland, and Luxembourg.

        Once there, the division became part of the Fifteenth Army and stood guard on the banks of the Rhine until the complete collapse of the pocket in mid-April bringing their time in combat to a close. They moved to the Dusseldorf area and were performing occupational duties when V-E Day was announced on May 8th, 1945. 

        In the city of Dusseldorf, the division had its first opportunity since coming overseas to take advantage of sporting facilities. At Truman Park, they held horse races such as the FDR Memorial and Fortier Handicap to audiences that reached capacity. They also competed in intra-mural track and field meets at the former Adolf Hitler Sportplatz which could seat 40,000 people. 

        British forces took over the area on June 12th and the 94th moved again. They left the Dusseldorf-Haan area on June 15th and went directly to Metomund where they waited for a few hours before climbing into box cars. The next two days were spent in the industrial section of Germany which had been totally destroyed. At Bielefeld they headed south and east where they saw Butzbeck, which had been a victim of "art bombing". The mass of bodies at Bad Manheim was a horror scene.

This scrap from a Nazi flag
was one of the souvenirs that
Bill collected at Nurnberg.

        They rode through the area near the Flossenburg concentration camp which, before being liberated by the US Army in April 1945, had 100,000 prisoners pass through; of those, around 30,000 died from malnutrition, overwork, execution, and death marches. When Flossenburg's numbers swelled with political prisoners from outside of Germany, they developed an extensive subcamp system that eventually outgrew the main camp. One of these subcamps was located in Wurzburg which became part of a strategic bombing campaign by the Allies against Nazi Germany on March 16, 1945. In 18 minutes, the city was totally destroyed and an estimated 5,000 people were killed. Traveling through the wreckage of this town, Bill saw SS women working on the street as punishment for serving as guards at the female subcamp. He remarked that the SS women "weren't working nearly as hard as they should have been."

        They visited and collected souvenirs from the large stadium at Nurnburg where six Nazi party rallies were held between 1933 and 1938. At Passan they left the train and prepared themselves for a 60-mile truck ride. They followed along the Main and Danube Rivers for miles before crossing over the Carpathian Alps which were a "thing of splendor." June 19th they arrived in Mecichov, Czechoslovakia where they rejoined the Third Army and received their final mission: "to make friends with the Checs, and to create a friendly feeling between this country and the US."

Bill outside of the school house

        It was just about dark when they rolled into the small village. They were all very tired, dirty, and expecting to land in a nice sized city. When they saw this place back in the sticks, many of the men began yelling and cursing. Bill chose to save his comments until he could see the place the next day and found it to be "very quaint and picturesque."

       Modernism hadn't affected the little village of Wessex, their method of living and tools for work being very crude. The population was about 200 and there were over a hundred G.I.s so they were very crowded for sleeping space. Each family hosted one or two men in their home and the rest of the men bunked in the school house which held only three large rooms and had a large stork nest on the roof. Despite their limitations, the villagers had put in a lot of effort to make the place nice for the US troops. They made straw tick mattresses and pillows made with new new burlap for each of the men. Bill remained in the small village for about six months before being discharged from the Army on January 8, 1946 and awarded a Bronze Star.

        More photos and letters from Bill's World War II Scrapbook can be found HERE.