This is taken from an article that appeared in the Saline Courier about a year ago:

Bravery is not just limited to one generation, but Americans have had it in every generation. It makes me think about those who are currently serving in our military. Jon Chris Roberts who is graduate of Benton High (2004) is serving in the Air Force and currently stationed at Beale Air Force Base in California. Roberts is to be deployed to Afghanistan this December. 

Lieutenant Colonel Jeremy Foot is originally from Little Rock but now assigned to the National Guard Bureau in Arlington, VA. In 2008, he was recalled to the Arkansas Army National Guard to deploy with the 39th Infantry Brigade Combat Team (IBCT) in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. While in Iraq he was stationed at Camp Victory in Baghdad where he served as the Senior Escort Officer for the Joint Visitors Bureau. In that capacity he coordinated security for distinguished visitors to the area and served as the primary escort for them throughout Iraq. 

Jeremy Foot is married to the former Stacey Bowers of Benton who is a 1997 graduate of Benton High School. Stacey is the daughter of Jim and Debbie Bowers of Benton. 

Jonathan Frerichs of Little Rock signed up with the National Guard  Unit out of Camp Robinson in March of 2008. His mother Denise tells me that he was deployed to Afghanistan in the middle of May of 2010. Jonathan is not even allowed to disclose his current location in Afghanistan for security reasons. 

Luke Lowery of Maumelle signed up with the US Army in October of 2005. In June of 2008 he was deployed to Afghanistan with the 1st Infantry Unit, THE BIG RED ONE,  and returned in June of 2009. He has been stationed in Ft Hood in Texas since then and was on base on November 5, 2009 when US Army Major Nidal Milik “AbduWali” Hasan murdered so many soldiers. Hasan has been charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted murder. Luke is scheduled to deploy to Iraq with the 1st Cavalry Division in in January of 2011.  

Related posts:

Veterans Day 2011 (Black Hawk Down and North Little Rock’s Donavan “Bull” Briley)

 Below I have the story of Joe Speaks who fought in Europe and was captured twice by the Germans.

Photo by Associated Press

American GI’s clamber into a landing craft as they prepare to hit the beaches along France’s Normandy coast in June 1944. The World War II operation was part of the massive Allied D-Day invasion to chase German forces out of France. An armada of landing vessels sits in the background under barrage balloons. (AP Photo/Wartime Pool)

Photo by Associated Press

A U.S. Coast Guard landing barge, tightly packed with helmeted soldiers, approaches the shore at Normandy, France, during initial Allied landing operations, June 6, 1944. These barges ride back and forth across the English Channel, bringing wave after wave of reinforcement troops to the Allied beachheads. (AP Photo)

Photo by AP / U.S. Army Signal Corps

U.S. paratroopers fix their static lines before a jump before dawn over Normandy on D-Day June 6, 1944, in France. The decision to launch the airborne attack in darkness instead of waiting for first light was probably one of the few Allied missteps on June 6, and there was much to criticize both in the training and equipment given to paratroopers and glider-borne troops of the 82nd and 101st airborne divisions. Improvements were called for after the invasion; the hard-won knowledge would be used to advantage later. (AP Photo/Army Signal Corps)

Story of Joe Speaks:

On Sunday June 27th, 2010 in the article “Heroes among us,” Benton Courier, there was a story about Larry’s father Joe. Here is a portion of that article: 

Larry Joe Speaks of Cabot is my wife’s cousin, and recently he told me about his father’s time in World War II. Joe Speaks (originally from Waldron , Ark. ) arrived in Normandy six days after D-Day (June 6, 1944), and he was involved in the Battle of the Bulge and he fought at Bastogne . The Battle of the Bulge was the bloodiest of the battles that U.S. forces experienced in World War II; the 19,000 American dead were unsurpassed by those of any other engagement. 

During one day of intense fighting, Speaks was so focused on shooting and reloading during the heat of the action that he did not realize that his leg had been struck by shrapnel during the battle. As soon as the battle was over, a fellow soldier pointed out that his boot was filled with blood. Speaks said he had not felt a thing.  

In another battle, Speaks was on the second floor of a building involved in a machine gun battle with the Germans. Then in the middle of the battle, the soldier in charge of getting the ammunition from downstairs did not return. So Speaks went downstairs to get the ammunition and discovered the Germans were holding everyone at gunpoint. Speaks asked the lieutenant upstairs to come down because the situation was hopeless, but the lieutenant refused.  

Then the Germans took their prisoners and backed off some and bombed the building. For the next two weeks, the American prisoners were forced to march back and forth next to that building with the lieutenant’s boot still sticking out of the rumble.  

When the Germans were not looking, Speaks and another soldier took off running and escaped. They made it to a farm owned by a German lady, and they made up a story that Hitler had been killed and the lady broke down and cried. She allowed them to stay in the barn until the end of the war.  

Joe Speaks passed away on March 1, 1999, at age 73 and was buried in Sheridan . He had received two Purple Hearts, a Silver Cross and a Silver Eagle. 

• Previous
• 7 of 14
• Next

Photo by Associated Press

In this June 6, 1944 file photo, while under attack of heavy machine gun fire from the German coastal defense forces, American soldiers wade ashore off the ramp of a U.S. Coast Guard landing craft during the Allied landing operations at the Normandy. (AP Photo)

Photo by Associated Press

This was the scene along a section of Omaha Beach in June, 1944 during Operation Overlord, the code name for the Normandy invasion during World War II. Large landing craft put troops and supplies on shore at Omaha, one of five invasion beaches. In background is part of the fleet of 2,727 ships that brought the allied troops from Britain. In the air are barrage balloons, designed to entangle low-flying attack aircraft in their cables. (AP Photo/files)

Photo by Associated Press

Members of an American landing unit help their exhausted comrades ashore during the Normandy invasion, June 6, 1944. The men reached the zone code-named Utah Beach, near Sainte Mere Eglise, on a life raft after their landing craft was hit and sunk by German coastal defenses. (AP Photo)

Photo by U.S. Air Force

U.S. Air Force photograph of P-38’s streaking towards France on D-Day.

Photo by Associated Press

Men of the American assault troops of the 16th Infantry Regiment, injured while storming a coastal area code-named Omaha Beach during the Allied invasion of the Normandy, wait by the chalk cliffs at Collville-sur-Mer for evacuation to a field hospital for further treatment, June 6, 1944. (AP Photo)

Photo by Associated Press

German prisoners of war are led away by Allied forces from Utah Beach, on June 6, 1944, during landing operations at the Normandy coast, France. (AP Photo)

Photo by Associated Press

Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower visits paratroopers, including Bill Hayes, at center behind Ike’s right hand, in England on June 5, 1944, moments before the troops boarded transport planes bound for Normandy and the June 6 D-Day invasion. Hayes, who now lives in Fargo, N.D., recalls how he told Eisenhower that he was “damned scared” before the mission, his first combat jump of the war. This photo became a pre-invasion classic and continues to bring Hayes a measure of celebrity. (AP Photo/File)

Leon McDaniel’s picture

Okinawa – At the Emperor’s Doorstep” episode from “WWII: GI Diary”….. This old 1978 TV docu-drama was narrated by Lloyd Bridges and told the stories of real soldiers/sailors/pilots and their first-hand experiences in battle. Archival footage and good background music really made the stories come alive…..about 25 episodes were made. Video converted from really old VHS tape………. This is the story of the invasion and capture of the island of Okinawa in 1945–the last major land battle of WW2…..part 1 of 3

_____________________________________________________

This story was originally published in the Saline Courier.

Okinawa
Leon McDaniel said the battle of Okinawa proved to be the roughest on the Army, Navy and Marines. More men and ships were lost during this battle because of Japanese kamikaze attacks than any other battle.
The USS George Clymer was targeted by a kamikaze plane, but it missed. The USS Bunker Hill aircraft carrier was not so lucky. On the morning of May 11, 1945, 346 men were killed in one attack by kamikaze pilot Ensign Klyoshi Ogawa of Japan.
During the very intense battles, McDaniel would wait in the landing crafts a half-mile from shore for the troops to bring the wounded men down to the shore, where he then picked up the wounded and carried them to the waiting hospital ships.
After Okinawa, McDaniel said, the USS Clymer and many other ships were near the Philippine Islands when they were hit by a typhoon. The ships were in the storm for close to 24 hours. Ships became separated, and a destroyer was never seen or heard from again.
The swells were 80 feet high, McDaniel recalled, and the ship would ride to the top of many swells and then the whole bottom would fall out. McDaniel did have to serve on deck during part of that storm. He was tied to the watch station and at other times he was tied to his bunk.
McDaniel had a twin brother named Louie (now deceased) who served on the USS George Clymer with him. Before receiving ship assignments they were told to ask for no special treatment or assignments. However, Leon had made a promise to his mother to bring Louie and himself home again. So he asked for special permission to be kept together because of being twins and was granted his request.
Leon McDaniel said he participated in the attacks on Guam, Saipan, Leyte, Iwo Jima and Okinawa, and for these battles he was awarded five medals.
I have known McDaniel’s daughter, Linda Matyskiela and her husband, Terry, for 10 years as the owners of Bobby’s Country Cookin’ in Little Rock. Linda recently told me, “Daddy, for the last few months, seems to be living in those days that he once would never talk about. My sister Karen and I are so proud of what he did for our country in those many months. He lost friends and shipmates. He kept in touch with several of these men from the ship (from Texas) until the last few years. My family thanks you very much for wanting to share part of his time in World War II. We are so proud of him.”
Linda told me that McDaniel was humbled by my plans to write this article. However, it is I and the readers of this newspaper that should feel humbled to have brave heroes such as Leon McDaniel who have served our Armed Forces and did what had to be done to get us to the point where we could celebrate our nation’s first VJ Day 65 years ago today.

Everette Hatcher is a regular contributor to The Saline Courier and is the fourth generation in his family to work in the broom manufacturing business. Everette and his wife, Jill, have four children and live in Alexander.

_______________________________________________

This is the story of the invasion and capture of the island of Okinawa in 1945–the last major land battle of WW2…..part 2 of 3

This is the story of the invasion and capture of the island of Okinawa in 1945–the last major land battle of WW2…..part 3 of 3