William J. BARTON
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Source : Silent Heroes
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NUMBER OF SERVICE | 35613296 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
AGE | 21 yo | |||||||||||||||||||||||
DATE OF BIRTH | 8 July 1922 OHIO | |||||||||||||||||||||||
ENLISTMENT STATE | OHIO | |||||||||||||||||||||||
FAMILY | Spouse : Mary BARTON | |||||||||||||||||||||||
RANK | Private First Class | |||||||||||||||||||||||
FONCTION | Infantry Man | |||||||||||||||||||||||
JOB BEFORE ENLISTEMENT | Aeronautical worker | |||||||||||||||||||||||
DATE of ENLISTEMENT | 23 novembre 1942 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
COMPANY | Company D | |||||||||||||||||||||||
REGIMENT SQUADRON | 329th Infantry Regiment | |||||||||||||||||||||||
DIVISION GROUP | 83rd Infantry Division | |||||||||||||||||||||||
DATE OF DEATH | 6 July 1944 |
Source : Jeff Hall | ||||||||||||||||||||||
STATUS | KIA | |||||||||||||||||||||||
PLACE OF DEATH | Carentan Sector | |||||||||||||||||||||||
CEMETERY TEMPORARY |
CEMTERY TEMPORARY of Ste-Mère-Eglise #2 N°3586 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
CEMETERY | NORMANDY AMERICAN CEMETERY of Colleville | |||||||||||||||||||||||
GRAVE |
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DECORATION |
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STORY | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Source : Silent Heroes |
William James Barton was born in 1922, the only son of James and Margaret Barton. According to city directories, James worked as a salesman in 1928 while the family lived at 192 Hirn Street. In the 1930 census, Williams's aunt, Dorothy, also lived with the family. At one point, William worked as a newspaper carrier for the local paper. Barton was a graduate of Chillicothe High School, but he was not pictured in the senior yearbook. Curtiss-Wright Corporation Source : Silent Heroes Prior to being drafted into the military, William James Barton worked at Curtiss-Wright, an aerospace company in Columbus, The company was the largest aircraft producer ofWorld War II, creating 13,738 of their famous P-40 WarHawks? throughout the course of the war. The company noted its wartime production included "142,840 aircraft engines; 146,468 electric propellers; 29,269 airplanes which included the Curtiss Commando transport and the Navy dive bomber, the Helldiver." Barton was drafted into the 83rd Infantry Division, 329th Infantry Regiment, on November 23, 1942. Source : Silent Heroes Camp Atterbury and Camp Breckinridge The 83rd Infantry Division trained at Camp Atterbury, Indiana (commissioned January 6, 1941). It was created to house 30,000 soldiers that were preparing for war. The division was led by Major General Frank W. Milburn. Training at Atterbury consisted of marches, rifle training, bayonet courses, exercises in all types of weather, and field inspections. At the end of a grueling 13 weeks (though the men were given furloughs and weekend passes to Indianapolis), the soldiers of the 83rd Infantry Division proceeded on to Camp Breckinridge, Kentucky. Before heading to Breckinridge, however, the division made a brief stop in Tennessee. They trained for maneuvers with the 80th Infantry Division and the 101st Airborne Division. They made day long marches in the heat with only one canteen of water. The training was designed to simulate how fighting in Europe would be. Divisions practiced assaults, defense, digging foxholes, and combat with blank ammunition. On August 8, 1943, it was announced that they would be going to Kentucky. After arriving in Kentucky, the 83rd Infantry Divisionmade an exhausting 100-mile march from Springfield to Camp Breckinridge, which took five days. Until February the 329th Infantry Regiment underwent specialized training, eventually leaving for New York on March 24, 1944, where they would depart to England Training for D-Day in England On April 18, 1944, the 329th Infantry Regiment arrived in Liverpool, England, after 12 days aboard the HMS Samaria. The soldiers spent months marching through the mountains of northern Wales, sleeping outside on the damp ground under wool blankets. After training, the 329th Infantry Regiment moved to Wrexham, and then on to England's southern shore along the English Channel. | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Fighting in France On the afternoon of June 23, the 329th Infantry Regiment landed on France's Normandy coast at Omaha Beach. They made their way through the previously liberated city of Carentan to relieve the 101st Airborne Division. Combat in the Hedgerows The Norman hedgerows - also known as the "bocage" - have existed in the region since the twelfth century, as a way to mark property boundaries. Each hedge was generally between two and six feet wide at its base, and anywhere from three to 15 feet high. Atop the earthen base was a thicket of brambles, trees, and shrubs that created a “formidable barrier.” Throughout the Middle Ages, the individual plots of land grew smaller. By 1944, the plots of land enclosed by hedgerows had been reduced to an average size of 50 to 100 yards between each hedgerow, making large-scale battles impossible to coordinate. With a lack of massive assaults, fighting in the hedgerows was reserved to skirmishes dependent entirely on teamwork. Prior to departing for D-day, soldiers in North Wales were given almost no training for hedgerow combat, which caused confusion and frustration; they quickly adapted. The fighting was broken into platoon by platoon, squad by squad skirmishes against a formidable German defense, which the terrain favored greatly. To clear a hedgerow, soldiers required the support of tanks; charges would be placed a few feet apart from one another and a tank equipped with a "rhinoceros" would clear away the debris, of course, this could only proceed when the fighting ceased. The 329th Infantry Regiment in the Hedgerows The Unit Journal for July 4 through 6 reports gruesome fighting. Heavy casualties were reported the morning of July 4. Officers reported that the "going was rough." The men in the hedgerows were in desperate need of artillery. Later that morning, 30 men were evacuated and 35 were wounded after just two hours of fighting. After two days of similar situations, the 83rd Infantry Division gained just 200 yards of territory, captured six Germans, and had 1,400 casualties. Barton was sent to the hospital on July 5, and died one day later. |
Source : 83rdinfdivdocs.org | |||||||||||||||||||||||
83rd INFANTRY DIVISION - THUNDERBOLT
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SOURCE INFORMATION & SOURCE PHOTO | Nhdsilentheroes.org Spencer Queen- Abmc.gov - Findagrave.com - 83rdinfdivdocs.org |
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PROGRAMMER | Henri, Garrett, Clive, Frédéric & Renaud |