Today, June 6, is the 75th anniversary of D-Day, one of those pivotal moments in world history when Allied landings on the beaches of Normandy marked the start of a long campaign to free northwest Europe from German occupation. Before all was said and done, more than 5,000 vessels and ships, nearly 11,000 planes and more than 130,000 ground troops were involved.
In Lucas County, the news of the offensive would have reached most by radio that Tuesday morning, but weekly newspapers still felt responsible for reporting state, national and world news, too, and Tuesday was The Chariton Leader's press day. Its banner headline read, "Allies Land in France This Morning."
The late Roy E. Cochran, of Chariton --- then assigned to the 149th Combat Engineers --- was among those who landed on Omaha Beach at 7 that morning, and there were others from Lucas County, too. But no comprehensive list ever has been compiled so far as I know.
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Three young men from Lucas County gave up their lives during the weeks that followed the initial landings.
U.S. Army PFC Jefferson A. Osenbaugh, 26, assigned to Headquarters Co., 1st Battalion, 358th Infantry Regiment, 90th Infantry Division, was killed in action on June 11, 1944.
U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Richard L. Patterson, 24, of Chariton, assigned to the 300th Engineer Combat Battalion, was lost in the English Channel on June 19, 1944, when the LST he was aboard, bound from England to the French coast, was struck by a German mine.
The third was U.S. Army Pvt. Raymond D. "Doc" Morrison, assigned to the 47th Regiment, 9th Infantry Division. His remains, along with those of PFC Osenbaugh, are interred in the Normandy American Cemetery, Colleville-sur-Mer. Sgt. Patterson is commemorated there on Tablets of the Missing.
Raymond, born Oct. 28 or Oct. 30 northeast of Russell in Cedar Township, was the youngest of 18 children. His father, John W.S. Morrison, had nine children by his first wife, Elizabeth, and nine more by his second, Raymond's mother, Mary Frances Dean. John Morrison died when his youngest son was only two years old, so Raymond was raised by his mother and older siblings.
By 1940, when Raymond was 20, he was living in Chariton with his mother and working as a truck driver. I've never been able to find a photograph, but when he was drafted, Raymond was described as a slight young man --- 5-feet-7-inches in height, 125 pounds, with blue eyes, a light complexion and black hair.
He was assigned to the 47th Infantry Regiment, a storied unit that entered combat in early November, 1942, in the campaign to secure the northern coast of Africa, when the 47th Regimental Combat Team stormed the beaches of Safi, Morocco. The 47th continued across North Africa with the Allies in their successful campaign to drive the German armies from that continent.
Landing at Palermo, Sicily, on August 1st, 1943, the regiment entered combat a week later. On August 26, Sicily was officially declared in the hands of the Allies.
On D-Day plus 4, June 10, 1944, the 47th Infantry Regiment landed on Utah Beach in Normandy. With the landing complete by June 14, its troops blocked the last escape route for the Germans in the Cotentin Peninsula and played a pivotal role in the capture of Cherbourg on June 28.
On July 10, the 9th Infantry division joined the effort to liberate St. Lo, but came under an intense attack from the German Panzer Lehr Division on July 11 --- and Raymond was among the losses.
Following the war, families were given the options of bringing their loved ones' remains home to the United States or authorizing their burial in one of the American cemeteries then being established. Raymond's family chose the latter course and so he is buried among comrades at the Normandy American Cemetery, where observances are being held today.
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