1944: Two Laurel soldiers meet up in Normandy

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In an interview recorded on May 28, 2004, Lauren Johnson told this writer that he had met up with another Laurel soldier somewhere between Omaha Beach and the French city of St. Lo.

The man was Sgt. Dale H. Iller, son of Mr. and Mrs. Clyde Iler. After graduating from Laurel High School in 1938, Iler went to California looking for work. Unable to find a job, he enlisted in the army where he found plenty of work over the next 20 or so years. Johnson said he did not recognize ller at first because he had whiskers all over his face and his knees were full of thorns from the hedgerows. “I took him back to the medics where he could get fixed up,” said Johnson.

“A battlefield in Normandy might not be considered a satisfactory place for a reunion but one such field served this purpose for two Laurel boys,” commented the Cedar County News of Aug. 10, 1944.

“When Sgt. Dale ller and Cpl. Lauren Johnson met in Normandy recently it was a surprise for both as neither knew the other was in France. Both had taken part in the D-Day invasion.” ller and Johnson both were in the 30th Division but ller was in an infantry regiment and Johnson was in artillery. During his years of service ller was awarded a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart for a shrapnel wound. Johnson was hit by shrapnel, too, but said he didn’t think the wound was serious enough to deserve a Purple Heart.

After being discharged from the army, ller married Bettie Lou Wilson of Omaha and enrolled in a trade school in that city. Neither seems to have worked out. By 1949 she had filed for divorce and he had reenlisted in the army.

The Advocate of Dec. 27, 1950, reported that ller was on his way to Korea. This time ller was not in combat. Instead, he was a member of General Matthew Ridgeway’s staff and was involved in negotiating a peace settlement in Korea. Ridgeway’s headquarters were then in Japan.

Iler was in Japan nearly a year, during this time he met and married Dorothy Blankenship of Knoxville, Tenn. That marriage also ended in divorce.

In 1979 ller married Betty Jo Knisley also of Knoxville. He died in 1981; she lived until 2015. Both are buried in Knoxville where ller spent a number of years in the insurance business.

Although he had not lived in Laurel after the war, his obituary stated that he still was a member of the Laurel Presbyterian Church.

Back to Normandy: “I landed on Omaha Beach four days after D-Day,” said Dudley Blatchford in an interview with this writer in September 2005. “When we came out of the boat we ran over dead soldiers. That was just terrible. I also felt sorry for the guys that came out of the boats into the water. They were really wet and cold. I was riding in a truck so I didn’t have to wade ashore. Blatchford had been trained in artillery but had been transferred to supply shortly before D-Day.

Those hedgerows were really something,” he said. “They were about four or five feet high and so heavy and thick we could hardly get through them. When we tried to go over the top, the Germans would shoot at us. We finally got a bulldozer to open them up.

Then we followed behind the bulldozers. I wake up at night and still can see some of that stuff, he said. Blatchford no longer thinks of the war. He died in the Hillcrest Care Center on Dec. 29, 2008, at the age of 94. His wife, Hazel, passed away in September 2020, three months short of her 100th birthday. Both are buried in the Newcastle Cemetery.

The lead story in the Advocate of Aug. 9, 1944, was the bomber crash north of Laurel. The same issue also told of the deaths of Alvin LaVerne Voss and Clyde Jewell.

Voss, the son of Mr. and Mrs. William Voss of Laurel, had been killed in action on July 20 during the Normandy invasion. No details were provided about his death. Jewell, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Merrill Jewell who farmed southeast of Laurel, was killed in action in Italy on July 17.

After being wounded twice in the North African campaign, Jewell was sent to Italy, where he took part in the fighting on Anzio Beachhead. His tank was one of the first to enter Rome.

Although Jewell has a marker in the Concord Cemetery. Alfred Hansen, son of Mr. and Mrs. Louis M. Hansen, rural Dixon, was a member of the “Bloody Bucket” Division. This Division experienced eight months of combat from the hedgerows of Normandy to the heart of the German Reich. According to the Advocate, Hansen’s Division was the first to enter Germany in strength. He returned home in August 1945 with five campaign stars.

Sgt. Kenneth Dalton, son of Mrs. Viola Dalton of rural Laurel, was a gunner on a tank during the Normandy campaign. On July 16, his tank was hit by an enemy shell causing the ammunition to explode and the tank burst into flames. Despite suffering first degree burns, Dalton managed to pull other members of the crew out of the burning tank. For this, he was awarded a Silver Star for gallantry and a Purple Heart for his wounds.

He recovered from his injuries and returned to duty. He was killed in action in Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge, His body is buried in the Henri Chapelle American Cemetery in Liege, Belgium.

There were a number of servicemen from other area towns who also were involved in the Normandy campaign. Several fought with the 134th Infantry Regiment of the 35th Division - a unit made up of men from the Nebraska National Guard. Unfortunately, other obligations and limitations on time do not permit me to research this subject at the present time. This concludes my series on D-Day and the Normandy campaign — for now.