Duty and Honor

Photo credit: Best Defense Foundation

At 102 years old, WWII veteran and Washington County native Jack Myers reflects on his time in combat, returning to Normandy, and the great accomplishment of the Greatest Generation

By Lisa Gregory

In the midst of World War II two young men forged a friendship. One was a Native American named Albert “Al” Haschke from Nebraska. The other was Wilbur J. “Jack” Myers from Williamsport, Maryland.

Both were members of the 692nd Tank Destroyer Battalion fighting in Europe. One would make it home from the war. One would not.  

“He was a great guy,” says Myers of Haschke. “I loved him.” 

Over 80 years later Myers, who was an anti-tank gunner, can still recall the moment he lost his friend as if it was only yesterday. “We took this village in Germany,” he recalls. “I couldn’t traverse my gun because I was hitting trees and stuff, so he got out and started to cut the limbs down. And while he did that, we got a terrific barrage of shells.”

Haschke was hit. “A piece of shrapnel went through his steel helmet and came out the back,” says Myers, who now lives in Hagerstown. “He went down. We went to him, but there was nothing we could do. He was gone.” 

Myers pauses, then says with resignation in his voice, “That’s war.” 

Despite memories such as these and the pain they continue to cause him, Myers will tell you that even as he acknowledges the bad, he relishes the good. “I’ve had a good life,” he says. “I try to think about the good things.” 

That life began in 1923, when Myers was born the sixth of 13 children. “There were seven girls and six boys,” he says. His family loved music and some of his best memories are of them gathered around the family’s organ singing hymns. Even today at 102 years old Myers performs. Recently, he sang “God Bless America” at the Gettysburg Film Festival with its World War II theme to an enthusiastic crowd.  

Growing up during the Great Depression, Myers wanted to help out his family. At the age of 16 he dropped out of school and went to work for President Roosevelt’s Civilian Conservation Corps or CCC.  

“I read about it and that I could get $35 and give my parents $30,” he says of the monthly pay. “So, I did it.” 

Myers worked at Rock Creek Park camps in Washington, D.C., for six months “building bridges and fences and cutting down trees,” he says.  

World War II veteran Wilbur J. “Jack” Myers in a tank moving toward the Battle of the Bulge. 

After CCC he came home and continued to work at a variety of jobs, including Troy Laundry and Dry Cleaning where he made $55 a week driving a pickup and delivery route. In 1942 he married Kathryn “Kate” Kendle. The two met at a local carnival. “The prettiest girl I had ever seen,” he recalls of the dark-haired beauty.  

By the time he was drafted in 1943, he and his wife had had their first child, a boy named Ronald. Myers says he had no delusions about what the war would mean for him and his young family.  

“I knew we had to do it,” he says of going to war. “And I knew I was part of the young people that were going. We had to make sacrifices to do the right thing.” 

He relied heavily on his faith. “I am a Christian, and I know that God didn’t want the world like Hitler wanted it,” he says. 

Following basic training at Fort Hood, Texas, he would go on to board the English ship, Scythia, along with 6,000 other soldiers in August of 1944.  We left New York City in a ship convoy,” he says. “Ships as far as I could see.” 

Waking up early the morning after boarding the ship, “I went up on deck and went back to the stern to see the New York Harbor lights disappear in the early morning light,” he says. “It was quite an eerie feeling wondering about our future.” 

However, Myers took great comfort in knowing that he and his fellow soldiers were in good hands. “I saw destroyers on both sides,” he says. “The convoy would zigzag to defend against submarine torpedoes and the destroyers would drop depth charges from time to time chasing them away. We knew the subs were out there but thank goodness we were well protected.” 

After arriving in Cherbourg, France, “We spent the next few days in Normandy getting organized to go in a motorized column through Paris and Brussels, Belgium, to finally go into combat in Holland in the battle of Antwerp,” he says.  

For Myers, the war became very real at that point. “I saw my first dead GI when we first went into combat in Holland,” he says. “It made me feel sorry for him and also made me think about what could happen to us.” 

With a victory at Antwerp, he and his fellow soldiers moved on to the Siegfried Line, a line of defense on the German border. His battalion occupied defensive positions along the Roer River during the Battle of the Bulge and supported the 104th Division from the Roer to the Rhine River, helping capture Cologne, a key industrial city.  

Myers planting a tree. Photo credit: Best Defense Foundation.

“We had to knock out pillboxes with our three-inch guns, hand grenades, and flame throwers,” he says of the small, fortified structures which protected German soldiers and provided a firing position. Not an easy task. “But after several weeks,” he says, “we broke through and pushed into Aachen, Germany, where we were able to hold our line of defense in the Battle of the Bulge.” 

The Battle of the Bulge was Germany’s last major offensive on the Western Front and the eventual Allied victory would be a pivotal turning point in the war. 

“When we got to Cologne we celebrated after driving the Germans back across the Rhine River,” says Myers. “I remember some of us going up in a cathedral and we could see the Germans moving across the river.” 

But the battalion would pay a high price losing men like Haschke, Myers’s good friend. 

“We found out later that his twin brother, Adolph, was nearly killed in the same barrage,” says Myers. Adolph and his commander had stepped away from their jeep momentarily when it was hit by a shell and destroyed.   

Myers would experience a close call himself. “We were going through heavy artillery and mortar fire,” he says. “A shell hit a building above us and shrapnel sprayed our tank destroyer and the open turret.” 

A piece of that shrapnel hit his helmet but fortunately did not penetrate it. He took the piece of shrapnel home as a souvenir. “I was lucky,” he says.  

And he could be heroic when called upon to do so. Myers received the Bronze Star for firing at an enemy observation post in a church steeple 4,000 yards away, scoring a direct hit and stopping heavy shelling on his fellow soldiers.  

Company B, 692nd Tank Destroyer Battalion. Jack Myers Tank Crew. Sam Fena, Chester Bartoszek, Joseph Kelley, Jack Myers, and Albert Haschke in Tennessee.

 “Our men were pinned down,” says Myers. “My leader came over and said, ‘Jack, I think their fire is being directed by someone up in that church temple.’  He told me, ‘I want you to put a high explosive shell in that window and see what happens.’ The gun I had was a 90 millimeter, and I put a shell right in there. It was a direct hit. I felt good because I thought, well, that’s going to help us. We won’t get shot anymore. And we didn’t.” 

His battalion would also help to liberate Dachau, one of the first and longest-running concentration camps established by the Nazis. When asked about it, the usually chatty Myers becomes quiet. He stares off into the distance for a brief moment deep in thought.  

“They were skin and bone,” is all he will say before adding, “How do you treat another human being like that?”  

But even among the atrocities, there were moments of simple pleasures. A good pork chop, for example. The two farm boys, Myers and Haschke, knew a good eating opportunity when they saw it. 

“One day we came across some hogs,” recalls Myers. “Haschke said if we killed one of those hogs, he would skin it, and we would have some pork. So, we shot the hog and threw it on the tank until we had a chance to eat it. The weather was cold, so it didn’t spoil.” 

A few days later the unit was “holed up in a small village long enough for us to skin this hog and have us some pork chops,” says Myers. “It was nice to have something to eat besides rations.” 

A taste of home for the two men. 

Being away from their home and their loved ones was always challenging, but especially during the holidays. “At Christmastime in 1944,” says Myers, “we got a command to stop firing. They gave us time to go through our cards and just sit there and think about being home. I was longing to be home with Kate and Ronnie. All of sudden across the river the enemy started to sing Christmas carols. We sang with them.” 

The soldiers found solace in other ways as well. “One of the men in our company found a friendly dog, brown in color,” says Myers. “So, he called it Brownie.” 

The dog and soldier stayed together until the war ended. “I’m sure the dog was a great comfort to him,” says Myers. So much so that after the war, the soldier took the dog back home with him to Wisconsin.  

Wilbur J. “Jack” Myers took part in the 81st anniversary D-Day celebration in Normandy, France in June, planting a tree and signing memorabilia. Photo credit: Best Defense Foundation.

Myers fighting days would end earlier than he wanted or expected following an accident. He had a German soldier surrender to him who had on him “a beautiful 32-caliber pistol, which I took,” says Myers.  

Later showing it to his fellow soldiers, “it accidentally fired going through my left hand,” he says. “I told them to just put a bandage on it and let me remain, but it was too serious. I was so disappointed and disgusted. I really wanted to stay with my unit until the end.” 

He was sent to England for surgery on his hand and would not return to the battlefield. 

Myers would eventually return home to Kate and his little boy. A second son had been born while Myers was overseas fighting but died shortly after birth. “I never got to see him,” says Myers. “But it couldn’t be helped. That was a hard time for Kate and I.” 

The couple would have a total of four children, all boys. Today, Myers is not only a proud father, but a proud grandfather, great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather. Including great-grandchildren who are a set of triplets. “They named the boy after me,” says Myers, beaming. 

Myers went on to work in the furniture business, and he and Kate made a good life for themselves and their children. Kate passed away after 69 years of marriage. 

For most of his life, Myers couldn’t talk about what he had seen and experienced during the war. But, in more recent years he began to share his stories. He has even returned to Germany and France, including this year’s 81st anniversary of the Normandy invasion. “The people there still thank us,” he says of himself and his fellow veterans.  

Opening up and talking about the war has also benefitted him in ways he could not have imagined. When Myers was asked to participate in a Zoom presentation on World War II and talked about losing his friend Al, the great-great-nephew of Albert Haschke saw it. He reached out to Myers. 

“We’re best friends now,” says Myers. “He looks like Al. He talks like him. He laughs like him. I got my friend back. I got Al back.”