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John William Vessey Jr. was born in 1922 and grew up in Lakeville, Minnesota, when it was still a small town of 500 or so.
His dad worked for the Minneapolis, Northfield and Southern Railroad, usually
called the Dan Patch Line in those days. A World War I veteran, Vessey's father helped establish the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post in their community.
With the Great Depression gripping the nation,
Vessey's family moved to Minneapolis when he was in 9th grade. He attended Roosevelt High School where he was captain of the swim team.
In May 1939, while still in high school, and with a little
creative math when putting down his age, he enlisted in the Minnesota National Guard.
"It was pretty clear that Europe was getting ready to blow up, but that's really not why I joined the Guard. It
was an opportunity for a little adventure, to do something different. Plus, they promised me I'd get to ride a motorcycle if I joined up."
By the following summer, it was clear that Minnesota's 34th
"Red Bull" Division was going to be called up. "They didn't call us until February, 1941, but we knew long in advance that it was going to happen."
Vessey had been working as a package wrapper at the
Sears and Roebuck company on Lake Street in Minneapolis. "I was making about 25 cents an hour, or some astronomical wage like that. I didn't think there was any use in starting college, knowing that we
would be leaving soon."
The men marched from the Minneapolis Armory to the Milwaukee Depot. It was 20 degrees below zero.
It was warmer at Camp Claiborne, Louisiana, their destination. "We were
organizing the division, and draftees were coming in to fill the ranks. We weren't anywhere near war-time strength."
There was no basic training at that point. "All the training was inside the unit.
Draftees went directly to the divisions."
Vessey inched his way up the ranks with a promotion to corporal. He also changed job descriptions from a surveyor to a radio operator. "There was more money
in it."
At a training inspection, the sergeant in charge of the radio unit failed the test.
"They asked me if I wanted to be in charge of the unit, and I told them I really didn't know that much
about radios. They handed me Field Manual 24-5 and said on Monday morning they were going to give me an exam. They said, if you pass, you'll be a sergeant. If you fail, you'll be a private. I spent all
weekend with that manual working on those things. On Monday, I managed to pass."
Vessey was serving in the Headquarters unit of the 59th Field Artillery Brigade. On December 7, 1941, he and his
comrades listed to the news about Pearl Harbor on the radio in the day room.
"I think it was shock for everyone. If you followed the news, you knew something was coming. I had splurged an got a
subscription to Time Magazine, and I tried to keep up on world events. It was a shock, though, that they bombed Pearl Harbor. It wasn't a shock that we were in the war."
On December 8th, the Division
was sent to the Gulf Coast near New Orleans to guard the beaches. Knowing that an assignment overseas was imminent, the division sent half its men home on leave, and when they came back the other half
were sent.
"I had a date for New Year's Eve, but then I got a message that the men at Camp Claiborne had already been loaded on a train."
Taking a taxi from the railroad station, Vessey arrived in time to find the camp deserted. He was told he might still catch the division at Oakdale, Louisiana. He hopped back in the cab, and set off for that rendezvous.
"I made it, but that taxi bill exhausted every single dime I had."
The 34th went overseas on the British ship Aquitania as part of a huge convoy. "This was early 1942, and the Germans were sinking
Allied shipping in great numbers at that point. We watched ships in our convoy disappear."
The unit, the first American division brought over to Europe, was sent to Northern Ireland. "Don't ask
me why. I guess the idea was to reinforce the European Theater early on."
In September of 1942, Vessey was promoted to first sergeant of his company. "At the same time, the Army decided that all first
sergeants would be master sergeants, and so I got a double jump in pay and rank on the same day."
At age 20, he may have been the youngest first sergeant in the Army. "I suppose I was tough, you had
to be tough. But we really had a good outfit. The company was loaded with guys from Minnesota, Wisconsin, North Dakota and South Dakota. They were hardworking and they were smart. I only remember one
court martial the whole period of World War II in our battery, and that guy was from Texas."
The 34th Division eventually took part in the American invasion of North Africa, landing near Oran. The
Division moved by truck across Algeria into Tunisia.
"We got there in February of 1943, just before Rommel's big attack. We were assigned to the French 19th Corps. The troops were fed into the battle
as they arrived, and it was a big mess."
The 34th, like other American divisions, did not fare well in the early encounters with the battle-hardened Germans. "We had German tanks running all over the
place, plus the Germans had a lot of air support in those days. We were in all kinds of trouble.
"It was a lesson for all of us. We were well trained, but we were not trained for the war we came to
fight. It was a lot harder than our leaders had envisioned.
"Plus, we were miserably equipped for that war. We had just got rid of our World War I helmets before we got there. We were still using a
lot of World War I equipment. Our radios were from the early 1930s. We were really using vintage technology.
"Still we fought well. We fought a lot better than the history books give us credit for."
His job as a first sergeant was demanding. "My main job was to keep the troops alive, make sure they got fed, make sure we were getting replacements, and to get my tail chewed for everything that
didn't work."
At Hill 609, a major victory for the division and the Allied forces, Vessey recalled another side of the battle that didn't make the history books. "The night before, they handed out the
atabrine tablets, and they made sure that we all took them. The next day, there were more guys sick from that than there were casualties from the Germans."
The Allies pushed the Germans out of Africa,
and the 34th was encamped along the Mediterranean Sea near Bizerte. German air power was still strong at that point, though, and Vessey was wounded during a German bombing attack that summer.
"It
didn't take long for me to get over my wound, but I had another medical problem they were taking care of." Vessey had a cyst, and the Army doctors were not at their best in helping it heal.
Word got
back to Vessey that if he didn't get back to his outfit soon, he'd lose his job. "I went AWOL from the convalescent camp in order to get back. For a short while, I was listed on the roll as a North
Africa Campaign deserter."
In late summer of 1943, the division packed up and headed for Italy, landing at Salerno on D-Day plus five or so. The slow advance of the Americans up the boot of Italy was
difficult. "It was just a long series of tough battles. We crossed and recrossed the Volturno River I don't know how many times.
By Christmas of 1943, the Allies had reached Cassino, and early the
next year, the 34th Division was the first to enter the famous monastery town.
Vessey's unit then was pulled back and joined the invasion at Anzio. It was there that he got he next promotion.
"Who
knows what happened. I got called back to headquarters with four or five other guys. They told me they wanted to make me a second lieutenant. There didn't seem to be any way to say no.
"By this time,
we'd been in war a couple of years. I knew that second lieutenants were pretty much cannon fodder. I thought it was okay to be an officer, but it wasn't like I'd just won the lottery. But I could feel
some pride that they thought I was a reasonably decent soldier. We had some really good officers in our battery, and it was nice to be counted as one of those officers."
Again, the going was tough as
the Americans worked their way north. "That first winter, our clothing was just marginal for the weather. There was snow and mud, wet and cold all the time. And the German shelling and bombing added to
that discomfort."
It was also difficult to move the artillery. "I saw trucks mired up to their beds in mud. We had to use bulldozers to pull things around. The Germans never left a bridge behind, so
we had to ford the rivers.
Vessey's new job, with his commission, was to be a forward artillery observer. But that wasn't all. "At one point, both our battery commander and executive officer were
wounded at the same time. For all intents and purposes, I was the battery commander for some time. People just kept the army going, no matter what the table of organization said your duties were.
"I
don't want to paint myself as some kind of hero. I wasn't. I just did what had to be done. We all did what had to be done."
As a forward observer, his job was to call in the shelling where it was
needed. Being able to read a map and be accurate were important attributes. "We didn't like to have our artillery landing on ourselves."
Was it dangerous? "The casualty rates for observers were pretty
high, but there wasn't any work in Italy that wasn't dangerous."
One of the ways Vessey did his job was to fly in airplanes to figure out where the artillery was needed. "It was probably the best
target acquisition system we had in those days. An eyeball observation from an aircraft gave you a great view of the battle. We did get shot at a lot. The Germans didn't like the idea that your were
adjusting fire from up there."
During one flight, Vessey was able to see that an entire German division was coming down a road. The Americans on the ground, not realizing the size of the threat, sent
a platoon of armored cavalry roaring down the road at the Germans.
Vessey could see from the air that the little American unit was heading for big trouble, and he tried to warn them. The planes were
equipped with message bags that could be dropped to the ground troops.
"We wrote a quick message warning them and dropped it near them. There was a big orange streamer on the message bag, but they
guys didn't pick it up. They just kept heading down the road at great speed.
"We dropped a second message bag, and again, they ignored it. Time was running out, and I found a pair of linesman's pliers
and tied it to the third message bag. This time we flew in really low, and we actually hit the armored car with it. This time they picked it up. The lead armored car just kept going, though, and they
were immediately captured by the Germans."
Vessey stayed a second lieutenant until long after the war was over. "It was a battlefield commission, and our commanding officer thought they were necessary
evils. It was only a wartime emergency that forced the commissions. The 34th Division had an unwritten rule that no second lieutenants with battlefield commissions would be promoted."
In the end,
Vessey went from being the youngest first sergeant in the army to perhaps the most senior second lieutenant. The pain was assuaged somewhat when the Army declared that second lieutenants with prior
enlisted service would be paid the same as first lieutenants.
As the war ended in Italy, Vessey's number came up on the lottery to be rotated home. Along the way he was assigned the job of escorting
an entire trainload of German prisoners to Naples.
In Naples, he found himself one of many trying to get home. "To say there was chaos would be an understatement. There was a long line waiting for an
airplane to go home." Vessey was able to get himself designated as a courier, and eventually used that precedence to get an airplane seat.
"After World War II, I didn't know whether to stay in
or get out. I liked what I was doing." In the end, Vessey decided to stay in, and in April, 1946, he was finally made a first lieutenant. The rest, as they say, is history.
He attended Army and
civilian schools, and rose swiftly through the ranks. In 1967, as a lieutenant colonel in Vietnam, he led his 300-man artillery unit against an all-out attack by 2,000 enemy troops. At one point he took
up a grenade launcher and from an exposed position, knocked out three enemy rocket launchers. For that action, he earned the Distinguished Service Cross.
By 1970, he was a brigadier general with
assignments in Thailand and Laos. He earned his fourth star in 1976, commanded the forces in Korea, and in 1979 became the Army Vice Chief of Staff.
In 1982, President Ronald Reagan named Vessey the
Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff, the highest military position ever attained by a Minnesotan. When he retired in 1985, he had served longer than any other person in the Army, 46 years of active
duty.
His service was far from over, however, and he later led the U.S. mission to Vietnam that has resulted in the return of many servicemen's remains that had been listed as MIA. He still serves on
various national commissions, including those looking at the national security of the United States. Vessey was honored in 1992 with the nation's highest civilian honor, the Medal of Freedom, presented
by President George Bush.
Vessey also served on the commission that picked the design of the World War II Memorial in Washington D.C.
He and his wife, Avis, have two sons and a daughter, and they
live in a beautiful home overlooking a lake near Garrison, Minnesota. After the first of the year, he is planning to begin work on a book about his life.
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