World War II Veteran: Dean Lettington

As part of the 559th Field Artillery Battalion, Lettington had spent the last few months fighting across France.

Private First Class Dean Lettington, a 19 year-old from Des Moines, had crossed the English Channel with the Units of the 7th Army, 17 days after D-Day. As part of the 559th Field Artillery Battalion, he had spent the last few months fighting across France. By late December, his unit was getting close to the growing bulge in the line. As the German forces began to push forward the order to withdraw was given. After spotting German tanks, the men of the 559th were more than willing to comply with their orders and fall back.

(Dean Lettington) To get out of there, we had to go between two big stone buildings and we actually seen those tanks fire at us as we were sitting on the truck. The Lord was with us. Instead of firing into our convoy they fired into these buildings trying to get a cave in. Well some of us got sprinkled with rocks from the building, you know, nothing really severe. But then later we realized that yeah, they didn't want to destroy our convoy, they wanted our ammunition, gasoline and possibly our guns—if we didn't get them exploded.