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JOHN
CAMPBELL MOORE
Private,
Corps of Engineers, Army of the United States
JOHN
MOORE, a good woodsman and mechanic, applied for duty with the Corps of
Engineers when he enlisted in the Army on September 23, 1942. He was
assigned to Company B, 853d Engineer Battalion and was stationed at
Bradley Field, Windsor Locks, Connecticut, from September 1, 1942, until
January, 1943. Then he was transferred to the Dyersburg Army Air Field
in Tennessee where he served until August, 1943.
Moore went overseas about September 13. His battalion was
attached to the A.A.F. in the Mediterranean theater and had the task of
taking over captured airfields and repairing them for the use of the
American Army. Often his duty was performed in advance of other fighting
troops. Moore met his death on November 26, 1943, while troops were
being transported on board the H.M.S. Rohna. The Rohna was
sunk off the coast of Africa near Bone, Algeria. Bomb damage from an air
attack, heavy seas, and darkness hampered rescue work. More than half
the 1,981 men aboard the ship died.
The Alumni Horae of St. Paul's School, where he
prepared for Yale, said: "A person of unusual gentleness and
kindness, devoted to his family and his friends, from early childhood
sensitive, thoughtful and intelligent, John Moore, as he grew up, was,
more often than most people of his age, puzzled and bewildered by the
senseless avarice and violence that he perceived in the world into which
he had been born . . . . Having chosen a strenuous and dangerous branch
of the Army, he served with constancy and cheerfulness." |
