Cleston Stell was born in Alvarado, Texas in 1926. The family moved to Fort Worth when he was young. During the 1930s, he attended school and graduated from high school. He was in ROTC [Annotator's Note: Reserve Officer Training Corps] for four years. He went into the Army after graduation. He was in school when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. It did not mean a lot to him at 15 years of age. After entry into the Army, Stell took his basic training at Camp Wolters in Mineral Wells, Texas. He was scheduled to go to Camp Ord in California, but he knew trainees from there were bound for the Pacific. The Pacific did not appeal to him because he had heard too much about the Japanese. He did not want any of that. He worked with a friend to change the Camp Ord orders to Camp Wolters. After basic, his advanced training was at Fort Meade in Maryland. After advanced training, he went to Camp Shanks and then shipped out from New York. He trained in heavy weapons that included 81mm mortars and .30 caliber water cooled machine guns. He was not in a heavy weapons squad but became an infantryman overseas. He later joined a Tiger Patrol [Annotator's Note: a Tiger Patrol was a small unit of men commanded usually by one officer who billeted with headquarters but had the dangerous task of scouting behind enemy lines]. When Stell shipped out, his troopship did not convoy but went south to Florida then zigzagged across the Atlantic to avoid submarines. The ship arrived in Liverpool then sailed to Southampton. After boarding another ship, they sailed across the English Channel to land at Omaha Beach in Normandy, France. The men climbed down cargo net ladders off the ship and boarded landing crafts to reach the beach. They were not part of the initial D-Day assault on Normandy. They landed after the beaches were secure.

Cleston Stell arrived in France where he joined the 80th Infantry Division in St. Avold. He was assigned to Company G, 317th Regiment [Annotator's Note: Company G, 2nd Battalion, 317th Infantry Regiment, 80th Infantry Division] as a replacement. He first experienced combat near the Maginot and Siegfried Lines [Annotator's Note: French and German built opposing fortified positions]. Stell was trained on what to do. He received the Bronze Star after the war for taking a machine gun nest in this region. Many people including his family are not aware of this fact. He circled around the nest and overcame three Germans manning a machine gun. That gun had put withering fire on advancing American troops and pinned them down. Stell shot two and bayoneted a third enemy soldier after his rifle was empty. He reloaded his M1 rifle and finished off all three of the Germans in the position. That was the only time he had to use his bayonet in combat. Years later, he checked on the incident and was awarded the Bronze Star for that action. He received a second Purple Heart for a wound that was only recognized years after the war. His first wound happened in Germany. It involved a German tank firing its machine gun on him. He was wounded in the rump. The second wound was from shrapnel in the leg received during an enemy 88mm artillery attack. Both times, he was treated and released to return to the front. Following this, Stell met a fellow Texan who talked him into joining a Tiger Patrol. After Stell did so, he found out the other Texan did not actually go on patrols but drove a weapons carrier instead. The Tiger Patrol went behind the lines at night to observe available enemy equipment and troop dispositions. He also conducted patrols when communication lines were cut. Radio contact could be sporadic at times. The Tiger Patrol troops would stay in battalion billets and do what they wanted until they were called upon for a patrol. Two or three men would be on a patrol. It could be dangerous but Stell was young, and it was interesting. A Zundapp motorcycle was found by an individual in one of the buildings where the men were billeted. When the men were asked who could ride a motorcycle, Stell volunteered even though he had never been on one. He was told to take it to the motor pool and paint it OD [Annotator's Note: Olive drab color] and learn how to ride it. Stell put gas in it and it started right up. He had it for little over a week when it started raining. The troops moved up a mountain road. The motorcycle could not climb up the slope in the mud. Stell decided to leave the vehicle beside the road and take a ride on a weapons carrier instead. Tiger Patrols operated mainly at night. Stell came close to being spotted by the enemy. He moved up on a German machine gun nest. He was carrying a grease gun [Annotator's Note: the .45 caliber M3 submachine gun]. It was called a grease gun because of its appearance. When Stell pulled it down, he lost the clip for the weapon. Stell left the gun there and returned to his camp. At that point, he was issued an old Tommy gun [Annotator's Note: .45 caliber Thompson submachine gun]. The stock was damaged on the gun and when the selector was put on automatic, the gun might fire one round or the whole clip. Stell was with the 80th Infantry Division when it crossed the Rhine River. The crossing was after midnight. They used motorized boats to cross. The engineers who were supposed to man the boats for the assault across the river got drunk that night. Other engineers had to be located. The men of the 80th were landed on an island in the river. Several of them were killed and some wounded that night. The next morning Stell found a friend from Texas who had been cut in half by machine gun fire. It was bad that night. From the Rhine, the 80th went up into Luxemburg and then Belgium and then back to Luxemburg. At that point, the division crossed the Our River into Germany then moved back into Luxemburg. The 80th then headed south into Czechoslovakia. The division then went to the Enns River in the Austrian Alps. After crossing the Rhine, Stell found the German resistance was not as strong as before. Many of the enemy chose to surrender. Some trigger happy Americans would shoot at them. More enemy troops surrendered as the Americans progressed further into Germany. The 80th waited three days for the Russians to appear. When the Soviets arrived, they were on bicycles, horses, and cars. German civilians were fleeing the Russians even to the point of throwing their children into the river. The Germans preferred to surrender to the Americans instead of the Russians. Since Stell was in the Tiger Patrol, he did not have to stand in formation. The next day there was a formation ceremony. A Russian tank came over to the American side, but it slid down into the water. An American tank had to winch the Russian tank out of its predicament. Four or five the Tiger Patrol men went across the river to meet with the Russians. They drank their vodka and ate their candy and sardines. When the ceremony ended, the troops returned to their positions but the Tiger Patrol continued to celebrate with the Russians. A sergeant went to get Stell and the others. He drove a tanker jeep fitted with a rack on the back. The Americans loaded up some of the men on the rack like firewood then headed back to their billeting area. On the way back, they met the Colonel in his jeep. Observing the men laying in the rack in the back of the jeep, the Colonel questioned what was wrong with them. One of the intoxicated men said "F- you, Colonel." The officer demanded that the men report to him after they sobered up. They did but the Colonel saluted their efforts and sent them back to their infantry units. The Tiger Patrol was disbanded. The Russians had a lot of vodka and believed in partying. [Annotator's Note: Stell chuckles.]

Cleston Stell saw that Germans had mixed feelings toward to the advancing Americans. The 80th Infantry Division took three concentration camps as they moved forward. They secured Buchenwald, Dachau and Ebensee. In Buchenwald, the commander's wife would kill prisoners just to get their tattoos in order to make lamp shades and other things. Stell photographed scenes in Dachau. He captured a German flag in the Ebensee camp located in Austria. It was hard to believe how people could treat other people that way. Some camps still had German guards there, and some did not. The inmates were glad to see the Americans. There were many dead people there. His photographs captured some of the horror. Cameras were easier to get than film during that time. He had the photographs of the camps developed, but he did not mail them home. Instead, he carried them home to assure they would get back. [Annotator's Note: censorship rules may have resulted in mailed photographs being withheld from shipment.]

Cleston Stell was on the Enns River in Austria when Hitler killed himself and the war ended. He did not believe the news to start with. He did not have enough points to go home but it was enough to avoid the war in the Pacific. Stell's outfit was broken up and he was sent to Munich. He was going to join the 9th Traffic Regulation Group [Annotator's Note: annotator cannot verify unit]. It sounded like MP [Annotator's Note: military police] work but was actually working with airplanes and required filling out forms on departure and arrival. There were three of them that worked together. There was a lieutenant, Stell and a jeep driver. Stell only worked about 30 minutes a day. Later he was transferred to the RTO [Annotator's Note: Rail Transportation Officer] until he was discharged. He left Europe to return to the United States in August 1946. He came in through Camp Kilmer in New Jersey and then was sent by train to Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas. He received his discharge there. If the war had not happened the way it did, Americans might be speaking German or Japanese. Stell supported Truman's decision to drop the bombs [Annotator's Note: the two atomic bombs dropped on Japan in August 1945]. Men fighting in wars today have a different situation than Stell and his fellow troops faced. He sees a lot of amputees today and feels fortunate that he did not suffer any more damage than he did. He is 100 percent disabled, but there is a new VA [Annotator's Note: Veterans Administration] clinic near him that is handy for him. During the war, he was young and ready to go, but he would not want to do it again.