J. D. Graddy was born in Hopkins County, Kentucky in March 1925. He was the fifth child in a family of 11 siblings. One other brother served in the armed forces during World War 2 with the Coast Guard in the Pacific Theater. His childhood was very quiet. He grew up on a farm with no electricity or indoor plumbing. While not attending school, he spent all his time helping out around the farm. He began running a team of plow horses at the age of six. He and his brother could do the work of one man. Graddy is proud of the way he grew up and feels his parents taught him right from wrong. His only access to news from the outside world came from his teachers in the one room schoolhouse he and his siblings attended. Graddy learned about the war in Europe while in school. As a sophomore in high school when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941], Graddy had no idea how the news would affect him until his brother volunteered for the Coast Guard in the summer of 1942. Graddy and 500 other 18-year-olds from the county were drafted and called in for examinations in Evansville, Indiana. He was initially placed in the Marine Corps. Graddy says that sounded like it would involve water, and he did not like that so, he successfully advocated to be placed in the Army instead. Before reporting for basic training, Graddy's father told him to listen to every word he was taught in training as his life could come to depend on it. He pressed the words onto his heart and thought of them throughout his training. He boarded a train to Camp Shelby, Mississippi [Annotator's Note: Camp Shelby near Hattiesburg, Mississippi] where he began his basic training as a rifleman. After 16 weeks, he graduated to advanced training where he was taught to kill or be killed. Graddy's lieutenant told him a lesson he never forgot, "If you are afraid, you will be killed." These training experiences exposed him to a world he never knew existed, and one he came to have great affection for. After training was completed, he boarded a train to Camp Kilmer, New Jersey [Annotator's Note: in Piscataway Township, New Jersey] to await shipment overseas. While in New Jersey, Graddy was given a 24 hour pass [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time] to visit New York City [Annotator's Note: New York, New York]. Feeling there was nothing there for him to see and only trouble to get into, he decided not to go. Instead, his platoon sergeant returned home for 48 hours using both his own and Graddy's passes. Upon the sergeant's return, he was stripped of his stripes and transferred to another division. Graddy was called into the company commander's office and promoted from corporal to platoon sergeant. He took command of 39 men of B Company, 272d Infantry Regiment, 69th Infantry Division [Annotator's Note: Company B, 1st Battalion, 272nd Infantry Regiment, 69th Infantry Division]. The commander and several lieutenants were impressed with his abilities in training and in handling himself in New Jersey and felt he was the man for the job.

After receiving an unexpected promotion, J.D. Graddy had a lot to think about on the journey overseas to England. After several weeks in England [Annotator's Note: beginning 12 December 1944], Graddy boarded a landing craft and crossed the English Channel. Stepping from the craft with 39 men behind him was a frightening experience [Annotator's Note: at Le Havre, France, 24 January 1945]. He then realized that he would be out front and the men behind him would follow him like children. He committed himself to use everything he learned in training to keep his men safe. He marched through France, Belgium, and Luxembourg before reaching Germany where the real danger began. His unit, the 272nd Infantry Regiment, 69th Infantry Division [Annotator's Note: Company B, 1st Battalion, 272nd Infantry Regiment, 69th Infantry Division], was moving fast through Europe. He had a scare during the Battle of the Bulge [Annotator's Note: Battle of the Bulge or German Ardennes Counter Offensive, 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945] when the company commander visited his foxhole and asked him how things were going. In response, Graddy lifted the butt of his rifle above the rim of his foxhole and immediately came under heavy enemy machine gun fire. The enemy was always trained on his position. His leadership position gave him incentive to stay alive for the safety of his men. His first time under enemy fire was during the capture of a small, unknown German village. A machine gun covered the road and prevented him from crossing. By watching the tracer bullets, Graddy learned to time his movements and effectively dodge the bullets. He crossed the road successfully only to have his assistant, Pasquale Campagna [Annotator's Note: phonetic spelling], come barreling behind him, knocking them both to the ground, though unharmed. On another occasion, Graddy was pinned down by heavy German artillery fire. The shells were landing only inches from his face and the force of the blast lifted him off the ground repeatedly as he struggled to retreat. Following the shelling, Graddy realized the barrel of his gun was filled with dirt and debris. [Annotator's Note: Graddy becomes very emotional and says he had never told anyone the story before.]

[Annotator's Note: The video and sound are out of synch in this clip. J.D. Graddy is emotional.] Shortly after a near death experience, Graddy was wounded and evacuated to a hospital in Paris [Annotator's Note: Paris, France] before being evacuated to a rehab [Annotator's Note: rehabilitation] facility in England. It was at this facility where Graddy learned he was to be shipped to the Pacific to continue fighting. However, when the Germans surrendered, these orders were cancelled, and he was able to return to the United States. When he heard about the German surrender, he remembered the happy roar of the patients in the hospital. He has purposefully forgotten a lot of the traumatic experiences in combat. There were many times of laughter, quiet, and fearlessness. He credits the training he received with keeping him alive. While advancing through the Argonne Forest [Annotator's Note: Forest of Argonne, Northern France], Graddy led his men around a fallen pine tree as he knew it was booby trapped. Every man safely bypassed the trap, except for the company ammunition Jeep which hit the mines and exploded, killing the men inside. After crossing the Rhine River and capturing hundreds of prisoners, the war became more businesslike and began to feel less dangerous, though Graddy knew he could be killed at any moment. He felt that there was a machine gun that always tried to hit him. At this time, his platoon took a two story house in a village and slept in it for the night. When he awoke in the morning, the house had crumbled around him, and he had not been awakened by the noise. There were many occasions that Graddy would fall asleep and not be disturbed by the noises around him. He made sure that there was always a guard nearby to wake him up. On Thanksgiving 1944 [Annotator's Note: 23 November 1944], Graddy's unit [Annotator's Note: Company B, 1st Battalion, 272nd Infantry Regiment, 69th Infantry Division] had taken over a village. He stayed in an empty house and the cooks made a nice hot meal which was a pleasant change from C rations [Annotator's Note: prepared and canned wet combat food]. He filled his mess kit with his Thanksgiving meal and went to sit beneath a tree to eat it. However, before he could take a bite strong storms moved in, completely swamping his plate.

Upon returning to the United States, J.D. Graddy was sent to Thayer General Hospital in Nashville, Tennessee to continue recuperating [Annotator's Note: after being wounded in Germany] before being sent home. [Annotator's Note: Graddy talks to someone off-camera at 0:49:35.000.] He was told that he would be shipped to Japan as soon as he recovered from his wounds. He was home when news of the Japanese surrender arrived and says he was thankful that his brother would be able to return home. He was discharged in October 1945. He says his family spoke to neither he nor his brother about their war experiences. Graddy stills suffers from his wounds from war today.

[Annotator's Note: The video and sound are out of sync in this clip.] J.D. Graddy's most memorable experience of World War 2 was wading ashore coming out of the English Channel with his platoon behind him [Annotator's Note: at Le Havre, France on 24 January 1945]. As he was the youngest sergeant in the company [Annotator's Note: Company B, 1st Battalion, 272md Infantry Regiment, 69th Infantry Division], he was often called Sergeant Boy. Graddy took his military training very seriously which helped him get promoted early in his military career. His training lieutenant was mean and tough, but prepared him well and Graddy always appreciated that, He did not know how to swim, so he was always scared when they practice amphibious invasions. He did not like being on a ship. He says he was told he was fighting for our peace here in America. Upon returning to the United States after the war, Graddy wanted to be a farmer but lost a corn crop to heavy rains. He got a job as a carpenter, which he held for 30 years. Later in life, Graddy became a preacher. He is proud of his service and if he would have been encouraged more after the war, he would have stayed in the service for 20 more years. He loved the routine and discipline that came with Army life. Most Americans do not know anything about World War 2 because they are not teaching History in schools anymore. Graddy was taught to be tough on those that are below his rank. He had an incident where he had to strip a PFC [Annotator's Note: Private First Class] of his stripe because he was caught intoxicated. Graddy believes it is important to have institutions like The National WWII Museum [Annotator's Note: in New Orleans, Louisiana] and to continue to teach the war to future generations. Graddy believes we need some kind of discipline in this country.