Jack A. Smithson was born in Malvern, Arkansas in 1923. As a kid, he worked in the sawmill there. At about 15, Smithson started working in nearby Benton [Annotator's Note: Benton, Arkansas], driving diesel trucks in the strip mines. He quickly learned how to operate and work on heavy-duty machinery. It was after the Great Depression [Annotator's Note: Great Depression; a global economic depression that lasted through the 1930s], but people were still on hard times. Smithson did all he could to help his mother. When he heard people talking about the attack on Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941], he had no idea where the place was. Because of the nature of his work, Smithson was granted a draft deferment. He was drafted into the Army in 1941. He was inducted at Camp Robinson [Annotator's Note: in North Little Rock, Arkansas], then went to Camp Wallace, Texas for 13 weeks of basic training. Smithson was then sent on to Camp Haan, California, where he was assigned to the 124th [Annotator's Note: 124th Antiaircraft Artillery Gun Battalion], driving the truck for one of the gun crews. The unit moved to Camp Irwin [Annotator's Note: now Fort Irwin in San Bernardino County, California] for advanced training. One Saturday, a general came to inspect their operations. The crew had a target drone that was towed behind a big plane. On the planes' first pass, Smithson watched as the crew correctly fired below the target. When the plane circled and came back, the crew fired again and hit the drone. He said the crew apologized for the mistake. The officer said it they had plenty more. The gun they were operating was a 90mm [Annotator's Note: 90mm antiaircraft gun M1/M2/M3] that could fire 10 to 12 miles out. They shot a lot of buzz bombs [Annotator's Note: V-1 pulse jet flying bomb, German name: Vengeance Weapon 1; Allied names: buzz bomb, doodlebug] down with it in England and got lot of practice there. Smithson continued his training in war games at Camp Livingston [Annotator's Note: Camp Livingston, now part of Kisatchie National Forest in Rapides Parish and Grant Parish, Louisiana] and Camp Polk [Annotator's Note: now Fort Polk in Vernon Parish, Louisiana], and proceeded to Camp Edwards, Massachusetts [Annotator's Note: in Cape Cod, Massachusetts] to wait on a ship. They did not know where they were headed. Soldiers were kept in the dark about their assignments most of the time, especially when they were overseas, and it was like living in a lost world.

Jack A. Smithson deployed overseas on the USS George Washington [Annotator's Note: USAT George Washington] a luxury liner that had been converted to a troopship. It was a terrible trip. The bunks were stacked from floor to ceiling to accommodate the thousands of troops, most of whom got seasick. The journey took about eight days, and the ship docked at Liverpool, England. Smithson went from there to Blackshaw Moor, England and stayed for a couple of days waiting for their equipment. They [Annotator's Note: the 124th Antiaircraft Artillery Gun Battalion (Mobile)] set up and started firing at the buzz bombs [Annotator's Note: V-1 pulse jet flying bomb, German name: Vengeance Weapon 1; Allied names: buzz bomb, doodlebug], and it was Smithson's first experience in combat. He filled and setup sandbags all around their emplacement. They were firing every day and every night. They left England from Southampton on an LST [Annotator's Note: Landing Ship, Tank] about a month after the Normandy invasion [Annotator's Note: D-Day; the Allied invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944], and landed at Omaha Beach [Annotator's Note: in Normandy, France]. They moved up into the hedgerow [Annotator's Note: man-made earthen walls that surround a field that are often overgrown with impenetrable vegetation] country. There were a lot of wrecked gliders littering the countryside. General Eisenhower [Annotator's Note: General of the Army Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower, Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force; 34th President of the United States] did a great job planning the invasion.

Jack A. Smithson went where the big guns [Annotator's Note: 90mm antiaircraft guns M1/M2/M3; Smithson was in the 124th Antiaircraft Artillery Gun Battalion (Mobile), 3rd Army] were needed, and would stay in a location for a month or two. He never knew where he would be taking his truck, even though he would ask. The answer was to always follow the truck in front of you, and you'll get there. He was told it was a precaution in case he got captured. At times there was a lot of German aircraft activity in the skies, and at other times there was none. Smithson said he traveled through France, Germany, Luxembourg, and Holland, and remembers the winter of 1944 to 1945 being cold. The trucks, many of which had canvas tops and sides, had no heaters or power steering. He drove a six by six [Annotator's Note: two and a half ton, six by six truck, also known as deuce and a half], that performed well. When he had the opportunity, he opted for an older model truck that had a steel cab and doors. He went somewhere in France on a detail to pick up a trailer. He was towing a one-ton trailer when one of its wheels came off and went rolling down the road in front of him. He retrieved the wheel, but had no way to repair it, so he just left it all behind. His sergeant told Smithson he would have to pay for it. They both laughed when Smithson retorted that at what the Army was paying him, it was going to take a long time for them to get their money. In another incident, he was driving along late in the evening when he realized there was someone in the back of his truck. He continued on his way until he could pull up to a group of American soldiers. He explained the situation to the officer in charge, who's men pulled out a man who was probably a German soldier. When he was moving thought France and Germany, the citizens would come out into the streets and greet the convoys. He couldn't stop to talk with them, but knew they were glad to see the Americans. The Germans had just fled Paris [Annotator's Note: Paris, France], and Smithson remembers seeing the shaved heads of French women who had taken up with German soldiers. In Germany, the Air Force had flattened many of the big cities. According to the Army's fraternization policy, the GIs [Annotator's Note: government issue; also, a slang term for an American soldier] were not supposed to talk to the German people, but they did so anyway. He found them friendly and felt they had been misled by Hitler [Annotator's Note: German dictator Adolf Hitler]. The soldiers got a lot of information from the Stars and Stripes [Annotator's Note: American military newspaper] newsletters. He learned of the Germans surrender through that means. He was excited to know the war was over. In the same way and around the same time, he learned that President Roosevelt [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States] had died.

Jack A. Smithson was not in Europe for too long after the war was over. When he had enough points [Annotator's Note: a point system was devised based on a number of factors that determined when American servicemen serving overseas could return home] to go home, he went to a cigarette camp [Annotator's Note: one of the transit and rehabilitation camps in France named after popular cigarette brands] for processing and to wait for a boat. While he was there, he was offered a pass [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time] to Switzerland but refused it because he did not want to miss his chance to get home. No one in his outfit [Annotator's Note: 124th Antiaircraft Artillery Gun Battalion (Mobile), 3rd Army] perished during the war. He came home on the ship Elgin Victory. It was January 1945, and he did have to ride through an Atlantic storm, but he wasn't sick on the trip. He thought, as a seasoned warrior, he would be sent to finish the war in the Pacific, but America's use of the atomic bombs [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima, Japan on 6 August 1945 and Nagasaki, Japan on 9 August 1945] made that unnecessary. Smithson rejoiced when he went home to his family but said when he looks back on his time in the Army, he wouldn't have missed it for the world. Like a lot of other guys, when things got bad, he was praying. After he returned home, he joined a church and became a Christian. He feels he has nothing to be sorry for, or anything to be ashamed of.