The third 2026 program on World War II history sponsored by the History Roundtable, Audie Murphy Chapter, will be July 23 at 7 p.m. in the American Cotton/Murphy Museum, Greenville, Texas. The lecture will be presented by Dr. John C. McManus, professor of military history at Missouri University of Science and Technology in Rolla. His subject will be the invasion of Normandy with a focus on the 1st infantry Division, commonly called The Big Red One.
Numbered battle units might have had narrative monikers in World War II, but they consisted of men from all over the United States. Some from Northeast Texas. Parisian Thomas Steely, for example, was second in charge of Subchaser 695 in the Mediterranean when he saw some of the results that the 1st Infantry Division pasted on the Island of Sicily at and after the Battle of Gela July 10, 1943.
The Big Red One had already been part of the invasion of Africa in late 1942. After Sicily, it moved to England in August 1943, preparing for an invasion of Europe. Then on June 6, 1944 came Normandy. Two months later Steely watched as the Allies invaded Southern France.
On another front, since December 1944, south of London in Winchester, England, Lamar County native Ben Hinds was a member of the 69th Infantry Division, part of which landed at Le Havre, France in late January 1945.
This was at the end of what was called The Battle of the Bulge. He saw results where The Big Red One was in battle there. A blizzard piled up snow two-feet deep. The city was already flattened. Hinds and the 69th relieved the 99th Division at the Siegfreid Line a month later.
The Big Red One men then occupied the Remagen bridgehead. Hinds went on to other places, like Leipzig. The 99th had been trained at Camp Maxey near Paris, Texas. Steely and Hinds years later worked together at The Lamar County Echo in Paris, Texas. The world could be small! Both Hinds and Steely brushed by the edge of the 1st Infantry Division’s path.
The Big Red One, whose 26th Infantry Regiment was mostly from Texas, had fought from Algeria, North Africa to Sicily, earning a reputation as stalwart warriors on the front lines but rabble-rousers in the rear. Yet on D-Day, these jaded combat veterans melded with fresh-faced replacements to accomplish one of the most challenging and deadly missions in American history.
As the men hit the beach, with much of their equipment destroyed or washed away, and soldiers cut down by the dozens, courageous heroes emerged: men such as 2nd Lieutenant John Spalding, a former Kentucky sportswriter, and previously decorated for action near El Guettar, Tunisia. Another was New Jersey Tech Sergeant Phil Streczyk, a former truck driver who spoke Polish, who together with Spalding landed at Omaha Beach. They helped demolish a German strong point overlooking the Easy Red sector, where hundreds of Americans had landed.
Men such as Baylor graduate Captain Joe Dawson, a onetime geologist, who led his company from the front, and exploited the gaps in enemy defenses created by Spalding's team, was wounded in the process. Others were such as Kansas farm boy Big Red One Commander Major General Clarence Huebner, who along with Colonel George Taylor trained the division to the highest standards, and led them at the landing on Easy Red and Fox Green sectors of Omaha Beach. Illinoisan Taylor had a link to Northeast Texas. He was at West Point when Greenville’s future general Robert Reese Neyland was a graduating senior pitching over at the baseball field.
Professor McManus will bring these and other stories to life and discuss the realities of Omaha Beach on D-Day, giving the key reasons for the American victory. Admission is free and all invited to attend.
