SSG Vance Elroy Mead

courtesy of Richard Howell

SSG Vance Elroy Mead was born 27 Mar 1918, probably in Spencer, Michigan.  He was the youngest of 3 children born to Charles R. and Ethel A. (Baldwin), born 15-years after their 2nd child. His father farmed. Vance completed 4-years of high school. His father died in 1939 and Vance was farming to support himself and his mother in 1940.

Vance was drafted in January 1942 at which time he was probably working in furniture manufacture. After his initial training he was assigned to C Company 116th Infantry and probably went with the unit to Camp Blanding, Florida and aboard the Queen Mary to England in September 1942. His demonstrated competence resulted in promotions to the rank of SSG which he was when the unit fought their way ashore on Omaha Beach on D-Day, 6 Jun 1944. He survived that to fight with the unit until killed in action on 1 Jul 1944.

SSG Mead was repatriated in 1948 and re-interred in the Spencer Mills Cemetery in Harvard, Michigan.