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Remember...Herschel Ashby Jarrell
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Herschel Jarrell was born May 2, 1919, in Van, West Virginia, the son of Sullivan and Laura Price Jarrell. Herschel had two brothers and three sisters.
| Herschel attended Van High School, graduating in 1936, and briefly attended Greenbrier Military Academy in Lewisburg. He went to West Virginia University 1937-1939, where he played football and was enrolled in ROTC. Appointed to West Point, Herschel graduated in 1943 as a second lieutenant in the United States Army Air Corps. On January 19, 1943, Herschel married Sue Haislip of Logan in the West Point Chapel. |  Herschel Ashby Jarrell |
Herschel was named commander of a B-17 Bomber crew and this was followed by a promotion to first lieutenant. He was sent to England in December 1943 and assigned to the 447th Bombardment Wing.
On January 11, 1944, Lieutenant Jarrell was participating in a raid into Germany, with an assigned target of a factory in Brunswick. During the attack, his plane's bomb bay was struck by an air-to-air missile from a German fighter plane, causing it to explode. The plane went down near Rehburg, Germany, killing the entire crew. Their bodies were buried in a nearby cemetery.
The body of Lieutenant Herschel Jarrell was returned to the United States on June 1, 1949, and buried at Boone Memorial Park in Madison.
Information courtesy of Coal Valley News in Madison, West Virginia
West Virginia Archives and History welcomes any additional information that can be provided about these veterans, including photographs, family names, letters and other relevant personal history.
