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| Lt. Wells Lewis' grave service attended by his commanding general, John Dahlquist. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/56373782 |
Wells Lewis never had a chance to reach 100 years old today. Instead, he sacrificed his life for our freedom.
He was born on July 26, 1918 in Minnesota. He was named after H.G. Wells. He was the only child of parents Sinclair and Grace who were born in Minnesota and New York, respectively. His father was a renowned short-story writer, novelist, and playwright who was the first American writer to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature. Wells' parents divorced in 1925. He spent much of his youth in Europe where he learned German, Italian, and most fluently, French. He graduated from Harvard University, where he majored in history, in 1939. He was a writer like his father and wrote a well received novel titled They Still Say No.
Despite his blue blood pedigree, Wells joined the Coast Artillery Corps on February 10, 1941 as a private. At some point he transferred to an artillery unit with the 36th Infantry Division.
Wells saw action in Morocco, Tunisia, Sicily and Italy while serving with the 36th Infantry Division. He eventually became a first lieutenant in the HQ Company of the 36th Infantry Division. He was the personal aide of the division commander Major General John Dahlquist.
Although stories of Wells Lewis refer to him earning the Silver Star and the Bronze Star, I was not able to find either citation. All I was able to find out was that the Silver Star was earned for unloading a burning ammunition truck under fire in Sicily and the Bronze Star was earned for a secret mission behind enemy lines in France where he captured five German soldiers armed only with his pistol.
On October 29, 1944, Lt. Wells was driving General Dahlquist to various locations near the front line in order to assess the progress of the Nisei 100th Infantry Battalion's efforts to rescue the 1st Battalion of the 141st Infantry Regiment, which was surrounded by Germans. At one observation point, Lt. Wells was shot by a German sniper and fell dead into the arms of General Dahlquist.
The loss of Wells Lewis, who gave up privilege and station to serve his country, can never be measured. Many people were predicting he would have been a more successful writer than his famous father.
His grave is at Epinal American Cemetery and Memorial in Epinal, France.
The Minnesota Historical Society produced a short video about Wells Lewis. You can watch it here.
Last year on this date I profiled A-36 pilot Everett Fager. You can read about Everett here.
On behalf of the fallen, if you would like to see more people become aware of this project to honor the WW2 fallen, be sure to share with others on Twitter, Facebook, etc. Thanks for your interest!
I created this video to explain why I started this project: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXt8QA481lY.
Please consider joining the public Facebook group to increase the exposure of this project. Go to: WW2 Fallen 100
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