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| Washington Irving Wigton's high school year book picture and troops from his 358th Infantry Regiment a week before he was killed. Pueblo Centennial High School 1934 yearbook http://www.everytownusa.com/world-war-ii/90th-infantry-division-pic-of-the-week-habscheid-germany-2/ |
Washington Irving Wigton, Jr. never had a chance to reach 100 years old today. Instead, he sacrificed his life for our freedom.
He was born on September 10, 1917 in Pueblo, Colorado. His parentage is a bit of of a puzzle. His namesake Washington Irving Wigton, Sr. was born in Illinois in 1865 and in the 1920 census he was shown as divorced with no children living with him. Wigton Sr. would marry South Dakota native Bessie Corrigan, who was 34 years old in 1920 and was a divorced stenographer living in Denver. She had no children living with her at the time of the census either. I could not locate 1920 census records for Wigton junior. Wigton senior was a successful real estate developer in Pueblo from 1899 until his death in 1951. Washington had three younger brothers and one younger sister. By 1940 Washington was still living at home and had completed 4 years of high school.
On August 12, 1942 Washington left a stenographer job to enlist in the army. He became a private first class in Company I, 3rd Battalion, 358th Infantry Regiment, 90th Infantry Division (nicknamed "Tough Ombres").
The 90th ID landed on Utah Beach on D-Day and D+1. It is possible that Pfc. Wigton was with his unit at that time. It fought through Normandy and across France as part of General Patton's 3rd Army. By February 1945 the Tough Ombres smashed through the Siegfried Line and advanced to the Prüm River. Pfc. Wigton was killed on February 19, 1945 when his battalion captured the town of Masthorn.
His grave is at Mountain View Cemetery in Pueblo, Colorado (were I grew up).
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!
To mark having over 100,000 visits to my project to honor the fallen of WW2 on their 100th birthdate, I created this video to share. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXt8QA481lY. Now more than 200 fallen have been profiled with more than 200,000 visits. Is there interest in seeing a similar video highlighting those from the group of second 100?
Join the public Facebook group WW2 Fallen 100
Thank you for putting a face and story to a name of a hero... Very inspiring. I've been working on short biographies for my towns heroes that sacrificed their lives in defense or our liberties...
ReplyDeleteIf any match up with birthdates from the rest of 1917 up to 1920, let me know and I can also plan to profile them here. Thanks for your interest in learning and sharing more about all these fine men.
DeleteRick, you should look into the project that replaced this blog that now has more than 1,300 involved. See www.storiesbehindthestars.org
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nm-7FhLG1rk&ab_channel=LegendsofWWII
ReplyDeletehis comrade talks about his death in this. RIP.