WW2 Fallen - Bronze Star hero Bernard Tucker, 70th Infantry Division

Sgt. Bernard Tucker served in the 70th Infantry Division in France and Germany.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/18353244/bernard-councille-tucker
http://the70thdivision.blogspot.com/2013/01/saarbrucken-20-march-1945.html 

Bernard Councille "Tuck" Tucker, Jr. never had a chance to reach 100 years old today. Instead, he sacrificed his life for our freedom.

If you have enjoyed reading the stories of the WW2 fallen, Can you help write some stories? It's a big project. The more help, the better.  Announcing "The Stories Behind the Stars", see https://www.storiesbehindthestars.org. This crowd-sourced national project has the goal of compiling stories of all 400,000+ of the US World War 2 fallen in one free-to-access central database.  Anyone visiting a war memorial or gravesite will be able to scan the name of the fallen with a smartphone and his story will appear on the phone.

He was born on March 27, 1920 in Etna, California. His parents Bernard and Charlotte were also both born in California. His mother died in 1937. His father worked as a chauffeur and later as a mail contractor. Still later he worked as a truck driver. Bernard had two younger brothers. By 1940 Bernard was still living at home. He found work as an ethyl alcohol mine machine agent.

He was drafted into the army in May 1942. He became a staff sergeant in the HQ Company, 1st Battalion, 276th Infantry Regiment, 70th Infantry Division. The 70th ID arrived in Marseille, France in December 1944. It first saw action against the Germans during Operation Nordwind and then fought through the Saarland. KIA and MIA losses for the 70th ID were light compared to most other divisions, only in the 800 range. According to a note on his application for headstone, Sgt. Tucker earned the Bronze Star. I was not able to find confirmation anywhere else. After fighting ended, Sgt. Tucker was assigned occupation duties in the Frankfurt area.

By September 1945, Sgt. Tucker's military service was coming to an end and he was sent back to the states. On September 15, 1945 Sgt. Tucker was a passenger on a C-47 Skytrain transporting men from New Jersey to California. After stopping to refuel in Kansas City, the plane exploded 14 seconds after takeoff. Three men, including Sgt. Tucker were pulled from the wreckage alive. Sgt. Tucker died shortly thereafter. One man survived in critical condition. In all, Sgt. Tucker and 22 other men were killed.

His grave is at Etna Cemetery in Etna, California.

Thank you Sgt. Tucker for your sacrifice. Let's Earn It for Bernard.

Last year on this date I profiled B-24 bombardier Rudy Zebora. You can read about Rudy 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.

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WW2 Fallen 100 is supported by

The Greatest GENERATIONS Foundation

“Where Every Day is Memorial Day”

http://www.tggf.org