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| Bronze Star hero 1st Lt. Richard Constable served with the 37th Infantry Division in the Battle of Manila (painting by Keith Rocco). https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/130199750/richard-a_-constable https://www.ong.ohio.gov/stories/2020/mar/20200303-37th-manila.html |
Richard A. Constable never had a chance to reach 100 years old today. Instead, he sacrificed his life for our freedom.
Richard was born on June 4, 1920 in Ashland, Kentucky. His parents Albert and Mary were both born in Ohio. His father worked as a magazine agent and later as a nurse. Richard had one older brother. He played basketball in high school and participated in the Ohio National Guard.
He joined the army and was sent overseas to the South Pacific where he was accepted to attend officers candidate school and was commissioned as a first lieutenant. He served in Company C, 1st Battalion, 129th Infantry Regiment, 37th Infantry Division. The 37th ID first saw action in New Georgia in July 1943.
During the Battle of Bougainville Lt. Constable was wounded in action on March 18, 1944. He was awarded the Bronze Star. This was during a time when the Japanese made a series of unsuccessful counterattacks. Soldiers like Lt. Constable were the reason the Japanese efforts all ended in defeat.
The 37th ID participated in the invasion of Luzon in January 1945 and fought in the Battle of Manila. On February 4, the 37th ID freed more than 1,000 POW held at Bilibid Prison. It was tasked with eliminating the enemy from the southern part of the city. The 129th IR suffered the highest casualties over the next week. Lt. Constable was killed in action on February 14, 1945.
His grave is at Blanchester IOOF Cemetery in Blanchester, Ohio.
This is one of the final 100 stories (91) to be written as part of this project which ends on September 2, 2020, the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II. At that time more than 1,370 men and women will have been profiled. The project will live on in an expanded program to write the stories of all 400,000+ US World War II fallen. Visit www.storiesbehindthestars.org to learn more. We welcome your continued support and interest and encourage you to help write some of these stories.
Last year on this date I profiled Leland Mitchell, 87th Infantry Division. You can read about Mitchell 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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