JESSE BECK
Age: 89
Residence: Roswell
Service: U.S. Army, 2nd Infantry Division, 2nd Engineers, B Company
Jesse Beck got a quick indoctrination into the ways of the Army, especially during wartime, a few months after he was drafted in 1944. After training as an infantryman and learning all the basics of that job in preparation to fight the Axis powers in Europe, Beck was at a replacement depot near Givet, France, one day when he heard news he almost couldn’t believe.
“An old red-faced master sergeant was out there and he said, ‘OK, I know that some of you people whose names start with A’s, B’s and C’s have been getting extra detail and all sorts of things because of where your name is in the alphabet. I’m going to do you a favor.’ And I thought, yeah, you’re going to do us a favor all right. But sure enough, he called names A through H and he said, ‘OK, get on that truck over there, you’re going to the 2nd Engineers.’ So having trained as an infantryman, I suddenly became an engineer.”
After one week of training – yes, one week – Beck and his fellow novice engineers began the tasks of clearing minefields and installing barbed wire, as well as transporting troops across rivers and wherever else they needed to go.
Was he worried about his lack of preparation, with so much on the line every day?
“I was hoping I didn’t screw up things. I wanted to be able to do the job without messing up. And I think I did.”
It’s an attitude that served Beck well during the latter stages of World War II and then during his time in the Korean War in the early 1950s, when he changed jobs again – becoming a paratrooper and making combat jumps. He eventually spent 28 years in the service, retiring as a lieutenant colonel.
It’s a long way from where the self-described “farm boy” started his journey. Granted a deferment, he was allowed to finish high school in New Mexico. That allowed Beck to wait until May 1944 before he had to report to Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas.
“Practically everyone I knew who was not too old was going into the service. I figured I had to.”
Beck was stationed at Fort McClellan in Alabama as D-Day was happening on June 6, 1944. He spent time in Maryland and Massachusetts before shipping out to England and eventually landing in Le Havre, France, in mid-December. By the time his company got to the Belgium border, the city of Givet had been “pulverized” by the Germans. That’s where Beck got his new marching orders.
One reason they were moved to the engineering unit was because it had been decimated during the Battle of the Bulge. But despite the short amount of training, Beck didn’t mind being out of the infantry.
“Those guys (in the Hurtgen Forest) were in the snow 24 /7. I could at least go get in a truck.”
In his new job, Beck aided the 23rd Infantry to cross a river near Hamelin, Germany. He and a fellow engineer transported 12 soldiers per boat amid tracer fire.
On another occasion, his unit was installing a temporary bridge while dodging rounds from a German anti-tank artillery gun — an 8.8 Flak 18, commonly called the 88. Beck said since the embankment on his side of the river was higher, many of the shots were landing six or seven feet below him.
“I got to thinking, if that sucker had just elevated that the slightest amount, we wouldn’t be here. We’d be gone. We would have disappeared.”
Just trying to excel at his job, Beck said he seldom contemplated the thought of death or felt anxiety.
“If I had lived a little longer and had a little more common sense, I might have thought it was a hell of a place to be.”
From there, Beck’s unit moved into Czechoslovakia. That’s where he was on May 8, 1945, when Germany officially surrendered.
“I remember feeling pretty damn good.”
He then traveled back through Germany – they stopped long enough to urinate in the Rhine River, Beck said – and into France. After he arrived back in New York, he was sent to Camp Swift in Texas to begin training for a possible deployment to the Pacific. But when the war ended in September, Beck was given yet another new job: helping discharge servicemen at a personnel center.
On June 1, 1946, he was discharged from the Army and hitchhiked home to New Mexico to save money. He assumed his military career was over.
“I had no idea I’d be back in the Army.”
After the war: Beck attended Eastern New Mexico College for just one month before dropping out. He then worked as a part-time farmer and at a general store before deciding to give the Army another try. He re-enlisted in 1948, retained his corporal rank and opted to become a paratrooper, which included five weeks of training with the Army’s Airborne Training Department at Fort Benning. He then went to officer candidate school, graduated as a second lieutenant and was sent to Korea in July 1950. He did the second combat jump of the war at Imjin. Beck moved to Atlanta in 1969 and started taking college courses, eventually earning his degree at age 46 from Oglethorpe University. After leaving the service in 1971, he went to work for former Georgia Secretary of State Ben Fortson as his personnel officer. From there, Beck earned his law degree from John Marshall and became an administrative hearing officer.
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