Memorial

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Sgt William E. Fowler enlisted at Fort McPherson Atlanta, Georgia on 27 October 1941.
The following is a copy of a letter received by his mother from a friend stationed with him:
"Dear Mrs Fowler, I was in Company E of the 345th infantry and I knew your son, William of whom you spoke of in your letter in Army Times. I am not any good at this sort of thing (I mean writing a letter like this), but I feel that it is my duty to you and to him to tell you what I knew about him. I will try to tell you some of the things that happened a few days before his death. Sometime near Feb. 15, 1945, Company E moved up in a defense position and during our stay there everything went quite well. We had hot food three times a day, everyone had a good rest and there were very few casualties. Then on Feb. 26, at 3:30 o'clock the whole 345th regiment started moving up in the attack. We had gone about half way through a mine field when Germans opened up on us with machine guns and mortars. Everyone hit the ground and took what cover was available. When anyone would rise up the machine guns were terrible, the mortars came in all night long. Sgt Fowler was not hit: then he was okay. We maneuvered around this still strong German position and dug fox holes on a hill in the woods. The Germans counter-attacked just after dark on the night of the 27th. We kept them beat off intil just before the day, the morning of the 28th, and then they broke into our lines. Sgt Fowler and his squad were dug in nearer the Germans than the rest of the company. He was trying to keep the Germans off of us with his machine guns, but the Germans crawled up and threw hand grenades at the fox holes. Sgt Fowler was a real soldier up to the last minute. He died instantly. He was a real leader of men: he kept his squad firing until the Germans were almost on top of him. Due to this so many Germans were killed that the rest withdrew and the rest of the company was saved until we got reinforcements. I knew Sgt. Fowler before he went overseas when we were at Fort Jackson, S. C. He was very popular all the time he was in E company and was well liked by everyone."