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Sgt John T. Puckett graduated from East High School in 1941. He attended Wichita University.

He entered the Army under the A.S.T.P program in March 1943. He was sent overseas in November 1944.

The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced that the remains of two Army soldiers; missing in action were identified on 30 March 2005 and returned to their families for burial. They are Sgt John T. Puckett and Pvt Earnest E. Brown.

On 15 January 1945, Puckett and Brown were searching for German soldiers in a wooded area near Elsenborn, Belgium. They were ambushed and came under intense enemy machine gun and mortar fire. Eyewitnesses indicated they were killed, but their bodies could not be recovered due to enemy activity.

Following the war, remains of American soldiers were recovered and identified, but not those of Puckett and Brown. Then in 1992, two Belgian nationals located and excavated an abandoned fighting position in the forest east of Elsenborn. They recovered remains and other evidence and turned them over to U.S. authorities in Europe.
Scientists of the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory used mitochondrial DNA as one of the forensic tools to identify the remains as those of Puckett and Brown.

Sgt John T. Puckett was buried at the Ardennes American Cemetery.

In X-File Neuville X-3144, dealing with the unidentified remains of what later turned out to be S/Sgt Robert G. Rudd, a curious account can be found. In March 1946, residents of Wirtzfeld, Belgium discovered in their village a common grave of seven American soldiers. A helmet with the marking P-2911 on the helmet liner is also discovered in this grave. This designation corresponds to Sgt John T. Puckett's laundry mark.