John J. Mills

John J. Mills

Courtesy of the Delaware Public Archives

Quick Facts

Significance:

Buffalo Soldier killed during World War Two

Place of Birth:

Columbus, Ohio

Date of Birth:

November 14, 1920

Place of Death:

Recogne, Belgium

Date of Death:

January 14, 1945

Place of Burial:

Luxembourg City, Luxembourg

Cemetery Name:

Luxembourg American Cemetery

John James Mills was born on November 14, 1920, in Columbus, Ohio. His father, Phillip Thomas Mills, was born in Cuba in 1871; his mother, Lelia Mills, was born in Virginia in 1886. Before moving to Columbus, the couple lived in New York City. Phillip Mills worked as a clergyman as well as a laborer on the railroad while in Columbus. John Mills was the second youngest of five children. His mother died in September 1939.

By September 1941, Mills along with his father, who had remarried, relocated to Wilmington, Delaware. While in Wilmington he worked at the Delaware Tool Corporation factory. John J. Mills registered for the military draft on February 16, 1942. On his draft registration he was listed as five feet, six inches tall and weighed 170 pounds. One of Mill’s brothers, Leslie Mills, was serving in the US. Navy in the Pacific during the war.

John J. Mills was drafted on November 19, 1942 and entered the U.S. Army in Camden, New Jersey. Mills was briefly stationed at Fort Dix, New Jersey, before receiving training at Fort Devens, Massachusetts, and Camp Van Dorn, Mississippi. After initial training, Mills was assigned to Battery C, 969th Field Artillery Battalion. The 969th was an all-Black segregated unit with white officers. Mills joined the battalion in the fall of 1943 when it was stationed in Louisiana for maneuvers. The 969th was stationed in Jasper, Texas, and Camp Gruber, Oklahoma, before transitioning to overseas deployment in early 1944.

On February 3, 1944, Mills and the 969th arrived at Camp Shanks, New York. Camp Shanks was the last staging area for many of the soldiers heading to fight in Europe. On March 1, the battalion sailed for the United Kingdom aboard the R.M.S. Queen Mary. They arrived in Scotland on March 7, 1944. The battalion later moved to Crewe, Cheshire, England.

The 969th Battalion headed for France on the morning of July 8, 1944. The next afternoon, they arrived on Utah Beach. It didn’t take the battalion long to see combat. They were called into action the next day, July 10, near La Haye-du-Puits. The battalion stayed active during the closing days of the Normandy campaign. They also participated in the Battle of Brest. Afterward, the battalion raced east on September 28. In the fall of 1944, Mills and the 969th were stationed along the Siegfried Line.

By the beginning of December 1944, the 969th Field Artillery Battalion was in a quiet sector near Belgium and Luxembourg. The calm did not last: The Germans launched a counteroffensive nearby in the Ardennes Forest on December 16. This counteroffensive is known as the Battle of Bulge. The 969th was in the thick of the fighting, initially in support of the 28th and 106th Infantry Divisions. The German advance threatened to overrun the battalion, which began to withdraw on the third day of the battle. On December 19, the battalion assisted elements of the 101st Airborne and 10th Armored Divisions during the defense of Bastogne, Belgium.

On December 20, the 969th took up positions southwest of Bastogne near Villeroux. The Americans repulsed two attacks around Villeroux on December 21. The Germans were close enough that the 969th suffered casualties from mortar and small-arms fire, and the battalion pulled back to Senochamps that afternoon. Most of the battalion withdrew again to the vicinity of Bastogne on the afternoon of Christmas Eve, losing several men when German aircraft bombed the town that night. On Christmas, Mills and others in Battery C responded to “an urgent fire mission” against an enemy position that included a six-gun artillery battery, which they reportedly knocked out. On December 27, the U.S. Third Army broke through to Bastogne and helped break the German siege. Also on December 27, a glider brought ammunition and 155-millimeter shells for the howitzers to the 969th.

On January 14, 1945, Private Mills’s battery was stationed in or near the village of Recogne, northeast of Bastogne in the vicinity of Foy, Belgium. A bomb from an American P-47 Thunderbolt accidently landed in Battery C’s area. As a result of the explosion, Mills, along with Sergeants Jon C. Hall and James Keith, died. Mills was buried on January 18, 1945, at the U.S. Military Cemetery No. 1 at Grand Failly, France. 

In 1947, Mills’s father requested that his son be buried in a permanent military cemetery abroad. Private Mills’s body was disinterred from Grand Failly on August 5, 1948. On January 21, 1949, Private Mills was reburied at the Luxembourg American Cemetery in Plot E, Row 8, Grave 20.