Date of birth:

February 5th, 1923 (Hazard-Perry County/Kentucky, United States)

Date of death:

September 20th, 1944 (Lent, the Netherlands)

Service number:

15090280

Nationality:

American

James William Allen Jr. “Jimmy” was born on February 5, 1923, in Hazard, Perry County, Kentucky, the United States of America. He was the second child of James William Allen Sr. and Birdie Belle Dickerson Allen. Jimmy had five brothers and two sisters. He had an outgoing personality and often made jokes. He and four of his brothers would serve in the American armed forces.

Jimmy enlisted on February 12, 1942, in Fort Thomas, Newport, Kentucky. It is currently not known when he was assigned to the H Company, 3rd Battalion, 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment (PIR), 82nd Airborne Division ‘All American’. His rank and the quantity and nature of his commendations suggest that he likely fought in that unit already in 1943-44 in Italy.

In September 1944, Jimmy was Staff Sergeant (SSgt) with H Company, 3rd Battalion, 504th Parachute Infantry Battalion and on September 17, he jumped above Overasselt, the Netherlands, to take part in operation Market Garden. His regiment, the 504th PIR, then seized the bridges across the river Maas and the Maas-Waal canal. In the afternoon of September 19, 3rd Battalion had become divisional reserve for the 82nd Airborne Division. This meant that the unit was the disposal of Commanding Officer of the division (General James Gavin), who could decide where and in what role the unit was to be deployed. Jimmy moved, with his battalion, via bridge number 7 (near Heumen) to the southern suburbs of Nijmegen. That night the battalion made camp in the Jonkerbosch. That evening its commander, Major Julian Aaron Cook, was ordered by General Gavin, to do a river crossing the next day in order to seize the northern ramps of the two bridges across the river Waal. On the morning of September 20, Jimmy and his fellow troopers moved to the southern bank of the Waal, near the Nijmegen powerplant on the NYMA terrain. They then had to wait for the canvas boats which were brought up all the way from a depot in Belgium to Nijmegen.

That afternoon, after 15 minutes of shelling by artillery and tanks, amongst others to gain an smoke shield, at 15.15 hours the heroic river crossing started, led by Major Cook. With 26 flimsy boat, under murderous enemy fire, he crossed the river in the first wave, together with his battalion staff and H and I companies. Jimmy, serving in H Company, was in this first wave. Of the thirteen troopers in his boat, only he and his company commander, Captain Kappel, and medic Flox were unharmed when they reached the northern shore. Six others were killed and four wounded. Following, Jimmy with other troopers, fought in the expanding bridgehead on the north bank of the river Waal. Allegedly, Jimmy got wounded at some point, in a thigh near a dike and was patched up by Captain Kappel. After some time troopers from H Company were attacking an embankment with a railroad on it, in order to gain access to and seize the northern approach of the railroad bridge.

During that attack, Jimmy lead an assault on an underpass in the railway dike, the Lent viaduct in the Grifdijk. After he and fellow sergeant Leoleis first had stormed a house five yards from the underpass, he directed a light machine section forward. Then suddenly some 30 German soldiers opened up on them, together with a 20 mm FLAK canon. Jimmy was hit in his groin and died within minutes of an arterial bleeding. Staff Sergeant James William Allen Jr. was 21 years of age when he died on September 20, 1944. Initially he was buried in Molenhoek, Nijmegen. After the war his remains were repatriated to the US and buried at Riverside Cemetery, in Hazard, Perry County, Kentucky. There he was buried next to his, also during WW2 killed, brother Charles.

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• Photo 1: Findagrave.com by Don J
• Photo 2: Findagrave.com by SWF
• - LUNTEREN, F. VAN, The Battle of the Bridges, Casemate, 2017.
  - NORDYKE, P., All American All the Way, Zenith Press, St. Paul, United States, 2005.
  - STEENBERGER, D. e.a., De Oversteek, De Gelderlander, Nijmegen, 2013.
  - Oorlogsdoden Nijmegen
  - https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/article/across-the-wide-river/
  - https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/8939/records/2831242
  - https://wwiiregistry.abmc.gov/honoree-plaque/?honoree_id=1210927
  - https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/54611961/james-william-allen
  - https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/59305423/charles_douglas-allen#view-photo=49049104
  - https://www.uswarmemorials.org/html/people_details.php?PeopleID=31559
  - https://www.honorstates.org/profiles/307379/
  - https://www.ww2-airborne.us/units/504/504_trp_3.html
  

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