Memorial

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Pfc Joe A. McGraw enlisted in Huntington, West Virginia on 7 April 1941.

Pvt Herman J. Bergeth saw Pvts Franklin Van Nest and Joe A. McGraw and one other GI engaged in hand-to-hand combat in a ditch with several Germans. According to Bergeth, Van Nest, a big man, was wielding a knife as large as a Roman short sword. They seemed to have won their struggle when a couple of German grenades were tossed into the ditch, wounding both men. Germans firing submachine guns came in on the left, threatening to outflank the Americans. Pvt Robert Owen killed four before Bugno withdrew his men to the site of their earlier fight, where they would be supported by Peck's machine gun. There they managed to stop the German advance. Although wounded, Van Nest and McGraw refused to retreat and continued to kill the few Germans who tried to advance. When word came from battalion of a possible tank attack from the direction of the Mill d'Uhrbruck, Bugno sent back for bazookas. No tanks came, but German voices were heard. Then, German artillery fire began falling on them. Realizing that they had been zeroed in, Bugno ordered his men to retire. As they stood up to retreat, artillery rounds killed Bugno, McGraw and Van Nest. The rest fell back, several of them wounded by shrapnel. They could hold out no longer, but they had done their job. They had blunted the German effort toward Neubourg.