John W Cooper

1st Lt John Cooper was killed in action on 06 June 1944, serving with Company D, 1st Battalion, 18th Infantry Regiment. On the morning of 6 June 1944, the 1st Battalion, 18th Infantry, lay twelve miles off the Normandy coast aboard landing craft, waiting through the early hours for its turn to go ashore on the beach east of the Ruquet River, north of Colleville-sur-Mer. Scheduled to land at 1000 hours, the battalion instead met a beach still swept by shellfire, machine guns, and snipers, with only a few narrow gaps cleared through the obstacles offshore, and did not finish landing until 1245 that afternoon, suffering heavy losses among its officers and men even as it kept its equipment and organization intact. Pushing inland toward assembly areas several hundred yards from the shore, the battalion's companies ran into entrenched German troops still holding ground there; sharp, close fighting through the afternoon cleared these positions before the men dug in to await further orders. It was, by any account, one of the hardest days the battalion would face in the war. 1st Lt Cooper was killed in action that day; the report does not specify the individual circumstances.