WW2 veterans honored for past service

Service seven decades ago to rescue this country’s oldest ally in its darkest hours earned a quartet of local men France’s greatest tribute Thursday, the Legion of Honor.

Three of the recipients got their medals personally from France’s new consul general in Louisiana, Grégor Trumel, in a somber ceremony in Centenary College’s Bynum Commons, which ended with a rousing version of the French national anthem, “La Marseillaise.”

“It is a real pleasure to be with you today in Shreveport to pay special tribute to four American war veterans from Louisiana who more than 70 years ago risked their young lives for the liberation of France and Europe,” Trumel said. “The French people will never forget what American soldiers have done to help restore our freedom.”

He opened his remarks with a nod to how those bonds are stronger today.

“It is very important that France was attacked at his heart, at her heart, in Paris two weeks ago,” he said. “It was not just an attack against France, against a newspaper, against a Jewish supermarket, it was an attack against freedom of speech and democracy. And I have to say that the support we received from Louisiana in the last weeks was amazing. Thank you very much for your friendship and affection for my country.”

Living veterans honored were Rollin H. Cochran, Ethan Allen Gillispie Jr. and Dr. William C. Wilkins Jr.

“It’s nice, we appreciate it,” Allen Gillispie said of the honor. “But we had more fun over there than we do here.”

Gillispie said while his division had tanks, he never served in one or even rode on one.

“I was armored infantry,” he said. “I wasn’t a tanker, I was on the ground. You know, in a tank charge you saw a bunch of guys walking between the tanks? That was us.”

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