US AIRBORNE

John Lesko was born on March 16th, 1916 and died during the airborne operation in Normandy June 6th, 1944.

He entered in army on February 10th, 1942 to Kulpmont, Pennsylvania. The military career of Lesko would well before begin to join the 101st Airborne. He would have fight within another unit in North Africa where he was decorated with Purple Heart and Bronze Star.

According to his family, John Lesko was a part of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, a group of 2.800 American volunteers who fought Franco and the Nazis during the Spanish Civil war in 1930.

He joined the 101st Airborne before the jump in Normandy. He joined the HQ Company of 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne.

John Lesko's dead is a mystery. We know that John Lesko jumped near the village of Foucarville on June 6th, 44. But what arrived at the Pfc John Lesko is a mystery. Certain report indicates that it would have lands in a flooded sector and would have drowned itself. Many troopers so finished but when the sector was drained in July, 1944 we discovered a body but it was not his.

He was also registered as wounded during the landing. The declarations of witnesses taken back in "Missing Report" indicate that he was wounded, evacuated towards England to be hospitalized there and be sent back towards the United States.
But no body was ever got back, one finished by the dead declared on June 7th, 1945, what is the standard of 1 year and 1 day after the disappearance.

John Lesko is registered on the wall of the missing on the St Laurent's American Cemetery, Normandy, France.