The lobby of the Holiday Inn on Manchester Express was teeming Thursday with the who’s who of U.S. Army Ranger royalty, in town this week for their annual reunion.
There was Len Lomell, who earned the Distinguished Service Cross for destroying the howitzer cannons at Pointe du Hoc on D-Day. “I’m the guy that found the guns,” Lomell, now 89, said with a playful grin
Lomell’s friend, fellow Ranger and former company commander, George Kerchner, was also in attendance.
Kerchner was a 26-year-old 2nd lieutenant when the 2nd Ranger Battalion landed on the beach at Pointe du Hoc. In the time it took for him to step from his boat onto the already blood-soaked sand, however, he had gone from being a low-ranking officer to the company’s commander. “On the way in the landing craft that had the company commander and the other lieutenant in it had sunk,” Kerchner recalled. “It never reached the shore so when I landed on the shore I was the company commander.
Over the next three days, the approximately 100 veteran Rangers who were able travel to Columbus for this year’s reunion will observe a Rangers in Action demonstration at Hurley Hill on Fort Benning, tour the new National Infantry Museum and Soldier Center and take a walk along WWII Street. There will also be opportunities along the way for Rangers past and present to meet and swap stories.
Thursday, for example, the veterans teamed up with current Rangers to compete in a simulated gallery shoot-out hosted at the Holiday Inn by Ranger Joe’s.
The WWII Ranger reunion wraps up Oct. 25.
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There was Len Lomell, who earned the Distinguished Service Cross for destroying the howitzer cannons at Pointe du Hoc on D-Day. “I’m the guy that found the guns,” Lomell, now 89, said with a playful grin
Lomell’s friend, fellow Ranger and former company commander, George Kerchner, was also in attendance.
Kerchner was a 26-year-old 2nd lieutenant when the 2nd Ranger Battalion landed on the beach at Pointe du Hoc. In the time it took for him to step from his boat onto the already blood-soaked sand, however, he had gone from being a low-ranking officer to the company’s commander. “On the way in the landing craft that had the company commander and the other lieutenant in it had sunk,” Kerchner recalled. “It never reached the shore so when I landed on the shore I was the company commander.
Over the next three days, the approximately 100 veteran Rangers who were able travel to Columbus for this year’s reunion will observe a Rangers in Action demonstration at Hurley Hill on Fort Benning, tour the new National Infantry Museum and Soldier Center and take a walk along WWII Street. There will also be opportunities along the way for Rangers past and present to meet and swap stories.
Thursday, for example, the veterans teamed up with current Rangers to compete in a simulated gallery shoot-out hosted at the Holiday Inn by Ranger Joe’s.
The WWII Ranger reunion wraps up Oct. 25.
Full Story
