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The war is never over for those of us who mourn, nor the peace quite won until that strong young soldier, wearing his beloved wings over his heart, comes home. Thousands of homes were forever saddened by those dreaded, soul-shattering messages, “Regret to inform - Killed in Action. Missing in Action.” The former so crushingly final, the latter so horrible in its uncertainty, yet admitting of so much hope! And so, in the midst of an over-powering grief, there has nestled for years the small, bright spark of hope.</p>
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<em>Harry Lee Jarvis, Jr</em>., was born in Dalton, Georgia to Harry Lee and Eugenia Bitting Jarvis, May 11, 1919. He was the adored young brother of two older sisters. At the age when most young boys are planning to be policemen, firemen, or locomotive engineers, he was dreaming of flying a plane. As the years went by his love for airplanes had tangible evidence in the many beautiful models he constructed.</p>
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Into his heart came the enviable ambition of being a West Point Cadet. As a preparation for his military career Harry was sent at the age of 15 to the Tennessee Military Institute at Sweetwater, Tennessee. From this Honor School he received his much coveted appointment to the United States Military Academy.</p>
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Harry’s four years at West Point were happy, rigorous years, in which his character unfolded and developed. His happy disposition and quiet friendliness endeared him to his associates, who nick-named him “Jo-Jo”. They declared that that was the name he gave, in his Southern accent, to his native state, Georgia.</p>
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On June 11, 1941, he received the prize for which he had worked so hard, his diploma and a commission as Second Lieutenant. Holding fast to his early desire to fly, he joined the Air Corps. He took his basic training at Jackson, Mississippi, Augusta and Albany, Georgia. At the latter air school he proudly received his wings in March 1942.</p>
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Next he went to Barksdale Field for further training as a pilot of a Liberator, then the giant of the air, the B-24. Next he served as pilot on patrol duty over the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. At last he flew a plane of his own, the “Jo-Jo”. In August 1942 Harry rested at Manchester, N.H., preparatory to his service overseas. Here he received a new Liberator, “Jo-Jo”. No. 2. in this he made the flight to England. In the meantime he had received his First Lieutenant’s Commission. During all these months of intensive training and flying he had been anxious to get into the “thick of things”, as were thousands of other young American Soldiers.</p>
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On October 9, 1942, there was a memorable raid over the continent by U.S. Heavy bombers. The news came of the raid on Lille, France, by Associated Press, that First Lieutenant Harry Jarvis had piloted one of our Liberators. With this flight he began a series of regular hazardous raids over enemy territory.</p>
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He was nearing the completion of his allotted missions and thus far leading a “charmed life”. He had earned his captaincy and a furlough home. Just at this time there was, as we have since learned, a dangerous and daring plan to overcome one of the enemy’s strategic points, the Ploesti Oil Refineries in Rumania. Volunteers were sought for this secret mission. Those pilots who had been tried in the “fiery furnace” of war, where courage and precision were of utmost necessity, were selected to do a dangerous and a heroic deed for their country, with the realization of almost certain destruction. Captain Jarvis, with his brave crew, piloted his “Jo-Jo” over the inferno that was Ploesti, and thus joined the long line of American patriots who have done their jobs so well.</p>
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Three weeks after the tragic message was received from the War Department, Harry’s father, then in falling health, succumbed to the shock. During these years of grieving and waiting many letters have gone back and forth among the nearest of kin, but no known and conclusive facta have ever come from them or the War Department as to the real fate of the gallant “Jo-Jo” and her heroic men of the sky.</p>
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Captain Jarvis’ medals have been sent home; the Air Medal, the Purple Heart, and the Distinguished Flying Cross “for meritorious service, over and above the line of duty”. Small consolation, you may say, for a brokenhearted family. But there is comfort in the memory of a blithe spirit, happily marching on to a known and beloved goal, in a well-spent, though too short, beautiful life.</p>
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Hope dies such a hard, lingering death, and perhaps never dies at all in the human breast. And so, to his loved ones, Harry still lives, his memory forever dear, forever shining. It is almost as if he, with the words of his beloved Air Corps Song, is still flying, “Into the wild blue yonder, climbing high into the sun”.</p>
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<em>—V. J. S.</em></p>
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