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<em>Maxwell, known to us as Max, helped to crash the gates of West Point back in 1926. Tuscaloosa is his podunk; Alabama is his state, and he’s proud to let the world know where he’s from.*</em></div>
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<em>Winston R. Maxwell</em>, son of Farley and Maude Rose Maxwell, was born in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, on 6 June 1905, a descendant of families prominent in Tuscaloosa history for more than a century. He attended Tuscaloosa High School, Marion Institute, and spent two years at the University of Alabama before entering the Military Academy.</div>
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Max was appointed to the United States Military Academy from Alabama by Representative W. B. Oliver. He arrived at the Academy on 1 July 1926 and joined the Class of 1930'.</div>
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<em>He was always ready with a smile or pleasant word, making everyone he comes in contact with forget his troubles. He never seems to worry about his own, but hides them away, that the world may never know of their existence.*</em></div>
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While at West Point Max excelled in football, which he played all four years. He will probably be remembered best as a guard on the West Point football team. He was a member of the football and lacrosse “A” Squads and wore a major “A” for football. He played on the lacrosse team his last three years at the Academy.</div>
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Max was an ardent football fan from the start, and by the time his Second Class year had rolled around he was one of Army’s mainstays, fighting, smashing his way down the field, doing his part, giving his best to the Army.</div>
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Max chose the Infantry upon graduation and was sent first to Brooks Field, Texas, as a student officer at the Air Corps Primary Flying School. From 1931 on he saw service before the war at Fort Sam Houston, Texas; Fort Benning, Georgia; Schofield Barracks, Hawaii; Fort Lewis, Washington; and after being detailed to the Ordnance Department in 1939, he was sent to Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland.</div>
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Max was ordered to duty in the Philippine Islands, serving with the Ordnance Department for the Air Corps at Nichols Field, near Manila, at the time of Pearl Harbor. He was reported to have fought at Bataan and was taken prisoner by the Japanese at Corregidor. He was initially imprisoned at Mindanao. In June 1944 he was transferred to Cabanatuan on Luzon. Then on the 15th of December 1944 while on the Japanese prisoner of war ship, <em>Oryoku Maru</em>, en route from Manila to Japan, the ship was bombed in Subic Bay and about half of the 1800 aboard were killed. (In 1944 there were a number of Allied attacks on Japanese ships that, unknown to the Allies, were evacuating prisoners of war to Japan.) Max survived but died of wounds on the 14th of January 1945, probably in the Japanese prison camp in San Ferando, Luzon, where survivors of the bombing were taken. He was a major in the Army of the United States at the time of his death.</div>
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Max married Phyllis Parmenter, an Army brat, in 1931, and when he went off to war she was left with their three small children: Winston Earl, born January 1935 in Schofield Barracks, Hawaii; Farley Robin, born November 1937 in Fort Lewis, Washington; and Celeste Marie, born January 1939 in Fort Lewis, Washington.</div>
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In 1945 Phyllis married George W. Murray and the family moved to Eugene, Oregon.</div>
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In a letter to the class of 1957 Phyllis wrote about the Maxwell children: Winston, a Phi-Beta-Kappa graduate from the University of Ohio was aspiring for a medical career; Farley, a good steady fellow much like his father in personality, was attending the University of Ohio; and Celeste, a drama major, was hoping for a career in television production or teaching. Max would have been proud of his family.</div>
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We will never know what military greatness Max might have achieved, but we do know the Long Gray Line has received an honorable, steadfast and exemplary member.</div>
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<em>That is our Max. and as the years pass by he will be remembered by us as a great pal and a good soldier.*</em></div>
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May he rest in peace.</div>
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*Quotation from the 1930 <em>HOWITZER </em>entry for Cadet Winston Rose Maxwell.</div>