Marvin B. Zickefoose
Biography: Marvin Berl Zickefoose was born on March 29, 1921, in Upshur County, West Virginia. He was the son of Asa Webster Zickefoose and Minnie Bell Tenney and attended local schools through the grammar level. We are not sure of his early work experience but the 1940 Census indicates that he was working as a truck driver and still living at home. Records indicate that sometime prior to the war, Marvin had moved to Lakeville, Ohio.
Service Time: Marvin entered the service on October 17, 1942, and would have then been sent to complete his basic training. While on leave from the unit, Marvin traveled back to Ohio and married the former Alma Marie Sigafoos on November 13, 1943. Alma who was born in Akron, OH and was the daughter of Sherman Sigafoos and Elizabeth “Bessie” Surko. Reverend Robert Matthews of the Millersburg Church of Christ preformed the service.
Marvin returned to complete his early training and at some point was assigned to the 801st Tank Destroyer Battalion. The unit trained at Camp Sutton, North Carolina, and participated in the Carolina Maneuvers in the fall of 1942. They then moved to Camp Hood, Texas, for advanced unit training. Following this, they were assigned to the Tank Destroyer Training Brigade as school troops for almost a year. The unit assisted in the development of the rocket launcher (Bazooka), the 3-inch gun, both towed and self-propelled, the M-10 and M-18 tank destroyers and the M-8 armored car.
On February 28, 1944, they sailed from the Boston Port of Embarkation aboard the H.M.S. Britannic, landing in Liverpool, England on March 11th. The 801st landed at Utah Beach on June 13th with towed 3-inch anti-tank guns. They fought at Mortain, France, later entering Belgium on September 8th and Germany on September 12th. Supporting operations in the Hurtgen Forest in late November, they were in the Ardennes when the German offensive struck on December 16th. Moving to Aachen, Germany, in February, 1945, they crossed the Roer River on February 25th, crossed the Rhine River on March 29th, and eventually supported the drive to the Ruhr River before turning east to the Elbe River. After being moved south, they supported operations in the Harz Mountains in late April.
They converted to M-18 Tank Destroyers in late April. Crossing the Danube River followed soon after the conversion and they reached the Inn River outside Braunau am Inn, Austria, by VE day. Marvin shipped back to the U.S. and left the service on December 29, 1945, at the rank of Technician 5th Grade.
We have very little on Marvin’s life after the war but we do know that in 1950, he was working an auto-body technician and living in Wooster, Ohio He and Alma had five sons, Berl, Marvin Jr., Al, Donald and Ronald and one daughter, Evelyn. He was active in the Freemasonry. Marvin passed away on June 27, 1978, and was buried in the Nashville Methodist Church Cemetery in Nashville, Holmes County, Ohio. Thank you to Find A Grave contributor Bill Miller for the use of the grave marker photo.
