| 1. |  OUELLETTE, Wilfred George was born on 22 Apr 1926 in Lowell, Middlesex, Massachusetts, USA (son of OUELLETTE, Wilfred Joseph and JAMES, Vivian Ruth); died on 8 Mar 1945 in Iwo Jima, Japan; was buried about Nov 1948 in Pine Grove Cemetery, Brookline, Hillsborough, New Hampshire, USA. Other Events and Attributes:
- Military: WORLD WAR II - 5th Marine Division
- 1930 US Federal Census: 10 Apr 1930, Lowell, Middlesex, Massachusetts, USA; Page 24 of 40
- 1940 US Federal Census : 11 Apr 1940, Lowell, Middlesex, Massachusetts, USA; E18-116 Page 2 of 30
- Military: Mar 1945, Iwo Jima, Japan; Eulogy by Lt Roland B. Gittelsohn, ChC, USNR at the dedication
of the 5th Marine Division Cemetery, Iwo Jima - March 1945
"This is the grimmest, and surely the holiest, task we have faced since D-day. Here before us lie the bodies of comrades and friends. Men who until yesterday or last week laughed with us, joked with us, trained with us. Men who were on the same ships with us, and went over the side with us as we prepared to hit the beaches of this island. Men who fought with us and feared with us. Somewhere in this plot of ground there may lie the man who could have discovered the cure for cancer. Under one of these Christian crosses, or beneath a Jewish Star of David, there may rest now a man who was destined to be a great prophet to find the way, perhaps, for all to live in plenty, with poverty and hardship for none. Now they lie silently in this sacred soil, and we gather to consecrate this earth to their, memory.
It is not easy to do so. Some of us have buried our closest friends here. We saw these men killed before our very eyes. Any one of us might have died in their places; Indeed, some of us are alive and breathing at this very moment only because the men who lie here beneath us had the courage and the strength to give their lives, for ours. To speak in memory of such men as these is not easy. Of them too it can be said with utter truth: The world will little note nor long remember what we say here. It can never forget what they did here.
No, our power of speech can add nothing more to what these men and the other dead of our Division have already done. All that we can even hope to do is follow their example. To show the same selfless courage in peace that they did in war. To swear that by the grace of God and the stubborn strength and power of human will, their sons and ours shall never suffer these pains again. These men have done their job well. They have paid the ghastly price for freedom. If that freedom be once again lost, as it was after the last war, the unforgivable blame will be ours, not theirs. So it is we the living who are to be dedicated and consecrated.
We dedicate ourselves, first, to live together in peace the way we fought and are buried in this war. Here lie men who loved America because their ancestors generations ago helped in her founding, and other men who loved her with equal passion because they themselves or their own fathers escaped from oppression to her blessed shores.
Here lie officers and men, Negroes and whites, rich and poor together. Here no man prefers another because of his faith or despises him because of his color. Here there are no quotas of how many men from each group are admitted or allowed. Among these men there is no discrimination, no prejudices, no hatred. Theirs is the highest and purest Democracy.
Any man among us the living who fails to understand that will thereby betray those who lie here dead. Whoever of us lifts his hand in hate against a brother, or thinks himself superior to those who happen to be in the minority, makes of this ceremony and of the bloody sacrifice it commemorates an empty, hollow mockery.
To this, then, as our solemn, sacred duty, do we the living now dedicate ourselves: to the right of Protestants, Catholics, and Jews, of white men and Negroes alike, to enjoy the Democracy for which all of them here have paid the price.
To one thing more do we consecrate ourselves in memory of those who sleep beneath these white crosses and stars. We shall not foolishly suppose, as did the last generation of Americas fighting men, that victory on the battlefield will automatically guarantee the triumph of Democracy at home.. This war, with all its frightful heartache and suffering, is but the beginning of our generations struggle for Democracy. When the last battle has been won, there will be those at home, as there were the last time, who will want us to turn our backs in selfish isolation on the rest of organized humanity, and thus to sabotage the very peace for which we fight. We promise you who lie here: We will not do that! We will join hands with Britain, China, Ria, in peace, even as we have in war, to build the kind of peace for which you died.
When the last shot has been fired, there will still be those whose eyes are turned backward, not forward, who will be satisfied with those wide extremes of poverty and wealth in which the seeds of another war can breed. We promise you, our departed comrades: This too we will not permit. This war has been fought by the common man; its fruits of peace must be enjoyed by the common man. We promise, by all that is sacred and holy, that your sons, the sons of miners and millers, the sons of farmers and workers, will inherit from your death the right to a living that is decent and secure.
When the final cross has been placed in the last cemetery, once again there will be those to whom profit is more important than peace, who will insist with the voice of sweet reasonableness and appeasement that it is better to trade with the enemies of mankind than, by crushing them, to lose their profit. To you who sleep here silently, we give you our promise: We will not listen! We will not forget that some of you were burnt with oil that came from American wells, that many of you were killed by shells fashioned from American steel; we promise that when once again men seek profit at your expense, we shall remember how you looked when we placed you reverently, lovingly, in the ground.
Thus do we memorialize those who, having ceased living with us, now live within us. Thus do we consecrate ourselves, the living, to carry on the struggle they began. Too much blood has gone into this soil for us to let it lie barren. Too much pain and heartache have fertilized the earth on which we stand. We here solemnly swear: This shall not be in vain!
Out of this, from the suffering and sorrow of those who mourn, this will come we promise the birth of a new freedom from the sons of men everywhere. AMEN."
Rabbi Gittelsohn was assigned to HQ, 5th MarDiv as the Jewish divisional Chaplain. He ministered to Marines and Sailors of all faiths. He was the first Jewish Chaplain ever to serve with the Marine Corps.
from http://www.recordsofwar.com/iwo/dead/dead.htm
- Newspaper Article: 29 May 1945, Lowell, Middlesex, Massachusetts, USA; Two Killed in Action; One Wounded
Paratrooper and Marine Die Hero Deaths
Lowell - Two Lowell men, a paratrooper and a marine, who were previously reported missing in action, have been killed, and an infantryman has been seriously wounded, according to war department and marine corps telegrams received here overnight. They are killed.
Killed
Pfc. Wilfred G. Ouellette, Jr., USMC, 57 Llewellyn street.
Pvt. John C. Lebednick, 27 Durant Street
Wounded
Corp Joseph D. Ray, 728 Merrimack Street
Killed in action during the fighting on Iwo Jima was 18-year old Pfc. Wilfred G. Ouellette, Jr., only son of Mr. and Mrs. W. G. Ouellette, 57 Llewellyn street. He was attached to the Fifth Marine division and Iwo Jima was his first combat duty.
Enlisted at 17
Enlisting in the Marne Corps shortly after turning 17, Pfc. Ouellette trained at Paris Island and went overeas a year ago. He attended St. Michael's and Varnum Schools.
Just before enlisting he fractured an ankle, but he was so intent upon becoming a marine that he surmounted the accident and was accepted some months later. A letter, written April 8 by Rev. John Eker, a Catholic marine corps chaplain, and released in Washington May 15, stated that the young marine had been a constant communicant and had been buried with the Catholic ceremony.
Besides his parents, Wilfred G. and Vivian (James) Oouellette, he is survived by two sisters, Gail Ann and Carol Elizabeth Ouellette.
A pro-burial mass will be celebrated at St. Michael's church Saturday morning at 9 o'clock.
Lowell Sun 29 May 1945 Front Page
- Newspaper Article: 25 Oct 1948, Lowell, Middlesex, Massachusetts, USA; Lowell Sun
Notes:
Died:
My uncle (Wilfred G. Ouellette) died taking this island. He was only 18 years old and was part of the 5th division. I am humbled by the price these young men paid for our liberty. To this day our family has very little info on Wilfred and his experiences. All we heard is that he died on March the 8th going cave to cave. - Steve Gawrys http://www.iwojima.com/today.htm/comment-page-7/
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1926 - 1945 (18 years)
OUELLETTE, Wilfred Joseph was born on 27 Nov 1899 in Nashua, Hillsborough, New Hampshire, USA (son of OUELLETTE, Joseph Suprien and LEMIRE, Marie Louise); died in 1955 in Lowell, Middlesex, Massachusetts, USA; was buried in Pine Grove Cemetery, Brookline, Hillsborough, New Hampshire, USA. 
OUELLETTE, Joseph Suprien was born on 22 Jun 1875 in St-Pacôme, Kamauraska, Quebec, Canada (son of OUELLETTE, Germaine and LEVESQUE, Marie Anne); died on 26 May 1921 in Brookline, Hillsborough, New Hampshire, United States; was buried in Pine Grove Cemetery, Brookline, Hillsborough, New Hampshire, USA. 
LEMIRE, Marie Louise was born on 1 Oct 1872 in Rock Forest, Quebec, Canada (daughter of LEMIRE, Pierre and BOISVERT, Sophie); died on 10 Mar 1944 in Brookline, Hillsborough, New Hampshire, United States; was buried in Pine Grove Cemetery, Brookline, Hillsborough, New Hampshire, USA. 
OUELLETTE, Germaine was born on 14 Jun 1848 in Saint Pacome, Kamouraska, Quebec, Canada (son of OUELLETTE, Edouard and LEVESQUE, Marie Julie); died in 1878 in Hôpitaux de la Marine, Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. 
LEVESQUE, Marie Anne was born on 5 Jun 1848 in St-Pacôme, Kamauraska, Quebec, Canada (daughter of LEVESQUE, Andre Noel and CHENARD, Marie Georgina); died on 8 Apr 1914 in St-Gabriel-Lalemant, Kamauraska, Quebec, Canada. 
LEMIRE, Pierre was born on 21 Feb 1823 in Rock Forest, Quebec, Canada; died on 13 Mar 1893. 
BOISVERT, Sophie was born in 1828; died in 1888. 
LEVESQUE, Marie Julie was born about 1817 in Rivière-Ouelle, Kamouraska, Québec, Canada. 
