Captain Charles Sartain

Charles Lenton Sartain, Jr. was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana on September 19, 1920. His father was a railroad conductor, and his mother had a teachers certificate although she did not teach after she married. Charles attended a public elementary school and a Catholic High School.

Sartain attended LSU in the summer of 1938 and finished his Pre-Law studies in June 1942. In those days, Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) was compulsory for the first two years. Sartain then enrolled in advance military training for his last two years at LSU, graduating in 1942.

He was commissioned a Second Lieutenant and assigned active duty to the Army’s artillery school in Fort Sill, Oklahoma

“I was in a pack outfit (a military unit that used pack and saddle animals such as mules, to operate in mountainous terrain) at Fort Sill for about six weeks,” Sartain later explained. “One of the reasons I joined the paratroopers was to get away from those damn mules. I knew the pack outfit was headed for the pacific and New Guinea. And I wanted no part of it.”………….. (read more)