Daughter of World War II hero from Aurora finds closure

Anna Green Showerman was only three years old when her family received the news that her father, U.S. Army Staff Sgt. John William Green of Aurora, had been killed in action in World War II.

According to Jacob Zimmerman, head of the Kane County Veterans Assistance Commission, it took five years for Green’s body to be returned to his family in Fox Valley for burial.

But the medals that Green had earned during his service in World War II and which were supposed to be presented to his family never arrived.

Showerman, now 83, said she has finally come to terms with her father’s story.

On Tuesday, Showerman, of Batavia, received her father’s medals, most notably a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star, from U.S. Army officials at Batavia VFW Post 1197. She was surrounded by generations of her family as she held each of her father’s medals for a brief moment.

“For me, the whole thing was all about my mother,” said Patricia Showerman, Anna Showerman’s daughter. “She never knew her father and always wanted to know where she came from and how her biology fit in.”

Although Anna Showerman had a stepfather for most of her life, she began to worry more about her biological father when she saw how tall her son was becoming.

For Showerman, this search for documents was the beginning of a long journey that ended with Tuesday’s ceremony. She said she had now learned everything she wanted to know about her father.

“It’s the end, the end of my story,” Showerman said of the ceremony.

In late 2019, on a whim, she asked Zimmerman for help in finding documents about her father.

Showerman was only at the Kane County government building on Batavia Avenue in Geneva to pay her taxes, according to previous reports, but when she noticed Zimmerman’s office, she decided to stop by, she previously said.

Zimmerman said it took a long time to obtain Green’s military records because they are all on paper, and the COVID-19 pandemic has not made the process any easier, he said.

Just obtaining these paper documents took over three years, he says. Then the documents had to be sent to an army department that authenticated them and prepared the official orders authorizing the awarding of the medals to the surviving family members.

Eventually, those orders had to be sent to another Army branch that actually issues the medals, Zimmerman said. He said the process can normally take 18 months or more, but he and the family reached out to U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Illinois) to speed things up.

Col. Daniel Mitchell, commanding officer of U.S. Army Garrison Rock Island Arsenal, was sent along with other soldiers from the garrison to present Showerman with the medals at Tuesday’s ceremony.

In a speech, Mitchell said he was honored to attend the ceremony and called Showerman a “hero” for researching her father’s records and military service. He also said Zimmerman was “instrumental” in conducting the ceremony.

John William Green was a member of the U.S. Army’s 28th Infantry Division, 112th Regiment, 2nd Battalion, according to Mitchell. He said that means Green arrived in Normandy after D-Day in 1944, moved through France and into Germany, fought in the Battle of the Hürtgen Forest and died in the Battle of the Bulge.

Although there are conflicting accounts of Green’s exact age, he appears to have just turned 21 when he died in battle.

Sergeant Major James Brown, also of Garrison Rock Island Arsenal, read orders confirming that Green had received the Bronze Star Service Medal, the Purple Heart, the Army Good Conduct Medal, the European–African–Middle Eastern Campaign Medal with three bronze service stars, the World War II Victory Medal, the Presidential Unit Citation, the Combat Infantryman’s Badge, and the Honorable Service Lapel Button for his service in World War II.

As Brown read the order for each medal, Mitchell presented the medal to Showerman, who held it gently in both hands before passing it back.

Showerman also received a letter from Duckworth, delivered by a representative of the senator.

The event received more community support than Showerman expected, she said, with representatives from nearby VFWs, elected officials and even the Boy Scouts showing up for the ceremony.

Zimmerman said the ceremony, which made amends for something that happened about 80 years ago, was a testament to how much the nation cares about its veterans.

According to Sandy Showerman-Gast, another of Showerman’s daughters, the ceremony was about the family bringing closure to Showerman’s life and honoring Green’s memory. She said the ceremony made her think of families in the same situation who have lost a family member.

“For me, it was just nice to say, ‘OK, he was here. He was alive. He fought and served and died for our country,'” Showerman-Gast said. “It’s like he meant something to us because we’re all here today as a family.”

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