A salute to a life being well lived! General Van Stockum has a far more interesting life than this brief squib relates. Born in England, his birth father, Royal Army Sergeant Reginald George Bareham, died 6 days before his birth at the Battle of the Somme. His widowed mother, Florence, became an ambulance driver for the RAF where she met a Dutch-born American Army Sergeant, Antonius Wilhemus Van Stockum, just before the war’s end. By 1920, she married him and Ronald was adopted, settling in Washington State.
Ronald graduated from University of Washington and their ROTC program in 1937, joining the Marines as a 2nd Lieutenant. He earned his first battle ribbon commanding a Marine Fleet Detachment aboard the USS Wasp when it twice went deep into the Mediterranean to ferry Spitfires to Malta in 1942.
Transferred to land duty, he participated in the post-Guadalcanal Marine actions of Bougainville and Guam, earning a combat Bronze Star, exiting the war as a Lieutenant Colonel. Post war, he was active duty but working with the various components of the Marine Reserves and later in various other areas. He retired in 1969 with the active rank of Brigadier General, choosing Kentucky for his retirement.
He has authored several books including one about the birth father he never got to meet; My Father: British Sergeant Reginald G. Bareham (1894–1916) and The Battle of the Somme.
He turns 105 today!