Corinth World War II Veteran Says Monument Is ‘Wonderful’

By Josh Mitchell

Corinth Today News Editor

On a quiet Saturday afternoon in downtown Corinth, a World War II veteran remembered the Japanese bomb blasts.

“They would bomb us at night,” said Leroy Worsham. “We’d hear them all the time.”

Worsham, 97, visited the veterans monument by the Alcorn County Courthouse Saturday, and found his name on one of the engraved bricks.

He recalled that two brothers from Corinth were killed in the war.

“I was raised about a block from them,” said Worsham, who was stationed with the Air Force on various Pacific islands, including Guadalcanal and Okinawa.

Worsham volunteered for World War II, saying, “I thought it was my duty.”

World War II “changed everything,” Worsham said, adding, “It was a big war. Everybody I knew was involved in it . . . There’ll never be another one like that I don’t think because we just can’t stand another one.”

Asked what the experience of being in World War II was like, Worsham said, “unpleasant.” Each day there was a possibility of being shot, he noted.

“You never knew what was going to happen the next day,” Worsham said.

The only good thing about the war was when it was over, he added. Worsham was on Okinawa on V-J Day, when victory over Japan was declared. He couldn’t believe it when he heard the war was over.

In the 1940s, communication was not what it is today, and the soldiers did not know much about what was going on in the overall war, he said.

As an engineer in the war, he helped build airstrips and places where the servicemen lived. He noted that they had to be careful when it came to storing bombs and gasoline.

“We had them camouflaged so the Japanese couldn’t find them (from the air),” he said.

The Japanese were a tough enemy, Worsham noted.

“They were hard to beat,” he said. “You had to whoop everyone of them to do it.”

He returned to Corinth after he got out of the service and worked as a private road contractor. Worsham says Corinth is a “good town” and that the veterans monument by the courthouse is “wonderful.”