WWII – Carl Sparks

A tribute to Carl Sparks, who would have
celebrated his 91st birthday on March 23, 2014.

In World War II he was Sergeant First Class Carl R. Sparks of the 511th “Angels” Airborne Infantry Regiment, 11th Airborne Division, whose motto was “Strength from Above.”

The Battle of Leyte

In 1944 General MacArthur needed the Philippine Islands retaken from Japan. The mission: invade Leyte Island and fight the length of it to the northern mountains. On November 18, 1944, 21 year old SFC Sparks and his platoon began fighting from the southern beach.  This was the first battle in which Japan used “kamikaze” planes.

Carl wrote, “It rained everyday; no one took off their clothes or boots.  The Japs were cooking and cannibalizing our boys.  We fought the last eight days without any food.  We left half our division lying dead in the mud of that island.”  (3504 U.S. dead; 49,000 Japanese dead)

“On Christmas Day 1944, I stood on a mountain looking down at the ocean and the most beautiful scenery a mill town boy from Cliffside, NC had ever seen.  I promised God if He would let me get back home I would serve Him always.”

(Back home on that Christmas Day his son was three days old, and wouldn’t meet his dad until over a year later.) 

After rest and resupply the regiment was sent to the island of Mindoro where the 11th Airborne was preparing for its part in the Battle of Luzon.

On Feb. 3, 1945 the 511th jumped on Tagaytay Ridge, on the island of Luzon, and advanced toward Manila. During this battle, the 511th’s 1st Battalion pulled off the famous Raid at Los Baños, freeing over 2,000 Allied civilians and military internees from a Japanese prison camp south of Manila.

Once Luzon was secured, the regiment moved on to Okinawa and then Morioko, Japan.  But Leyte was “first blood,” which a soldier never forgets.

In July 1971, he was miraculously healed and overflowed with the Holy Spirit. From that day, he told everyone about the power of God through Christ Jesus.

On Christmas Day 1978, he looked back at that mountain top in the Philippines and wrote the following: