Private First Class Leslie Kimbrell

Leslie L. Kimbrell was born on October 17th, 1928, coming of age at the end of the Great Depression and being a teenager during the Second World War. Growing up in the small town of Garden City, Missouri, he attended Sherwood High School before enlisting in the US Army on September 4th, 1946. After basic training, Kimbrell shipped off to Japan where he was assigned to Weapons Platoon, G Troop, 2nd Squadron, 7th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Cavalry Division as a machine gunner. During his tenure of service, Kimbrell operated an M1919 Browning .30 caliber medium machine gun.

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Private Kimbrell served in Japan throughout 1947, a busy time in the division's history. He likely arrived to the division in the early months of the year, one of about 10,000 replacements arriving at the unit. All of these replacements were green, only having eight weeks of boot camp and a trip over the Pacific under their belts. The first half of the year was spent intensively training the troopers in military bearing, weapons usage, and small unit tactics. Eventually, this made way for an uptick in patrols across the countryside and in Tokyo itself. 

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Kimbrell eventually rotated back to the United States for discharge in early 1948. Not much is known after his time in the army. In 1979, he married Mary Ann Henkel Kimbrell before he passed away on March 1st, 2001 at the age of 72.