Vernon Funkhouser (1926 - 1951)

FUNKHOUSER, CHILDERS, GOSSETT

Posted By: Karen Brewer (email)
Date: 12/20/2018 at 12:32:00

MURRY MAN
LOSES LIFE IN
KOREA ACTION

Lt. Funkhouser,
Who Won Silver
Star, Reported
Dead; No Details

First Lieutenant Vernon Funkhouser, son of Mr. and Mrs. E. O. Funkhouser of Murray, was killed in action in Korea on April 5. Word of the tragedy came to his parents from the widow who with their two year old daughter, lives in Canton, Ohio.

No details of the former Clarke county man's death have been received but the war department message said that a letter would follow.

Lieutenant Funkhouser first entered the service during World War II and served in the China-Burma-India theatre.

After the close of the war he remained in the service and was sent overseas in July, 1950 soon after the outbreak of the Korean war.

He went into action almost immediately and was in the thick of the fighting up and down the peninsula.

Last September he was awarded the Silver Star for gallantry in action. At that time he was a forward artillery observer and took charge of an infantry platoon when its officers were killed.

Lt. Funkhouser is survived by his wife and daughter, his parents, one brother, B. L. Funkhouser of Murray, and two sisters, Mrs. Bessie Childers, who is employed at the Gold Star market in Osceola, and Mrs. Vern Gossett of Loveland, Okla.