James A. Martin was born in 1922 in Florida. He resided in Duval County, Florida prior to the war. He enlisted in the Army on April 15, 1943 at Camp Blanding, Florida. He was noted, at the time of his enlistment, as being employed as a Driver and also as Married. James served as a Private First Class, U.S. Army during World War II.

On May 23, 1945, he was a passenger on Flight C-46D (4-77507) which was taking 41 American soldiers that were ill, injured, or repatriated prisoners of war to hospitals in the Paris, France area and was then eventually going to take them all back to the United States. This flight occurred after Germany's surrender on May 7, 1945. However this C-46, for unknown reasons, developed a fire in one of it's two engines and crashed near the village of Taillefontaine, near Paris. All men aboard were killed in the crash. PFC Martin is now buried in the Zachary Taylor National Cemetery, Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky, USA in the same grave with the other passengers of the aircraft.

Source of information: www.findagrave.com