Edward V. Loustalot

At Dieppe on August 19, 1942, Loustalot took command of his men when the British captain leading the assault was killed. He led them up a steep cliff, was wounded three times, and was cut down by crossfire while trying to reach a machine-gun nest at the top. The Germans first buried him with the Canadians at Dieppe, and he now lies in the Ardennes American Cemetery in Belgium. Accounts of the raid often call him Edwin, which is wrong. Martin Gilbert's history treats him as the first American soldier killed by Germans on land.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Grevemberg House Museum — 0.7 mi
  Franklin's 1851 Greek Revival townhouse, the official St. Mary Parish museum, saved from demolition by one vote and set in the Franklin Historic District on Bayou Teche.
• Chitimacha Museum — 6.9 mi
  The Chitimacha Tribe of Louisiana's own museum at Charenton: the tribe's account of its territory, the French wars and enslavement, the land held in trust, and river cane baskets.
• Wedell-Williams Aviation and Cypress Sawmill Museum — 15 mi
  A Louisiana State Museum in Patterson on the world's largest cypress sawmill town and the Wedell-Williams racing planes, with a theater and changing exhibits.
• Cypremort Point State Park — 22 mi
  A 185-acre Vermilion Bay park reached by road, with a half-mile man-made beach, a marsh boardwalk, shore fishing and a boat launch, and a Chitimacha tradition of a great cypress here.

More markers nearby

• Battle of Irish Bend — steps away
• The Gunboat Diana — steps away
• Jared Young Sanders — steps away
• Franklin — steps away