Erle Cocke Jr.; Ex-Commander of American Legion

Erle Cocke Jr., 78, World War II hero, former national American Legion commander and advisor to four presidents. A native of Dawson, Ga., Cocke graduated from the University of Georgia in 1942 and immediately joined the Army. As a captain in Europe during the final years of World War II, he led reconnaissance patrols behind enemy lines and was captured by Germans three times. He escaped twice, but the third time was shot repeatedly by a firing squad and left for dead, only to be saved by German civilians. He spent 18 months in military hospitals, had 17 operations and earned the Silver Star, Bronze Star, Purple Heart and the French Croix de Guerre, and was nominated for the Distinguished Service Cross. After receiving an MBA from Harvard, he pursued a business career in Georgia, serving as an executive of the Central Georgia Railway and Delta Airlines and as executive director of the state Department of Commerce. Cocke also became state commander of the American Legion and in 1950, at 29, was the youngest person ever elected national commander of the veterans organization. A year later President Harry S. Truman named Cocke a special Defense Department consultant and sent him to Korea, where he served as a liaison between Gen. Douglas MacArthur and Washington. In 1959, President Dwight D. Eisenhower appointed Cocke a U.S. delegate to the United Nations, and subsequently Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson named him a consultant to the World Bank. When the nation celebrated its bicentennial in 1976, Cocke was honored as the symbolic veteran of all wars at the Iwo Jima Monument. On Sunday in Chevy Chase, Md., of cancer.