Honoring Guy H. Mills

  • Guy H. Mills, a longtime resident of Bluewater Village, proudly served in World War II as a combat engineer, breaking through the beaches on D-Day, and later helping to build some of Cibola County’s most enduring landmarks. Known for his humility, hard work, and quiet strength, Mills was remembered as a veteran, a builder, a neighbor, and a man who always led by example. Courtesy Photo
    Guy H. Mills, a longtime resident of Bluewater Village, proudly served in World War II as a combat engineer, breaking through the beaches on D-Day, and later helping to build some of Cibola County’s most enduring landmarks. Known for his humility, hard work, and quiet strength, Mills was remembered as a veteran, a builder, a neighbor, and a man who always led by example. Courtesy Photo
  • Guy H. Mills, pictured in uniform during his World War II service with the U.S. Army’s 3rd Armored Division. A combat engineer and demolition expert, Mills spent 337 days on the front lines in Europe, surviving the D-Day invasion and earning five battle stars and an Arrowhead. He returned home to New Mexico, where he built a life grounded in service, faith, and community. Courtesy Photo
    Guy H. Mills, pictured in uniform during his World War II service with the U.S. Army’s 3rd Armored Division. A combat engineer and demolition expert, Mills spent 337 days on the front lines in Europe, surviving the D-Day invasion and earning five battle stars and an Arrowhead. He returned home to New Mexico, where he built a life grounded in service, faith, and community. Courtesy Photo

    CIBOLA COUNTY, N.M. — Guy H. Mills stood just over five feet tall, but his impact on Cibola County—and the country he served—was anything but small.

    Born in Weed, New Mexico, in 1922, Mills left school after the seventh grade to support his single mother and younger twin brothers during the Great Depression. It was a sacrifice that set the tone for the rest of his life: a quiet determination to do what was necessary— without complaint, without fanfare.

    At just 18, Mills earned his pilot's license, a remarkable achievement for a young man with limited formal education. Not long after, he enlisted in the U.S. Army and served as a combat engineer in the 3rd Armored Division, known as the Ghost Battalion, during World War II.

    For 337 days, Mills was on the front lines in Europe, specializing in demolition and pushing through some of the most grueling campaigns of the war, including the invasion of Utah Beach on D-Day. He returned from the battlefield with five battle stars and anArrowhead for combat invasions—a record of valor made even more remarkable by his humility.

    One of Mill ‘closest friends, Taube Jenkins, told the Cibola Beacon in 2014 that Mills and one other man were the only two members of their highly specialized unit to return home. Jenkins was a friend of Mills, connecting over spirituality. Her religion, Judaism, resonated with Mills, who saw the horrors of genocide while moving through Europe to liberate the country.

    During the war, Mills was once trapped for six days in the rubble of a bombed building. Seven fellow soldiers died in the blast. Mills survived—but he lost all hearing in one ear. Still, he never complained. “The war was necessary,” he once said. “And I was proud of what we accomplished.”

    He came home the day before Thanksgiving in 1945. Though he had survived a world at war, it was in New Mexico that he found his purpose.

    After a brief stay in Texas, Mills returned to Cibola County in 1958, settling first in San Rafael and then Bluewater Village, where he lived for the rest of his life.

    He and his friend Wallace Rowley founded the Bluewater Village Fire Department, and Mills helped construct its first facility. Around the same time, he built a post office, a Baptist church, and several other buildings still in use today—including the building that now houses the Milan Post Office on Airport Road and Route 66, formerly the Grants State Bank. He also worked on the seats at the old Grants High School gymnasium.

    He built, hauled wood, lent a hand, and showed up for his neighbors in ways big and small. To some, he was the cowboy with a quiet voice. To others, a trusted friend. But to everyone who knew him, Guy Mills was a man who led by example— a soldier whose service extended long after the battlefield.

    Guy and his wife Betty, to whom he was married for 40 years, raised five children: Judy, Guy Jr., Kenneth (deceased), Nanette, and Sandy. He left behind 12 grandchildren, 19 greatgrandchildren, and 6 great-great-grandchildren— a family who now carries his story forward.

    Guy’s daughter, Sandy Jenkins, remarked that one of his worst fears was people forgetting the sacrifices of World War II. He passed away on March 1, 2019, at the age of 96. He was laid to rest beside his wife at Grants Memorial Cemetery, following services at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Grants. Military honors were provided by American Legion Post #13.

    A warrior. A builder. A neighbor. Guy H. Mills is remembered not just for what he survived, but for what he gave back.