Henry Eugene Gerland was born at Marion, Grant County, Indiana, on October 26, 1921. His parents were Eugene Henry Gerland (5 Dec 1897 – 30 Mar 1988), who was born at Joliet, Will County, Illinois; and Lucy M. (Leonard) Gerland (6 Aug 1899 – Mar 1968), who was born at Marion, Grant County, Indiana. His parents married about 1917, and in 1918 lived at Marion, Indiana, where his father was a cutter at the Marion Shoe Factory. He had at least one sister, Edith M. King. By 1930 the family lived in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. By 1940 his father moved to Pontiac, Livingston County, Illinois, where he was a lodger in the household of Lucy Veatch at 614 South Street, and worked as a cutting room foreman in a shoe factory. His father's widowed mother, Bertha Gerland, also lived there and was housekeeper. By 1944 his father lived at 318 West South Street, Pontiac, Illinois.

He registered for the draft at Clarksville, Montgomery County, Tennessee on February 16, 1942. His home address at that time was 706 Sheridan Road, Chicago, Illinois, the address of his father. He was 5 feet 11 inches tall, weighed 162 pounds, and had brown eyes and brown hair. He completed two years of college at Austin Peay Normal School, a two-year teacher's college in Clarksville, Tennessee. Later he resided at Adams County, Illinois, where he worked in a semiskilled occupation in the processing of dairy products. He was single, without dependents, when he enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Corps at Peoria, Illinois on September 22, 1942.

He completed Army Air Forces pilot training in Class 44-C at Lubbock Army Air Field, Texas in March 1944, and was assigned as copilot on the heavy bomber crew of Lt Lloyd W. Kersten. The Kersten crew completed B-17 operational training at Dyersburg Army Air Base, Tennessee, and was assigned to the 836th Bomb Squadron of the 487th Bomb Group at Army Air Forces Station 137 near Lavenham, Suffolk, England. The crew arrived at Station 137 by July 24, 1944, and became part of the 8th U.S. Army Air Force in Europe.

Lt Gerland and six of his crewmates were killed in action on November 30, 1944, when their aircraft, B-17G 43-37877, was shot down by flak. The target was the large I. G. Farben synthetic oil refinery at Leuna near Merseburg, Germany. As the 487th Bomb Group formation approached the initial point of the bomb run near Triptis, the radar set in the lead ship malfunctioned, and the deputy lead ship took over the lead for a visual run. The bombardier in that ship couldn't pick out the Leuna refinery through the smokescreen and the flak, so he chose to drop on what was thought to be a refinery in the vicinity of Zeitz. At 1:15 PM, just after bombs away, Lt Kersten's B-17 received direct flak hits and went down in the vicinity of Theißen, just north of Zeitz, Germany. Lt Hyland and Lt Ritchhart bailed out before the aircraft exploded, and survived as prisoners of war. The bombs struck the eastern outskirts of Zeitz, about 19 miles southeast of the assigned target.

Lt Gerland is buried at Lorraine American Cemetery in Saint-Avold, France.

B-17G 43-37877 crew:
• Kersten, Lloyd W – 1/Lt – Pilot – KIA
• Gerland, Henry E – 1/Lt – Copilot – KIA
• Hyland Jr, James W – 1/Lt – Navigator – POW
• Ritchhart, Warren H – 1/Lt – Bombardier – POW
• Eberhart, John D – T/Sgt – Radio Operator – KIA
• Shegal, Arnold R – T/Sgt – Engineer – KIA
• Morrison, Everett S – S/Sgt – Ball Turret Gunner – KIA
• Sullivan, Maurice J – S/Sgt – Tail Gunner – KIA
• Miller, Joseph M – S/Sgt – Waist Gunner – KIA

Source of information: Paul M. Webber, www.findagrave.com, www.abmc.gov