When the call to duty came, like most guys his age, Robert “Bobby” Collins went off to war. And to this day, the 87-year-old Jones County native will tell you he was just doing his duty when he threw his leg over a grenade to save his buddies.

It was late December 1944 and Sergeant Collins and the 17th Airborne Division were in the midst of what would become known as the Battle of the Bulge. Collins and a dozen more of his comrades were settling in for the night.

“There were 13 of us in a room the size of a bedroom in the cellar of a house,” explained Collins, who was sitting on the floor when a grenade suddenly flew in through an open window. “The grenade slid by me and I threw my leg over it to keep it from scattering and killing all of us.”

Collins explained that he was in a demolition platoon and knew a thing or two about explosives.

“I knew by throwing my leg over the grenade, it would keep it from scattering,” said Collins. “If I was standing up, I probably would have sat down on it.”

The grenade exploded, but somehow Collins was not seriously injured.

“You talk about luck,” said Collins. “I thought I would lose my leg, but it didn’t even cut an artery.”

Collins was shipped out and spent nine months in military hospitals as the leg healed. He was discharged in Daytona Beach, Fla., and was “more interested with getting back home than anything else,” said Collins.

Back home in Mississippi

Before the war, Collins attended Ellisville Agriculture High School. “I think I knew everybody in Jones County at that time and everybody I think knew me,” said Collins, who was a pretty good athlete in high school, earning six letters in football, basketball and track.

When he returned from the war, Collins entered junior college in Ellisville. It was at JCJC and the friends he made that he credits with turning his life around. Though his leg injury had healed, he still had a difficult time walking. One of his good friends, Doug Hollingsworth, asked him to come out for the football team.

“I said ‘Doug, I can’t even put my left leg in front of my right,’” said Collins. Hollingsworth eventually convinced Collins to join the football team.

“I came out that first day and I ran about a foot,” said Collins. “The second day, I ran three or four feet. The next day I ran 12 or 18 feet. After a month, I ran all the way around the track. If I had not done that, I know I’d be a cripple today. I got a lot of help from a lot of friends who were very patient with me.”

Collins went on to earn four letters for the Bobcats — two in basketball and two in football.