Born to Fred and Edna Kennedy in Smithville, Mississippi, on July 5th, 1924, Lawrence Eugene Kennedy was the oldest child out of four children. He and his siblings, David, Clovis, and Ira, grew up on a farm called Rabbit's Ridge during the Great Depression. When he was a child, Lawrence was given the nickname "rabbit" because his gaunt appearance, his family's reliance on rabbit meat to survive, and of course his family's farm name. His family's poor financial circumstance influenced his decision to join the US Army in 1940, a decision which his brother, David, would make in 1946 when he joined the US Navy. Lawrence viewed enlisting in the US Army as an act of survival.
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