B157668 Rifleman Joseph Arnold Sereres was born in Deer Lake, Haliburton, Ontario, on 21 January 1925, the son of Jacob Sereres and Wilhelmina Sophana Rausch, and had four brothers and three sisters. One brother, Jake, was serving in the Royal Canadian Army Service Corps and died in England in June 1941.

Sereres left school at 14 having completed Grade 7, and was a Lutheran.

He worked as a general labourer for Herman Stockman (a farmer and lumberman) when he enlisted in Toronto with the active service army on 8 January 1944 with no previous military experience. Sereres trained at Brantford and Camp Borden and arrived in the United Kingdom on 19 July 1944. He was posted to a reinforcement unit and on 17 August 1944 he arrived in France.  On 22 August 1944, he was posted to The Queen’s Own Rifles and fought with them through North West Europe.

Rifleman Sereres was killed in action in Germany during Operation Blockbuster on 26 February 1945, aged 20. He is buried in Groesbeek Canadian War Cemetery, grave reference VIII. B. 12. His family had the following engraved on his marker:

THERE
AT MY SAVIOUR’S SIDE
HEAVEN IS MY HOME
I SHALL BE GLORIFIED