Johannes Persson was born September 7th, 1886, at Flaberg, parish of Skarstad, Sweden. When he was six months old his parents left Flaberg for their farm Stora Gatan, in the parish of Jung, and there he lived with them working as a laborer until 1906. In that year he emigrated to the United States, and thereafter found employment in various localities as a farmer, lumberman, millwright and miller. He finally located in Reno, Nevada, where he found his calling as a miller. When the Nation called upon Nevada for young men, Johannes Persson was one of the first contingent to leave Washoe County for Camp Lewis (September 5th, 1917).

He was assigned to Company D, 362d Infantry, of the 91st Division, which later in the war was to win renown at Gesnes in the Battle of the Argonne. But when the 91st sailed for France in July, 1918, he was not among them, for the Grim Reaper had called him at Camp Lewis, Washington, on the 8th of June, 1918. He was buried in Grave W-9, Camp Lewis, Cemetery, Washington. His family in far-off Sweden mourns the loss of the one who had been to them a loving son and brother, and Nevada has set his name in her Golden Stars in perpetual remembrance. Those who survive him are his mother, Mrs. Matilda Svensson; his brothers, Sven Emanuel and Karl Peter, and his sister, Maria Viristina, all of Jungskola, Sweden.