The Deserters: A Hidden History of World War II

by Glass, Charles

  “froze the Army” WD/Second Draft, p. 85. Weiss’s figures are accurate, as confirmed by General George C. Marshall in “Biennial Report of the Chief of Staff of the United States Army, July 1, 1943, to June 30, 1945, to the Secretary of War,” reprinted in Yank magazine, U.S. Army, Washington, DC, 19 October 1945, p. 7. U.S. Army chief of staff Marshall wrote that available American manpower “physically fit for war service lay between 15 and 16 million.” Of that total, some were needed for naval and merchant marine service, as well as in the production of armaments to supply the American forces and the other Allies. Army ground forces numbered 3,186,00 in all theaters (Pacific, European and Mediterranean). American peak mobilization for all services and ancillary military support was, according to Marshall, fourteen million. This compared to the Soviet contribution of twenty-two million, the British Empire’s twelve million and China’s six million. The Germans mobilized seventeen million.

  “To me the personnel” The General Board, European Theater, “Combat Exhaustion,” U.S. Army, Office of the Chief Clerk, Military History, General References Branch, File: R704/11, Study No. 91, 1945, pp. 127–28.

  “However, we now find” Ibid., p. 129.

  “I was slow” WD/Second Draft, p. 85.

  “She looked straight” Ibid., p. 87.

  “The relationship I did” Steve Weiss, interview with the author, Paris, 17 July 2010.

  TWENTY-THREE

  “This was demonstrated” “High Officer Reveals: 12,000 Yanks AWOL in Europe, Half of Them in Black Market,” Washington Post, 26 January 1945, p. 1.

  “The organization of” Colonel L. A. Ayres and Lieutenant Colonel P. R. David, “Military Rail Service,” The General Board, United States Forces, European Theater of Operations, Center of Military History, Department of the Army, Washington, DC, File R321/7, Study No. 123, p. 7.

  Allied use of Ibid., p. 12.

  “They went AWOL” Allan B. Ecker, “GI Racketeers in the Paris Black Market,” Yank magazine, 4 May 1945, p. 2.

  “temporarily AWOL from” Ibid.

  In late September “27 Paris GIs Held in Paris Black Marketing,” Associated Press, Washington Post, 22 September 1944, p. 2.

  Soon after the Americans Barkley, In Death’s Dark Shadow, p. 216.

  “My thoughts went” Whitehead Diary, p. 128.

  Barkley and the rest Second Battalion Staff, “The Second Battalion, 38th Infantry, in World War II,” p. 41. Although Harold Barkley remembered staying at the hotel near the Eiffel Tower, the battalion history stated that Company G’s billet was the Hôtel “Nouvelle” [probably Nouveau], 20 rue de Paris, in the suburb of Vincennes. Whitehead and the rest of Headquarters Company stayed at 1 avenue Charles Floquet.

  “The people there” Whitehead Diary, p. 130.

  “Thugs and AWOL” Barkley, In Death’s Dark Shadow, p. 216.

  “French renegades were” Whitehead Diary, p. 129.

  “They knew what” Second Battalion Staff, “The Second Battalion, 38th Infantry, in World War II,” p. 41.

  Whitehead wrote that Whitehead Diary, p. 132.

  “daily staged an” Second Battalion Staff, “The Second Battalion, 38th Infantry, in World War II,” pp. 41–42.

  Yet it was Barkley Barkley, In Death’s Dark Shadow, pp. 229–30.

  Al Whitehead rotated Whitehead Diary, p. 134.

  Joyriders used contraband Robert Sage, “Paris Protests Waste of Gas by Joy Riders,” Chicago Daily Tribune, 26 October 1944, p. 5.

  On 13 October “Black Market Deals of U.S. Soldiers Told,” Associated Press, Chicago Daily Tribune, 26 December 1944, p. 3. See also, “MP Killed in Fight as Black Market Gang Is Broken Up,” Associated Press, Washington Post, 8 January 1945, p. 1.

  “cutting thefts down” Wade Werner, “MPs in France Check U.S. Supply Thefts,” Washington Post, 20 December 1944, p. 2. Werner filed his article on 4 December, but it was delayed—presumably to clear military censorship.

  “a job superbly done” Ethell and Caldwell, The Thirty-Eighth United States Infantry, pp. 18–19.

  Al Whitehead sent Whitehead Diary, p. 135.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  The men of Clarke and Smith, Riviera to the Rhine, United States Army in World War II, p. 89.

  Despite formidable Wehrmacht Ibid., p. 196.

  Operation Dragoon’s three Ibid., p. 210.

  The 36th alone Clarke and Smith, Riviera to the Rhine, United States Army in World War II, p. 283; Summary of Activities: North African Theater of Operations, U.S. Army, 1 October 1944, Vol. VIII, Copy No. 31, Analysis and Control Section Office C/s NATOUSA, NARA RG 498, UD 1018, Box 1.

  “October was upon us” Eric Sevareid, Not So Wild a Dream, pp. 472–73.

  Until then, the 36th Summary of Activities: North African Theater of Operations, U.S. Army, 1 October 1944, Vol. VIII, Copy No. 31, Analysis and Control Section Office C/s NATOUSA, NARA RG 498, UD 1018, Box 1.

  “desertions among the line” Clarke and Smith, Riviera to the Rhine, United States Army in World War II, p. 291.

  Courts-martial convicted The General Board, European Theater, “Military Justice Administration in the Theater of Operations,” U.S. Army, Office of the Chief Clerk, Military History, General References Branch, File: R250/1, Study No. 83, 20 November 1945, pp. 3–4.

  Most received sentences Ibid., p. 69.

  “All officers, particularly” Major General J. A. Ulio, Adjutant General, U.S. Army, to Commanding Generals, Army Ground Forces, Army Air Services, Services of Supply, commanders of all ports of embarkation et al., 3 February 1943, NARA RG492, Box 2029 (NND 903654), Records of Mediterranean Theater of Operations, U.S. Army, Records of the Special Staff, JAG Headquarters Records, Decimal Correspondence 250.401 to 251.

  “had little stomach” Ibid.

  “The troops who” The General Board, European Theater, “Combat Exhaustion,” U.S. Army, Office of the Chief Clerk, Military History, General References Branch, File: R704/11, Study No. 91, 1945, p. 7. On p. 2 of the same report, the authors wrote, “There was a total of 102,989 neuropsychiatric casualties in the European Theater of Operations and a vast majority of these were combat exhaustion cases. The majority of these casualties occurred in combat divisions. . . . The condition occurred among all types of individuals and was encountered in two widely separated periods of combat.”

  “Colonel Paul D. Adams” Ibid., p. 291.

  “You give them” Clarke and Smith, Riviera to the Rhine, United States Army in World War II, p. 292.

  “one of the finest men” Lockhart, op. cit., p. 115.

  Sensitive to the depth Ibid., p. 118.

  The 36th established The General Board, United States Forces, European Theater, “Report on the Army Chaplain in the European Theater,” Center of Military History, Department of the Army, Washington, DC, File: 322.01/4, Study No. 68, 1945, p. 88.

  The 36th Division Major Irvin F. Carpenter, “The Operations of the 3rd Infantry Division, VI Corps (Seventh United States Army), in the Crossing of the Meurthe River and the Breakout from the Vosges Mountains, 20–27 November 1944 (Rhineland Campaign),” Staff Department, The Infantry School, Fort Benning, GA, 1949–50, pp. 5–6. Major Carpenter included a military description of the Vosges: “The VOSGES MOUNTAINS begin in the forested hills around KAISERSLAUTERN and extend generally southward, dividing the plains of ALSACE and LORRAINE with SAVERNE GAP, being that point, which divides the mountains into the LOWER AND HIGHER VOSGES. South of SAVERNE, the HIGHER VOSGES rise steeply to heights of over 4,000 feet and continue southward to the 4,600 foot heights overlooking BELFORT GAP. From a military viewpoint, the LOWER VOSGES present a greater problem or obstacle than do their counterpart. To the North, the mountains have very steep western approaches and are densely forested, whereas, to the South, the western approaches rise more gradually and are less densely forested except for a sharp decline to the East onto the
plains of ALSACE. There are four major passes through this mountain range. In order from North to South, they are as follows: SAVERNE GAP, which provides entrance to STRASBOURG; SAALES PASS, which provides entrance to SELESTAT and STRASBOURG; SCHLUCHT PASS, which provides entrance to COLMAR; and, BELFORT GAP, which provides entrance to MULHOUSE. These mountains, in their entirety, presented quite a formidable barrier to any proposed breakthrough and favored the enemy along the entire front.”

  “clear approaches to” G-2 History, Seventh Army Operations in Europe, Seventh United States Army, quoted in Carpenter, “The Operations of the 3rd Infantry Division,” p. 4.

  While much of Lieutenant John D. Porter, “The Operations of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team in the Vosges Mountains, 29 September–20 November 1944, Rhineland Campaign (Personal Experience of a Platoon Leader),” The Infantry School, General Section, Military History Committee, Fort Benning, GA, Advanced Officers Course, 1946–47, p. 7.

  “Almost every adverse” Lockhart, op. cit., p. 131.

  Although there were Samuel A. Stouffer et al., Studies in Social Psychology in World War II: The American Soldier, Vol. II: Combat and Its Aftermath, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1949, pp. 61–62. Stouffer wrote that it was “always surprising to the uninitiated how small a part of a modern army ever comes into contact with the enemy.”

  The infantry, barely Gerald Linderman, The World Within War: America’s Combat Experience in World War II, New York: Free Press, 1997, p. 1.

  “The 36th was” Lockhart, op. cit., p. 131.

  On 8 October Testimony of Private First Class Frank C. Turek, in Turek, Frank J., CM297854, Court Martial File, Office of the Clerk of the Court, U.S. Army Judiciary, 901 North Stuart Street, Suite 1200, Arlington, VA, 22203-1837.

  “I remember it” General David Frazior to Colonel Vincent M. Lockhart, quoted in a letter from Lockhart to Steve Weiss, 20 April 1991, Steve Weiss, personal papers. Lockhart added in his letter to Weiss, “Too bad that stupid bastard who was your company commander didn’t see it that way.”

  “I was sure” WD/Second Draft, p. 89.

  No soldier, according Information and Education Division, U.S. Army Service Forces, “What the Soldier Thinks: A Digest of War Department Studies on the Attitude of American Troops, December 1942–September 1945,” Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1945, p. 2.

  “The good leader” The General Board, European Theater, “Combat Exhaustion,” U.S. Army, Office of the Chief Clerk, Military History, General References Branch, File: R704/11, Study No. 91, 1945, p. 7.

  “When Harry Shanklin” Steve Weiss, interview with the author, the Vosges, France, 30 April 2011.

  “I was just nineteen” Steve Weiss, interview with the author, London, 7 October 2009.

  “Poor supply of” Lieutenant John D. Porter, “The Operations of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team in the Vosges Mountains, 29 September–20 November 1944, Rhineland Campaign (Personal Experience of a Platoon Leader),” The Infantry School, General Section, Military History Committee, Fort Benning, GA, Advanced Officers Course, 1946–47, p. 25.

  “vulnerable and unprotected” WD/Second Draft, p. 91.

  “I ran into” Ibid., p. 92.

  “I didn’t want” Steve Weiss, interview with the author, London, April 2009.

  “The discovery of” Lieutenant John D. Porter, “The Operations of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team in the Vosges Mountains, 29 September–20 November 1944, Rhineland Campaign (Personal Experience of a Platoon Leader),” The Infantry School, General Section, Military History Committee, Fort Benning, GA, Advanced Officers Course, 1946–47, p. 23.

  The squad dug WD/Second Draft, p. 95.

  At 7:30 that morning “Original Record of Trial of Weiss, Stephen J., 12228033, Private, Company C, 143rd Infantry, APO 36, U.S. Army, 7 November 1944,” official transcript, p. 12. Office of the Clerk of the Court, U.S. Army Judiciary, 901 North Stuart Street, Suite 1200, Arlington, VA, 22203-1837. (Hereafter referred to as “Weiss Court-Martial Transcript File.”)

  BOOK III: MILITARY JUSTICE

  TWENTY-FIVE

  “that severe pressures” United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit, Albert C. Homcy versus Stanley R. Resor, Secretary of the Army, 455 F.2d 1345, opinion by Circuit Judge George MacKinnon, http://cases.justia.com/us-court-of-appeals/F2/455/1345/168414/.

  “He said that” Ibid.

  “After the Court-Martial” Ibid.

  Homcy, formerly a Letter from Colonel Schultz, Headquarters, Eastern Branch, U.S. Disciplinary Barracks, Green Haven, New York, 7 January 1946, Weiss Court-Martial Transcript File, p. 25. File, Homcy, Albert C., CM271489, p. 194, Office of the Clerk of the Court, U.S. Army Judiciary, 901 North Stuart Street, Suite 1200, Arlington, VA, 22203-1837, p. 194. Homcy served until 7 January 1946, the day on which he was both released from prison with a dishonorable discharge and reenlisted in the U.S. Army as a private. He received an honorable discharge from his 1946 enlistment on 24 August 1946. See Albert C. Homcy versus United States, 536 F.2d 360 (Fed. Cir. 1976).

  “ended up in” Darkes, “Twenty-five Years in the Military,” p. 23.

  “I can’t take it” Audie Murphy, To Hell and Back, New York: Picador, 2002 (originally published New York: Henry Holt, 1949), p. 236.

  “No quarter was” Lieutenant John D. Porter, “The Operations of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team in the Vosges Mountains, 29 September–20 November 1944, Rhineland Campaign (Personal Experience of a Platoon Leader),” The Infantry School, General Section, Military History Committee, Fort Benning, GA, Advanced Officers Course, 1946–47, p. 11.

  The American forces Clarke and Smith, Riviera to the Rhine, United States Army in World War II, p. 344.

  A frontline stalemate Lieutenant John D. Porter, “The Operations of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team in the Vosges Mountains, 29 September–20 November 1944 (Rhineland Campaign) (Personal Experience of a Platoon Leader),” The Infantry School, General Section, Military History Committee, Fort Benning, GA, 1947, pp. 6 and 12.

  “I never confronted” WD/Second Draft, p. 100.

  “I was jumpy” Testimony of Private First Class Frank C. Turek, in Turek, Frank J., CM297854, Court Martial File, Office of the Clerk of the Court, U.S. Army Judiciary, 901 North Stuart Street, Suite 1200, Arlington, VA, 22203-1837.

  “I also remember” Steve Weiss, interview with the author, the Vosges, 30 April 2011.

  The Polish-American youngster Weiss recalled that Turek deserted at this time, but Turek’s court-martial records show that he left the line on 28 October 1944. See Turek, Frank J., CM297854, Court Martial File, Office of the Clerk of the Court, U.S. Army Judiciary, 901 North Stuart Street, Suite 1200, Arlington, VA, 22203-1837.

  “You could never” Steve Weiss, interview with the author, the Vosges, 30 April 2011.

  “The longer the” Major Duncan Stewart et al., “Anvil/Dragoon, Combat & Staff Lessons, Seventh Army, Invasion of Southern France,” CSI Battlebook 3-D (A.D.-A151 685), Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 1984, p. 65. See also Army Ground Forces Board, Report 639, Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1945, p. 62.

  Sixty-three infantrymen from Branch Office of the Judge Advocate General, “History, Branch Office of the Judge Advocate General with the United States Forces European Theater, 18 July 1942–1 November 1945,” Washington, DC, 1946, p. 17, from the files of U.S. Army Legal Services Agency, U.S. Army Court of Criminal Appeals, 901 North Stuart Street, Arlington, VA 22203-1837.

  “The enemy fired” Lieutenant John D. Porter, “The Operations of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team in the Vosges Mountains, 29 September–20 November 1944, Rhineland Campaign (Personal Experience of a Platoon Leader),” The Infantry School, General Section, Military History Committee, Fort Benning, GA, Advanced Officers Course, 1946–47, p. 20.

  “Overseas most combat” Arnold M. Rose, “The Social
Psychology of Desertion from Combat,” American Sociological Review, Vol. 16, No. 5, October 1951, p. 616.

  “Most mess sergeants” WD/Second Draft, p. 99.

  By this time “High Officer Reveals: 12,000 Yanks AWOL in Europe, Half of Them in Black Market,” Washington Post, 26 January 1945, p. 1. In 1944, military censors did not approve stories on deserters in France or Italy, and many reporters did not file stories out of self-censorship.

  “Our venture was” WD/Second Draft, p. 99.

  Physicians in the European The General Board, European Theater, “Combat Exhaustion,” U.S. Army, Office of the Chief Clerk, Military History, General References Branch, File: R704/11, Study No. 91, 1945, p. 1

  “My mother and” Steve Weiss, interview with the author, Paris, 17 July 2010.

  “Fair play was” WD/Second Draft, p. 100.

  “If one day” Steve Weiss, interview with the author, Paris, 17 July 2010.

  “I was so depressed” Ibid.

  “ordered him to return” Affidavit of First Lieutenant Herman L. Tepp, in Turek, Frank J., CM297854, Court Martial File, Office of the Clerk of the Court, U.S. Army Judiciary, 901 North Stuart Street, Suite 1200, Arlington, VA, 22203-1837.

  Captain Richard J. Thomson “Receipt for Deserter and A.W.O.L., Statement of Police Officer or Person Returning Subject to Military Custody,” signed by Richard J. Thomson, Captain, Infantry, 67th Military Police Company, 30 October 1944. File: Private Office of the Clerk of the Court, U.S. Army Judiciary, 901 North Stuart Street, Suite 1200, Arlington, VA, 22203-1837.

  The MPs gave WD/Second Draft, p. 101.

  TWENTY-SIX

  “inaptness or undesirable” A Manual for Courts-Martial, U.S. Army, Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1 April 1928, p. 63.

  The 442nd did “ARMY & NAVY—Medals: Record,” Time, 21 August 1944. Time reported that the 100th Battalion of the 442nd Infantry Regiment had earned “nine Distinguished Service Crosses, 44 Silver Stars, 31 Bronze Stars, three Legion of Merit Medals. . . . Of the 100th Battalion’s 1,300 men (including 500 reserves), 1,000 had been wounded in action. . . . Most remarkable record of all: since the 100th had been organized it had not had a single case of desertion or absence without leave.”