First Special Service Force
6th CO, 3rd REG
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Force S-2

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Forum Home > S1, Adjutant, FSSF HQ > The Last Man to Die Part #2

papajoad
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Posts: 22 		Letter # 2

Dear Ed,

This is how the patrol went November 6, ’44, Southern France.

About the last of October, G-2 found out the Germans had left the forts, (Castillion and Barbonnette) and their original line of defense. They had pulled back across the French-Italian border.

Word came down from Bn HQ to 4th CO. 3rd REG to send out a recon patrol and to find out just how far back they retreated.  1st LT. John A. Hanschen said he would take out the patrol and chose John Pinciak and me.  The LT told us to take light firearms, 2 grenades each and rations for 2 days.  The Lt. was briefed to avoid any contact with the enemy, also to map all positions we might see and any other activity we might observe, and to take as much time as possible to complete the mission.  No other outfit had sent out a patrol or tried to contact the Germans at this point. 

We decided that our line of departure would start at a 517th paratroop forward machine gun position.  The time was 1200 hours. As we passed through ther positions, I remember them saying to us, “You guys must be nuts to go out there in broad daylight,”  we just smiled and went on, It was a beautiful fall day, the sun was out and felt so good, also, it was awful quiet, we didn’t like that.

The Lt. led the patrol; we walked about 15 yards apart.  We proceeded with stealth and discipline, a Force trademark.  As we continued on our assignment, we were finding trip wires to mines everywhere.  Also, it seemed as though they were hastily planted as well as the ones we found on roadways.  Anti-tank mines that were not buries properly, as we could see them.  We mapped all we saw.  The LT would take difficult places to walk to avoid mines and detection, John and I knew how to do that rather well.

We continues on for I don’t know how long, it seemed like forever, especially when you go 25 to 30 yards, stop and wait, observe a few minutes, then repeat the process and of course, you’re always expecting that burst of machine gun or mortar fire, so time means nothing.  Then the LT called john and me up and pointed out a German field artillery gun, a German was cleaning it.  After writing down this observation we came up on a whole battery of artillery. 

LT. Hanschen decided we had done all we could and that we should return to our lines.  It was soon going to be dark, so we decided to go as far as possible and when we could see no more, that we would stop, take cover, and start out again at first light.  There was no moon on November 5.  We were as careful going back as we were going forward.  No noise, no talking, always expecting an ambush, always alert.  We were walking along a terrace wall, when all of a sudden there was a bang and a blue flash.  At first I thought it was a mortar shell, No, the Lt had stepped on a shu mine.
John and I got as close to the wall as possible to avoid mines.  The Lt was a huge man, (6’4”, 240 lbs).  All he said was, “shit” and asked if we had any morphine.  I started to take off my ammo belt to get the morphine and didn’t notice Pinciak coming along the wall towards me.  As I looked up at him, he said, “Schuetz, the only thing we can do is take care of his foot.  I will stay with him and you go get help.  He is too big to carry without a stretcher.”  I gave the ground around me a quick look to pick a place to walk, Man how I wished I could fly! As I turned, john was right next to me, too late, he stepped on a mine; he had stepped back no more than a few inches.  The explosion blew me down onto the next terrace on my back, my face and hands caught some of the mine fragments. 

Now Pinciak lay there with his foot off, as did the Lt., I couldn’t believe this was happening, after our being so careful.  Lt Hanschen asked me how I was, I told him my hands had no feeling in them and the right side of my face and eye were bleeding badly.  He asked me again, “Schuetz, can you walk? I said, “yes”, ‘then go get help,” he replied.  It was so dark by then you could not see anything, and in the mountains it’s dark, dark.

I knew where I was but could hardly see at all.  I started out pell-mell, going through thorn bushes, falling off of rock foundations.  I knew if I got down to the Gospel River, I could go up it to my lines.  Also, there would be no mines in it.  When I finally got down there, the cold water fest so food on my hands and face.  I dept wading upstream, then got to a swift, deep places.  The river seemed to narrow in a thin point.  After of couple of attempts, I was weak, I decided to go around this deep place.  I noticed a footbridge above this place.  Didn’t know where it led, so I wanted to avoid any paths and bridge.  I started up the lift side; the climbing was hared to do in the dark.  Somehow I kept going.  Then all of a sudden a blue flash and bang.  I went flying through the air.  When I landed, I couldn’t feel my left arm and blood was pouring out of the back of my head and left side.  Then, to my amazement, I felt a trip wire across my lap.  I know I had exploded a mine.  It was a concrete one tied to a small tree.  I had fallen quite a distance and my first thought was that I was up against another trip wire.  As much as I hurt, I didn’t dare move. 

I knew the 517 paratroops line was across the valley from where I was, so I yelled for help and got no answer.  I kept on yelling, explaining the situation, still no answer.  Then I started to feel warm and sleepy.  This was a bad sigh and I knew it from experience with others I had seen wounded…they would die, so I kept yelling.  Finally, the 517 answered.  All they said was, “We hear you”.  Don’t know how long I lay there.  Still had no feeling in y left arm.  Kept fighting sleep.  Then, to top it all the Germans started shelling.  I could hear shrapnel flying all around me.  It went on for about 20 minutes or so, who keeps time at this point?

All at once, I heard the voice of Alan Lennox.  He yelled, “ Hey Schuetz, where in the bloody hell are you?”  I called back and said, “I have a trop wire in both hands and don’t know if it goes to a live mine or what.”  I was in a stone-like state from not moving for so long, about two hour, I think.  Then lennox said, “hold on, john, we are coming in anyway.”  Lennox and a half-track driver, (Comstock was his name), checked the wire across my lap and said, ‘can’t tell if it goes to a live trap or not.”  Anyway, they removed me very carefully.  They carried me down the mountain and placed me on a jeep with stretcher.  They asked me where the Lt. and Pinciak were, I told them as best I could.  The next day, Alan Lennox, James S. Underwood and others were wounded trying to get to the Lt and Pinciak.

When they got me to the first aid station, I was stripped of my wet and blood-soaked clothes.  They gave me tetanus and morphine shots, dressed my wounds and put me on a stretcher, naked, with a blanket thrown over me, I was very cold.  Then I must have passed out, for the next thing I knew, I woke up on the meat wagon – sometime that afternoon, November 7, to my amazement, the ambulance was full of wounded Forcemen.  I asked them how they got it, they said, “mines and more Mines.”

A day or so later, Peter kroll, from my platoon, brought some of my personal effects to the hospital and told me they found Lt. Hanschen and Pinciak.  Pete said the Lt. had taken his binocular strap and fashioned a tourniquet and applied it to Pinciak’s leg.  He said he couldn’t get John to move.  The Lt. told Pinciak he didn’t want to be captured, so he crawled away, but fell off a small cliff and broke his arm.  Pete said when they found Pinciak, he had died in a sitting position. 

I got to see lt. Hanschen in the hospital.  He was in good spirits.  He told me his only regret was that he wouldn’t be able to box again; he was a light heavyweight before WWII.

I was discharged from the 78th Station Hospital in March 1945 and was sent to Cherbourg.  I did not know that the force had disbanded.  How could such a thing happen? Was my first thought.  Whose idea was it?  I was furious; never did I want this to happen.  Well, anyway, I will never forgive the people who did this…never.  I did get over everything but that.  One thing for sure… I will never forget them. 


Ed, I know this will have to be condensed and proofread, so if there’s anything you want to know further, let me know.  But this is the way it all happened.  The force had so many brave men, and I am very proud to have been a member of one of the finest group of people ever assembled.

Best regards, John Schuetz
March 16, 2009 at 9:48 PM Flag Quote & Reply

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