When a metal detector enthusiast found a small folded piece of metal near Waldbrunn in Bavaria, Germany, it set in motion the return of a U.S. military dog tag worn by a World War II Purple Heart recipient from Olean.
Nearly 80 years after Army Pfc. Eugene F. Whittaker, born in 1922 in Franklinville, apparently lost the dog tag in the aftermath of fighting in Europe, an organization, Get it Home United of Niskayuna in Schenectady County, did the sleuthing to identify the tag’s owner, find out where he was from and find family members to whom it could be returned.
“When found, the tag was bent in half but when carefully opened, was found to be in otherwise pristine condition,” writes Iain Walker of Get it Home United. “It was thereafter sent to us in New York for further research.”
Walker’s group found that Eugene Whittaker, son of Mr. and Mrs. Floyd Whittaker of North Third Street in Olean, enlisted for service in Buffalo on Dec. 2, 1942. At that time, he was employed by ACME Electric in Cuba.
The group received detailed information about Eugene because, through a query on an Olean-area Facebook page, it connected with the WWII veteran’s daughter, Lori Whittaker of the Buffalo area.
“We were happy to find Eugene’s daughter,” Walker writes. “She confirmed the service number on the dog tag was in fact her father’s and provided an amazing history of his service. In fact, based on her own research, she was able to put her father just 2.5 miles away from where the tag was found.”
Eugene joined Company M of the 222nd Infantry Regiment, one of the three regiments of the 42nd Infantry Division (the famous “Rainbow Division”). As a heavy machine gun squad leader, Eugene was responsible for choosing the most advantageous position for gun placement, supervising tactical employment of weapons, and directing machine gun fire.
The 222nd Regiment, in December 1944, was attached to “Task Force Linden” and initially placed in position in Strasbourg, France, on the Rhine River. The 222nd was awarded the Presidential Unit Citation for its performance in defeating a furious German attack on Jan. 24-25, 1945, which is credited with bringing an end to Germany’s “Operation Nordwind” in the Alsace-Lorraine region.
Coupled with the U.S. Army pushing the Germans back in the Battle of the Bulge to the north in Belgium and Luxembourg, the Allies had essentially ended all German offensive action on the Western Front for the rest of the war.
During the final hours of the Alsace-Lorraine battle, Eugene was seriously wounded when, while in a foxhole, he was hit by enemy gunfire. He was later awarded the Purple Heart.
According to records kept by Lori, after a six-week hospital stay in Paris, Eugene rejoined the 222nd, which went into Germany in March 1945, advancing rapidly over the next few weeks en route to Munich, capturing many cities and towns.
“On Easter Sunday, April 1, 1945, the 222nd stopped for several days in the town of Madelhofen, near Wurzberg,” Walker writes. “It was likely then that Eugene lost his dog tag, found 79 years later in the town of Waldbrunn, just 2.5 miles away.”
In late April 1945, while preparing for the push into Munich, Eugene and the other soldiers of the 222nd, were among the first Americans to observe the atrocities at the Dachau concentration camp. On April 29, Gen. Henning Linden accepted the surrender of the camp in the name of the 42nd Division, liberating 30,000 prisoners.
After V-Day in May 1945, the 42nd Division moved into the Austrian region of Tyrol for occupation. Eugene remained there until January 1946, when he was honorably discharged.
He returned home to Olean and his wife, the former Barbara Jean Bartlett — they were married 55 years and had four children. He continued to work for ACME for 40 years and passed away March 11, 2000.
“Many thanks to Marko (Hentschel, the German metal detector enthusiast), who generously parted with this find and worked to return it to Lori almost 80 years later,” Walker writes. “And many thanks to the people of Olean, who assisted and showed interest in our little project.”
(More on Get it Home United and its mission in an edition of State & Union next week.)
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