Hellcat News (Garnet Valley, Pa.), Vol. 75, No. 9, Ed. 1 Sunday, May 1, 2022 Page: 5 of 28
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May 2022 HELLCAT NEWS Page 5
714th TANK (continuedfrom page 1)
90 degrees. I am celebrating, because that means it is once
again flip-flop season. I live in my $2.50 flip-flops from Old
Navy 90% of the time.
By the time you read this, Easter will have been here and
gone. Hope it was a good one for you. As I have written many
times before, Easter is a time of new beginnings. So, if you
failed at New Year’s resolutions, here’s a second chance.
As most of you already know by
now, Albert ‘Pete’ Holman [A]
passed away on March 2. His death
announcement was in last month’s
Hellcat News. Pete was 98 when he
passed away, not 90 like the Hellcat
News reported. Pete loved the 12th
Armored Division and never let an
opportunity go by where he could brag
about what the Division did to bring a
quick end to the war. Pete also loved to
talk on the phone with his friends in the
12th. One time he told me that when he
was not feeling well or feeling anxious,
just picking up the phone and hearing
Albert ‘Pete’ Holman
[A/714], Jan. 13,
1924- May 2, 2022.
a friend’s voice did wonders for him. I am going to miss his
calls. I went back to a couple of old Hellcat Newsletters and
found two pictures of Pete which I reprinted in this issue.
Albert ‘Pete’ Holman [A/714] taken
at his assisted living apartment.
Albert ‘Pete’ Holman [A/714] celebrating his 90th birthday in
January 2014.
I received a sweet card from Ruby Critzas [A], sometime
in February. She said she was planning a trip to Palm
Springs and then on to Los Angeles to visit her sister. Ruby
said she read something in the Hellcat News about Charles
McLaughlin [A], and it brought back memories of when he
used to come and visit her and John Critzas [A] at their home
in St. Louis. Charles and John used to play tennis together.
Ruby is planning to attend the reunion this summer in Abilene,
as I plan to, as well.
I called Lisa Bruneau-Norris [A] not long ago. I had
missed her last call. Lisa is doing fine and, like Ruby, plans
to attend the reunion this summer. I noticed the registration
form for the reunion was printed for the first time in April’s
Hellcat News.
A few months ago, I printed in the Hellcat News an inter-
view that Michael Naya, Jr. [L/66], a sophomore history
major from Kean University in New Jersey, had with a vet
from the Battle of the Bulge. Recently Michael sent me
another interview that he had done with Fred Hagen [A]. In
the interview, Fred talks about stories he and fellow soldiers
experienced while in training or in combat in Europe. Several
stories I recognized, as I had heard them from others in
the 714th. George Moss [A] comes to mind. In case you
are curious and want to know more, I decided to print the
interview (summarized in some parts) in this column (see
below). I found it entertaining.
“My name is Frederick J. Hagen. I was born in Rutherford,
New Jersey on January 17, 1924. I enlisted in the military
in October 1942 and was discharged in 1946. I was sent to
Camp Campbell, Kentucky, on the border of Kentucky and
Tennessee. There I was training to become a tanker. At the
time I thought I was going to be a driver, but I ended up going
to school in Fort Knox, Kentucky. When I got back to camp,
they retrained me as a tank commander, and they gave me the
rating of Sergeant. I was assigned to the 714th Tank Battalion,
3rd Platoon, A Company. Being a tank commander was a big
responsibility. There were five of us in the tank, a loader, a
gunner, a driver, an assistant driver, and myself. It was entirely
my responsibility to oversee the tank operations.
“The members of my tank crew were the gunner named
Julius Zucker, the driver named Wilson, an assistant driver
named Harold Baldwin, who also manned the thirty calibers,
and a loader named Anthony Patilla.
“When we were assigned to the 12th Armored Division, we
were sent over to England from Camp Shanks, New York. We
rode overseas aboard a ship and regrouped in England. There
we received our tanks and rode an LST, a landing ship tank,
to Le Havre, France, and then rode trucks to the equipment
storage area. There we got all of the equipment that was
stored away for us. From there we went and fought in three
campaigns. For our service we were awarded three Bronze
Stars on our ribbon.
“I can’t think of too many instances when we were in
danger. Sometimes, we would take turns being the lead tank.
One time when I was the lead tank, we wanted to get across
this bridge in this small town. The bridge was intact, but we
didn’t know if it was wired with explosives. We hit the bridge
and luckily it didn’t collapse. It was an iron superstructure
bridge and we made it straight across alright. It wasn’t too
long after coming out of this town that we were hit with a
Panzerfaust [shoulder-type German antitank weapon]. The
Panzerfaust struck the wheel and the track and stopped. The
column of other tanks went around our tank, and we had to
wait until maintenance came up to make repairs. Luckily, our
tank wasn’t heavily damaged and could be fixed.
“My friend George Moss (May 20, 1921 - March 20, 2020),
and another fellow named Gould, and myself were on this
road with an elevation above this field. It was dark and we
were on this flat part. We pulled up almost to the canal, three
o f us lined up side-by-side. Between the three of us, we were
ordered to remain there, which we did. George Moss and I
were in there a short while when someone fired at George’s
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Twelfth Armored Division Association (U.S.). Hellcat News (Garnet Valley, Pa.), Vol. 75, No. 9, Ed. 1 Sunday, May 1, 2022, newspaper, May 1, 2022; Garnet Valley, Pennsylvania. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1663335/m1/5/: accessed July 11, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting The 12th Armored Division Memorial Museum.