Baseball in Wartime Timeline
1944
By the start of the 1944 season, around
340 major league players were in military service, plus more
than 3,000 from the minors; with the vast manpower shortage,
just 10 minor leagues were in operation. It was the American
League's St. Louis Browns, relatively untouched by the military
draft and featuring an all-4-F (physically, mentally or morally
unfit for service) infield, that shocked the baseball world by
winning its first nine games of the season and hanging tough in
a four-team race with the Tigers, Red Sox and Yankees. In the
National League, the Cardinals clinched their third straight
pennant and prepared for the "Streetcar Series" as the Browns
took the American League flag with a come-from-behind, 5-2, win
over the Yankees on the last day of the season. The Browns put
up a good fight in the World Series against Billy Southworth's
Cardinals and won the opening game, 2-1, but were unable to tame
their opponent's offense over the long haul, losing out in six
games.
In the campaigns of 1943 and the first half of 1944, the Allies in the Pacific Theater had captured the Solomon Islands, the Gilbert Islands, the Marshall Islands and the Papuan peninsula of New Guinea. With operations in the Mariana Islands and the Philippines, 1944 marked the beginning of the end of the war in the Pacific. On June 15, more than 8,000 Marines landed on the west coast of Saipan (the Mariana Islands of Saipan, Guam and Tinian had been occupied by the Japanese since 1941). Among them was a young infielder named Wayne Terwilliger, a radioman on an amphibian tank with the 2nd Armored Amphibian Battalion. Corporal Terwilliger's tank advanced inland against mortar and small arms fire until it was bogged down in a large shell hole. "We had to abandon the tank," he told The Sporting News in 1950. "Everybody scattered into the nearest fox holes. But at just about that time a Jap tank rolled up and began blasting away. I knew I had to get out of there, so I ran for the beach, zigzagging in and out with the tank chasing me. I'm sure I'd be lying out there somewhere now, if it hadn't been for one of our own tanks, which luckily showed up while I was doing all that broken field running. They knocked out the Jap tank."14 Terwilliger participated in further invasions at Tinian and Iwo Jima, and went on to play nine seasons in the major leagues. After retiring as a player in 1960, he remained in the game as a coach and manager. On June 27, 2005, while managing the Fort Worth Cats in the Texas League, Terwilliger - 80 years old at the time -joined Connie Mack as the only octogenarian managers in baseball history. As a coach with the Cats in 2008, he was in his 60th season in professional baseball.
The Pacific Theater took its toll on the lives of former professional players. On June 16, 1944, Private First Class Chipper Wantuck, who won 34 games over two seasons (1941 and 1942) with Sheboygan of the Wisconsin State League, was killed in action on the island of Biak in New Guinea. First Lieutenant Beecher Twitchell, a first baseman with Johnstown of the Penn State Association in 1940, who was with the 27th Infantry Division on Saipan, was killed during a Japanese banzai attack in July. Corporal Johnny Taylor, a third baseman with Lubbock of the West Texas-New Mexico League in 1939, and First Lieutenant Art Vivian, a pitcher with Amsterdam of the Canadian-American League in 1942, were both killed in action on Guam. The battle to reclaim the Philippines took the life of Staff Sergeant Jim Whitfield, an outfielder with Albany of the Georgia-Florida League in 1941, who was killed on Angaur in the Palau Islands. On December 2, Lieutenant Junior Grade Tommy Woodruff, a shortstop with St. Joseph of the Michigan State League in 1941, was shot down while flying his F6F Hellcat near Luzon Island. On December 3, Lieutenant Junior Grade Stan Klores, a first baseman with Bloomington of the Three-I League in 1938, lost his life when the USS Cooper was torpedoed in Ormoc Bay. Private First Class Marion Young, a second baseman with Springfield of the Eastern League in 1942, was killed during a kamikaze attack on the USS Nashville on December 13, near Negros Island.
An often forgotten warzone of World War II was the China-Burma-India Theater (CBI). The Allies' aim in the CBI was to supply and strengthen Chinese armies in their struggle against a massive Japanese attack. The enemy's seizure of China's seaports had severed its traditional supply lines. Accordingly, the Allies transported equipment, men and supplies to China through Burma by building roads and pipelines, and from India by flying "the Hump" route over the Himalayas. In addition, the Allies aided China in the Japanese attack by conducting ground and air offensives. All-star Senators third baseman Buddy Lewis was one the pilots flying "the Hump." Lewis amassed 1,799 flying hours, of which 611 were in combat during 392 missions.
Hammerin' Hank Greenberg was assigned to the first group of B-29 Superfortresses to be based in the CBI. He spent six months in India before being ferried over Burma to China where he served in an administrative capacity. "I'll never forget the first mission our B-29s made from our base to Japan," Greenberg said. "I drove out to the field in a jeep with General Blondie Saunders who led the strike, and took my place in the control tower. Those monsters went off, one after the other, with clockwork precision. Then we spotted one fellow in trouble. The pilot saw he wasn't going to clear the runway, tried to throttle down, but the plane went over on its nose at the end of the field. Father Stack, our padre, and myself raced over to the burning plane to see if we could help rescue anyone. As we were running, there was a blast when the gas tanks blew and we were only about 30 yards away when a bomb went off. It knocked us right into a drainage ditch alongside the rice paddies while pieces of metal floated down out of the air." Greenberg was stunned and could not talk or hear for a couple of days, but otherwise was not hurt. The miraculous part of it all was that the entire crew escaped. "Some of them were pretty well banged up but no one was killed," Greenberg said. "That was an occasion, I can assure you, when I didn't wonder whether or not I'd be able to return to baseball. I was quite satisfied just to be alive."
Technical Sergeant John Regan, a pitcher with Janesville of the Wisconsin State League in 1942, was the first professional ballplayer killed in the CBI when the B-24 Lib erator he was aboard disappeared without a trace on May 25, 1944. Second Lieutenant George Gamble, an outfielder with Rome of the Canadian-American League in 1938, was killed in the CBI when his P-51 Mustang crashed after being caught in the explosion caused by a hit on a locomotive in French Indo-China (now Vietnam).
In the Mediterranean Theater during 1944, battles continued to rage between American troops and German forces in Italy. Second Lieutenant John Zulberti, a second baseman with Miami Beach of the Florida East Coast League in 1940, lost his life in the fighting on January 21. Technician Fifth Grade Art Sinclair, a pitcher with Fort Smith of the Western Association in 1938, was killed when his landing craft was sunk off the coast of Anzio on January 26. Staff Sergeant Don Shelton, who pitched a handful of games with Hopkinsville of the Kitty League in 1940, was killed in action with the 34th Infantry Division in Tuscany.
In the thick of it with the 88th Infantry Division in Italy was Corporal Lou Brissie, a promising young textile league pitcher who had signed with the Philadelphia Athletics before entering military service. On December 7, 1944, Brissie's squad was hit by a fierce artillery attack in the Apennine Mountains. "Our unit suffered over 90 per cent casualties," Brissie said. "Within minutes we lost three of our four officers as well as eight other men in the barrage." Brissie was badly hit. His left shinbone was shattered in more than 30 pieces and his left ankle and right foot were broken. He had to crawl for cover through the mud and lay there unconscious until he was found hours later. Brissie was rushed to a field hospital where his leg should have been amputated, but somehow he was able to persuade the doctors to ship him to an evacuation hospital where the limb might be saved. He was finally sent to a military hospital in Naples where Captain Wilbur Brubaker set about saving the young soldier's leg. "Captain Brubaker did a marvelous job," Brissie said. "Once he operated on me, I didn't wonder if I could make it back to pitch but how I could do it. I felt like the good Lord put Dr. Brubaker in my life. I really felt that God put me on the path that took me to all those hospitals over that three-day period to get me to someone who could help me." Brissie went through a total of 23 operations and 40 blood transfusions on the road to recovery. "They had to reconstruct my leg with wire," he explained. "I wound up going to hospitals all over. I was the first guy in the Mediterranean Theater who was put on penicillin therapy." With his leg in a specially designed brace Lou Brissie pitched for seven years in the American League.
In the European Theater, an alarming 23 former ballplayers lost their lives in 1944. On February 22, Staff Sergeant Metro Persoskie, a pitcher with Lancaster of the Interstate League in 1942, who served as a waist gunner in a B-17 Flying Fortress, was killed when his bomber collided with another B-17 while assembling before a mission in the skies over England. Flight Officer Joe Palatas, an outfielder with Washington of the Penn State Association, was severely wounded when his B-17 Flying Fortress was hit by flak over Germany on April 11. He bailed out and was taken to a prison-camp hospital by the Germans where he succumbed to his injuries later the same day. April 1944 saw the death in military service of the first professional baseball player with major league experience when Captain Elmer Gedeon, who played five games with the Washington Senators in 1939, was shot down while piloting a B-26 Marauder over France.
On May 21, First Lieutenant Bert Shepard, a pitcher with LaCrosse of the Wisconsin State League in 1942, was shot down in Germany while strafing an airfield in his P-38 Lightning. Shepard had arrived in England with the 55th Fighter Group at the beginning of 1944. "From then on it was a lot of flying," he recalled. He did, however, have time for some baseball. "In early May, we leveled off a field, laid out a diamond and started practice. Our first game was scheduled for Sunday, May 21." Shepard had already flown 33 missions by that date, but volunteered for another morning mission, figuring he would be back in time for the game. But as he strafed a German airfield near Lud- wigslust, his plane was hit by enemy flak, and shells tore through his right leg and foot. Shepard was knocked unconscious and the plane crashed into the ground. Ladislaus Loidl, a doctor in the German Luftwaffe, arrived at the smoking wreckage in time to save the injured pilot from a group of irate farmers on whose land the plane had crashed. Loidl, with the aid of two armed soldiers, drove the farmers away and checked to see if Shepard was still alive. "He was unconscious, his right leg being smashed, and he bled from a deep wound on his head," recalled Loidl in 1993. "I recognized that the man could be saved only with an urgent operation." Loidl's emergency hospital was not equipped for such a procedure, so he drove Shepard to the local hospital. When the colonel, who ran the hospital, refused to admit the "terror flyer," Loidl telephoned the general on duty at the Reich's Air Ministry in Berlin and reported the case. Whereupon the general called the colonel and hastily settled the matter. Shepard was admitted and his damaged right leg had to be amputated 11 inches below the knee. After a long period of recovery he was transferred to the Stalag IX-C prisoner-of-war camp in central Germany, where a Canadian medic crafted a makeshift artificial leg. Shepard was soon playing catch.
On June 6, 1944, at Normandy, France, Allied forces made one of the largest amphibious assaults ever conducted. Nearly 160,000 troops crossed the English Channel to launch an invasion of mainland Europe. Aboard an LCS(S) rocket boat 300 yards off shore from Utah Beach that morning was Seaman Second Class Yogi Berra. Just 19 years old, Berra had played one season in the minors with the Norfolk Tars before being called to service. He would be back in baseball in 1946 for the first of 18 years as a catcher in Yankee pinstripes.
The Normandy Invasion claimed the lives of three former professionals. Staff Sergeant Elmer Wright, a pitcher with Jackson of the Southeastern League in 1939, was the first to lose his life that day with the first wave of troops to hit Omaha Beach. Technician Fifth Grade Joe Pinder, who hurled in the minors for seven years and won 17 games with Sanford of the Florida State League in 1939, also lost his life at Omaha Beach, but not before showing indomitable courage trying to rescue radio equipment, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Later in the day, Private Forrest "Lefty" Brewer, a 25-game winner with St. Augustine of the Florida State League in 1938, was killed in action while serving with the 82nd Airborne Division. The following day claimed the life of another former minor leaguer. Second Lieutenant Syl Sturges, an outfielder with Goldsboro of the Coastal Plain League in 1941, who was a C-47 pilot flying supply runs to Allied troops in Normandy, died when he crash-landed in France. That same day, Staff Sergeant Pete Petropoulos, a pitcher with Fort Lauderdale of the Florida East Coast League in 1940, who landed with the 4th Infantry Division on D-Day, was badly wounded by an exploding enemy artillery shell. Petropoulos suffered severe leg wounds and was picked up by German troops the following day. Eleven days later, he was repatriated by Allied forces.
As the Allies tried to break out of Normandy against stiff resistance, Private Joe Moceri, a pitcher with Winston-Salem of the Piedmont League in 1942, was killed with the 29th Infantry Division on June 30. Staff Sergeant Connie Graff, an outfielder who batted .308 with Cooleemee of the North Carolina State League in 1941, was killed on July 8, and on July 11, the same day the National League routed the American League, 7-1, in the All-Star Game at Pittsburgh, First Lieutenant Hal Cisgen, a 6-foot-6 lefthander with Charleston of the Middle Atlantic League in 1942, lost his life. The following day, Staff Sergeant Herm Bauer - whose younger brother Hank would go on to play with the New York Yankees and manage in the major leagues until 1969 -was killed in action while serving with the 3rd Armored Division. Herm Bauer had been voted the Northern League's Most Valuable Player in 1940.
It was not until July 18 that U.S. troops reached Saint-Lo in France, and it was around this time that the playing days of Staff Sergeant Lou Thuman - one of the first major league players to be drafted back in 1941- came to an end. Thuman, a hard-throwing right-hander who made five appearances for the Washington Senators in 1939 and 1940, was hit in the right shoulder by a sniper's bullet. He spent the remainder of the year in a military hospital in Europe.
On July 26, two ballplayers lost their lives in France. First Lieutenant Walt Lake, a catcher in the Athletics organization, was killed while serving with the 2nd Infantry Division, and Private Carl Scott, who had pitched for Monessen in 1934, was killed while serving with the 83rd Infantry Division. Despite mounting losses, Allied forces gradually made headway against the Germans and Paris was liberated on August 25. Private First Class Les Wirkkala, who had pitched for seven years in the minors, was killed on September 7 while with the 7th Armored Division, and on September 29, Corporal Art Keller, a catcher with Toledo of the American Association in 1943, was killed in action with the 36th Infantry Division. The following day, Earl "Lefty" Johnson, who pitched 17 games for a 4-5 record with the Boston Red Sox in 1941, earned the Bronze Star and a battlefield commission, as a rifle platoon sergeant with the 30th Infantry Division. Johnson, along with several other members of his unit, was assigned to rescue vital radio equipment from a truck that had been hit by enemy artillery. They braved severe hostile fire in successfully dragging the vehicle to safety in plain view of the enemy.
The latter part of 1944 claimed the lives of yet more former professional ballplayers in the European Theater. On October 3, Corporal Bob Schmukal, an outfielder with Evansville of the Three-I League in 1942, was killed in action. On November 4, Technician Fourth Grade Mike Sambolich, an outfielder who batted .312 with Oil City of the Penn State Association in 1941, and Staff Sergeant Mason Smith, who won 14 games with Albany of the Georgia-Florida League in 1942, were both killed. On December 2, 1944, Private Charlie Pescod, a pitcher originally from Ecuador who had been in the minor leagues for six years, was killed in action in France.
the New York Yankees and manage in the major leagues until 1969 -was killed in action while serving with the 3rd Armored Division. Herm Bauer had been voted the Northern League's Most Valuable Player in 1940.
It was not until July 18 that U.S. troops reached Saint-Lo in France, and it was around this time that the playing days of Staff Sergeant Lou Thuman - one of the first major league players to be drafted back in 1941- came to an end. Thuman, a hard-throwing right-hander who made five appearances for the Washington Senators in 1939 and 1940, was hit in the right shoulder by a sniper's bullet. He spent the remainder of the year in a military hospital in Europe.
On July 26, two ballplayers lost their lives in France. First Lieutenant Walt Lake, a catcher in the Athletics organization, was killed while serving with the 2nd Infantry Division, and Private Carl Scott, who had pitched for Monessen in 1934, was killed while serving with the 83rd Infantry Division. Despite mounting losses, Allied forces gradually made headway against the Germans and Paris was liberated on August 25. Private First Class Les Wirkkala, who had pitched for seven years in the minors, was killed on September 7 while with the 7th Armored Division, and on September 29, Corporal Art Keller, a catcher with Toledo of the American Association in 1943, was killed in action with the 36th Infantry Division. The following day, Earl "Lefty" Johnson, who pitched 17 games for a 4-5 record with the Boston Red Sox in 1941, earned the Bronze Star and a battlefield commission, as a rifle platoon sergeant with the 30th Infantry Division. Johnson, along with several other members of his unit, was assigned to rescue vital radio equipment from a truck that had been hit by enemy artillery. They braved severe hostile fire in successfully dragging the vehicle to safety in plain view of the enemy.
The latter part of 1944 claimed the lives of yet more former professional ballplayers in the European Theater. On October 3, Corporal Bob Schmukal, an outfielder with Evansville of the Three-I League in 1942, was killed in action. On November 4, Technician Fourth Grade Mike Sambolich, an outfielder who batted .312 with Oil City of the Penn State Association in 1941, and Staff Sergeant Mason Smith, who won 14 games with Albany of the Georgia-Florida League in 1942, were both killed. On December 2, 1944, Private Charlie Pescod, a pitcher originally from Ecuador who had been in the minor leagues for six years, was killed in action in France.
In the night skies over Europe during 1944, the tail gunner in a Royal Canadian Air Force Handley Paige Halifax bomber was Philadelphia Athletics pitcher Phil Marchildon. Flying Officer Marchildon had won 17 games for the Athletics in 1942 before entering military service in his native Canada. During the night of August 16, Marchildon was on his 26th mission laying mines in Kiel Bay, and just four missions away from going home. As the bomber flew through the darkness above the Baltic Sea on the way to its target, it was attacked and set ablaze by a German night fighter. In the spiraling chaos, the bomber's pilot gave orders for the crew to bail out. Only the navigator and Marchildon made it. Stranded in the icy water, both crew members were picked up by a Danish fishing boat and handed over to the German authorities. Marchildon spent the following year at Stalag Luft III in Poland.
On September 17, 1944, Allied forces in Europe launched Operation Market Garden to secure a series of bridges over the main rivers of German-occupied Holland. The largest airborne operation in history, the strategic purpose was to allow an Allied crossing of the Rhine River, the last major natural barrier to an advance into Germany. The operation, initially successful, was a failure overall since the planned Allied advance across the Rhine at Arnhem had to be abandoned.
John "Jocko" Thompson, an 18-game winner with Centreville of the Eastern Shore League in 1940, played a vital role in the operation. As platoon leader, he and his men landed only 600 hundred yards from the southwestern edge of the bridge at Grave that spanned the Maas River. He could hear erratic firing from the town itself but everything around the bridge was quiet. First Lieutenant Thompson was unsure whether he should attack with the 16 men in his platoon or wait for the remainder of the company. "Since this was our primary mission, I decided to attack," he said.
Thompson led his platoon to cover in nearby drainage ditches, before wading in water up to their necks as they worked their way towards the bridge. They soon began receiving fire from a tower on the bridge and noticed a lot of other activity around a building on the bridge that Thompson thought might be a powerplant. Thompson believed the Germans might be preparing to blow up the bridge so he deployed his men to attack the building. "We raked the area with machine guns, overran the power plant, found four dead Germans and one wounded."
Shortly afterwards, Thompson heard two trucks approaching from the town. The driver of the lead vehicle was killed and the other vehicle quickly came to a halt. German soldiers poured out of the back of both vehicles and were met with a hail of fire from Thompson's platoon, forcing them back towards the town. Thompson's bazooka man then dealt with the machine-gun fire coming from the tower on the bridge, and the platoon set up a roadblock, securing the river crossing until the arrival of further elements of the 82nd Airborne. Thompson went on to pitch for the Philadelphia Phillies from 1948 to 1951. On September 17, 2004 - 60 years after his platoon captured the bridge at Grave in Holland - it was renamed Lieutenant John S. Thompson Bridge.
At 5:30 A.M. on December 16, 1944, a massive artillery barrage was followed by two powerful German armies plunging into the hilly and heavily forested Ardennes region of eastern Belgium and northern Luxembourg. It was Hitler's last desperate roll of the dice, with the optimistic aim to reach the port of Antwerp on the North Sea, trap four allied armies, and force a negotiated peace on the Western front. Thinking the Ardennes was the least likely spot for a German offensive, the line was held by just three U.S. divisions and part of a fourth. The German offensive, aided by thick fog, achieved total surprise. Two of the U.S. 106th Infantry Division's three regiments were forced to surrender and panic coursed through the Allied ranks, fed by rumors of German infiltrators in American uniforms and reports that unarmed prisoners had been massacred. In the snow, mud and sub-freezing conditions that could cause weapons to fail, the fighting peaked at Bastogne, where Brigadier General Anthony C. McAuliffe sent his famed one-word reply "Nuts!" to a German surrender ultimatum.
Within three weeks, however, the determined Allied stand and the arrival of powerful reinforcements insured that the ambitious German goal was beyond reach. The Germans failed to meet their objective and all that they accomplished was to create a bulge in the Allied line, hence the name "The Battle of the Bulge." The Germans lost irreplace able men, tanks and equipment, and on January 25, 1945, after heavy losses on both sides, the Bulge ceased to exist. The Ardennes Offensive was the most bloody of the battles American forces experienced in Europe in World War II, with 81,000 casualties, including 23,554 captured and 19,000 killed. Private Ernie Holbrook, a minor league first baseman during the 1930s who was on the coaching staff at USC in 1943, was killed on the first day of the battle. Sergeant Bill Hansen, an outfielder who hit .310 with Green Bay of the Wisconsin State League in 1942, died from wounds. Sergeant Hank Nowak, a 20game winner with Albany of the Georgia-Florida League in 1938, lost his life on New Year's Day 1945. Staff Sergeant Elmer Wachtler, a pitcher with Lynchburg of the Piedmont League in 1943, was killed on January 5. On January 12, Corporal Alan Lightner - who played in the minors as Alan Wray-was killed in action with the 70th Infantry Division. January 14 claimed the lives of Private First Class Ernie Hrovatic, an outfielder who hit .336 with Jamestown of the PONY League in 1943, and Technician Fifth Grade Paul Mellblom, a pitcher with Milford of the Eastern Shore League in 1939. The following day, Private George Meyer, an outfielder with Grand Forks of the Northern League in 1942, was killed. On January 24, a day before the battle ended, a mortar attack killed Technical Sergeant Lamar Zimmerman, an outfielder with Bristol of the Appalachian League.
The Battle of the Bulge also wrecked what was potentially a Hall of Fame career for Senators shortstop Cecil Travis. Sergeant Travis, who had batted .359 in 1941 (second only to Ted Williams' .406), suffered a bad case of frostbite that necessitated an operation. "Heck, you was in that snow," he recalled some years later, "and you was out in that weather, and you was lucky you got to stay in an old barn at night. The thing about it, you'd sit there in those boots, and you might not get 'em off for days at a time. And cold! You'd just shake at night. Your feet would start swelling, and that's how you'd find out there was something really wrong - you'd pull your boots off, and your feet is swelling."
The worst loss of life an American infantry division suffered from a U-boat attack during World War II occurred on Christmas Eve 1944, and claimed the lives of two players. There were 2,235 soldiers of the 66th Infantry Division on board the troopship SS Leopoldville bound from England to France. In the dead of night, and just five miles from the port of Cherbourg in France, the Leopoldville was spotted by German U-boat U-486 and torpedoed. Everything that could went wrong. Emergency calls for help were mishandled and rescue craft were slow to the scene where they met with unfavorable weather. Among almost 800 troops who lost their lives that night were Staff Sergeant Howard DeMartini, a 17-game winner with Salisbury of the North Carolina State League in 1941, and Sergeant Leonard "Link" Berry, who had won 47 games with New Bern of the Coastal Plain League between 1939 and 1941 (Also aboard the Leopoldville was Harvey Riebe, who had caught 11 games for the Detroit Tigers in 1942; after spending 45 minutes in the icy water he was fished out by an English boat and rejoined his unit). The loss of the Leopoldville was an embarrassment to the American and British governments and kept secret for many years. Even the families who lost loved ones that night were never told the truth and documents related to the sinking were not declassified until 1996.
In December 1944, the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) dispatched a former backup catcher named Moe Berg to Switzerland to attend a lecture by prominent German physicist Werner Heisenberg. The OSS was the first American intelligence agency and a forerunner of the CIA. Since joining the OSS in 1943, Berg had been involved in numer ous cloak-and-dagger exploits in the Caribbean, South America, France, England, Yugoslavia and Italy. But his most daring mission was to be the trip to Switzerland and it read like the script to a blockbuster thriller movie. Berg's orders were to kill Heisenberg if there was any indication that the Germans were close to building an atomic bomb. Armed with a pistol and a lethal cyanide tablet in case he needed to dispose of himself, it was, surely, a suicidal act for Berg. Fortunately, Heisenberg gave no indication that Germany was progressing with atomic bomb technology, and Berg was not required to fulfill his orders. But why was Berg selected for this and other assignments for the OSS?
A 15-year veteran of the major leagues who had been educated at Princeton and the Sorbonne in Paris, Berg was reputed to speak a dozen languages (although it was also said he could not hit in any of them). Furthermore, his baseball skills meant he could think clearly and quickly. Qualities that are ideal for spy work. But one of his most useful personal qualities was a dark, sullen complexion that helped him to fit in almost anywhere. Berg loved to recount an event that happened in Rome, Italy, that perfectly demonstrated this ability. Two American officers approached him in the street of the Italian capital to ask directions. "Let's ask this guinea where the hotel is," one of them said. "You can't miss it, it's three blocks up with a green awning," Berg replied. "Where'd that guinea learn to speak such good English?" one of the officers said to the other. "Princeton, Class of 1923," said Berg as he walked away.
Despite his vocation for anonymity, he did betray himself on at least one occasion. While at a field hospital in France, he could not resist the temptation to join in a game of catch with a couple of GIs. After Berg had made a couple of throws one of the soldiers remarked, "You're a pro." Soon afterwards the soldier added, "You're a catcher." Another throw and his cover was blown. "And your name is Moe Berg."
In the campaigns of 1943 and the first half of 1944, the Allies in the Pacific Theater had captured the Solomon Islands, the Gilbert Islands, the Marshall Islands and the Papuan peninsula of New Guinea. With operations in the Mariana Islands and the Philippines, 1944 marked the beginning of the end of the war in the Pacific. On June 15, more than 8,000 Marines landed on the west coast of Saipan (the Mariana Islands of Saipan, Guam and Tinian had been occupied by the Japanese since 1941). Among them was a young infielder named Wayne Terwilliger, a radioman on an amphibian tank with the 2nd Armored Amphibian Battalion. Corporal Terwilliger's tank advanced inland against mortar and small arms fire until it was bogged down in a large shell hole. "We had to abandon the tank," he told The Sporting News in 1950. "Everybody scattered into the nearest fox holes. But at just about that time a Jap tank rolled up and began blasting away. I knew I had to get out of there, so I ran for the beach, zigzagging in and out with the tank chasing me. I'm sure I'd be lying out there somewhere now, if it hadn't been for one of our own tanks, which luckily showed up while I was doing all that broken field running. They knocked out the Jap tank."14 Terwilliger participated in further invasions at Tinian and Iwo Jima, and went on to play nine seasons in the major leagues. After retiring as a player in 1960, he remained in the game as a coach and manager. On June 27, 2005, while managing the Fort Worth Cats in the Texas League, Terwilliger - 80 years old at the time -joined Connie Mack as the only octogenarian managers in baseball history. As a coach with the Cats in 2008, he was in his 60th season in professional baseball.
The Pacific Theater took its toll on the lives of former professional players. On June 16, 1944, Private First Class Chipper Wantuck, who won 34 games over two seasons (1941 and 1942) with Sheboygan of the Wisconsin State League, was killed in action on the island of Biak in New Guinea. First Lieutenant Beecher Twitchell, a first baseman with Johnstown of the Penn State Association in 1940, who was with the 27th Infantry Division on Saipan, was killed during a Japanese banzai attack in July. Corporal Johnny Taylor, a third baseman with Lubbock of the West Texas-New Mexico League in 1939, and First Lieutenant Art Vivian, a pitcher with Amsterdam of the Canadian-American League in 1942, were both killed in action on Guam. The battle to reclaim the Philippines took the life of Staff Sergeant Jim Whitfield, an outfielder with Albany of the Georgia-Florida League in 1941, who was killed on Angaur in the Palau Islands. On December 2, Lieutenant Junior Grade Tommy Woodruff, a shortstop with St. Joseph of the Michigan State League in 1941, was shot down while flying his F6F Hellcat near Luzon Island. On December 3, Lieutenant Junior Grade Stan Klores, a first baseman with Bloomington of the Three-I League in 1938, lost his life when the USS Cooper was torpedoed in Ormoc Bay. Private First Class Marion Young, a second baseman with Springfield of the Eastern League in 1942, was killed during a kamikaze attack on the USS Nashville on December 13, near Negros Island.
An often forgotten warzone of World War II was the China-Burma-India Theater (CBI). The Allies' aim in the CBI was to supply and strengthen Chinese armies in their struggle against a massive Japanese attack. The enemy's seizure of China's seaports had severed its traditional supply lines. Accordingly, the Allies transported equipment, men and supplies to China through Burma by building roads and pipelines, and from India by flying "the Hump" route over the Himalayas. In addition, the Allies aided China in the Japanese attack by conducting ground and air offensives. All-star Senators third baseman Buddy Lewis was one the pilots flying "the Hump." Lewis amassed 1,799 flying hours, of which 611 were in combat during 392 missions.
Hammerin' Hank Greenberg was assigned to the first group of B-29 Superfortresses to be based in the CBI. He spent six months in India before being ferried over Burma to China where he served in an administrative capacity. "I'll never forget the first mission our B-29s made from our base to Japan," Greenberg said. "I drove out to the field in a jeep with General Blondie Saunders who led the strike, and took my place in the control tower. Those monsters went off, one after the other, with clockwork precision. Then we spotted one fellow in trouble. The pilot saw he wasn't going to clear the runway, tried to throttle down, but the plane went over on its nose at the end of the field. Father Stack, our padre, and myself raced over to the burning plane to see if we could help rescue anyone. As we were running, there was a blast when the gas tanks blew and we were only about 30 yards away when a bomb went off. It knocked us right into a drainage ditch alongside the rice paddies while pieces of metal floated down out of the air." Greenberg was stunned and could not talk or hear for a couple of days, but otherwise was not hurt. The miraculous part of it all was that the entire crew escaped. "Some of them were pretty well banged up but no one was killed," Greenberg said. "That was an occasion, I can assure you, when I didn't wonder whether or not I'd be able to return to baseball. I was quite satisfied just to be alive."
Technical Sergeant John Regan, a pitcher with Janesville of the Wisconsin State League in 1942, was the first professional ballplayer killed in the CBI when the B-24 Lib erator he was aboard disappeared without a trace on May 25, 1944. Second Lieutenant George Gamble, an outfielder with Rome of the Canadian-American League in 1938, was killed in the CBI when his P-51 Mustang crashed after being caught in the explosion caused by a hit on a locomotive in French Indo-China (now Vietnam).
In the Mediterranean Theater during 1944, battles continued to rage between American troops and German forces in Italy. Second Lieutenant John Zulberti, a second baseman with Miami Beach of the Florida East Coast League in 1940, lost his life in the fighting on January 21. Technician Fifth Grade Art Sinclair, a pitcher with Fort Smith of the Western Association in 1938, was killed when his landing craft was sunk off the coast of Anzio on January 26. Staff Sergeant Don Shelton, who pitched a handful of games with Hopkinsville of the Kitty League in 1940, was killed in action with the 34th Infantry Division in Tuscany.
In the thick of it with the 88th Infantry Division in Italy was Corporal Lou Brissie, a promising young textile league pitcher who had signed with the Philadelphia Athletics before entering military service. On December 7, 1944, Brissie's squad was hit by a fierce artillery attack in the Apennine Mountains. "Our unit suffered over 90 per cent casualties," Brissie said. "Within minutes we lost three of our four officers as well as eight other men in the barrage." Brissie was badly hit. His left shinbone was shattered in more than 30 pieces and his left ankle and right foot were broken. He had to crawl for cover through the mud and lay there unconscious until he was found hours later. Brissie was rushed to a field hospital where his leg should have been amputated, but somehow he was able to persuade the doctors to ship him to an evacuation hospital where the limb might be saved. He was finally sent to a military hospital in Naples where Captain Wilbur Brubaker set about saving the young soldier's leg. "Captain Brubaker did a marvelous job," Brissie said. "Once he operated on me, I didn't wonder if I could make it back to pitch but how I could do it. I felt like the good Lord put Dr. Brubaker in my life. I really felt that God put me on the path that took me to all those hospitals over that three-day period to get me to someone who could help me." Brissie went through a total of 23 operations and 40 blood transfusions on the road to recovery. "They had to reconstruct my leg with wire," he explained. "I wound up going to hospitals all over. I was the first guy in the Mediterranean Theater who was put on penicillin therapy." With his leg in a specially designed brace Lou Brissie pitched for seven years in the American League.
In the European Theater, an alarming 23 former ballplayers lost their lives in 1944. On February 22, Staff Sergeant Metro Persoskie, a pitcher with Lancaster of the Interstate League in 1942, who served as a waist gunner in a B-17 Flying Fortress, was killed when his bomber collided with another B-17 while assembling before a mission in the skies over England. Flight Officer Joe Palatas, an outfielder with Washington of the Penn State Association, was severely wounded when his B-17 Flying Fortress was hit by flak over Germany on April 11. He bailed out and was taken to a prison-camp hospital by the Germans where he succumbed to his injuries later the same day. April 1944 saw the death in military service of the first professional baseball player with major league experience when Captain Elmer Gedeon, who played five games with the Washington Senators in 1939, was shot down while piloting a B-26 Marauder over France.
On May 21, First Lieutenant Bert Shepard, a pitcher with LaCrosse of the Wisconsin State League in 1942, was shot down in Germany while strafing an airfield in his P-38 Lightning. Shepard had arrived in England with the 55th Fighter Group at the beginning of 1944. "From then on it was a lot of flying," he recalled. He did, however, have time for some baseball. "In early May, we leveled off a field, laid out a diamond and started practice. Our first game was scheduled for Sunday, May 21." Shepard had already flown 33 missions by that date, but volunteered for another morning mission, figuring he would be back in time for the game. But as he strafed a German airfield near Lud- wigslust, his plane was hit by enemy flak, and shells tore through his right leg and foot. Shepard was knocked unconscious and the plane crashed into the ground. Ladislaus Loidl, a doctor in the German Luftwaffe, arrived at the smoking wreckage in time to save the injured pilot from a group of irate farmers on whose land the plane had crashed. Loidl, with the aid of two armed soldiers, drove the farmers away and checked to see if Shepard was still alive. "He was unconscious, his right leg being smashed, and he bled from a deep wound on his head," recalled Loidl in 1993. "I recognized that the man could be saved only with an urgent operation." Loidl's emergency hospital was not equipped for such a procedure, so he drove Shepard to the local hospital. When the colonel, who ran the hospital, refused to admit the "terror flyer," Loidl telephoned the general on duty at the Reich's Air Ministry in Berlin and reported the case. Whereupon the general called the colonel and hastily settled the matter. Shepard was admitted and his damaged right leg had to be amputated 11 inches below the knee. After a long period of recovery he was transferred to the Stalag IX-C prisoner-of-war camp in central Germany, where a Canadian medic crafted a makeshift artificial leg. Shepard was soon playing catch.
On June 6, 1944, at Normandy, France, Allied forces made one of the largest amphibious assaults ever conducted. Nearly 160,000 troops crossed the English Channel to launch an invasion of mainland Europe. Aboard an LCS(S) rocket boat 300 yards off shore from Utah Beach that morning was Seaman Second Class Yogi Berra. Just 19 years old, Berra had played one season in the minors with the Norfolk Tars before being called to service. He would be back in baseball in 1946 for the first of 18 years as a catcher in Yankee pinstripes.
The Normandy Invasion claimed the lives of three former professionals. Staff Sergeant Elmer Wright, a pitcher with Jackson of the Southeastern League in 1939, was the first to lose his life that day with the first wave of troops to hit Omaha Beach. Technician Fifth Grade Joe Pinder, who hurled in the minors for seven years and won 17 games with Sanford of the Florida State League in 1939, also lost his life at Omaha Beach, but not before showing indomitable courage trying to rescue radio equipment, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Later in the day, Private Forrest "Lefty" Brewer, a 25-game winner with St. Augustine of the Florida State League in 1938, was killed in action while serving with the 82nd Airborne Division. The following day claimed the life of another former minor leaguer. Second Lieutenant Syl Sturges, an outfielder with Goldsboro of the Coastal Plain League in 1941, who was a C-47 pilot flying supply runs to Allied troops in Normandy, died when he crash-landed in France. That same day, Staff Sergeant Pete Petropoulos, a pitcher with Fort Lauderdale of the Florida East Coast League in 1940, who landed with the 4th Infantry Division on D-Day, was badly wounded by an exploding enemy artillery shell. Petropoulos suffered severe leg wounds and was picked up by German troops the following day. Eleven days later, he was repatriated by Allied forces.
As the Allies tried to break out of Normandy against stiff resistance, Private Joe Moceri, a pitcher with Winston-Salem of the Piedmont League in 1942, was killed with the 29th Infantry Division on June 30. Staff Sergeant Connie Graff, an outfielder who batted .308 with Cooleemee of the North Carolina State League in 1941, was killed on July 8, and on July 11, the same day the National League routed the American League, 7-1, in the All-Star Game at Pittsburgh, First Lieutenant Hal Cisgen, a 6-foot-6 lefthander with Charleston of the Middle Atlantic League in 1942, lost his life. The following day, Staff Sergeant Herm Bauer - whose younger brother Hank would go on to play with the New York Yankees and manage in the major leagues until 1969 -was killed in action while serving with the 3rd Armored Division. Herm Bauer had been voted the Northern League's Most Valuable Player in 1940.
It was not until July 18 that U.S. troops reached Saint-Lo in France, and it was around this time that the playing days of Staff Sergeant Lou Thuman - one of the first major league players to be drafted back in 1941- came to an end. Thuman, a hard-throwing right-hander who made five appearances for the Washington Senators in 1939 and 1940, was hit in the right shoulder by a sniper's bullet. He spent the remainder of the year in a military hospital in Europe.
On July 26, two ballplayers lost their lives in France. First Lieutenant Walt Lake, a catcher in the Athletics organization, was killed while serving with the 2nd Infantry Division, and Private Carl Scott, who had pitched for Monessen in 1934, was killed while serving with the 83rd Infantry Division. Despite mounting losses, Allied forces gradually made headway against the Germans and Paris was liberated on August 25. Private First Class Les Wirkkala, who had pitched for seven years in the minors, was killed on September 7 while with the 7th Armored Division, and on September 29, Corporal Art Keller, a catcher with Toledo of the American Association in 1943, was killed in action with the 36th Infantry Division. The following day, Earl "Lefty" Johnson, who pitched 17 games for a 4-5 record with the Boston Red Sox in 1941, earned the Bronze Star and a battlefield commission, as a rifle platoon sergeant with the 30th Infantry Division. Johnson, along with several other members of his unit, was assigned to rescue vital radio equipment from a truck that had been hit by enemy artillery. They braved severe hostile fire in successfully dragging the vehicle to safety in plain view of the enemy.
The latter part of 1944 claimed the lives of yet more former professional ballplayers in the European Theater. On October 3, Corporal Bob Schmukal, an outfielder with Evansville of the Three-I League in 1942, was killed in action. On November 4, Technician Fourth Grade Mike Sambolich, an outfielder who batted .312 with Oil City of the Penn State Association in 1941, and Staff Sergeant Mason Smith, who won 14 games with Albany of the Georgia-Florida League in 1942, were both killed. On December 2, 1944, Private Charlie Pescod, a pitcher originally from Ecuador who had been in the minor leagues for six years, was killed in action in France.
the New York Yankees and manage in the major leagues until 1969 -was killed in action while serving with the 3rd Armored Division. Herm Bauer had been voted the Northern League's Most Valuable Player in 1940.
It was not until July 18 that U.S. troops reached Saint-Lo in France, and it was around this time that the playing days of Staff Sergeant Lou Thuman - one of the first major league players to be drafted back in 1941- came to an end. Thuman, a hard-throwing right-hander who made five appearances for the Washington Senators in 1939 and 1940, was hit in the right shoulder by a sniper's bullet. He spent the remainder of the year in a military hospital in Europe.
On July 26, two ballplayers lost their lives in France. First Lieutenant Walt Lake, a catcher in the Athletics organization, was killed while serving with the 2nd Infantry Division, and Private Carl Scott, who had pitched for Monessen in 1934, was killed while serving with the 83rd Infantry Division. Despite mounting losses, Allied forces gradually made headway against the Germans and Paris was liberated on August 25. Private First Class Les Wirkkala, who had pitched for seven years in the minors, was killed on September 7 while with the 7th Armored Division, and on September 29, Corporal Art Keller, a catcher with Toledo of the American Association in 1943, was killed in action with the 36th Infantry Division. The following day, Earl "Lefty" Johnson, who pitched 17 games for a 4-5 record with the Boston Red Sox in 1941, earned the Bronze Star and a battlefield commission, as a rifle platoon sergeant with the 30th Infantry Division. Johnson, along with several other members of his unit, was assigned to rescue vital radio equipment from a truck that had been hit by enemy artillery. They braved severe hostile fire in successfully dragging the vehicle to safety in plain view of the enemy.
The latter part of 1944 claimed the lives of yet more former professional ballplayers in the European Theater. On October 3, Corporal Bob Schmukal, an outfielder with Evansville of the Three-I League in 1942, was killed in action. On November 4, Technician Fourth Grade Mike Sambolich, an outfielder who batted .312 with Oil City of the Penn State Association in 1941, and Staff Sergeant Mason Smith, who won 14 games with Albany of the Georgia-Florida League in 1942, were both killed. On December 2, 1944, Private Charlie Pescod, a pitcher originally from Ecuador who had been in the minor leagues for six years, was killed in action in France.
In the night skies over Europe during 1944, the tail gunner in a Royal Canadian Air Force Handley Paige Halifax bomber was Philadelphia Athletics pitcher Phil Marchildon. Flying Officer Marchildon had won 17 games for the Athletics in 1942 before entering military service in his native Canada. During the night of August 16, Marchildon was on his 26th mission laying mines in Kiel Bay, and just four missions away from going home. As the bomber flew through the darkness above the Baltic Sea on the way to its target, it was attacked and set ablaze by a German night fighter. In the spiraling chaos, the bomber's pilot gave orders for the crew to bail out. Only the navigator and Marchildon made it. Stranded in the icy water, both crew members were picked up by a Danish fishing boat and handed over to the German authorities. Marchildon spent the following year at Stalag Luft III in Poland.
On September 17, 1944, Allied forces in Europe launched Operation Market Garden to secure a series of bridges over the main rivers of German-occupied Holland. The largest airborne operation in history, the strategic purpose was to allow an Allied crossing of the Rhine River, the last major natural barrier to an advance into Germany. The operation, initially successful, was a failure overall since the planned Allied advance across the Rhine at Arnhem had to be abandoned.
John "Jocko" Thompson, an 18-game winner with Centreville of the Eastern Shore League in 1940, played a vital role in the operation. As platoon leader, he and his men landed only 600 hundred yards from the southwestern edge of the bridge at Grave that spanned the Maas River. He could hear erratic firing from the town itself but everything around the bridge was quiet. First Lieutenant Thompson was unsure whether he should attack with the 16 men in his platoon or wait for the remainder of the company. "Since this was our primary mission, I decided to attack," he said.
Thompson led his platoon to cover in nearby drainage ditches, before wading in water up to their necks as they worked their way towards the bridge. They soon began receiving fire from a tower on the bridge and noticed a lot of other activity around a building on the bridge that Thompson thought might be a powerplant. Thompson believed the Germans might be preparing to blow up the bridge so he deployed his men to attack the building. "We raked the area with machine guns, overran the power plant, found four dead Germans and one wounded."
Shortly afterwards, Thompson heard two trucks approaching from the town. The driver of the lead vehicle was killed and the other vehicle quickly came to a halt. German soldiers poured out of the back of both vehicles and were met with a hail of fire from Thompson's platoon, forcing them back towards the town. Thompson's bazooka man then dealt with the machine-gun fire coming from the tower on the bridge, and the platoon set up a roadblock, securing the river crossing until the arrival of further elements of the 82nd Airborne. Thompson went on to pitch for the Philadelphia Phillies from 1948 to 1951. On September 17, 2004 - 60 years after his platoon captured the bridge at Grave in Holland - it was renamed Lieutenant John S. Thompson Bridge.
At 5:30 A.M. on December 16, 1944, a massive artillery barrage was followed by two powerful German armies plunging into the hilly and heavily forested Ardennes region of eastern Belgium and northern Luxembourg. It was Hitler's last desperate roll of the dice, with the optimistic aim to reach the port of Antwerp on the North Sea, trap four allied armies, and force a negotiated peace on the Western front. Thinking the Ardennes was the least likely spot for a German offensive, the line was held by just three U.S. divisions and part of a fourth. The German offensive, aided by thick fog, achieved total surprise. Two of the U.S. 106th Infantry Division's three regiments were forced to surrender and panic coursed through the Allied ranks, fed by rumors of German infiltrators in American uniforms and reports that unarmed prisoners had been massacred. In the snow, mud and sub-freezing conditions that could cause weapons to fail, the fighting peaked at Bastogne, where Brigadier General Anthony C. McAuliffe sent his famed one-word reply "Nuts!" to a German surrender ultimatum.
Within three weeks, however, the determined Allied stand and the arrival of powerful reinforcements insured that the ambitious German goal was beyond reach. The Germans failed to meet their objective and all that they accomplished was to create a bulge in the Allied line, hence the name "The Battle of the Bulge." The Germans lost irreplace able men, tanks and equipment, and on January 25, 1945, after heavy losses on both sides, the Bulge ceased to exist. The Ardennes Offensive was the most bloody of the battles American forces experienced in Europe in World War II, with 81,000 casualties, including 23,554 captured and 19,000 killed. Private Ernie Holbrook, a minor league first baseman during the 1930s who was on the coaching staff at USC in 1943, was killed on the first day of the battle. Sergeant Bill Hansen, an outfielder who hit .310 with Green Bay of the Wisconsin State League in 1942, died from wounds. Sergeant Hank Nowak, a 20game winner with Albany of the Georgia-Florida League in 1938, lost his life on New Year's Day 1945. Staff Sergeant Elmer Wachtler, a pitcher with Lynchburg of the Piedmont League in 1943, was killed on January 5. On January 12, Corporal Alan Lightner - who played in the minors as Alan Wray-was killed in action with the 70th Infantry Division. January 14 claimed the lives of Private First Class Ernie Hrovatic, an outfielder who hit .336 with Jamestown of the PONY League in 1943, and Technician Fifth Grade Paul Mellblom, a pitcher with Milford of the Eastern Shore League in 1939. The following day, Private George Meyer, an outfielder with Grand Forks of the Northern League in 1942, was killed. On January 24, a day before the battle ended, a mortar attack killed Technical Sergeant Lamar Zimmerman, an outfielder with Bristol of the Appalachian League.
The Battle of the Bulge also wrecked what was potentially a Hall of Fame career for Senators shortstop Cecil Travis. Sergeant Travis, who had batted .359 in 1941 (second only to Ted Williams' .406), suffered a bad case of frostbite that necessitated an operation. "Heck, you was in that snow," he recalled some years later, "and you was out in that weather, and you was lucky you got to stay in an old barn at night. The thing about it, you'd sit there in those boots, and you might not get 'em off for days at a time. And cold! You'd just shake at night. Your feet would start swelling, and that's how you'd find out there was something really wrong - you'd pull your boots off, and your feet is swelling."
The worst loss of life an American infantry division suffered from a U-boat attack during World War II occurred on Christmas Eve 1944, and claimed the lives of two players. There were 2,235 soldiers of the 66th Infantry Division on board the troopship SS Leopoldville bound from England to France. In the dead of night, and just five miles from the port of Cherbourg in France, the Leopoldville was spotted by German U-boat U-486 and torpedoed. Everything that could went wrong. Emergency calls for help were mishandled and rescue craft were slow to the scene where they met with unfavorable weather. Among almost 800 troops who lost their lives that night were Staff Sergeant Howard DeMartini, a 17-game winner with Salisbury of the North Carolina State League in 1941, and Sergeant Leonard "Link" Berry, who had won 47 games with New Bern of the Coastal Plain League between 1939 and 1941 (Also aboard the Leopoldville was Harvey Riebe, who had caught 11 games for the Detroit Tigers in 1942; after spending 45 minutes in the icy water he was fished out by an English boat and rejoined his unit). The loss of the Leopoldville was an embarrassment to the American and British governments and kept secret for many years. Even the families who lost loved ones that night were never told the truth and documents related to the sinking were not declassified until 1996.
In December 1944, the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) dispatched a former backup catcher named Moe Berg to Switzerland to attend a lecture by prominent German physicist Werner Heisenberg. The OSS was the first American intelligence agency and a forerunner of the CIA. Since joining the OSS in 1943, Berg had been involved in numer ous cloak-and-dagger exploits in the Caribbean, South America, France, England, Yugoslavia and Italy. But his most daring mission was to be the trip to Switzerland and it read like the script to a blockbuster thriller movie. Berg's orders were to kill Heisenberg if there was any indication that the Germans were close to building an atomic bomb. Armed with a pistol and a lethal cyanide tablet in case he needed to dispose of himself, it was, surely, a suicidal act for Berg. Fortunately, Heisenberg gave no indication that Germany was progressing with atomic bomb technology, and Berg was not required to fulfill his orders. But why was Berg selected for this and other assignments for the OSS?
A 15-year veteran of the major leagues who had been educated at Princeton and the Sorbonne in Paris, Berg was reputed to speak a dozen languages (although it was also said he could not hit in any of them). Furthermore, his baseball skills meant he could think clearly and quickly. Qualities that are ideal for spy work. But one of his most useful personal qualities was a dark, sullen complexion that helped him to fit in almost anywhere. Berg loved to recount an event that happened in Rome, Italy, that perfectly demonstrated this ability. Two American officers approached him in the street of the Italian capital to ask directions. "Let's ask this guinea where the hotel is," one of them said. "You can't miss it, it's three blocks up with a green awning," Berg replied. "Where'd that guinea learn to speak such good English?" one of the officers said to the other. "Princeton, Class of 1923," said Berg as he walked away.
Despite his vocation for anonymity, he did betray himself on at least one occasion. While at a field hospital in France, he could not resist the temptation to join in a game of catch with a couple of GIs. After Berg had made a couple of throws one of the soldiers remarked, "You're a pro." Soon afterwards the soldier added, "You're a catcher." Another throw and his cover was blown. "And your name is Moe Berg."
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