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Personal info

Full name
SCHMEISER, Frederick
Date of birth
20 October 1922
Age
22
Place of birth
Newark, Essex County, New Jersey
Hometown
Monmouth County, New Jersey

Military service

Service number
32595632
Rank
Private First Class
Function
unknown
Unit
F Company,
2nd Battalion,
397th Infantry Regiment,
100th Infantry Division
Awards
Purple Heart

Death

Status
Died non-Battle
Date of death
24 March 1945
Place of death
Stalag 9B
Bad Orb Hessen-Nassau, Prussia 50-09, Germany

Grave

Cemetery
American War Cemetery Margraten
Plot Row Grave
F 18 2

Immediate family

Members
Frederick W. Schmeiser (father)
Margaret (Bender) Schmeiser (mother)
Mildred Schmeiser (sister)
Dorothy Schmeiser (sister)
Ruth Schmeiser (sister)
Lois Schmeiser (sister)
Harold Schmeiser (brother)
Ann Schmeiser (sister)

More information

Pfc Frederick Schmeiser was employed at Raritan arsenal.

He enlisted in Newark, New Jersey on 30 November 1942.

Pfc Schmeiser was wounded in action 7 December 1944 and was hospitalized for about a month.

In early February, Pfc Schmeiser was part of a group of 350 POW's from Bad Orb that were sent by train about 200 miles east to a construction project at Berga am Elster, south of Leipzig. Schmeiser perished before liberation.

His parents received a message from the war department that their son had been missing in action in France since 9 January.
To their surprise they were reading in the servicemen's column in "The Press", several weeks after they received the news, that their son had been awarded the Combat Infantryman's Badge on the same date that he was reported missing. Hope strang anew to Mr. and Mrs. Schmeiser and Mrs. Schmeiser went to the editorial rooms of The Press where she was given the news item sent to the paper by the army. She was told, however, that her news was in all probability later than that received by the paper. Nevertheless, she returned home with new hope, and about two months later, she returned to The Press, elated over the receipt of a card from her son, mailed in Germany 18 January, and stating that he was a prisoner of war of the Germans. The card had taken three months to reach Oakhurst.
But later that week Mr. and Mrs. Schmeiser had their second telegram from the war department. It said: "It has now been officially established from reports received in the war department that your son, Pfc Frederick Schmeiser, died in Germany, 24 March while a prisoner of war of the German government. The secretary of war extends his deep sympathy. Confirming letter follows."

Source of information: Peter Schouteten, Terry Hirsch, Astrid van Erp, www.abmc.gov, www.wwiimemorial.com, www.archives.gov - WWII Enlistment Record / Records of World War II Prisoners of War, www.ancestry.com - 1930/1940 Census / Headstone and Interment Record / Simmen Family Tree, http://marshallfoundation.org, www.newspapers.com - Asbury Park Press, WWII Draft Card

Photo source: www.findagrave.com - Des Philippet, www.newspapers.com - Asbury Park Press