Page 22 - Gold Star Sons of Georgetown Prep

PRIVATE FIRST CLASS ANDREW W. MAHONEY, JR. ’43
CONTINUED
Andrew Mahoney, stands in front of teammate Bill Roberts in this 1943 photo of the Prep Varsity track team. Tragically, both young men were killed between September and December of 1944 during separate actions near the Dutch-German border.
personality and glowing good humor, plus a good portion of New England wit made him a swell fellow to know.”
Andrew’s nonconformity in the midst of an ordered, conservative school environment added to his cache among fellow students. This could be seen in his embrace of the Zoot suit, a men’s suit with “high-waisted, wide-legged, tight- cuffed, pegged trousers, and a long coat with wide lapels and wide padded shoulders.” Zoot suits were popular in African- American, Latino, Italian American, and Filipino American urban communities and controversial in the eyes of many whites. The Cupola claimed that Andrew’s highest ambition was to “Wear a zoot suit to class.”
Andrew, like his classmate Bill Roberts, who was about 8 months younger, had a great desire to serve. Several weeks after leaving Prep, Andrew enlisted in the U. S Army on
June 24, 1943. In character, he chose the unconventional
and challenging path of becoming a paratrooper, one of
the riskiest of military specialties. In mid-September 1944, his division — the elite 101st Airborne — participated in Operation Market Garden, an airborne assault on Holland by Allied forces. The operation aimed to liberate Holland and to seize key bridges across rivers, including the Rhine, that would allow Allied forces to cross more easily and quickly into Germany with the hope of ending the war quickly.
The airborne troops began their assault via gliders
or parachute from planes. It is not clear which method transported Andrew into battle. It is known that Andrew,
not yet 20, was killed in battle on September 25, the same
day on which the last of about 2100 troops of the 101st were ferried back from across the Rhine River as Operation Market Garden failed to achieve its major objective. Andrew’s death
Parachute assault by the 101st Division during Operation Market Garden.
COURTESY, HISTORY.NET
preceded that of Bill Roberts by approximately two months. Andrew W. Mahoney, Jr., an independent, feisty, brave,
determined, and adventurous teenager, had given his all
in every mile race that he had run on the cinders of the Georgetown Prep track. In an infinitely more serious setting in Holland, he did the same. It could truly be said of him that he had “fought the good fight” had “finished the race.” Andrew was buried in St. Ann Cemetery in Cranston, Rhode Island. His father, devastated by the loss of his son, would, for the rest of his life, break into tears at the mention of his son’s name — a measure of the emotional toll paid by the families of those who fought and died in the war. H
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GEORGETOWN PREPARATORY SCHOOL