Page 24 - Gold Star Sons of Georgetown Prep

1ST LIEUTENANT FEARN FIELD ’36
CONTINUED
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GEORGETOWN PREPARATORY SCHOOL
An artillery forward observer during WWII.
COURTESY, PIN ON WORLD WAR II,
on the German border during the winter of 1944-45. By March 1945, Fearn had risen in rank to 1st Lieutenant, a mixed blessing in that the casualty rate among 2nd and 1st lieutenants was so high.
In March, Patton’s forces crossed the Rhine and pressed into Germany. The war would end in about 2 months, but German resistance continued. Indeed, between January 1, 1945, and May 8, 1945, 20,000 additional American troops would be killed.
In the early hours of March 6, 1945, Fearn assisted his commander in establishing a sound ranging base to locate enemy artillery holding up attacking American forces. “Sound ranging determined the distance between a point and the position of a sound source by measuring the time lapse between the origin of the sound and its arrival at the
point.” As the operation progressed, however, the base was counterattacked, and an important outpost found itself surrounded by German forces. Fearn volunteered to join a small, lightly armed rescue mission and set out in fog and darkness to search for the trapped men. A strongly entrenched German force employing heavy machine gun fire, however, pinned down the rescue team. According to witnesses, Fearn, seeking to silence the enemy postion, advanced alone “fighting courageously until sustaining fatal wounds in the ensuing action.” For his “great devotion to duty and his men,” Fearn Field was posthumously awarded the Silver Star for valor.
“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”Twenty-five year-old 1st Lieutenant Fearn Field was such a man. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery. H