News-Info-Alerts

Re: A Brother Remembered

From: POW-MIA InterNetwork

Date: November 22, 2003

"A brother remembered

By: Ray Baltes, news editor

Dallas Schear, like his brother Robert, fought in Germany in World War II. Only Dallas came home.
Alexander man searches for traces of his brother

Dallas and Robert Schear were as close as brothers could be. The two youngsters grew up in Geneva, where they spent many hours playing basketball and baseball together. When Uncle Sam needed help in World War II, they both answered the call.

      Only Dallas returned home, and nearly 60 years later, he is still left with many unanswered questions.
      This much he knows: Robert L. Schear was inducted into the U.S. Army on March 26, 1943, and he served with Company F of the 18th Infantry.

      A faded old newspaper clipping Dallas, 77, has carried lovingly in his wallet for nearly six decades contains more information. After basic training, Robert was sent to England in April, 1944, and he was among the first U.S. soldiers to land on the beaches of Normandy on June 6, 1944.

      A little more than a month later, on July 11, Robert was wounded in action near St. Lo and sent back to England for medical treatment. In September, he was sent back to the front.
      
      Dallas Schear was inducted into the U.S. Army in 1944, and after basic training was sent to Camp Callan for advanced amphibious training. His next stop was Camp Cooke for more training.

      In December, 1944, his company was alerted to get ready to be shipped to the Pacific Theater. That was about the time that Adolph Hitler launched his last-ditch effort to regain control of the war in Europe, known today as the Battle of the Bulge. The move to the Pacific was cancelled.

      On Jan. 30, 1945, Dallas' unit loaded onto the USS Monticello, a former Italian luxury liner called the Conte Grande, for the trip to Europe. He embarked at Le Havre, France, on March 2, and his unit was sent to Camp Lucky Strike, near Vittefleur, Cany-Barnville, and Fecamp, France.

      It didn't take long before Dallas found himself in heavy combat. On April 6, his unit was moved into defensive positions on the outskirts of Neider Pleis. Three days later, the company received orders to cross the nearby Seig River. According to the history of Company A, "The crossing was made in assault boats under heavy enemy 88mm, 20mm, ack ack and machine gun fire. Total casualties for the day were one officer and 11 enlisted men."

      Dallas survived the harrowing river crossing, and holed up in some buildings in the town center that night. The next morning, his company attacked again, and after just an hour-and-a-half, achieved their objective.

      For the next several weeks, Dallas' company was in near constant combat. On April 15, they met fierce German fire while crossing an open field. The next day, they were hit with machine gun fire while attacking the Opladen rail yards. After a brief but vicious firefight, they captured a German artillery battery. The fighting continued the next day around Unkerath.

      Dallas' company had moved all the way to Marienbad, Czechoslovakia, when word came that Germany had surrendered.

      Like most of what has been called the Greatest Generation, Dallas Schear is humble when he talks about his service in World War II.

      "We didn't have it as rough as some of them," he recounted. "We, the 97th, lost 1,500 guys by accidents and combat. My brother's company had it much worse."

      Two months after returning to the front after being wounded in action, Robert Schear was sent on a six-man scouting patrol on Nov. 29, 1944. Robert and the five other men headed into Forest Wenan, near Langerwehe, Germany. He did not come back.

      Younger brother Dallas was just 18 and in basic training at Camp San Luis Obisbo, Calif., when he learned his older brother was missing in action.
      Sixty years later, he knows little more about his brother's death than what he learned that day in 1944. A second dog-eared newspaper clipping rides in Dallas' wallet, this one from 1945. It tells of the Army declaring Robert dead.

      "My folks always figured he'd come back," said Dallas, carefully clutching the newspaper article that announced his brother's loss. "There's been no memorial services for him."

      Perhaps seeking answers, perhaps looking for closure, Dallas, who now lives in Alexander, returned to Europe in May, 2002, to visit the Netherlands American Cemetery.

      "I wanted to go to that cemetery," he recounted. "I'd never been there before. There's the stone with my folk's at the Geneva Cemetery, but I wanted to go where he last was at. We don't know where he's buried."
      When the American Cemetery was dedicated in 1960, its centerpiece was the Court of Honor. A large granite wall in the Court of Honor lists the names of 1,722 U.S. soldiers and airmen who were missing in action in World War II. Robert's name is among them.

      Dallas took his daughter, Elaine, with him to Germany, where they visited the area of Germany where his brother had fought, and died.

      While there, Dallas and Elaine met a German man who, it turned out, was just a month older than Dallas. The German told the two Americans he had served in the German Army in World War II, had been captured, and spent several months in a prisoner of war camp in Iowa. The German also told them of the horrors faced by the German Army.

      "According to that one German we got talking to," remembered Dallas, "there were 56,000 Germans killed (in that area). There were about 8,000 Americans killed."

      Was it difficult for a man who had been the target of German fire many times to befriend one of those who had sought to kill him? No, said Dallas.

      "You've got to forget that stuff," he explained. "You can't have a grudge all your life."

      Dallas and Elaine vowed to keep in touch with the former German soldier, and already they are planning on looking him up when they return to Germany next year for the annual memorial service at the American Cemetery.

      Dallas also plans to make a return trip to Forest Wenan, where his brother disappeared. He and Elaine were able to stop there only briefly on his last visit. This time they want to spend more time in the place where Robert was last seen alive.

      Dallas admits there is little chance he will ever find signs of where his brother once fought. "We couldn't find anywhere he was stationed," he said. "If he lived like we did, he had a hole in the ground."

      He also admits, however reluctantly, that it is unlikely he will ever know his brother's final resting place. Dallas has learned to live with that. As far as he is concerned, Robert lives on in his brother's fond memories.

      "We used to go fishing a lot," remembered Dallas, "and hunting a lot. He was a good brother."

      Next summer when he treads through the now peaceful forest that once claimed his own flesh and blood, Dallas Schear will probably not be thinking of combat or gunfire or foxholes. His thoughts will more likely be of two young boys quietly stalking some four-legged prey, or making their way towards their favorite fishing hole through the woods around Geneva. Just as he and Robert had done so many times 60 years before.

©Hampton Chronicle 2003"