Warren Spahn
Hall of Famer Wounded in Combat
| Date and Place of Birth: | April 23, 1921 Buffalo, NY |
| Date and Place of Death: | November 24, 2003 Broken Arrow, OK |
| Baseball Experience: | Major League |
| Position: | Pitcher |
| Rank: | First Lieutenant |
| Military Unit: | 276th Engineer Combat Battalion, 1159th Engineer Combat Group US Army |
| Area Served: | European Theater of Operations |
Warren Spahn, the winningest left-handed pitcher in major league
history, received a battlefield commission in 1945.
Warren E. Spahn was born in Buffalo, New York, on April 23, 1921. He
played first base for the Buffalo City Athletic Club and pitched for
South Park High School in Buffalo, where he lead the team to a series of
resounding victories in 1939 and 1940.
The Boston Braves signed the young left-hander for $80 a month in 1940,
and assigned him to the Bradford Bees of the Class D PONY League.
Despite a a couple of injuries and an uninspiring 5-4 won-loss record he
had an ERA of just 2.73. The following year, Spahn posted a 19-6 record
and miniscule 1.83 ERA with the Evansville Bees of the Class B Three-I
League in 1941, followed by a 17-12 record for the Hartford Bees of the
Class A Eastern League in 1942, which was sandwiched between four brief
appearances for the Braves.
Spahn entered military service on December 3, 1942. He was assigned to
Camp Gruber, near Tulsa, Oklahoma, where he learned to be a combat
engineer, then served at Camp Chaffee, Arkansas, and pitched for the
1850th Service Unit baseball team. The team’s line-up included catcher
Eddie Kearse, future major league pitcher Zeb Eaton, and minor leaguers
Ed Sears, Avery Thompson and Elwyn Leatherman. On August 5, 1943, Spahn
pitched a 15-0 no-hitter against the KFPW Broadcasters, striking out 17.
Only two men reached base – both on errors.
He was sent to Europe in December 1944, with the 1159th Engineer Combat
Group's 276th Engineer Combat Battalion. "Let me tell you," Spahn said,
"that was a tough bunch of guys. We had people that were let out of
prison to go into the service. So those were the people I went overseas
with, and they were tough and rough and I had to fit that mold."
Spahn soon found himself in the heat of battle. "We were surrounded in
the Hurtgen Forrest and had to fight our way out of there. Our feet were
frozen when we went to sleep and they were frozen when we woke up. We
didn't have a bath or change of clothes for weeks."
In March 1945, the 276th were responsible for maintaining the traffic
flow across the Ludendorff Bridge at Remagen, the only remaining bridge
to span the Rhine. The bridge was under almost constant attack from the
Germans who were desperate to stop the flow of Allied forces into
Germany. At the same time they were to build a 140-foot Double Bailey
bridge nearby. On March 16, Spahn was wounded in the foot by shrapnel
while working on the Ludendorff. The following day he had just left the
Ludendorff when the entire structure collapsed into the river with the
loss of more than 30 Army engineers. The 276th received the
Distinguished Unit Emblem and for its efforts to keep the bridge
operating, while under constant enemy fire, Staff Sergeant Spahn
received a Purple Heart and a battlefield commission as a
second-lieutenant.
After Germany’s surrender in May 1945, newly-promoted First Lieutenant
Spahn pitched for the 115th Engineers Group at their base at the
University of Heidelberg. In a four-game stretch, he allowed only one
run and nine hits while striking out 73 batters.
With the war over, Spahn returned to Boston in 1946 and posted an 8-5
record and solid 2.94 ERA in 24 appearances “Before the war I didn’t
have anything that slightly resembled self-confidence,” Spahn told the
Associated Press in August 1946. “Then I was tight as a drum and
worrying about every pitch. But nowadays I just throw them up without
the slightest mental pressure.”
In 1947 he had the first of thirteen 20-win seasons. On September 16,
1960, Spahn pitched the first no-hitter of his career against the
Phillies, and the 4-0 win was his 20th of the season. The following year
he no-hit the Giants 1-0 on April 28, five days after his 40th birthday.
Spahn pitched his last game in the majors for the San Francisco Giants
in 1965, aged 44. But that wasn't to be the end of his pro pitching
days. He hurled three games for the Mexico City Tigers in 1966, and a
further three games for th Pacific Coast League's Tulsa Oilers in 1967,
aged 46.
Looking back on his military experience some years later, Spahn said,
“After what I went through overseas, I never thought of anything I was
told to do in baseball as hard work. You get over feeling like that when
you spend days on end sleeping in frozen tank tracks in enemy threatened
territory. The Army taught me something about challenges and about
what’s important and what isn’t. Everything I tackle in baseball and in
life I take as a challenge rather than work.”
Interestingly, Spahn returned to military uniform two decades after the
war, albeit under extremely different circumstances. In 1963, he
appeared in an episode of the television series, "Combat," dressed as a
German soldier!
In 1966, Spahn was presented with the Fraternal Order of Eagles' “Major
Richard Bong Award” for his WWII service. He was inducted in the
Baseball Hall of Fame in 1973.
On November 24, 2003, Warren Spahn passed away peacefully at his home in
Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. He was 82 years old and is buried at Elmwood
Cemetery, Hartshorne, Oklahoma.
Date Added December 22, 2017
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