Schwitzgold, Max Victor

Malmedy massacre

Date of birth:: June 15th, 1911 (Gloversville/New York, United States)
Date of death:: December 17th, 1944 (Baugnez, Belgium)
Buried on:: American War Graves Knesseth Israel Cemetery
Plot: D. Grave: 59.
Service number:: 32954422
Nationality:: American

Biography

Max Victor Schwitzgold was born on June 15, 1911, in Gloversville, New York, the United States of America. He was the son of Jacob and Rebecca Schwitzgold, who were Jewish immigrants from Poland and settled in the United States in the early 20th century. His parents had a business that manufactured gloves. He had one older sister, Dorothy. During his high school years Max worked as a paper delivery boy and also in a fruit market in Gloversville. Max graduated in 1929 at Gloversville High School. In 1930 Max moved to Wilmington, Delaware and held a job as clerk. On 29th of April, 1930, he married Rose Ruggiero. During the summer of the same year Max and Rose took over a luncheonette called “the Coffee Pot”, where they sold – besides coffee – newspapers, candy and sandwiches. In 1933 their daughter Joanne was born. In October 1933, they bought another store in Wilmington that sold soda, candy and all kind of goods, wares, merchandise, stock and fixtures. Apparently that store also held an apartment where Max and his family started to live in. In 1939 Max and Rose divorced. On 16th October, 1940, Max registered for the draft. In April 1941, Max would marry Ethel Rosevich.

On 19th July, 1943, Max joined the United States Army, in New Jersey. Approximately a month later Private Schwitzgold was posted at the Field Artillery Replacement Training Center at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, where he received his basic training. He was initially assigned to Battery C, 12th Battalion, 4th Field Artillery Training Regiment. Later he was transferred to Battery B in the same Battalion. After completing his basic training in December 1943, Max was placed at Battery B of 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion (FAOB) at Fort Sill, Oklahoma. He was reportedly promoted to private 1st class in July, 1944. In August 1944 his Battalion was shipped from New York to Cardiff, Great Brittain, where it arrived on the 31st of the same month. Max got promoted to Corporal in September, 1944. He, with his Battery B, 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion, then sailed from England to Normandy, France, in mid-September 1944. On 23rd September, 1944, the 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion was attached to the U.S. 1st Army to participate in the Rhineland campaign. Max’s Battalion saw action in ‘the Battle of the Bulge’ in the Ardennes, Belgium. The units main mission was to locate the enemy artillery positions using the “sound and flash” technique (sound ranging and flash spotting). In December of 1944, he was Technician 5th grade, working as a clerk-typist in Battery B, 285th.

On 17 December 1944, members of the 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion were traveling from Schevenhütte (10 kilometers east of Aachen), Germany, to the Ardennes in Belgium, when 120 of them were captured by Joachim Peiper’s 1st SS Panzer Division at Baugnez. The German army launched a massive counteroffensive through the Ardennes the day before, and the convoy of the 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion ran into the vanguard of Peiper’s 1st SS Panzer Division. The U.S. soldiers were no match and most of them surrendered. The prisoners were then lined up in a nearby field and mowed down with machine gun fire in what became known as the Malmedy massacre. Max was reportedly hit in the chest and fell on top of a fellow soldier, who was also wounded. Some German soldiers then walked in the field to execute the still living U.S. soldiers. Technician 5th grade Max Victor Schwitzgold died from a shot to the head, he was 33 years old. He was initially buried at the military cemetery at Henri-Chapelle, Belgium.

His family was informed on 7th January 1945, that Max was missing in action. After positive identification of his body, his family was notified on 3rd February 1945 about his tragic fate.
After the war his body was repatriated to the United States on the request of his family. Max is buried at Knesseth Israel Cemetery, Gloversville, Fulton County, New York; Grave D-59. There is also a cenotaph located at the Jewish Community Cemetery, Wilmington, New Castle County, Delaware. Max is also honored on the memorial at Baugnez, Belgium.

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