FRITZ WEINSCHENK

WEINSCHENK--Fritz. An American hero is no longer with us. The members of the board of directors of the Otto and Fran Walter Foundation mourn the passing on March 23, 2012, of their esteemed fellow director and treasurer of the Foundation, our dear friend Dr. jur. Fritz Weinschenk. Driven from his German homeland by Nazi hatred, he made a new life for himself in the United States. He volunteered for the U.S. Army immediately after Pearl Harbor and underwent training in South and North Carolina, in the course of which he was naturalized as a citizen. He liked to say that he considered himself a Rebel, since he became an American citizen in the South. He came ashore under Eisenhower at Omaha Beach on D-Day, where he incurred a leg wound that would plague him the rest of his life; he refused being sent to a field hospital, because that would have separated him from his unit. That unit was trained in beachhead communications, so after two months in France it was transferred to the Pacific. There, after participating in landings at Port Moresby, Hollandia (now Jayapura) and Sansapor in New Guinea, Fritz came ashore with MacArthur in the Philippines, first at Lingayen Gulf and later at Malapascua Island/Mt. Mayon. His unit was preparing for the invasion of Japan when the war ended. "The atomic bomb," he later said, "saved my life." His military honors include the American Campaign Medal, European--African--Middle Eastern Campaign Medal with one battle star and an arrowhead, Presidential Unit Citation (for the Normandy invasion), Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal with two battle stars and an arrowhead, World War II Victory Medal, Army of Occupation Medal and Good Conduct Medal; and foreign honors, the Philippine Liberation Medal and the Medaille de la Debarquement (French Liberation Medal). After his discharge he served as a civilian in the Army Counter Intelligence Corps in Germany, in the course of which he worked with the U.S. prosecution team in the trial of German war criminals at Nuremberg. Returning to the U.S., he took up the study of law, graduating from New York University School of Law in 1953, and then devoted the greater part of his long professional career to the pursuit of justice on behalf of those who, like himself, had suffered under Hitler's brutal regime. He interviewed hundreds of witnesses whose testimony was critical for the prosecution of war criminals in German courts, and served as counsel for Nazi victims in hundreds of restitution and indemnification claims. For his humanitarian service the German government bestowed upon him the Bundesverdienstkreuz am Bande (Knight's Cross of the Order of Merit) and the Bundesverdienstkreuz erster Klasse (Officer's Cross of the Order of Merit). Late in life he again took up the study of law and earned the degree of Doktor juris, summa cum laude, from the University of Mainz - the city from which he had been ostracized half a century earlier. He served in many capacities in numerous philanthropic and professional organizations, but the one that means the most to us is our own. We will miss his insight and wise counsel, as well as his unfailing courtesy and sly humor, at our board meetings. Otto and Fran Walter Foundation, Inc Frank G. Helman, President Martha H. Peak, Vice President and Grants Director