Local attorney was killed days before German surrender

This story is part of Mon Valley Sons of World War II, a series about our sons who lost their lives in service to our country during the war.

By JOHN J. TURANIN
For the MVI

At 4 feet, 11 inches tall and 105 pounds, 14-year-old Jimmie France was the smallest boy trying out for the 1926 Monongahela High School football team. But he was never one to let a disadvantage stand in his way. Jimmie eventually became one of the school’s star athletes, earned a law degree, rose to the rank of first lieutenant in the U.S. Army and survived being wounded while in combat deep in Germany.

If only Lt. James Lawrence France could have endured another 22 days of World War II, Germany would finally surrender on May 8. But on April 17, fate intervened when his life was cut short by an exploding artillery shell. He had only been in combat 37 days. This is his story.

The France Family

James Lawrence France was born Nov. 11, 1911, to Benjamin and Alice (née Kennedy) France in Monongahela, Pa. Benjamin and Alice married in Jefferson, Pa., in 1898 before settling in Mon City by 1910. Benjamin worked as a fire boss at a coal mine while Alice managed the France family household.

Benjamin France was born in Yorkshire, England, and immigrated to the United States in 1887. The parents of Alice Kennedy immigrated from Great Britain to the U.S. in the 1880s. Both families settled in Pennsylvania, where Benjamin and Alice met and married.

James, nicknamed “Jimmie,” was the fourth child born to the couple. Elizabeth (born 1899) was the first to arrive, followed by Norman Selby (1900) and Charles Henry (1902). Their father ran unsuccessfully for Mon City Council in 1913, and by 1920, Benjamin and Alice divorced. In 1920, Alice and her children were living at 457 Hudson Ave. in Mon City. Norman and Charles were both working as machinists to support the family.

Jimmie excelled at athletics at an early age. In 1925, he competed in track and field in the running broad jump. That year he also sang for the junior choir at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church. In 1926, at age 14, he tried out for the Monongahela High School football team as its smallest and lightest candidate. He was not going to be discouraged by apparent disadvantages. The following year, Jimmie made the junior var- sity team, and in 1927, his play on the gridiron earned him a place as an end on the all-valley second team.

But football wasn’t his only sporting interest, and in 1929, he lettered for the school’s basketball team, and was one of 16 lettermen to graduate from the school that year. His high school yearbook entry was assigned the King James Bible proverb 15:13: “A blithe heart makes a blooming visage,” a nod to his positive outlook and cheerful appearance. After graduating, he continued playing basketball for the Monongahela Larro club, winning the regional championship as the team’s second top scorer.

In the summer of 1930, Jimmie France, his cousin, Robert Kennedy, and three other young men came to the rescue of 19-year-old Mary Sweeney, drowning in the Monongahela River near the old Catsburg coal tipple. She was resuscitated after halfhour of care.

With that bit of excitement added to his resume, he enrolled in the pre-law curriculum at the University of Pittsburgh that September. He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1935, immediately entered the university’s School of Law, and graduated with a law degree in 1938. His siblings all contributed to finance his schooling.

James L. France passed the state bar exam in October 1938. While awaiting formal admittance to the state bar in Washington County, he suffered an attack of acute appendicitis, which delayed his admission until April 1939. James opened his law practice in Mon City in July 1939.

Global war is brewing

The citizens of Mon City monitored the burgeoning wars overseas. Germany had long been executing the “Third Reich” political-military strategy of Fuhrer Adolph Hitler. They entered alliances with the like-minded leaders of Italy and Japan, and by the end of 1940, Germany had invaded Czechoslovakia, Austria, Poland, France, Denmark, Norway, Belgium, Luxembourg, and Netherlands.

Pursuing its own empire- building aspirations, Italy had expanded into Ethiopia and Albania and was invading France by 1940. Japan had assumed control over Korea from the Russians in 1905, and by 1940, Japan had invaded China and French Indochina.

James registered for the U.S. Armed Forces draft on its first day, Oct. 16, 1940, as a 5-foot, 4-inch tall, 135-pound 28-year-old with brown hair and brown eyes. The following year, he was appointed as an attorney for the local draft board. He soon joined with two other local attorneys and began their joint law practice of Devore, Benedict and France by January 1941.

The U.S. enters WWII

Japanese forces launched a surprise attack on the U.S. military bases in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on Dec. 7, 1941. The U.S. declared war on Japan, and as an ally of the Japanese Empire, Germany declared war on the U.S. With his fellow citizens heading off to fight in the war, on Sept. 15, 1942, James enlisted with the U.S. Army in Pittsburgh. It was time for him to do his duty for his country.

Pvt. James France completed his basic training with the 17th Battalion of the Infantry Replacement Training Corps at Camp Wheeler, Georgia, and was promoted to the rank of corporal. While at Camp Wheeler, he demonstrated the key competencies sought in U.S. Army officers.

In January 1943, he was accepted as an officer candidate for training at Fort Benning, Georgia. In May of that year, he graduated from Fort Benning and received his commission as second lieutenant. He continued his training, and in June 1944 while at Camp Wolters, Texas, he was promoted to first lieutenant with the 11th Infantry Replacement Training Regiment. He continued to train stateside until he was shipped overseas on or about Jan. 10, 1945.

Combat in the European Theater of WWII

France was assigned to Company D of the 353th Infantry Regiment, 89th Infantry Division. The 89th Infantry Division, known as The Rolling W as illustrated by its insignia, landed at Le Havre, France on Jan. 21, 1945. The division spent its first few weeks in additional combat training. They received their orders and were assigned to Third Army’s XII Corps to march through France, Belgium and Luxembourg to the German border at the Sauer River.

The division was ready for its first day of combat after staging east of Echternach, Luxembourg, on March 11, 1945. The offensive began the next day with the 89th advancing across the Sauer River, continuing further east across the Moselle River on March 17. By March 24, they were reassigned to VIII Corps of General George Patton’s Third U.S. Army. The 89th was heading deep into the German homeland.

The 89th pushed forward, assaulting across the Rhine River on March 26, 1945, under heavy defensive opposition from the Germans. Lt. France and two of his men captured 60 German soldiers that day, but he was wounded by enemy action. He was briefly hospitalized, yet quickly returned to duty. On April 3, Lt. France was awarded the Purple Heart for his wounds.

In April, Lt. France and the 89th continued to press eastward against enemy resistance. On April 4, 1945, the division came across Stalag Ohrdruf, a satellite of the Nazi’s Buchenwald concentration camp. Ohrdruf was the first concentration camp liberated by U.S. troops in Germany, and the 89th was the liberating division. The GIs of the 89th were the first ones to witness the results of atrocities being inflicted upon concentration camp prisoners.

A week later, Generals Dwight D. Eisenhower, George S. Patton, and Omar Bradley visited Ohrdruf to see for themselves. The world would start paying attention as the realities of the Holocaust were soon revealed.

Jimmie’s final days

Lt. France and his fellow soldiers in the 353rd Regiment were seeing plenty of action and plenty of white flags of surrender. By mid-April, the 89th had captured more than 15,000 prisoners.

According to the 89th Infantry Division unit history, during April 16: “… Resistance stiffened as the 89th neared the Zwick-Mulde River. On the right, the 353rd’s 1st Bn. captured Zoghaus, then fought grimly for 24 hours to silence batteries of 88s [artillery] on the heights overlooking Greiz, Reichenbach, plastered by artillery and air bombardment, collapsed the next day under a sustained ground assault. Capture of Zwickau, an industrial city of 100,000 astride the Zwick-Mulde River, was the 89th’s last major engagement in the ETO.”

However, on April 17, 1945, near the town of Greiz in Germany’s Thuringia region, Lt. France lived his last moment. Shrapnel from a nearby exploding artillery shell struck Lt. France in the head, and he did not survive. His family was informed May 3 that he had been killed in action. The last two letters his mother received were dated the day of his death.

James Lawrence France, remembered

First Lt. James Lawrence France was initially buried at American Military Cemetery No. 1 at Eisenbach, Germany, on April 19, 1945. He was reburied at the American Military Cemetery at Margraten, Netherlands, on June 25, 1945. Lt. France was eventually transported back to Mon City for final burial at Monongahela Cemetery in January 1949 under the federal government’s Return of the War Dead program.

A former high school teammate, Dick Sklar, wrote to the editor of the Monongahela Daily Herald and his letter was published in the newspaper on May 24, 1945: “… I was deeply shocked when I read that James France was killed in action in Germany. Jimmie, as we all knew him, was one of my teammates while in the Monongahela High School, both on the basketball team and on the football team. I imagine that his war record will show that he was a fighter to the end. I can still hear him pepping us all up during a basketball game. I am sure that Monongahela has lost a very fine citizen in the loss of Jimmie France.”

Newspaper accounts state that 1st Lt. James France had been recommended for promotion to the rank of captain and for the Silver Star medal for gallantry. There are no military records in the public domain that confirm the promotion or the award.

Author’s Note: My maternal grandparents lived across the street from the France family during WWII. They likely joined them in grieving their fallen son, while silently giving thanks that their own two sons had survived the war. All shall be remembered this Memorial Day.

John J. Turanin is a retired Western Pennsylvanian and grandson of the Mon Valley. His new book is “Tin Men Steel Soldiers: The price paid in WWII by a Pennsylvania mill town: True stories of the lives and losses of 82 men is about Monessen, PA.” John is one of hundreds of volunteers with the nonprofit organization Stories Behind The Stars who are writing memorial stories for every one of the 421,000 U.S. service members and 31,000 Pennsylvanians who lost their lives during WWII. Those interested in joining the effort are encouraged to visit www. StoriesBehindTheStars.org.