Warren C. Fisher, Receives France’s Medal of Honor

Warren C. Fisher, Foulkeways Resident, Receives France’s Medal of Honor

Warren C. Fisher, a Foulkeways resident, recently received France’s highest award, the Légion d’honneur, for his service during World War II  (in particular for his service during the Battle of Colmar Pocket — Dec. 15, 1944 to Feb. 19, 1945 — to push the German Army out of the Alsace city of Colmar to the Rhine.)

Fisher was a member of the 28th Division — the Pennsylvania Division — of the U.S. Army 109th Infantry. After the Battle of the Bulge, Fisher said, the 28th Division pushed the Germans to the plain of Colmar.

“We had a huge battle,” he said. “It was so cold the rifles wouldn’t work, so we took aircraft artillery and made it horizontal and used it like a machine gun.”

The unusual thing, he recalled, was that a German general declared Colmar an open city, “so we went right through the city and resumed battle on the other side, so the city was not destroyed, and we pushed them to the Rhine.”

The only thing he could imagine, Fisher said, was that the German general thought Germany would win the war, and “he maybe thought Colmar would become a German city.”

The 28th Division, which was under the leadership of French General Charles de Gaulle during those battles in France, received the Croix de Guerre, the highest French military medal, for its service, but not the individual soldiers, he said.

Michael Scullin, the honorary counsel of France in Philadelphia and Wilmington, presented the French medal of honor to Fisher during a ceremony at Foulkeways July 27.  Fisher, who had also earned three Combat Stars and the Combat Infantryman Badge, served as an infantryman, intelligence observer and sharpshooter during the war. Click here to read the full article.