Slovik, Edward Donald “Eddi”

Slovik, Edward Donald “Eddi”, born 18-02-1920, in Detroit, Michigan, to the Polish-American, of Josef Slovik and his wife Anna, born Slowikowski.. As a minor, Edward was arrested frequently. The first time, when he was 12 years old, he and some friends broke into a foundry to steal some brass. Between 1932 and 1937, he was caught for several incidents of petty theft, breaking and entering, and disturbing the peace. In October 1937, age 17, he was sent to prison but was paroled in September 1938. After stealing and crashing a car with two friends while drunk, age 19, he was sent back to prison in January 1939. In April 1942, Slovik was paroled once more, and he obtained a job at Montella Plumbing and Heating in Dearborn, Michigan. There he met the woman who would become his wife, Antoinette Wisniewski,   while she was working as a bookkeeper for the owner, James Montella. They married on 07-11-1942, and lived with her parents. Slovik’s criminal record made him classified as unfit for duty in the U.S. military, but, shortly after the couple’s first wedding anniversary, Slovik was reclassified as fit for duty and subsequently drafted by the Army. His service number was 36896415. Slovik arrived at Camp Wolters in Texas for basic military training on 24-01-1944. In August, he was dispatched to join the fighting in France. Arriving on August 20, he was one of 12 replacements assigned to Company G of the 109^th Infantry Regiment   ,nicknamed,”Thirteenth Pennsylvania” under command of  Major General James Earl Rudder

  with the , U.S. 28^th Infantry Division , nicknamed “Keystone” and “Bloody Bucket” under command of Major General Lloyd Davidson Brown   in Germany and their casualties during their 196 days of combat amount 16.762.

Major General James Earl Rudder died on 02-03-1970, age 59, after suffering a cerebral hemorrhage and Major General Lloyd Davidson Brown died in Washington, Georgia on 17-02-1950, age 57.

While en route to his assigned unit, Slovik and a friend he met during basic training, Private John Tankey, took cover during an artillery attack and became separated from their replacement detachment. This was the point at which Slovik later stated he found he “wasn’t cut out for combat.” The next morning, they found a Canadian military police unit and remained with them for the next six weeks. Tankey wrote to their regiment to explain their absence before he and Slovik reported to their unit for duty on 07-10-1944. The US Army’s rapid advance through France had caused many replacement soldiers to have trouble finding their assigned units, and so no charges were filed against Slovik or Tankey. The following day on October 8, Slovik informed his company commander, Captain Ralph Grotte, that he was “too scared” to serve in a front-line rifle company and asked to be reassigned to a rear area unit. He told Grotte that he would run away if he were assigned to a rifle unit, and asked his captain if that would constitute desertion. Grotte confirmed that it would. He refused Slovik’s request for reassignment and sent him to a rifle platoon. The next day, October 9, Slovik deserted from his infantry unit. His friend, John Tankey , caught up with him and attempted to persuade him to stay, but Slovik’s only comment was that his “mind was made up”. Slovik walked several miles to the rear and approached an enlisted cook at a headquarters detachment, presenting him with a note which stated: I, Pvt. Eddie D. Slovik, 36896415, confess to the desertion of the United States Army. At the time of my desertion we were in Elbeuf, in France. I came to Elbeuf as a replacement. They were shelling the town and we were told to dig in for the night. The following morning they were shelling us again. I was so scared, nerves and trembling, that at the time the other replacements moved out, I couldn’t move. I stayed there in my fox hole till it was quiet and I was able to move. I then walked into town. Not seeing any of our troops, so I stayed over night at a French hospital. The next morning I turned myself over to the Canadian Provost Corp. After being with them six weeks I was turned over to American M.R. They turned me loose. I told my commanding officer my story. I said that if I had to go out there again I’d run away. He said there was nothing he could do for me so I ran away again AND I’LL RUN AWAY AGAIN IF I HAVE TO GO OUT THERE. The cook summoned his company commander and an MP, who read the note and urged Slovik to destroy it before he was taken into custody, which Slovik refused. He was brought before Lieutenant Colonel Ross Henbest, who again offered him the opportunity to tear up the note, return to his unit, and face no further charges. After Slovik again refused, Henbest ordered Slovik to write another note on the back of the first one stating that he fully understood the legal consequences of deliberately incriminating himself with the note and that it would be used as evidence against him in a court martial. Slovik was taken into custody and confined to the division stockade. The divisional judge advocate, Lieutenant Colonel Henry Lazar Sommer , again offered Slovik an opportunity to rejoin his unit and have the charges against him suspended. He offered to transfer Slovik to a different infantry regiment where no one would know of his past and he could start with a “clean slate”. Slovik, convinced that he would face only jail time, which he had experienced and found preferable to combat, declined these offers, saying, “I’ve made up my mind. I’ll take my court martial.” Slovik was charged with desertion to avoid hazardous duty and tried by court martial on 11-11-1944. Slovik had to be tried by a court martial composed of staff officers from other U.S. Army divisions, because all combat officers from the 28^th Infantry Division were fighting on the front lines. The prosecutor, Captain John Leslie Green  , presented witnesses to whom Slovik had stated his intention to “run away”. The defense counsel, Captain Edward Woods, announced that Slovik had elected not to testify. At the end of the day, the nine officers of the court found Slovik guilty and sentenced him to death. The sentence was reviewed and approved by the division commander, Major General Norman Cota.

  General Cota’s stated attitude was. “Given the situation as I knew it in November, 1944, I thought it was my duty to this country to approve that sentence. If I hadn’t approved it—if I had let Slovik accomplish his purpose—I don’t know how I could have gone up to the line and looked a good soldier in the face.” On 9 December, Slovik wrote a letter to the Supreme Allied commander, General Dwight “Ike” Eisenhower,

pleading for clemency. However, desertion had become a systemic problem in France, and the surprise German offensive through the Ardennes began on 16 December with severe U.S. casualties, pocketing several battalions and straining the morale of the infantry to the greatest extent yet seen during the war. Eisenhower confirmed the execution order on 23 December, noting that it was necessary to discourage further desertions. The sentence came as a shock to Slovik, who had expected a dishonorable discharge and a jail term (the latter of which he assumed would be commuted once the war was over), the same punishment he had seen meted out to other deserters from the division while he was confined to the stockade. The execution by firing squad was carried out at 10:04 a.m. on 31-01-1945, near the village of Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines. The unrepentant Slovik said to the soldiers whose duty it was to prepare him for the firing squad before they led him to the place of execution, “They’re not shooting me for deserting the United States Army, thousands of guys have done that. They just need to make an example out of somebody and I’m it because I’m an ex-con. I used to steal things when I was a kid, and that’s what they are shooting me for. They’re shooting me for the bread and chewing gum I stole when I was 12 years old.”

Death and burial ground of Slovik, Edward Donald “Eddi”.

Private Slovik died as he was 24 years of age. The whole process took 15 minutes and eleven bullets.

  Nick Gozik  now age 90-years old, spent the morning of his 25^th birthday as a witness to the execution of Private Eddie Slovik. None of the rifleman so much as flinched, believing Slovik had gotten what he deserved. Slovik was buried in Plot “E” of Oise-Aisne American Cemetery and Memorial in Fère-en-Tardenois, alongside 95 American soldiers executed for rape and/or murder. Their grave markers are hidden from view by shrubbery and bear sequential numbers instead of names, making it impossible to identify them individually without knowing the key. Antoinette Slovik  unsuccessfully petitioned the Army for her husband’s remains and his pension until her death in 1979. Slovik’s case was taken up in 1981 by former Macomb County Commissioner Bernard V. Calka, a Polish-American World War II veteran, who continued to petition the Army to return Slovik’s remains to the USA. In 1987, he succeeded in convincing President Ronald Reagan  to order their return. Calka raised $8.000 to pay for the exhumation of Slovik’s remains from Row 3, Grave 65 of Plot “E” and their transfer to Detroit’s Woodmere Cemetery, where Slovik was reburied next to his wife  Antoinette Slovik.

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