Two Jewish Heroes

By Avi Heiligman

contact with Australian Coastwatcher. Post was then given a ride to Australia by the submarine USS Grouper. After disembarking in Australia, he was given the Distinguished Service Cross for the valuable intelligence he gathered while on the run for a hundred days in the jungle. In August 1944, Major Post was killed during a test flight.

People from all backgrounds joined the military during the war, and athletes were no exception. The most famous Jewish athletes in uniform were Hank Greenberg and champion boxer Barney Ross. This list also includes Chicago native and former NFL quarterback Robert “Buck” Halperin. In college, he played for Coach Knute Rockne at Notre Dame before finishing his college career at Wisconsin. He then played for the Brooklyn Dodgers in the NFL (they were a football team from 1930-1945) before coaching high school football.

Not all World War II volunteers were in their late teens and twenties, and Halperin joined the navy in 1942 at the age of 34. First training under boxing champ

Gene Tunney, Halperin was soon joined by two other NFL stars, Phil Bucklew and John Tripson, in a secret program at Little Creek, Virginia. This group became the Navy Scouts and Raiders and were tasked to locate suitable landing beaches for amphibious landings, then they were to note any obstacles and guide troops in during the landings. They were present for major landings during the war; eight Scouts and Raiders were awarded the Navy Cross including Halperin.

Halperin first saw action in the North African Theater of Operations. On November 8, 1942, he successfully took his boat seven miles to the French Moroccan coast to mark the landing beaches. He then teamed up with an army scout team to guide in the landing force despite being under attack from strafing enemy planes. After the troops had landed, the sailor then scouted the area for roads and areas to lead the troops inland and personally captured two enemy soldiers. For his actions, Halperin was awarded the Navy Cross.

After the North African landings, Halperin then saw action in Sicily and Italy. He then was sent to England to prepare for the D-Day landings. Together with Bucklew, he planned for the landings that were to go in with the first two waves. Halperin commanded the Scouts and Raiders that went in on these waves despite the heavy enemy fire raining down on the invasion beaches. He found spots that weren’t being bombed and guided his boats safely to the beach. Some records have Halperin and his Scouts and Raiders as the first Americans to set foot on the beaches. While marking the beaches, he also assisted the swamped boats and saved two Americans from drowning.

After the Normandy landings, Halperin became the commanding officer of Naval Unit Six and was sent to China to train thousands of guerillas to fight against the Japanese. These forces were a thorn in the side of the enemy as they killed 1,300 Japanese troops and destroyed ships including a 1,000-ton freighter. Additionally, Halperin assisted in the rescue of sixteen downed American airmen. For his service in China, he was awarded the Silver Star and later awarded a Gold Medal for “meritorious conduct.” The Chinese Nationalist government awarded him the Yun Hui “Order of the Cloud and Banner” for his part in defeating the Japanese. After the war, he helped start the company Land’s End and in 1960 won a bronze medal at the Olympics in Rome in sailing.

Both Halperin and Post were decorated for their service during some of the most trying environments in battle. Many servicemen during World War II were noted for exceptional service, and even though their stories didn’t always make headline news, it is heroism that deserves to be remembered.