Colonel Henry Mucci

Henry A. Mucci (1909—April 20, 1997) was an Army Colonel and Ranger. He was famous for leading the raid that rescued survivors of the Bataan Death March during World War II. With only 120 Army Rangers, Mucci headed the January 1945 mission that freed 511 men from Cabanatuan Prison Camp despite being heavily outnumbered. Image File history File links Henry_mucci. ... Image File history File links Henry_mucci. ... 1909 (MCMIX) was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... April 20 is the 110th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (111th in leap years). ... 1997 (MCMXCVII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Army (from French armée) can, in some countries, refer to any armed force. ... Colonel is a military rank of a commissioned officer, with the corresponding ranks existing in nearly every country in the world. ... Official force name 75th Ranger Regiment Rangers Other names Airborne Rangers Army Rangers U.S. Army Rangers Branch U.S. Army Chain of Command USASOC Description Special Operations Force, rapidly deployable light infantry force. ... The Bataan Death March was a war crime involving the forcible transfer of prisoners of war, with wide-ranging abuse and high fatalities, by Japanese forces in the Philippines, in 1942, during World War II. In Japanese, it is known as Batān Shi no Kōshin meaning the same. ... Combatants Allies: Poland, British Commonwealth, France/Free France, Soviet Union, United States, China, and others Axis Powers: Germany, Italy, Japan, and others Casualties Military dead: 17 million Civilian dead: 33 million Total dead: 50 million Military dead: 8 million Civilian dead: 4 million Total dead: 12 million World War II... Cabanatuan City is a 1st class city in the province of Nueva Ecija, Philippines. ...

Early Years

Mucci was born in 1909 in Bridgeport,CT. His parents had both emigrated from Italy, and his father worked as a horse salesman in the Bridgeport area. Upon graduating from high school he applied to West Point but was rejected. He replied again the following year and recieved an appointment to West Point, from which he graduated in 1936, 246th in his class.

6th Ranger Battalion

See main article, 6th Ranger Battalion The 6th Ranger Battalion was a US Army Ranger Battalion which saw action in the Pacific during World War II. The Battalion is best known for its role in the Raid at Cabanatuan in January 1945. ...

In February 1943, the US Sixth Army put Henry Mucci in charge of the 98th Field Artillery Battalion, previously a mule-drawn pack artillery unit. The men Mucci had started with were for the most part boys from the farms and ranches of middle America -- big, strong men. Known as "mule skinners," they had been recruited to train in the mountains of New Guinea with heavy artillery carried on the backs of pack animals. By 1944, the Army considered the mule skinners obsolete, and General Krueger was looking to train a new special unit. Mucci was his man. Mucci announced that the Battalion was being converted from Field Artillery to Rangers, downsized the battallion from 1,000 men to 500, and held a training camp in New Guinea where he utilized commando type training techniques for over a year. Image:Http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/bataan/peopleevents/images/p mucci 02.jpg Ranger training under Mucci bordered on inhuman. A boxer, judo-expert, athlete, and former West Pointer, Mucci believed in training his men to the absolute limits of their physical capacities. He personally taught them all aspects of fighting: hand to hand combat, knifing, bayoneting and marksmanship. He led them on torturous exercises across the tropical New Guinea jungles, through treacherous rivers, and up mountainsides in the ferocious heat. Jungle combat, night combat, amphibious combat; Mucci taught and reveled in it all The French Navy commando Jaubert storm the Alcyon in a mock assault. ...

World War II and the Great Raid

Mucci survived the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. During the liberation of the Philippines General Walter Kreuger and one of his top men, Horton White, chose Mucci to head the liberation of the Cabuanatuan Prison Camp due to both the difficult and peculiar needs of such a mission. Walter Krueger (1881-1967) was a German-American soldier and general in the first half of the 20th century. ...

In January of 1945, Mucci led roughly 120 Army Rangers in liberating the Cabanatuan Prison Camp with the loss of only 2 men killed in action. Combatants United States Japan Commanders Henry Mucci (6th Ranger Battalion) Robert Prince (C and F Companies, 6th Ranger Battalion) Juan Pajota (USAFFE guerrillas) unknown Strength 127 U.S. troops, 200 Filipino guerrillas estimated 8,000 Japanese troops around the camp and about 700 in the camp Casualties 4 killed and...

Honors

For Mucci's actions on the raid he was personally awarded the Distinguished Service Cross by General Douglas MacArthur. The military promoted Mucci to full colonel. The Distinguished Service Cross (DSC) is the second highest military decoration of the United States Army, awarded for extreme gallantry and risk of life in actual combat with an armed enemy force. ... MacArthur landing at Leyte Beach in 1944. ...

Life after military service

After the war, 50,000 people turned out for a Bridgeport parade in the Harding High School graduate's honor, but he failed in a 1946 bid to be a U.S. congressman.

For several years, Mucci was president of Bridgeport Lincoln-Mercury Inc.

Route 25 was renamed in Mucci's honor in November 1974, but by that time he was living in Bangkok as the Far Eastern representative for the Sunningdale Oil Co. of Calgary, Canada.

The war hero retired to Melbourne, Fla., where he died at the age of 86 in April 1997, after a freak swimming accident in which he broke his hip and then suffered a heart attack. Henry Mucci was taking his morning swim as he did each morning after his 10 mile run, since retirement.