Tommy Prince
Thomas George Prince, MM was an Indigenous Canadian war hero and the most decorated soldier in the First Special Service Force or Devil's Brigade, an elite American-Canadian commando unit, during World War II. He is Canada's most decorated First Nations soldier, serving in World War II and the Korean War. Prince was one of only three Canadians to receive both the Canadian Military Medal and the American Silver Star during World War II. Prince's military deeds as a scout and as a forward combatant were unique and of major strategic importance. He has been described as "perhaps Canada's greatest soldier".
Tommy Prince was descended from chiefs of the Peguis First Nation. Prince's grandfather had negotiated treaty rights in Manitoba with representatives of The Crown. Prince himself would also represent First Nations concerns in Ottawa as Chairman of both the Manitoba Indian Association and the First Nations of Canada national delegation. He advocated for the abolition of the governing Indian Act in Canada and proposed respect for the traditional Crown treaties as the basis of First Nations rights. Prince's position, although considered radical at the time, has been vindicated in subsequent decades by Supreme Court of Canada rulings in support of the Crown treaties and is now accepted as government policy.
Early life
Born in the Brokenhead Ojibwe Nation, he was one of 11 children of Henry and Arabella Prince of the Peguis First Nation near Scanterbury, Manitoba. He was a great-grandson of the Indigenous Chief, Peguis, who, as a very young chief, had led his nation of about 200 people from Sault Ste. Marie, currently in Ontario, on a long distance migration to the southern end of Lake Winnipeg in the late 1790s, keeping their French name, the Saulteaux. Chief Peguis, who lived until 1864, gave his own name to his people, but created the Anglicized name "Prince" for his sons and successors. Tommy Prince was the grandson of Chief Henry Prince, also known as Mis-koo-kenew or Red Eagle, a son of Chief Peguis, who was an original signatory and a principal negotiator of First Nations Treaty 1 at Lower Fort Garry, Manitoba on behalf of the Peguis or Saulteaux tribe on 3 August 1871. The treaty as negotiated reserved hunting and fishing rights for the indigenous tribes of Manitoba, as well as land rights. Chief Henry Prince was also an original signatory to Treaty 2 on 23 August 1875, which reaffirmed the promises contained in Treaty 1. Tommy Prince's father Henry Prince was also a chief of the Saulteaux nation.Tommy Prince's family members had a strong military tradition, and had served in the Canadian armed forces in support of the Crown during the 1870 Red River Rebellion. Chief William Prince had led the Nile Expedition Voyageurs in the relief of General Gordon at the Siege of Khartoum in 1885. During WWI Prince's family members had served in France.
Growing up, Prince became a superb marksman with exceptional tracking and stealth skills learned from countless days spent hunting in the wilderness around his Indigenous reserve. Prince's father would teach him marksmanship and he developed the skill to shoot five bullets through a target the size of a playing card at 100 metres. He attended Elkhorn Residential School, completing grade eight, where he studied agricultural science and machinery. He joined the student Royal Canadian Army Cadets and later stated, "As soon as I put my uniform on, I felt like a better man. I even tried to wear it to class." He continued with the Army Cadets throughout his teenage years. Prince had aspirations to become a lawyer, but had to leave school at age 16 due to circumstances of the time, dire family finances during the Great Depression. He was employed at a variety of manual-labour positions but primarily as a tree feller.
World War II
First Special Service Force (FSSF) creation
At the start of World War II in September 1939 Prince volunteered to fight with the Canadian Army, although First Nations members were not subject to any conscription for national defence and were not required to join the armed forces. He easily met the requirements for recruitment, but was turned down several times. He was finally accepted on 3 June 1940 at a time when the war had reached a crisis for British and Canadian forces with defeat in the Fall of France. Prince was shortly afterwards transported by ship to England. He was originally a member of the Royal Canadian Engineers, trained as a "sapper" or member of a combat engineering platoon. He was promoted to lance corporal in February 1941. Prince eventually became bored with the routine duties spent mostly behind a desk or a lathe, and joined organized Canadian Army sports activities such as running and boxing. Later in 1942 he learned of the creation of a new unit which interested him, and he volunteered for duty with a parachute unit designated the 2nd Canadian Parachute Battalion. This designation was used to disguise the true reason for the recruitment of parachute volunteers in the UK at that time: the United States and Canada had begun the formation of a special force to conduct secret sabotage and raids against German deuterium plants or heavy water production being used in atomic weapons research in German-occupied Norway. Men were recruited in Canada and in the overseas Canadian Army in Britain for this unit secretly named the First Special Service Force. The Canadians involved with this training continued to be listed on the rosters of their prior units. Although later given an official title of the 2nd Canadian Parachute Battalion for administrative purposes, no such unit actually existed. Prince then reported to the UK's parachute school at RAF Ringway, near Manchester. Out of 100 initial volunteers, Prince was one of the nine graduates of the parachute course to be chosen to continue with the selection program.In September 1942 he returned to Canada where his enlistment was registered as the 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion, and was promoted to sergeant. He then formally but unofficially volunteered for the still confidential and unknown 1st Canadian Special Service Battalion and proceeded to Fort Benning, Georgia, where they were forming. The Canadians were well below strength due to injuries in training and washouts of substandard recruits. They agreed to bolster the 1st Special Service Force commando unit by allowing men to volunteer, and were transported to Helena, Montana where the Americans in the Force were training. Due to security and secrecy concerns, the Americans and Canadians were transported to Montana by trains with the windows blacked out, so that no one would know where they were headed. The modern American and Canadian special operations forces trace their heritage to this unit. The Force initially consisted of 1,800 men, 900 Americans and 900 Canadians, and one-half of the officers were Canadian and the Brigade second-in-command was a Canadian. As casualties reduced the size of the Force during combat, the Canadian contingent could not be completely replaced due to manpower restrictions in the Canadian Army, and eventually about two-thirds of the brigade were American and one-third Canadian.
The Brigade commander was Robert T. Frederick, who had masterminded the creation of the unit. Frederick would later be hailed by Winston Churchill as "the greatest fighting General of all time". American equipment, arms, and uniforms were used and provided by the U.S. government with a Canadian financial contribution. Prince and the other men of this unit were originally chosen for their rugged outdoor backgrounds and received rigorous training, often under live fire. Only single men were chosen for the Force, married men were not accepted. All members of this elite commando force received intensive instruction in stealth tactics, hand-to-hand combat, the use of explosives for demolition, amphibious warfare, rock climbing and mountain fighting and as ski troops. They were trained meticulously in the operation and assembly of German weapons, in the event that it became necessary to use German weapons on the battlefield during combat. This training in German weapons would later prove to be of critical importance in some of the Force's battles. Prince became a "Reconnaissance Sergeant"—or, in the Force table of organization, a "Scout"—responsible for moving into forward positions and reporting on the movements of the enemy.
Warrior Traditions
Prince's Ojibwe First Nations warrior traditions would be assimilated into his combat skills. The Ojibwe/Algonkian warrior traditions emphasized the skills of stealth and invisibility in their tactical methods. Even in large scale battles, once the action commenced the fighting was undertaken on a single combat basis by individual warriors. The causes and resolutions of the battle were determined by individual grievances, and loss of life was deliberately circumscribed to resolve the issues with a minimum of casualties.Prince would later be credited with entering enemy sleeping locations and leaving messages or stealing boots, a form of native traditional Counting coup whereby an enemy is shocked or shamed without causing harm. This achievement would lead to honours of promotion within the tribe.
Italy deployment
The Norwegian operations were cancelled due to changes in Allied strategy against the German deuterium plants which were instead destroyed by Norwegian commandos. To prevent the Force from being disbanded, Frederick then volunteered the FSSF to fight against the Japanese in Alaska. Following reassignment, the 1st Special Service Force was initially deployed in the Aleutians for possible actions against Japanese forces, but no battlefield situations materialized.The unique capabilities of the Force in mountain warfare were finally recognized by Allied commanders in the Italian campaign, and the Force then moved to Italy in November 1943. They would take part in the stalled Allied offensive against the Bernhard or Winter Line, which had effectively obstructed the Allied push towards Rome. In December and January, the 1st Special Service Force would be assigned to assault enemy positions which were regarded as impregnable, Monte la Difensa, Hill 720, Monte Majo and Monte Vischiataro, assignments which large assaulting formations of Allied soldiers had failed to attain, and had sustained enormous and sometimes catastrophic casualties in the attempts.
After a temporary posting in Naples, the Force moved on 20 November 1943 to a permanent base at the Italian Artillery School barracks approximately one-half mile west of Santa Maria well north of Naples near Monte Cassino. It was from this location that Tommy Prince initially discovered and developed his capabilities of entering enemy locations at night without making any sound and without the enemy being aware of his presence. Prince's ability to move in complete silence wearing traditional Ojibwe moccasins into situations where the enemy could be threatened became known to senior officers such as Lt. Col. Tom Gilday, who commanded Prince's battalion. Gilday established a close working relationship with Prince and would assign him to special tasks requiring his unusual abilities.