Wings of Freedom Print Page Close Page

Jake McNiece

World War II had its Eisenhower. Its MacArthur. Its Patton.
And then there were the likes of Jake McNiece, who apparently never saw a fight he didn't like.
Jake McNiece

An enlisted man, McNiece served 3 1/2 stormy years in the Army, and in Europe in World War II became knows as the leader of the "Filthy Thirteen."

McNiece said that during World War II he had a knack for fighting, whether it was against the Germans or while he was on leave or had gone AWOL.

When he was being separated from the Army in 1946, after the war ended in 1945, McNiece said he inquired about separation pay for the good time he had served.

He remembers a captain telling him that it appeared he had more bad time and he might owe the Army.

As a soldier, McNiece admits, he liked to fight, drink, chase women, go AWOL and often landed in the brig.

But, more than anything else, McNiece was in the business of fighting a war against the Germans.

The gruff-talking 85-year-old believes "The Dirty Dozen" movie starring Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine and Charles Bronson was loosely based on "The Filthy Thirteen."

In the 1967 classic, Marvin played a U.S. Army major assigned to train a dozen convicted murderers for an assassination mission targeting German officers.

"Hollywood," McNiece says of the movie.

"They were all good men," he says of the other 12 members of "The Filthy Thirteen," who were paratroopers.

But, he adds, "they were misfits. We didn't salute officers. We didn't mop barracks. We didn't do all that crappy nonsense that they had. But, we were all good combat soldiers," who often wore Mowhawk haircuts.

"We weren't there to play soldier. We were there to kill Germans," McNiece said.

The Ponca City resident is the author of a book titled "The Filthy Thirteen." It is subtitled "The True Story of 'The Dirty Dozen.'"
McNiece said his co-author in writing the book, Richard Kilblane, at first said several people "questioned whether these things really happened."

McNiece said Kilblane, a former Ponca City resident and now an Army historian, became convinced after around two dozen World War II enlisted men and around six commissioned officers said they did.

This story is based on the account by McNiece, who was a member of the 101st Airborne Division.

The Filthy 13
Book Description
Since World War II, the American public has become fully aware of the exploits of the 101st Airborne Division, the paratroopers who led the Allied invasions into Nazi-held Europe. But within the ranks of the 101st, a subunit attained legendary status at the time, its reputation persisting among veterans over the decades. Primarily products of the Dustbowl and the Depression, the Filthy13 grew notorious, even within the ranks of the elite 101st. Never ones to salute an officer, or take a bath, this squad became singular within the Screaming Eagles for its hard drinking, and savage fighting skill and that was only in training. Just prior to the invasion of Normandy, a "Stars and Stripes" photographer caught U.S. paratroopers with heads shaved into Mohawks, applying war paint to their faces. Unknown to the American public at the time, these men were the Filthy 13. After parachuting behind enemy lines in the dark hours before D-Day, the Germans got a taste of the reckless courage of this unit except now the men were fighting with Tommy guns and explosives, not just bare knuckles. In its spearhead role, the 13 suffered heavy casualties, some men wounded and others blown to bits. By the end of the war 30 men had passed through the squad. Throughout the war, however, the heart and soul of the Filthy 13 remained a survivor named Jake McNiece, a half-breed Indian from Oklahoma the toughest man in the squad and the one who formed its character. McNiece made four combat jumps, was in the forefront of every fight in northern Europe, yet somehow never made the rank of PFC. The survivors of the Filthy 13 stayed intact as a unit until the Allies finally conquered Nazi Germany. The book does not draw a new portrait of earnest citizen soldiers. Instead it describes a group of hardscrabble guys whom any respectable person would be loath to meet in a bar or dark alley. But they were an integral part of the U.S. war against Nazi Germany. A brawling bunch of no-good niks whose only saving grace was that they inflicted more damage on the Germans than on MPs, the English countryside and their own officers, the Filthy 13 remain a legend within the ranks of the 101st Airborne.