The Story of Fritz Niland...The Real Ryan
This is the story of the family who the SPR movie is based on. Mr. Spielberg was quite a guy to meet. This is a portion of my book about the Niland family. My father was Private Ryan. I thank you for the opportunity to write this story without all the Nazi crap that seems to be drawn to the various chat lines about Fritz. This is the true story, part of which is in the movie. Thanks, cate
This last two years the dramatic story of the Niland family was brought to light once again after 55 years with the release of Steven Spielberg's outstanding film Saving Private Ryan. In the movie a paratrooper in the 101rst Airborne is rescued from behind enemy lines in a daring attempt to send Ryan home as the sole surviving son after all his brothers are killed. Mr. Spielberg had us tell our story on the HBO Special Saving Private Ryan after he met us in Hollywood. Like the fictional Ryan, my father, Sgt. Fritz Niland was forced to return home as a sole surviving son following D-Day after losing his three brothers in the week of June 6th, 1944. At first Fritz refused to go, insisting his mother would understand his desire to stay with the only brothers he had left, his fellow paratroopers. John Bacon remembers Fritz saying, " No, I'm not going, I'm staying with the boys." His jump buddies confirm Fritz initially was ready to make the Army send him back in handcuffs. I think it must have been very hard for my father that first year he returned to the states. This forever set my family in history books and the memories of his comrades. The war never did really end for Dad. He carried it with him for the rest of his life.
So strong are the similarities of the movie with the Niland story that historical author Mark Bando contacted me in Anchorage and asked, "Has Hollywood called you yet?" They had not, which prompted me to write a letter to Mr. Spielberg. In the letter I included old newspaper articles from the time of the invasion and family photos of my father and uncles.
In part I wrote:
"God blesses you Mr. Spielberg and my family thanks you for making a movie that will honor the incredible heart and bravado of these veterans. This story I tell you is my family's legacy. I hope you will understand the love and pride we feel when their names are mentioned. The Paratroopers themselves compared their endeavor to St. Crispian Day. It is taken from Shakespeare's Henry V Act IV, a play my father read to me as a child.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
I personally wish you great success with Saving Private Ryan. I trust that your movie will help these men to rest in peace. My father and my uncles did their duty before God and man. Today I say a prayer for all the warriors who gave their lives, expecting that our generation might live our dreams. I hope God has a special place in heaven for each and every one of them"
After reading my letter, Steven Spielberg was so amazed by the parallels of his movie and the true story of the Niland brothers that he personally invited the direct descendents of the Niland clan from around the country as his guests to come to Hollywood and tell our family history. The story was told in the HBO special Saving Private Ryan, which aired nationally on cable July 21rst, 1998. The HBO filming was held up for over an hour as the Niland family met with Mr. Spielberg. He read every letter and looked at every picture. At one point, my cousin Pete Niland, my Uncle Eddie's only son and the last Niland to carry on the family name shared a copy of a letter written from the battlefield by our Uncle Bobbie to our grandmother Gussie. The letter promising her that after the war he and all the brothers would return safely home. The reading of the letter brought tears to everyone's eyes. The family was invited to return a second time to Hollywood for the premiere of the movie. At a private reception held before the film premiered the family, including the Niland granddaughters, had the incredible opportunity of meeting meet Mr. Tom Hanks and the other stars of the movie. The experience was deeply moving as the family proudly recalled the bravery and sacrifice of the four Niland boys of Tonawanda, New York. In the 54 years that have since passed, the impact of the Niland story as first told has not lessened one single bit.
On June 6th, 1944 my father, Sgt. Frederick (Fritz) Niland made history in the great D-Day invasion as a 101rst combat paratrooper in the 501rst PIRA Co. H. Fritz's plane was hit buy enemy fire and his group was dropped miles away from their jump target. Slowly over nine days the group reassembled and fought their way back to Carrentan with the help of the French Underground and their leader Jean Kapiton. After Fritz reunited with his comrades in arms he received news that his brother Mortar Sgt. Robert Niland with the 82nd Airborne 505th PIRA Co. D had been killed on D-Day protecting the wounded after they had run out of ammo around Neville au Plain. My dad sought out the company chaplain Father Francis Sampson who took Fritz to search in the make- shift cemeteries around St. Mere Eglise to find Bob. They searched several cemeteries and were unable to find him. Father Sampson told Fritz there was one more place to check and when the chaplain emerged from the last cemetery he was happy to tell my father there was no Robert Niland there, only a Preston Niland a platoon leader with the 22nd Infantry Regiment 4th Division. Father Sampson assumed there must have been a mistake in names. "Father Sampson, Preston is my brother too, replied Fritz." In this sad way my father discovered that his other brother Preston had been killed as well. He was killed D+1 Day defending the wounded at Utah Beach. It was a terrible moment for my Dad. Within this tight timeframe his oldest brother T/ Sgt. Edward Niland had been reported shot down in Burma on May 20th 1944. Uncle Eddie a radio operator and gunner with the 25th bomber group was presumed dead. At that moment my father's life changed forever. Finally, back in England after several attempts to have Fritz return willingly and fed up with my Dad's resistance to return home, in August of 1944 President Roosevelt ordered Fritz home. Father Sampson told him, "Fritz you can take it up with General Eisenhower or the President, but your going home." I will never forget the haunted look in his eyes when he would recount the story to my sister Mary and I as children. He told us, " Girls never forget it took a presidential congressional order to get me out of France." My father told us that there would come a time in our lives that we would not be able to deny the fighting genes of the 101rst Airborne that flows through our veins. Fritz's prediction has come to pass. We are truly the 501 Children of Wonders.
My grandfather and grandmother, Michael and Augusta Niland received the first telegram about Edward on June 6, 1944. The other telegrams kept coming over the next week informing my grandparents of the tragic extent of their loss. Over and over again they read, "The secretary of war desires me to express his deep regret" In one week, three sons killed and the fourth, my dad, who was the youngest, had been reported missing in action since June 6th, behind enemy lines. The family was later told that after several telegram deliveries the bicycle courier refused to go back to my grandparent's home. "Please don't send me back to that house." He could not bear to give Mrs. Niland yet another telegram. My father's cousin Joe Niland remembers how my Grandma Gussie cried as each telegram was delivered. "She felt ashamed she didn't instinctively know in her heart which of her sons was lying dead on a foreign battlefield. She told us years later that she had prayed for each of her boys, but felt from start she would loss them all." After the war my grandmother refused to touch the bedrooms of my uncles, and my father himself would never enter them. As 5-year-old child I can remember my Uncles beds being perfectly made and all their clothes still in their closets. Everything as they had left it. We were not allowed to play in that room. My Aunt Claire, the oldest Niland sister, told us it was a matter of respect. Our uncles had died as heroes and Grandma Gussie could not let them go.
After my father returned home he was assigned as an MP at the Buffalo train station. The position embarrassed him, and he was unhappy with the treatment. He had been a member of the elite. He told me years later that he had signed on as a paratrooper not an MP. He felt that the Army had broken their contract. Fritz suffered much indignity in that first year home. Most notable is a story that my Aunt Diana (Edward's wife) told us. As an MP Fritz was allowed to wear civilian clothes on the weekends. He took my aunt and some friends out to dinner. While in that restaurant a stranger came up to the table and asked, "What's a healthy young man like you doing out of uniform?" My father's sense of humor still alive, His reply and the stranger's comeuppance: " I guess lady that's my reward for minding my own damned business." Fritz later told me he could have had both his legs shot off under that table for all she knew.
Around that time my Grandmother being of German decent had her dachshund hung in the backyard by a Nazi hater. I can tell you my grandmother was devastated to think that after the sacrifice of her sons, someone would think she was sympathetic with the German Nazis. Even after this incident my father never disclaimed the German soldiers as evil. He pointed out the enemy's admirable qualities. They were brave men and good fighters. To my father it was Hitler that was evil. Hitler destroyed Germany.
My grandfather had a dynamic dream about my Uncle Eddie. Cousin Pete remembers the story that my grandfather had a dream that Ed was alive. Grandpa Mike dreamed that the plane crashed, and Ed stepped out of the smoldering plane. My grandfather asked, "Son are you all right?" 'Yeah, I'm all right Dad, I'm coming home." The dream was so intense that Mike awakened my grandmother and said, "Gussie, Eddie is o-kay, he's coming home." For a year after that there was always a chair held for my uncle at the dinner table. Cousin Billyanna Niland recalls that they thought my grandmother had succumbed to stress, but true to the dream, a year later Uncle Eddie escaped from a Japanese prison camp and returned home. He was only 75lbs. when he returned home. My Dad said that they were moving Ed and the other prisoners to another camp and they were striffted by enemy fire from planes. They all scattered into a field and when the Japanese gathered them back into formation, Eddie just stayed in the field. He wandered for days through the jungle hiding. Later he heard troops coming through the area. They were the British Gurkas and Eddie jumped up to make himself known. In that moment Uncle Eddie heard his brother Preston's voice calling out to him, "What kind of soldier are you? Get Down!" Eddie dropped down and seconds later machine gun fire came over his head. They thought he was Japanese. He jumped up again and cried, "Don't shoot, I'm an American!" At that time there is no way my uncle could have known of Preston's death. There is no doubt in my mind of a spiritual intervention by my Uncle Preston to save my Uncle Eddie's life.
I have known since childhood that I came from a family of warriors. My grandfather Michel Niland was a Rough Rider with Teddy Roosevelt on San Juan Hill. The family remembers affectionately my grandfather's boast in typical Niland bravado. Grandpa said, "He wouldn't have made it without a Niland, I carried Teddy up that hill."
My dad was the bravest man I ever knew. He taught me honor, integrity and real courage. He faced many demons after the war and won, but we will always remember Fritz as a great guy and a good soldier, as John Bacon says, "Fritz was all Man." He passed on to me the truest sense of what means to be a descendent of the 101rst Airborne. Geronimo!!!!!
http://www.homestead.com/sprfanfic/fritzniland.html