Capt. Hans Dollhausen
ans C. Dollhausen was born around 1940 and grew up in the Cleveland, Ohio area, where he attended St. Ignatius High School. As a kid, Hans was the kind of boy every neighborhood knew — out on the sandlots playing baseball with his buddies, greeting everyone with the wide, warm smile that would become his trademark for the rest of his life. Those who knew him then would say he was simply “a fine gentleman,” even as a young man.
Hans answered his country’s call and was commissioned as an officer in the United States Army. By 1965, he held the rank of Captain and was assigned as the Commanding Officer of Battery A, 1st Battalion, 16th Air Defense Artillery, 2nd Armored Division — “Hell on Wheels” — stationed at Fort Hood, Texas. His command was no ordinary artillery unit. Captain Dollhausen led the men responsible for the MGR-1 Honest John Rocket, the Army’s most powerful field-deployable weapon system, capable of delivering both high-explosive and nuclear warheads.
During the height of the Vietnam War buildup, Captain Dollhausen kept his soldiers sharp, briefed, and battle-ready at all times. “When the call came, we wouldn’t have the luxury of hesitation,” he told his men. “We had to go, right now.” In March 1966, he stood alongside Secretary of the Army Stanley Resor during a live Rocket firing demonstration — a testament to the trust the Army placed in him and his unit. His soldiers remember him as one of the finest commanding officers they ever served under — a leader who earned respect not through rank alone, but through the way he carried himself and cared for his men.
After his military service, Hans returned to Ohio and settled in Independence, where he built a successful sporting goods business and a beautiful family. He married Joan Carole Biales, and together they raised their daughter, Amanda. In time, he became the proud grandfather of Gretchen Carole and Graham Cornel.
Captain Hans C. Dollhausen passed away in October 2014 at the age of 74. He was laid to rest at Holy Cross Cemetery following a Mass of Christian Burial at St. Michael Church. Decades after their service together, the soldiers of the 16th Artillery still speak his name with admiration. He was, as one of them put it, “one of the best of those we served with.”
Captain Dollhausen — your men haven’t forgotten you, sir. Soon, we will all be back in formation.