Sergeant Joe "Red" Hartsock

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Joseph Hartsock
July 26, 1922 - ???
Nickname	Joe, Red
Place of birth	Laramie,Wyoming
Rank	Before Hill 30: Corporal; After Hill 30: Sergeant; After Normandy: Staff Sergeant
Unit	Fox Company, 2nd Battalion, 101st Airborne 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment

Sergeant Joe "Red" Hartsock is a fictional person from Gearbox Software's Brothers in Arms series. Hartsock is a secondary person in Brothers in Arms: Road to Hill 30 and the playable protagonist of Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood.

1 Hartsock's Past
2 Brothers in Arms: Road to Hill 30
- 2.1 Hartsock's Fire Team
3 Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood
- 3.1 Baker and Hartsock
4 Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway
5 Misc. Info
6 See also

[edit] Hartsock's Past

Joe "Red" Hartsock (he got the nickname "Red" because of his red hair) is a family man from Laramie, Wyoming. He was born on July 26, 1922. During his youth Hartsock grew up on his father's farm where he worked all the way up until the day he volunteered for the U.S. Army. Hartsock was a wild and rebellious young man that gained a rather large and painful looking scar during a bar fight in which what he describes as "an angry lumberjack" cut his face with a broken beer bottle. Hartsock soon married his wife named Erma, whom was a very strict and authoritarian woman that whipped the rebellious Hartsock into shape. Hartsock and Erma had a daughter named Carol, just before he shipped out to basic training.

Hartsock joined the 101st Airborne Division and was eventually moved to England with the rest of his unit to train for the initial invasion of Normandy, "Operation Overlord." At this time Hartsock was a Corporal and lead 3rd Squad's Fire Team. Hartsock, and Sergeant Matt Baker (whom was at that time a Corporal) were good friends and often joked about how they had 13 men in their squad and that they didn't care about what would happen in combat and would just let fate take it's course. However, shortly before D-Day, the 3rd Squad's leader injured his leg during a training exercise and Baker was forced to become Squad Leader.

[edit] Brothers in Arms: Road to Hill 30

High above the Normandy coast, 3rd Squad was getting set to jump behind enemy lines from their C-47 transport planes when the German defenders began to open up with anti-air artillery. So much flak was generated but the inexperienced pilots began to fly to low and/or fast and began to break formation which scattered the 101st Airborne all over Normandy. Hartsock's plane was no exception. As they were waiting for the green light to jump, Sergeant Baker was knocked out of the plane by a flak burst, at which time Platoon Sergeant "Mac" Hassay ordered the squad out of the plane.

During his drop Hartsock's leg bag which held his M1 Carbine (M1A1 variation) was ripped from his leg, so he was unarmed. Hartsock's chute got entangled in a tree and as he dangled in mid air a German soldier came across him. The German was about to kill him until he was cut down by rifle fire. Hartsock was saved by Corporal Seamus Doyle from the 82nd Airborne Division, whom quickly became one of his best friends during the Normandy invasion.

During Road to Hill 30, Hartsock followed Baker through some of the most bloody battles in the early days of the invasion. Most notably Hartsock helped Baker secure "Objective XYZ," helped secure the town of Vierville, paved the way for glider reinforcements (Hartsock gets his trademark Browning Automatic Rifle or BAR from a dead soldier in a crashed glider), lead his fire team through Purple Heart Lane, led his fire team during Lieutenant Colonel Robert Cole's charge, led his fire team through the Battle of Carentan, and finally helped with the frantic and bloody defense of Hill 30.

[edit] Hartsock's Fire Team

At no point during D-Day did Hartsock have his full Fire Team which would have included Private Larry Allen, Pvt. Michael Garnett, Pfc. Stephan "Obi" Obrieski, Pfc. Tom Zanovich, and Pvt. David Muzza. Pvt. Muzza was killed in the C-47 by flak before he had the chance to jump. During the first few days of the operation Hartsock led Privates Allen and Garnett until they were killed during a flanking maneuver against an enemy held farm when they were under the command of Pfc. Kevin "Legs" Legget, whom Hartsock blames for their deaths. Finally, Pfc. Obrieski was killed by a sniper in Carentan. In fact, Pfc. Zanovich was the sole survivor, and it is likely that he took over the Fire Team after Hartsock was promoted (Zanovich is seen leading the team in the debut trailer and bootlegged videos of Gearbox's Hell's Highway demonstration).

Even through all of this Hartsock maintains himself as a strong leader and as a result of his incredible feats during D-Day he was promoted to Sergeant after the defense of Hill 30 and became the Squad Leader of 2nd Squad.

[edit] Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood

Throughout Earned in Blood, Hartsock is telling the details of his experience in Normandy to Army historian S.L.A. Marshall. The first half of the story tells about missions that happened in between the normal missions in Road to Hill 30. Due to the terrible misdrops the airborne suffered Hartsock was often stuck with members of 2nd Squad, mostly Corporal Franklin Paddock and Pvt. Dean "Friar" Winchell though he did also have Pfc. Marsh on occasion too. This was mostly due to the fact that 2nd Squad's Sergeant was killed during the drop.

After Hartsock is promoted to 2nd Squad's leader the left overs from 1st Squad (Cpl. Jacob Campbell, Pvt. Will Paige, and Pvt. Derrick McConnel) are folded into 2nd as the squad's Fire Team. Hartsock helps Baker push the remaining Germans out of Carentan, leads most of what was left of 3rd Platoon to clear out the unit's left flank during the defense of Hill 30, and finally helped Cpl. Doyle and the 82nd to capture and clear the strategically important city of St. Sauveur, France. Unfortunately while in St. Sauveur he witnesses his friend Doyle get vaporized by a tank shell from a Panzer tank. The blast disoriented Hartsock, and Pvt. Paige (whom had a sucking chest wound from a piece of the shell) used the last ounce of his strength to pull Hartsock to safety before dying right in front of him. Hartsock however rallies his men and ultimately leads them to win the engagement. Afterwards, Hartsock finds Doyle's 82nd arm patch and secures it to his helmet as a gesture of remembrance.

[edit] Baker and Hartsock

Hartsock and Baker as described above had a strong bond before the drop into Normandy but Hartsock began to feel anger and resentment towards Baker as their squad mates kept on dying. Hartsock had been put into several leadership roles early in the campaign and hadn't lost a single man and yet under Baker's command most of 3rd Squad was being killed. After the death of Pvt. Desola, Hartsock vowed to never let death have him or any of his men. However, Hartsock did in fact lose Paige and he also lost his best friend Doyle. After his interview with S.L.A. Marshall, Hartsock begins to understand the terrible pain and turmoil Baker had been going through since becoming the leader of 3rd Squad. As a result the two forged an even stronger bond than before that was "earned in blood."

[edit] Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway

In Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway Hartsock and Baker take part in Operation Market Garden, an operation that ultimately failed. Hartsock will lead a squad consisting of the survivors of 2nd Squad (Campbell, McConnel, Paddock, Friar, and Marsh) in addition to new replacements.

[edit] Misc. Info

Hartsock is most often seen in the games using an M1A1 Carbine during the early parts of D-Day and the BAR during the later stages. However during an assault on the city of Baupte, France, Hartsock's ring finger is blown off at the tip and on top of this the stock of his BAR is shattered by a piece of shrapnel that took his finger. After this incident Hartsock is seen wielding the M1 Garand rifle and Thompson submachine gun.