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03 - Hearing About Concentration Camps

When did you first start learning about the concentration camps and what was happening?

We had heard some rumors in the States, but nobody knew for sure. They didn't want to believe it—is what the big problem was. And we didn't really know until we goot over there and actually saw the concentration camps and the bodies and everything else. And the survivors—we'd get into these concentration camps and these survivors they were skin and bones. They weighed, maybe, sixty or seventy pounds. Bodies all over, as I said, when we came in they were stacked line cord wood against the buildings. I read some things that a lot of other GIs had written about this kind of thing and every single one of them uses the same expression, "Bodies stacked like cord wood." It was amazing, every one of these GIs that I had read about, they all said the same thing. It was just unbelievable. We saw the ovens where they were gassed and everything else. In one town we went in, we went into the town and we took a lot of the town's people, the mayor and a lot of people—we had rifles, we forced them at gun point to come and see the insides of the concentration camps so they could see what was really going on. Even then some of the didn't want to believe it.

How often did your division take prisoners of war?

We took prisoners of war a lot. The end of the Battle of the Bulge, for example, we were taking prisoners out by the truckload and sending them back of the lines to prisoner of war camps. Almost everywhere we went, eventually they were surrendering. At the end, a lot of the Germans that we were facing were either very old men or young children. People were in their sixties—which to me is young today of course but that was old—and young, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen year olds. They were forced into the German Army and forced to fight. Of course, the worst ones were the SS troopers. They were a bunch of arrogant bastards. I must say the first time I ever saw one was in the States when I was at this air base. They had captured some SS troopers, sent them as prisoners of war back to the States from North Africa. These were the first ones we saw. When my wife and I were married—and she came with me to Columbia South Carolina for several months before I was transferred to the infantry—she used to come onto the camp occasionally. We'd walk through the camp, and I can still remember—you know my wife was young and beautiful—and these German SS troopers, the prisoners, some of them would be making remarks in English and whistling. If I had had a weapon, I would have shot the bastards. But they were under guard and they were shut down very quickly. But they were just so arrogant. Just incredible.

I know there were a number of POW camps in the United States. Were any of these work camps like the one that you're referring to?

They were in different places. I didn't see a whole PW camp, but I remember the prisoners were at, for example, the army air base. They were used as prisoners to do different kinds of things, all under armed guard of course. It was really something though. I had other experiences that were interesting. The outfit I was with in Linz, Austria, as I mentioned, we ran the displaced persons and prisoners of war camps in Austria and I was with a small group, part of the intelligence group. We had several dozen guys in the office. I was the chief administrative non-com, I was a staff sergeant. We had about fifteen, twenty guys in the group, including about ten GIs who were interpreters. Between them, they probable spoke sixteen languages. What was interesting was that we had contacts. The different nationalities had a repatriation officer. Hungary, France, even Germany, every country you could think of, we had one repatriation officer that we worked with to repatriate their nationals back to their town. We gave each of these officers a vehicle and a gasoline allowance. We took care of them. But everybody had to come through my office to get things. Here I was nineteen, twenty, twenty-one years old and I had a lot of responsibility. I handled it well I think. We used to get mothers, wives, daughters, sisters of prisoners that we had—prisoners of war—and they would come into our office and they'd come to my office and they'd say, "Oh, my son, my husband, was not a Nazi. We didn't know what's going on." Bullshit. There is know way they could not know what was going on in these particular cases. They just wanted them released and I never would do anything for them.

So you were in charge of the POW camps as well as the DP camps?

The administrative office at this particular group.

But it wasn't just the DP camps?

Displaced persons and prisoner of war camps. It was interesting.

Battle of the Bulge

When did you first realize the Germans were counter-attacking in the Battle of the Bulge?

I wasn't there for the beginning of it, I got in at the end of the Battle of the Bulge. At the beginning they were pushing us back and then it finally turned around and we were pushing them back. That's when we started taking prisoners and sending them back.

And where were you exactly?

It was in Germany. I can't even tell you the names of some of these places. I wish I had kept a real good diary.

Did you have close friends in your group?

Obviously we were all close. When it was all over we got separated into different places. I was with the Battle of the Bulge, a lot of them got sent into different areas. Some of them joined me when we went to Austria, but everybody got sent someplace else.

So the guys that you trained with?

We got separated. When I trained I met a couple of my high school friends and we got separated after that. But I'm still in touch with some of them. Miriam and I had some very good friends and to this day, am still in touch with some of them who survived.

Those people that you mentioned that you are still in touch with, were you in combat with them side-by-side?

One of them especially. Matter of fact, he was the best man at our wedding. I wanted my brother to be best man, but he was not able to get a furlough at the time, he was in flight training.

What's this guy's name?

Al Wold We were in school together. Matter of fact, he knew my wife before I did. I was in touch with him so he became my best man at the wedding. Then we trained together and went on to certain areas and then we got separated. Afterwards we got out and we're still in touch.

Were you in touch during the war itself?

You couldn't. It was impossible. Unless you were in the same unit, it was impossible to keep in touch. When I think of what was going on then and compare it to today, or even Vietnam, or what's happening today, the public had a different view of things. Everybody was wholeheartedly in support of everything. Not like today.

It's a very special group of people that served and a special time, a very patriotic time in our country's history.

We just made a lot of good friends. I remember one of my very close friends, I could still remember him in combat and afterwards. His name was Don and he was from Omaha. We kept in touch for a short time, but that was kind of difficult to do.

The war was just about over when Franklin Roosevelt died. Can you describe?

He died in '45...

...in April...

...early '45. The Germans surrendered shortly afterwards, as a matter of fact. And Truman became president.

Can you describe the environment when you found out that he had passed away?

We were all tickled pink that that part was over. Then they started transferring a lot of troops to the Pacific theater.

Can I ask first about FDR's death? When you found out that Roosevelt had passed away?

We were in a troop convoy, I remember, on a road going someplace and the word came down. Somebody had heard it on a radio somewhere that Roosevelt had died, and everybody took it pretty hard, of course. They couldn't believe it. Then everyone wants to know, "Who's Truman?" Nobody knew who Truman was at the time. It was different.

Concentration Camp Rumors

You talked about how you had heard some rumors about the concentration camps before you got there. What did you hear? What were the rumors?

The fact that there were concentration camps, but nobody wanted to believe it in this country. It really wasn't until—there were some eyewitnesses from different countries, but they were few and far between. As I said, nobody wanted to believe it because early on there were no survivors that came out until later on. When we heard about it, obviously everybody was terribly upset. As far as being in the service at the time, in a way I was happy to go in because I wanted to do my part. I didn't volunteer, I knew they would get me anyway very shortly and I wanted to get in as much school as I could before then. I had a half of a semester before I was taken in. But as I say, people did not want to talk about it, about those concentration camps. When I came back from the service after my discharge, I couldn't talk, I couldn't tell anybody about what I saw. It took me years before I was able to talk about my experiences. I found out afterwards that that was not uncommon. It took me years before I could talk about it.

When you heard those first rumors, who were you hearing them from? Other soldiers?

Some soldiers, a couple of the training people who came back to do some training. I mean they knew about them, but that was even before they went in to liberate the camps.

Did they talk about actual things that were happening at the concentration camps?

It took a long time before people really knew what was going on in the concentration camps. Not until we actually got into the camps and then talked to these people, and saw, and talked with them. By that time, many of them obviously did not know English, but there was a few who did and we had enough people who could translate for us. But we could see what went on. There was no way you couldn't tell. You saw the bodies and the ovens and all of that. It was right out there to see and when you saw it you couldn't believe it.

 

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