I Remember

[sgtcarl1]

Does anyone know that the official mottoe of the SS was "Gott mit uns."? "God with us"

[Saltwater Cowboy]

Remembering my late Uncle...captured by the Nazis during the Battle of the Bulge; his squad, cut off and surrounded. Taken by train to a POW camp near Berlin. Only talked about it once. After Thanksgiving dinner; sent the little kids away to play; recounted his story for the 1st time after almost 35 years. His own wife, a former Army Nurse, never heard the whole story till then....He spent a year in the camp (downwind from some gas ovens). No sanitary facilities, no running water. Only an outside ditch, completely overflowing after 3 months. Fed cabbage 90% of the time. Lived in mud and human waste. Lice, maggots, disease and death every day.
Listened to the American and British bombers hitting their targets day after day. Closer and closer wondering if an errant bomb would finish their suffering.
Woke up one day to complete silence. Locked in cages and no guards in sight. They all had left. Later in the afternoon heard sounds of engines coming down the road. A long column of Soviet armor.
Liberation. Russian tanks knocked walls and gates down and released the prisoners. What was left of them. The sick and unable to walk were taken away by ambulance. The rest, my uncle included, were given directions and maps with instructions how to reach the American lines.

Now if you are queasy and unsettled by this....Please close this thread....If you want to know what war can do to someone's psyche...read on.


My uncle recounted that during his captivity, he changed. (wouldn't we all) He was no longer a fun loving 2nd generation Italian from Brooklyn. He was a man so filled with rage at what had been done to his friends and himself. He blamed the German people period. We in this day and age know that many in the German population were captive to the Nazi regime as well. But my uncle didn't. All he knew was that the Germans were the cause of everything wrong in his life.
He asked a young Russian soldier for a rifle and ammo. The soldier foolishly found him one and several clips. My uncle proceeded to hike down the road with several of his fellow POWs and a couple of Russians with him till he came to the village that in his mind had tolerated and supported the POW and concentration camps in the area. He raised his gifted rifle and fired at groups of German civilians in the streets. Dropping men, children and women in the process. He was tackled and disarmed and sent to American lines under guard. No mention of the incident was made to any of the American commanders by his Russian guards and he was treated like any other liberated POW. Washed, fed, doctored and sent home.
Never would he speak of it.....until that Thanksgiving dinner with his whole family around......he never spoke of it again.

The quote that "war is hell" is about the most mild statement anyone could say.

Matt