Category: War in Europe

Escape Over the Pyrenees Mountains: And the Story of WWII B-17 Gunner “Bud” Owens

 

Francis “Bud” Owens during B-17 Flying Fortress training with the 381st Bombardment Group at Pyote Army Air Base, Texas, spring 1943.  Photograph WW2 Escape Lines Memorial Society.

 

Francis Edward “Bud” Owens was born December 26, 1923, in Lawrenceville, Pennsylvania.  He was one of 10 children.  

Bud enlisted in the United States (US) Army after the December 7, 1941, Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, Oahu, Hawaii.  He became a member of the newly formed United States Army Air Force 381st Bombardment Group (BG) flying the B-17 Flying Fortress and trained in Pyote, Texas, and Pueblo, Colorado.  The 381st BG arrived at Ridgewell, Station 167, County Essex, England, in May and June 1943.  Staff Sergeant (S/Sgt.) Owens was assigned as a B-17 gunner in the 533rd Bombardment Squadron (BS).

June 23, 1943.  In the early morning darkness the 533rd BS Ordance crew was loading bombs (with the fuses in place*) on B-17 tail number 42-30024 for a mission that day.  One of the bombs exploded and caused a series of explosions as other bombs and ammunition aboard and near the plane also blew up.  S/Sgt. Owens was in a nearby aircraft cleaning the guns when he saw a man who was still alive lying on the ground in the explosion area.  He ran over and pulled Private First Class Glen W. Burkland to safety.  For his bravery S/Sgt. Owens was awarded the Soldier’s Medal which is awarded for “distinguishing oneself by heroism not involving actual conflict with an enemy.”  Twenty-three men of the 381st BG and one civilian died that day.

July 4, 1943.  Wartime industrial installations in Le Mans, France, were the Allied targets for the US Eighth Air Force that day.  Ninety-five B-17s were deployed for the mission.  Four B-17s were lost.  

One of the aircraft lost that day was 381st BG B-17 42-29928.  Flying to the target it was attacked by Messerschmitt 109 (ME 109) German fighter planes.  After the number 4 engine and the rudder were hit and with the oxygen line to the rear of the aircraft compromised, Pilot First Lieutenant (1st Lt.) Olof M. Ballinger made the decision to drop out of formation and attempt to return to England.  German fighters continued to attack and anti-aircraft artillery flak was in the air.  B-17 Navigator Second Lieutenant (2nd Lt.) Paul H. McConnell shot down an ME 109 with machine gun fire.  Ballinger gave the crew the order to bailout.  

Left Waist Gunner Owens, realizing no one had heard from the radio operator, opened the door of the radio room discovering a seriously wounded Radio Operator Technical Sergeant (T/Sgt.) John K. Lane.  Flak had most likely hit the aircraft under the radio room, and there was a fire.  Seeing Lane’s condition and noticing his parachute was on fire, Bud pulled him from the room over to the B-17 waist hatch, put his own parachute on Lane, and pushed him out of the plane while pulling the D ring on the parachute.  He then found the spare parachute in the plane, put it on, and jumped.  [T/Sgt. Lane would be found by the Germans, treated for his injuries, and became a prisoner of war (POW).]

Bombardier 2nd Lt. George C. Williams’ parachute accidentally deployed inside of the B-17.  He was last seen moving toward the back of the plane to locate the spare parachute.  2nd Lt. Williams, Ball Turret Gunner S/Sgt. Albert G. Wackermann, and Right Waist Gunner S/Sgt. Harry W. Bauscher were killed in action that day.

The B-17 crashed and exploded in a farm field just south of the village of La Coulonche in the Normandy region of France.  

Flight Engineer and Top Turret Gunner T/Sgt. Byron J. Gronstal  became a POW.  Pilot 1st Lt. Olof M. Ballinger, Co-Pilot 2nd Lt. John M. Carah, Navigator 2nd Lt. Paul H. McConnell, Tail Gunner S/Sgt. William C. Howell, and S/Sgt. Francis E. Owens escaped capture by the Germans and were found by members of the French Resistance.

[Resistance groups in France, Belgium, The Netherlands, and Denmark formed escape and evasion lines to rescue British and American airmen shot down over occupied Europe and to help in their return to England.  

 

Map of WWII Pat, Comet, and Shelburne Escape Lines.  Map WWII Netherlands Escape Lines.

 

The Pat Line (also known as the Pat O’Leary Line), the Comet Line, and the Shelburne Line are noted in the illustration above.  There were other escape lines also, and routes could vary depending on German presence or activity in an area.  Resistance members and Helpers (those people sheltering airmen, providing food and clothing, accompanying them between safe houses and other locations), if caught by the Germans, could be arrested, sent to concentration camps, or executed.  

It is estimated that about 5,000 Allied airmen were helped to evade capture by the Germans in WWII.]

1st Lt. Ballinger and S/Sgt. Owens were found by local Frenchmen on July 4 after parachuting from the B-17 and were reunited while hiding in the area.  

September 1, 1943. Ballinger and Owens were moved from the Normandy countryside to Paris.

October 21, 1943. They left Paris by train for southern France with other evaders to begin the journey over the Pyrenees Mountains. 

 

The Pyrenees Mountains divide France from Spain and stretch about 270 miles (435 kilometers) from the Bay of Biscay to the Mediterranean Sea.  Photograph World Atlas.

 

The plan for the escape group was to climb from France over the Pyrenees to Andorra and then into Spain.  Map World Atlas.

 

The  Allied escape group consisted of seven Americans and seven French military officers.  [Not much historically is known about the Frenchmen in the group.]  The American evaders:

 

Photograph courtesy of Warren Carah and Boren family.

Major William T. Boren, Pilot, B-26 Marauder, 387th BG.  Aircraft crashed in France September 21, 1943.  

Photograph courtesy of Warren Carah and daughters Debra and Patricia Ballinger.

1st Lt. Olof M. Ballinger, Pilot, 381st BG.  B-17 shot down over France on July 4, 1943.

 

 

 

 

Photograph courtesy of Warren Carah and Keith Murray.

1st Lt. Keith W. Murray, Bombardier, 95th BG.  B-17 shot down near Paris, France, on September 6, 1943.

Photograph courtesy of Warren Carah and grandson Aaron Leary.

2nd Lt. Charles H. Hoover, Pilot, 381st BG.  B-17 shot down over Belgium on September 3, 1943.

 

 

 

 

Photograph courtesy of Warren Carah and cousin K. Ellis.

2nd Lt. Harold B. Bailey, Navigator, 379th BG.  Bailed out of B-17 August 16, 1943 near Paris, France.

Photograph courtesy of Warren Carah and brother Oscar Plasket.

T/Sgt. William B. Plasket, Jr., Radio Operator, 306th BG.  B-17 crashed near Rouen, France, on September 6, 1943.

 

 

 

Photograph WW2 Escape Lines Memorial Society.

 

 

S/Sgt. Francis E. Owens, Waist Gunner, 381st BG.  B-17 shot down July 4, 1943, over France.

 

 

 

October 22, 1943.  The journey over the Pyrenees into neutral Spain started in the foothills of the mountains near Suc, France, with local guide Emile Delpy and another unidentified guide.   

French guide Emile Delpy. Photograph courtesy of Warren Carah and Claude Benet (Andorra, Spain, historian).

The Americans who had been in hiding for months were weak from inactivity and lack of food.  The French provided the evaders with what food they could, but the German seizure of French provisions left the French with inadequate food supplies.  

To disguise the evaders the French Resistance and Helpers provided them with French clothing and footwear.  But the clothing and footwear were inadequate for the climb and the unforeseen weather.  An early snowstorm blanketed the Pyrenees with about three feet of snow.  

1st Lt. Ballinger due to weakness and leg cramping dropped out of the group and hid from the Germans in the area.  [Ballinger would later cross the Pyrenees on his own, with good weather, navigating by the stars and sun.  He eventually reached Gibralter, a British Overseas Territory, in southern Spain and returned to England on December 3, 1943.]

During the climb up the Pyrenees 2nd Lt. Bailey collapsed and could no longer walk.  According to interviews with surviving evaders, Sergeants Plasket and Owens dragged and carried Bailey about eight hours of the journey as the group ascended up the mountains.  The group had crossed into Spain and started their descent when Owens and Plasket collapsed from exhaustion.  Bailey and Plasket were unconscious.  Owens was semi-conscious but couldn’t move.  The guides tried to revive the three men without success.  After several attempts the guides made the difficult decision to continue on with the remaining ten evaders.  The three American airmen were left behind in the snow.  

On or about October 25, 1943.  Believed to be the date of death of the three American airmen in the Pyrenees Mountains.

Spring 1944.  Three bodies without identification were discovered in the mountains by Andorran shepherds.  They were buried in a cemetery near Arinsal, Andorra.  

1951.  An American Graves Registration unit disinterred the bodies in 1950 and positively identified them in 1951.

Harold Brunson Bailey was buried at the Lancaster Memorial Park in Lancaster, South Carolina.

William Beebe Plasket, Jr., was buried at the East View Cemetery in Salem, New Jersey.

October 1, 1951.  Francis Edward “Bud” Owens was buried at the Ardennes American Cemetery in Belgium.  While he was being laid to rest, Bud’s family members, at that moment, were attending a Requiem Mass in his memory at Saint Mary Church in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

2006.  In September 1943 before being moved to Paris by the French Underground, Bud gave his military identification “dog tags” to the Duval family who had hidden him in the Normandy countryside.  In the 1980s, former Ballinger crew member Paul McConnell visited La Coulonche.  He was given the dog tags and asked to return them to the Owens family next of kin if he could find them.  Paul McConnell passed away without finding the family, and the responsibility was given to Warren Carah, son of the crew Co-Pilot John M. Carah.  In 2006 Warren presented Bud’s dog tags to the Owens family in Pittsburgh.

 

 

 

Co-Pilot 2nd Lt. John M. Carah, Navigator 2nd Lt. Paul H. McConnell, Tail Gunner S/Sgt. William C. Howell were helped by other French Resistance groups after they parachuted from their B-17 on July 4, 1943.  They crossed the Pyrenees, were helped by British diplomats once in Spain, and returned to England in February 1944.

Lieutenant Colonel John M. Carah, US Air Force (Retired), would later write a book Achtung! Achtung! Die Flugfestungen Kommen! (Attention! Attention! The Flying Fortresses Are Coming!), Memoirs of WW-II  with his son Warren Carah who edited the book.  It provides in-depth information about the Ballinger crew and the experiences of other downed American airmen in WWII Europe.  Thank you to Warren Carah for his support in the research for this story.  He can be contacted at wcarah@livingonline.com.

*In a 2013 documentary From Pyote to Fortress Europe about the WWII 381st BG, 533rd BS Ordnance Chief S/Sgt. Joe H. Willis, on the taxi strip at the time of the June 23, 1943, explosion, said in a 2003 interview with WWII Historian Dr. Vernon L. Williams that procedures after that incident were changed when loading bombs into aircraft.  Fuses were placed in the bombs after they were loaded, not before, and fewer people were allowed in the area around a plane during the loading.

A 2016 documentary filmed in France, Spain, and Belgium Preserving a Legacy: In the Footsteps of Bud Owens Belgian battlefield guide Geert Van den Bogaert leads a group from the Normandy countryside, hiking over the Pyrenees Mountains into Spain, with the film concluding at the grave of Bud Owens in the Ardennes American Cemetery in Belgium.  Bud’s niece, Colleen Brennan, and his great-niece, Hayley Hulbert, represented Bud on the journey.  Thank you to the Owens family for providing information used in the writing of this story.

Early in WWII escape lines were mainly financed by individuals in German-occupied countries.  Later on monetary support was given by the British Directorate of Military Intelligence Section 9 (MI-9) and the British Special Operations Executive (SOE).  Support included agents parachuting into occupied countries to help the Resistance and bringing maps, money, and false documents with them to help downed Allied airmen.  Pyrenees guide Emile Delpy worked with MI-9.

The WW2 Escape Lines Memorial Society identifies and describes many of the escape lines used in WW2 Europe.  Search this website for additional stories about Bud Owens.

Thank you to WWII Historian Dr. Vernon L. Williams, WWII Historian and Researcher Sue Moyer, 306th BG Historical Association Historian Clifford Deets, and Editor of the 8th Air Force News Magazine Debra Kujawa.

 

The German Resistance: The WWII Story of Otto and Hanna Kiep

 

Dr. Otto Kiep and his wife, Hanna, circa 1920s.  Private, undated photograph; Commemoration of German Resistance.

 

“He was never famous, and hardly anyone now remembers his name, but he was a very special kind of man ….  It was his honesty which led to his death.  He refused to tell lies to his friends at a time when telling the truth was a crime.”  From Ice Set Free: The Story of Otto Kiep by Bruce Clements.

 

Otto Carl Kiep was born on July 7, 1886, in Saltcoats, Ayrshire, Scotland, to the Imperial German Consul for Glasgow and Western Scotland Johannes and Charlotte Kiep.  His father and uncle had a timber importing business in Glasgow.  Otto had three brothers and one sister.  By 1909 the family had moved back to Germany and lived in Ballenstedt in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt.  

Otto Kiep earned a Bachelor of Law degree in London, England, and a Doctor of Law degree from the University of Leipzig in Germany. 

In 1925 when he met his future wife, Hanna Alves, Dr. Kiep was the Reich Chief Press Officer of the Weimar Republic (1918-1933).

Hanna Alves was born February 10, 1904, in Braunschweig, Lower Saxony, Germany.  She studied law and political science in Berlin, Germany; Geneva, Switzerland; and Oxford, England.

Otto and Hanna met at a party in Berlin in February 1925 at the home of a mutual friend.  They were married December 14, 1925, at the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church in Berlin.  

On December 20, 1926, Hanna gave birth to their first child, a son, they named Nikolaus Friedrich Albrecht Kiep.  They called him Albrecht.

 

Portrait of Hanna Kiep in 1928 with her two year old son, Albrecht.  Photograph credit ullstein bild/GRANGER.

 

From December 1926 to 1929 Otto served as Counselor to the German Embassy in Washington, District of Columbia (D.C.), in the United States (US).  It would be the first of his two German government postings there.  

The Kiep family returned to Germany in 1929, and their second child, Hildegard, was born August 10, 1929, in Berlin-Dahlem.

In 1932 Dr. Kiep was in New York City, New York, serving as the German Consul General.  

 

Photograph caption: German literary genius honored at City Hall. Dr. Gerhart Hauptmann, the most distinguished figure in the literature of Germany across a generation, was formally honored today, Feb. 26, with a reception at New York City Hall. Left to right [first row], on the steps of City Hall, during the ceremonies, are: Dr. O.C. Kiep, German Consul General; Major William Deegan; Nicholas Murray Butler, President of Columbia University; Mrs. Gerhart Hauptmann; Gerhart Hauptmann; Mayor Walker and Victor Ridder, Publisher of a German newspaper in New York.  Photograph taken at New York City Hall on February 26, 1932, by ACME Newspictures, Inc. 

 

Eleven months after the above photograph was taken Adolph Hitler was sworn in as Chancellor of Germany on January 30, 1933.  The Weimar Republic had ended, and so began the rise of the Third Reich which lasted until May 1945.

On March 16, 1933, Dr. Kiep spoke at a dinner at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York City in honor of German mathematician Dr. Albert Einstein.  He made complimentary remarks about the United States and Dr. Einstein in the speech.  The comments were brought to the attention of the German government and Chancellor Hitler.  Dr. Kiep was summoned back to Germany and had a personal meeting with Hitler.  In the Bruce Clements’ book From Ice Set Free: The Story of Otto Kiep Otto told of being lectured for ten minutes by Adolph Hitler on the future of the Third Reich.  He also observed that Hitler did not just look at you, but he “watched you.”

Their third child, Hanna Charlotte, was born in New York City on June 2, 1933.

After continuing pressure from the National Socialist Party,  Otto wrote a letter of resignation as German Consul General on July 15, 1933.

From 1934 to early 1936 Dr. Kiep represented the German Foreign Ministry in business negotiations in South America and East Asia.  In 1936 he was chosen as the German representative to the International Committee on Non-Intervention in London, England.  He and Hanna would return to Germany in August 1939.

On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland.  WWII began.

The Abwehr … a secret nest of German Resistance.  By the end of September 1939 Otto had been drafted into the German military counter-intelligence service, the Abwehr, and worked for Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, Chief of the Abwehr, and Wehrmacht General Hans Oster.  Shortly before the start of WWII, Hans Oster recruited Hans von Dohnányi, a German jurist into the Abwehr.  

[Hans von Dohnányi was the brother-in-law of German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer.  In 1941 he brought Dietrich into the Abwehr under the pretense that his “ecumenical contacts” would be of assistance to Germany.  Dietrich would become a courier within the German Resistance movement.

Admiral Canaris, initially supported Hitler, but by 1939 he and other anti-Nazis were working secretly to subvert the Nazi government.  He and many other resisters would eventually be arrested for treason and executed.]

The Solf Circle.  Dr. Kiep and others had social connections to resistance groups.  One such group was the Solf Circle.  Hanna Solf, the widow of Dr. Wilhelm Solf who had served in the Weimar Republic, would bring together German intellectuals to discuss the war.  A member of the Solf Circle, Elizabeth von Thadden, on September 10, 1943, hosted a birthday party and invited Dr. Paul Reckzeh who claimed to be a Swiss physician and sympathetic to the German Resistance.  He was in reality a Gestapo spy.  Many of the guests at the party would later be arrested.  [Dr. Reckzeh would be the main witness at Otto Kiep’s trial that began on July 1, 1944.  He took the witness stand wearing his SS uniform.]

Dr. Otto Kiep was arrested at his home at Taubertstrasse 15, Berlin-Grunewald on January 16, 1944, at four o’clock in the morning.  Hanna Kiep was arrested later that month.  

Ravensbrück Concentration Camp.  After days of interrogation Otto was transported to the German concentration camp of Ravensbrück 56 miles (90 kilometers) north of Berlin.  He was put in a cell below ground in the cell building.  Hanna was also taken to Ravensbrück and imprisoned on the top floor of the cell building.  Neither knew the other was there until they caught a glimpse of one another in late February when both were being moved within the building; they knew to give no sign of recognition of each other.

[Ravensbrück concentration camp was established as a women’s camp in 1939, but in 1944 the “Lange Special Commission” of the Gestapo, which had moved from Berlin because of Allied air raids, used the Ravensbrück cell building to hold and interrogate “special prisoners” such as those involved with the Solf Circle and those later arrested in connection with the 20 July 1944 plot to assassinate Hitler.

Nina Schenk Countess von Stauffenberg, wife of 20 July failed assassin Colonel (Oberst) Claus von Stauffenberg, was one of the “special prisoners” held at Ravensbrück.]

Some of the “special prisoners” managed to write letters and keep a diary during their incarceration and had added privileges as compared to other prisoners in the main camp.  Being able to secretly communicate with one another through letters and notes was a way Otto and Hanna provided each other solace.  Otto knew he would be executed, and while in Ravensbrück he wrote his memoir for his children.

In their communications with each other at Ravensbrück Otto and Hanna would recall past times in their lives.  Before Christmas of 1944 they had read aloud the novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder.  In a note to Hanna, Otto recalled a passage from the book:  “… soon we shall die and … be loved for a while and forgotten.  But the love will have been enough; all those impulses of love return to the love that made them.  Even memory is not necessary for love.  There is a land of the living and a land of the dead and the bridge is love, the only survival, the only meaning.”  He wrote a poem to her “The Bridge of Love.”  While walking in the yard of the cell building compound during an allowed prison exercise period, Otto looked up at the window of the cell that he knew was hers.  Hanna had written the word BRIDGE on a note card and held it up to the glass window.

In June 1944, on a Sunday afternoon, Otto and Hanna were allowed to meet for a short time.  The SS guards were not on duty on weekends.  Another guard, knowing Otto would soon be moved to Berlin for his trial, allowed them a visit.  

Both Otto and Hanna had shared a love of the play Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.  In the play Faust, the protagonist, speaks of spring and Easter.  He goes on an Easter Walk (Osterspaziergang) and during the walk in nature, begins to feel that Easter is a time symbolic of a personal rebirth.  This is a sentence of Faust’s speech as quoted in Bruce Clements’ book:

“From ice set free are brooks and river,

Touched by spring’s fair, life-giving glance,

And in the valley new hope blooms.”

As Otto Kiep walked out of Ravensbrück concentration camp for the last time to be put on trial in Berlin, he glanced up at Hanna’s cell window and saw cards with the words “From ice set free…”

 

Dr. Otto Carl Kiep.  Photograph German Resistance Memorial Center, Berlin, Germany.

 

Dr. Otto Carl Kiep’s trial began in Berlin on July 1, 1944.  He was convicted and sentenced to death.

Hanna Kiep was released from Ravensbrück on July 6, 1944.

On August 26, 1944, Dr. Kiep was hanged at Plötzensee Prison in Berlin.

 

After WWII Hanna Kiep worked in the American occupation zone to establish a civil administration.  While working with the Americans she recognized one of her interrogators at Ravensbrück.  Her testimony led to his arrest.

In 1946 Hanna was Vice-President of the Bavarian Red Cross in Munich.

From 1951-1969 Mrs. Hanna Kiep was the Women’s Affairs Secretary of the German Embassy in Washington, D.C.

 

Mrs. Hanna Kiep Women’s Affairs Secretary of the German Embassy in Washington, D.C.  Official portrait German Embassy.

 

Hanna Kiep died in Pullach, Germany, on August 22, 1979.

She was survived by her daughters, Hildegard and Hanna.  Her son, Albrecht, was killed on the Eastern Front in WWII.

 

 

 

The personal accounts of the lives of Otto and Hanna Kiep used in this story are found in the book From Ice Set Free: The Story of Otto Kiep written by Bruce Clements.  Mr. Clements was the son-in-law of Hanna Kiep and the husband of Hanna’s daughter, Hanna Charlotte.

Thank you to German historian Dr. Susanne Meinl for assistance in locating information sources and in the research for this story about Otto and Hanna Kiep.

Thank you to Dr. Insa Eschebach, Director, and Cordula Hundertmark, Deputy Director and Head of Scientific Services Department of the Ravensbrück Memorial Museum, for their assistance in my research for this story. 

Thank you to G. L. Lamborn for his research assistance.

Thank you to Professor Charles Hansen for the translation of German documents used in this story.

In August 1971 on a trip with my uncle, US Congressman Alvin E. O’Konski and his wife, Bonnie, I met Mrs. Kiep at a luncheon in Munich, Germany.  They had become friends in Washington, D.C., when Hanna was posted there with the German Embassy.  I remember her as a gracious lady.  Little then did I know of her life and losses in WWII.

A Canadian in the US Army: The Story of WWII Nurse May Buelow Alm

 

First Lieutenant May Buelow standing next to a US Army 104th Evacuation Hospital tent in France 1944.  Alm Family photograph.

 

May Albertine Buelow was born March 21, 1916, near Mirror, Province of Alberta, Canada.  She was born at home on the family farm.  Her mother died in the worldwide influenza pandemic of 1918.  After high school she attended the Royal Alexandra School of Nursing in Edmonton, Alberta, and graduated in 1937.  In 1939 May travelled to the United States (US) to visit her grandparents in the State of Washington.  She decided to stay in the US, completed exams for a State of Washington nursing license, and worked as a nurse.  May was visiting an aunt in Tacoma, Washington, on Sunday, December 7, 1941, when she heard on the radio that the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor, Oahu, Hawaii.

On April 10, 1942, May applied to the US Army Nurse Corps through the American Red Cross since her application for US citizenship was not yet completed.  She was sworn in as a Second Lieutenant on October 30, 1942.

On February 27, 1944, First Lieutenant (1st Lt.) Buelow with the US Army 104th Evacuation Hospital sailed from New York City, New York, on the British ship Samaria and docked in Liverpool, England, on March 10, 1944.

The nurses travelled by truck from Liverpool to Southport where they were billeted in the homes of local British civilians.  Military housing for the large number of Allied military personnel arriving in England was limited.  Local families opened their homes to the troops.

1st Lt. Buelow was billeted with the Fisher family in Southport.  A Fisher family member is photographed with her in front of the Bibby Road home.  Alm Family photograph.

The 104th Evacuation Hospital remained in the Southport and Churchtown area for four months.

The Allied D-Day Invasion of Normandy, France, was June 6, 1944.  After the successful landing on French beaches troops and equipment began moving from England to France.

The 104th Evacuation Hospital landed on Omaha Beach in Normandy on July 12, 1944.  Upon landing and moving inland they saw the debris on the beach, sunken ships, damaged buildings, destroyed vehicles, and dead bodies in varying states of decomposition.

The 104th Evacuation Hospital was attached to General George S. Patton’s Third Army.

The first evacuation hospital setup was Sainte-Mère-Église, France.  1st Lt. Buelow was assigned to Central Supply, a part of surgery, and one of her responsibilities was to insure that sterile supplies were ready for surgery and patient care.

 And then the war began for the US Army 104th Evacuation Hospital.

The hospital treated military and civilian casualties both men and women. There were times casualties exceeded bed capacity.  After the beds were filled  litters were placed on sawhorses and on the ground after that.

A duty day often included watching for landmines in the area and the sound of German 88 mm anti-aircraft and anti-tank artillery fired nearby.

One night they were alerted of possible capture by the Germans.  Unit personnel were moved by truck to a secure area until it was safe to return.

At night they often heard US reconnaissance planes overhead trying to locate German positions.  They nicknamed the aircraft “Bed Check Charlie.”

There were times German prisoners of war would help in the hospital.  May recalled they were generally helpful, but the German nurse prisoners of war could be uncooperative.   

The average stay of military casualties was three days.  They would then be moved to a medical unit further behind the front lines or flown to England.

Hospital setups could be in tents or in already existing buildings.  On October 7, 1944, when the 104th moved to Nancy, France, they were in a former mental hospital.  On December 16 they were told about the German breakthrough in a battle that became known as the Battle of the Bulge.

On December 24, 1944, the evacuation hospital moved from Nancy to Luxembourg.  Christmas Eve for the hospital staff that year was C-rations (military packaged meals) by flashlights.  The building they used at this location had been occupied by the elderly and orphans who were moved to a safe location.  May said casualties “poured in” by ambulances and litters tied to jeeps on Sunday, December 25, Christmas Day.

They would be in Luxembourg for three months before moving to their next  setup in Trier, Germany, on March 14, 1945.  The casualties by then were fewer, and May and other unit personnel were given time for a three-day pass to Paris.

The last 104th Evacuation Hospital tent setup was April 22, 1945, in Erlangen, Germany.  On May 8 the unit heard about the declaration of Victory in Europe (V-E) Day. 

1st Lt. Buelow had applied for US citizenship before the war began, but the process was not completed before she left for Europe with the US Army.  On May 10, two days after V-E Day, she and other non-citizen military members received an order to report to unit headquarters where they took the US Oath of Citizenship.  May left the US as a Canadian, officially became a US citizen in Germany, and would return to the US as a US citizen.

The last 104th Evacuation Hospital setup was in Bad Wiesse, Germany, on May 22, 1945.

The 104th began the journey back to the US on September 8.  After stops along the way and periods of waiting for further orders the unit reached Marseille, France.  On October 27, 1945, they boarded the Liberty ship USS Hermitage* at Marseille and would arrive at Pier 88 in New York City, New York, on November 6.  

May travelled from New York City to her grandparents home in Addy, Washington.  She was home in time for Thanksgiving.

May Buelow was officially discharged from the US Army on January 26, 1946.  She was awarded the American Defense Service Medal and the European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal with five Bronze Service Stars for the Normandy, Northern France, Ardennes, Central Europe, and Rhineland Campaigns.  She was also awarded the World War II Victory Medal, and the US Army 104th Evacuation Hospital received a Presidential Unit Citation Award.

 

When May left for duty in WWII she, like her friends, would communicate through letter writing.  One of the people she wrote to was a friend from Washington named Maurice Alm, also known as “Swede” to his friends.  They had dated before the war began.

 

Bernhardt Maurice Alm was born December 1, 1916, in Chewelah, Washington.  He enlisted in the US Army Air Force in 1942.  He trained as a Flying Fortress B-17 armorer.  [An armorer was responsible for airplane maintenance and loading bombs.]

1943 photograph of Sergeant Maurice Alm.  Alm Family photograph.

Sergeant Alm was assigned to the 307th Bombardment Group (BG) in the Pacific Theater.  The BG flew multiple long distance missions, hence the nickname “The Long Rangers.”  One bombing mission on October 3, 1944, to Baltkapapan, Borneo, oil refineries** was 17 1/2 hours long; the mission was a round trip of 2,610 miles, and the bombing raid caused extensive damage to an important Japanese fuel source in the South Pacific.

While in New Guinea (an island north of Australia) Maurice developed rheumatic fever that damaged his heart.

 

After WWII Maurice returned to his hometown.  He and May were married  on June 2, 1946, in Chewelah, Washington.

Maurice and May Alm wedding picture June 2, 1946.  Alm Family photograph.

They had three children and were married for 10 years before his heart condition would take his life on May 27, 1956.

May returned to her nursing career to support herself and their children.  She retired in 1981.

 

May never married again.  She led an active life in retirement and would return to Normandy for the 40th, 50th, 60th, and 70th D-Day Anniversaries.  In 2004 she met the actor from the film Saving Private Ryan, Tom Hanks, who attended the ceremony.

Tom Hanks and May Alm in 2004 at the 60th Anniversary of D-Day in Normandy, France.  Marie Alm photograph.

May passed away on September 30, 2019, at the age of 103.  She was buried with full military honors next to her husband, Maurice, at the Chewelah Memorial Park Cemetery in Chewelah, Washington.

 

 

 

*The USS Hermitage (AP-54) was a US Navy troop transport ship in WWII.  But before Italy declared war on Britain and France on June 10, 1941, the ship had sailed as the SS Conte Biancamano, an Italian luxury liner.  When Italy declared war, the ship was moored at the Panamanian port of Cristóbal, and it was interned there.  When the US entered the war in December 1941 the ship was seized by the US and converted to a troop ship by Cramp Shipbuilding of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and commissioned  the USS Hermitage on August 14, 1942.  The ship would sail in both the European and Pacific Theaters of Operation and was returned to Italy after WWII in 1947.  It was refitted, renamed the SS Conte Biancamano, and again sailed as a luxury liner until 1960.

**Borneo is a large island in the southwestern Pacific Ocean.  Before WWII it was divided into Dutch Borneo and British Borneo.  The island was quickly captured by the Japanese in the opening weeks of war in the Pacific.  The Baltkapanan oil refineries on Borneo were of significant value to the Japanese for wartime fuel supplies.  The oil refineries were of important strategic value to Japan just as the Ploesti (now spelled Ploiești), Romania, oil fields were to Germany.

Thank you to Maurice and May’s daughter, Marie, for her help in the research for this story and for permission to use family photographs.  For further information on the WWII experiences of Maurice Alm and May Buelow Alm email wwii@crytalsw.com.

Thank you to historian Dr. Vernon L. Williams, Director of the East Anglia Air War Project, for his research assistance.

The book Voices of WWII Veterans: A Kaleidoscope of Memories edited by Rae Dalton Hight tells of May Buelow Alm’s life and WWII experiences as well as the lives and experiences of other WWII veterans.

I met May in 2004 at the 60th Anniversary of D-Day.  We kept in touch over the years.  It was an honor to know her.

Left to right: Marie Alm, May Alm, and this story’s author Susan O’Konski on Omaha Beach, Normandy, France, in 2004.  Marie Alm photograph.

 

 

The “British Schindler”: The WWII Story of Sir Nicholas Winton

Nicholas Winton holding Hansi Beck on January 12, 1939, before the first evacuation by air of 20 children from Prague, Czechoslovakia, to London, England.  Photograph www.dailymail.co.uk.

 

“If it’s not impossible, there must be a way to do it.”  Nicholas Winton

 

In December 1938 twenty-nine year old British stockbroker Nicholas Winton was planning a holiday skiing trip to Switzerland when he received a phone call from friend Martin Blake who was working with the British Committee for Refugees in Czechoslovakia (BCRC).  Instead of Switzerland Nicholas travelled to Prague.  [In January 1993 Czechoslovakia in a peaceful dissolution would be split into the two sovereign states of the Czech Republic and Slovakia.]

What was the political climate in Europe in the 1930s?  Adolph Hitler became Chancellor of Germany in 1933.  In violation of the WWI Versailles Treaty Germany began rebuilding its military.  In violation of the Treaty of Versailles Germany reoccupied the Rhineland in March 1936.  In violation of the Treaty of Versailles Germany absorbed Austria in March 1938.  In September 1938 England and France (without consulting the government of Czechoslovakia) and as part of the Munich Pact allowed Hitler to occupy the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia which had been incorporated into the country as part of the Treaty of Versailles.

It was at this time in history that Nicholas Winton would arrive in Prague on New Year’s Eve 1938.  He would check into the Grand Hotel Šroubek (later renamed the Grand Hotel Europa) on Wenceslas Square.  A hotel restaurant table would become his office as he met with families and helped plan for Czech refugee children to be taken to England for the duration of the soon expected outbreak of war in Europe.  

[Germany occupied the rest of Czechoslovakia in March 1939.  With the invasion of Poland in September 1939 England and France declared war on Germany.]

In addition to working with the BCRC in Prague Nicholas would provide logistical support for two Kindertransport (children’s transport) flights sponsored by the Barbican Mission on January 12, 1939, which brought 20 children to England and a Sweden Red Cross flight that transported 30 children to Sweden on January 16 or 17, 1939.

Having exhausted his vacation time Nicholas returned to England and his stockbroker job on January 21, 1939.  But his work to rescue the children continued.

Nicholas’ job was not insurmountable, but he put into practice his motto, “If it’s not impossible, there must be a way to do it.”  He needed to raise money for the transportation of the children.  He needed permission of the Immigration Section of the British Home Office to bring them into the country and was required to provide guarantor monies for them.  The Netherlands had closed its borders in November 1938 after Kristallnacht.  He negotiated with the government of The Netherlands to allow the train to pass through the country.  And he needed to find foster families, hostels, or other organizations to care for the children.

In Prague Nicholas’ colleagues working with the BCRC were hurriedly gathering documents, photographs, adding names of children to the list of refugees, and dealing with the Nazis’ requirements to allow trains of mostly Jewish children to leave Czechoslovakia.

 

The identity document of nine year old Eveline Prager needed for the Czech Kindertransport.  Photograph www.dailymail.co.uk.

 

Kindertransport trains would leave Prague, travel through Germany, pass through The Netherlands to the Hook of Holland, children would sail by ferry to England, and arrive by train at the Liverpool Street Station in London.  The foster families would be waiting at the station to meet their new family member.

 

Winton Kindertransport train route 1939. Map stephenliddell.co.uk.

 

The first Kindertransport train left Prague on March 14, 1939.  Seven Kindertransports were to follow.  The ninth train with 250 children was scheduled to leave in September 1939.  After Poland was attacked by Germany on September 1, 1939, the Germans cancelled the ninth train.  According to Nicholas’ daughter, Barbara, who wrote the book If it’s Not Impossible… about her father’s life,  no further information about the children scheduled to leave on the ninth train was found and that many of them most likely died at Auschwitz Concentration Camp.

The Czech Kindertransport rescue lasted nine months.

With the start of WWII and the Kindertransports ending,  Nicholas Winton joined the British war effort as an ambulance driver and then became a member of the Royal Air Force until the end of the war.

After the war ended, Nicholas Winton would work for the London-based International Committee for Refugees which would be integrated into the International Refugee Organization of the newly formed United Nations.  In 1948 he accepted a job with the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development in Paris, France.  It was in Paris that he met a Danish girl, Grete Gjelstrup.  They were married in October 1948.  

Grete did not know about the Czech Kindertransport until she found a scrapbook in their attic in Maidenhead, England, in the late 1980s.  The scrapbook she found would make the story public.

Nicholas Winton and the group of rescuers working together on the Czech Kindertransport over the nine months of its existence saved the lives of 669 children.

The Scrapbook.  At the end of the Kindertransport operation in 1939,  a volunteer in the organization, Mr. W. M. Loewinsohn, presented a scrapbook to Winton that included correspondence, data, photos, and other information gathered during the BCRC effort to rescue the children.  At the back of the scrapbook was a list of the rescued children and the names and addresses of the  families who agreed to foster them.  

 

The cover page of the Nicholas Winton scrapbook.  Photograph www.cbsnews.com.

 

In 1988 Nicholas was invited to be a member of the audience in a BBC television program called That’s Life!  The host of the show, Esther Rantzen, would tell the story of the 1939 Czech Kindertransport and show the scrapbook to the audience.  At a point in the show the host spoke of a rescued child, now an adult, named Vera (Diamant) Gissing.  Unbeknownst to Nicholas, Vera was sitting next to him.  Vera gave him an embrace and said “thank you, thank you.”

 

Nicholas Winton and Vera (Diamant) Gissing meet on February 27, 1988, on BBC television program That’s Life!  Photograph www.storypick.com.

 

In a follow-on episode of That’s Life! the next week, the host asked if there was anyone in the audience who owed their life to Nicholas Winton.  Almost five rows of “Nicky’s children” stood up.

 

Nicholas Winton, in the front row with his back to the camera, looks at the people who were rescued as children on the Czech Kindertransport.  The woman sitting in the front row is Nicholas’ wife, Grete.  Photograph people.com.

 

The “children” contacted by the BBC did not know how they were saved or who had saved them until then.

On March 11, 2003,  Nicholas Winton was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II of England.

A documentary Nicky’s Family was released in 2011.  It was narrated by Canadian Broadcasting Corporation journalist, foreign correspondent, and author Joe Schlesinger.  Joe was one of “Nicky’s children.”  

 

Sir Nicholas Winton with Joe Schlesinger (right).  Photograph www.theglobeandmail.com.

 

Sir Nicholas Winton died in his sleep on July 1, 2015.  He was 106 years old.

A Prague Post article on July 4, 2015, stated, “The first candles on the platform from which trains with Czechoslovak children of Jewish origin were leaving appeared a few hours after Winton’s death was announced.”

 

A statue created by Flor Kent of Sir Nicholas Winton with two children was unveiled on September 1, 2009, at the Prague Main Railway Station.  Photograph Prague Post July 4, 2015.

 

The Katyn Forest Massacre: And Five Betrayals of Poland by Its WWII Allies

Hands tied behind the back of a Polish soldier found in a mass grave in the Katyn Forest (Soviet Union) in spring 1943.

 

In Moscow on August 23, 1939, an agreement between Germany and the Soviet Union was signed.  It included a plan for the division of Poland.  The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact served as a prelude to Germany’s invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939.  The Pact assured Hitler that the Soviets would not interfere with Germany’s planned military action against Poland.

 

Betrayal One

Britain and France signed military alliances with Poland in 1939 to come to her aid if attacked.  

Germany invaded Poland September 1, 1939.  

Britain and France declared war on Germany on September 3. 

The Soviet Union attacked Poland September 17. 

By the end of September 1939 both Germany and the Soviet Union occupied the agreed upon Polish territory as set in the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.  The Second Polish Republic no longer existed.

 Neither Britain nor France came to the aid of Poland.

 

Betrayal Two

[The account of this massacre as told in this story is based upon declassified documents and the release of Soviet archival material in the early 1990s after the fall of communism.]

As the Germans advanced into the Soviet Union in 1943 they found a mass grave in the Katyn Forest near Smolensk which held an estimated 4,500 bodies.  The bodies, some in Polish uniforms, some with their hands tied behind their back, were stacked in layers 12 bodies high in an approximate 92 feet long and 52 feet wide pit.  Victims had been shot in the back of the head. 

Photograph of Polish mass gravesite in the Katyn Forest after it was discovered in 1943 by the Nazis when Germany was advancing into the Soviet Union. 

The Soviets captured and arrested thousands of Polish military and Polish intelligentsia after attacking Poland September 17, 1939.  An estimated 22,000 prisoners of war were imprisoned in three main prisoner of war camps in the Soviet Union:  Kozelsk, Ostashkov, and Starobelsk.  On March 5, 1940, Stalin signed a document ordering the execution of the prisoners.  The executions were carried out in April and May 1940.  The Polish prisoners of war at Kozelsk were shot at the Katyn Forest site, according to most accounts, and buried in a pit.  The prisoners of war at Ostashkov and Starobelsk were shot at NKVD (People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs/Soviet Secret Police) prisons at Kalinin and Kharkov, respectively.

Benjamin B. Fischer in a paper, “The Killing Controversy:  Stalin’s Killing Field,”  wrote, “Those who died at Katyn included an admiral, two generals, 24 colonels, 79 lieutenant colonels, 258 majors, 654 captains, 17 naval captains, 3,420 NCOs, seven chaplains, three landowners, a prince, 43 officials, 85 privates, and 131 refugees. Also among the dead were 20 university professors; 300 physicians; several hundred lawyers, engineers, and teachers; and more than 100 writers and journalists as well as about 200 pilots.  It was their social status that landed them in front of NKVD execution squads. …  In all, the NKVD eliminated almost half the Polish officer corps–part of Stalin’s long-range effort to prevent the resurgence of an independent Poland.”

One of the Polish pilots killed at Katyn was a woman. Her name was Lieutenant Janina Lewandowska.  

Lieutenant Janina Lewandowska, Polish WWII pilot.
Polish WWII pilot Lieutenant Janina Lewandowska.

After finding the Katyn gravesite in early 1943, the Germans called in forensic experts before announcing to the world that the Soviets had killed the Polish officers.  The Soviets denied the accusation and blamed the Germans for the mass murder.  The London based Polish government-in-exile led by Polish Prime Minister General Wladyslaw Sikorski wanted to open an investigation by the International Red Cross.  The Soviets immediately cut off diplomatic relations with the Polish government.  

According to declassified historical documents and archival findings, both United States (US) President Franklin Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill had been told by members of their governments about the Soviet responsibility for the mass murder discovered at Katyn.

Both the US and British governments were accused of suppressing information about the massacre.  Neither government at the time publicly acknowledged Katyn nor sought an investigation.  

A post WWII US Congress investigation would concur with the US suppression charge in 1952.

 

The US Congress Select Committee on Katyn Forest Massacre 1951 – 1952 *

A Select Committee hearing in Washington, D.C., on February 6, 1952.  A Polish soldier hiding his identity was testifying.  Associated Press Photograph/Bill Allen.

The seven committee members on the rostrum in the photograph above are (left to right) US House of Representatives members Timothy P. Sheehan, Alvin E. O’Konski, George A. Dondero, Ray J. Madden (Chairman), Daniel J. Flood, Foster Furcolo, and Thaddeus M. Machrowicz.

Committee CONCLUSIONS

 1.  In submitting this final report to the House of Representatives, this committee has come to the conclusion that in those fateful days nearing the end of the Second World War there unfortunately existed in high governmental and military circles a strange psychosis that military necessity required the sacrifice of loyal allies and our own principles in order to keep Soviet Russia from making a separate peace with the Nazis.  

For reasons less clear to this committee, this psychosis continued even after the conclusion of the war.  Most of the witnesses testified that had they known then what they now know about Soviet Russia, they probably would not have pursued the course they did.  It is undoubtedly true that hindsight is much easier to follow than foresight, but it is equally true that much of the material which this committee unearthed was or could have been available to those responsible for our foreign policy as early as 1942.

And, it is equally true that even before 1942 the Kremlin rulers gave much evidence of a menace of Soviet imperialism paving the way for world conquest.  Through the disastrous failure to recognize the danger signs which then existed and in following a policy of satisfying the Kremlin leaders, our Government unwittingly strengthened their hand and contributed to a situation which has grown to be a menace to the United States and the entire free world.

2.  Our committee is sending a copy of this report, and volume 7 of the published hearings, to the Department of Defense for such action as may be proper with regard to General Bissell.  We do so because of the fact that this committee believes that had the Van Vliet report been made immediately available to the Department of State and to the American public, the course of our governmental policy toward Soviet Russia might have been more realistic with more fortunate postwar results.

3.  This committee believes that the wartime policies of Army Intelligence (G-2) during 1944-45 should undergo a thorough investigation.  Testimony heard by the committee substantiates this belief, and if such an investigation is conducted another object lesson might be learned.

4.  Our committee concludes that the staff members of the Office of War Information and Federal Communications Commission who participated in the program of silencing Polish radio commentators went beyond the scope of their duties as official Government representatives.  Actually, they usurped the functions of the Office of Censorship and by indirect pressure accomplished domestic censorship which was not within the jurisdiction of either of these agencies.

5.  This committee believes that if the Voice of America is to justify its existence it must utilize material made available more forcefully and effectively.

6.  This committee began its investigation last year, and as the committee’s work progressed, information, documents, and evidence was submitted from all parts of the world.  It was at this same time that reports reached the committee of similar atrocities and violations of international law being perpetrated in Korea.  This committee noted the striking similarity between crimes committed against the Poles at Katyn and those being inflicted on American and other United Nation troops in Korea.  Communist tactics being used in Korea are identical to those  followed at Katyn.  Thus this committee believes that Congress should undertake an immediate investigation of the Korean war atrocities in order that the evidence can be collected and the truth revealed to the American people and the free peoples of the world.  This committee will return to Congress approximately $21,000 in surplus funds, and it is suggested that this money be made available by Congress for such an investigation.

Committee RECOMMENDATIONS

The final report of the Select Committee Investigating the Katyn Forest Massacre hereby incorporates the recommendations contained in the interim report, filed on July 2, 1952 (H. Rept. No. 2430).

This committee unanimously recommends that the House of Representatives approve the committee’s findings and adopt a resolution:

 1.  Requesting the President of the United States to forward the testimony, evidence, and findings of this committee to the United States delegates at the United Nations;

2.  Requesting further that the President of the United States issue instructions to the United States delegates to present the Katyn case to the General Assembly of the United Nations;

3.  Requesting that appropriate steps be taken by the General Assembly to seek action before the International World Court of Justice against the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics for committing a crime at Katyn which was in violation of the general principles of law recognized by civilized nations; 

4.  Requesting the President of the United States to instruct the United States delegation to seek the establishment of an international commission which would investigate other mass murders and crimes against humanity.

The final report of the Select Committee Investigating the Katyn Forest Massacre was sent to US President Harry S. Truman.  No action was taken on the Recommendations, at least not publicly. 

 

Betrayal Three 

Churchill had told the Poles that they would again have a free and independent country and be “happy” after the war.  

Two “Big Three” Conferences would decide the postwar fate of Poland.  

Tehran Conference November 28 – December 1, 1943

This was the first of the WWII “Big Three” Conferences.  The participants were US President Franklin Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin.  

It was at this conference that Churchill told Stalin that after WWII the Soviet Union could keep the territory of Poland that Stalin captured in September 1939 (as designated in the August 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact between Germany and the Soviet Union).  Churchill said the prewar western border of Poland could be moved further west to compensate Poland for her loss to the Soviets.

Yalta Conference February 4 – 11, 1945

The future of Europe post WWII was determined by the “Big Three.”  

After Stalin’s broken promise to hold free elections in Poland the country would become a satellite state within the “sphere of influence” of the Soviet Union.  It would be named the communist People’s Republic of Poland.

The Allies did not consult with the London Polish government-in-exile regarding the postwar future of Poland.

 

Betrayal Four

After Poland was overrun by Germany and the Soviet Union in 1939 those Poles able to escape established a government-in-exile in London.  The Polish agreed to continue their fight under the British High Command.  The Polish military would support the Allied cause in the air, sea, and on land. Overall, the Polish military was the fourth largest Allied army in WWII after the Soviet Union, United States, and Britain. 

On June 8, 1946, Britain celebrated the end of WWII with a Victory Parade in London.  

Britain’s WWII Polish ally was not invited to take part in the parade.

London Victory Parade June 8, 1946.

Historians write that a British sensitivity to Stalin, the pro-communist government set up in postwar Poland, and the start of the Cold War may account for the Clement Attlee government to exclude their wartime ally from the parade. 

 

Betrayal Five

On September 18, 1976, a memorial to the Katyn Forest Massacre was dedicated at Gunnersbury Cemetery in London.

Katyn Memorial in Gunnersbury Cemetery, London, England.  Photograph TracesOfWar.com.

Poles in the United Kingdom were trying since the end of the war to have a memorial dedicated to their countrymen killed at Katyn.  Successive British governments after WWII had objected to a remembrance of the massacre.

Mrs. W. Piotrowska at the dedication of the Katyn Memorial in London September 18, 1976. Her first husband Captain Ksawery (pictured in the photograph she carried) was last seen at the Starobielsk camp in May 1940.  Photograph Keystone Press Agency, Inc., New York, N.Y.

The British government chose not to be represented at the 1976 dedication.  Serving British military officers were told they could attend the ceremony but were instructed not to wear a uniform.

 

On April 13, 1990, the Soviet government officially acknowledged  its responsibility for the Katyn Forest Massacre.

After the fall of communism Poland would become the independent and free Third Republic of Poland.

On April 10, 2010, Poland President Lech Kaczyński, his wife, high-ranking Polish military leaders and government officials were flying from Warsaw, Poland, to Russia to commemorate the 70th anniversary of Katyn.  The airplane crashed on approach to Smolensk and near the Katyn Forest site.  All 96 people on board died.

 

 

* The 45 page Final Report of the Select Committee to Conduct an Investigation and Study of the Facts, Evidence, and the Circumstances of the Katyn Forest Massacre can be found at https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=osu.32435078695582&view=1up&seq=1

An excellent resource on this topic is British historian Laurence Rees’ TV documentary series “WWII Behind Closed Doors:  Stalin, the Nazis, and the West.”  Mr. Rees’ website is http://ww2history.com/ .

WWII American Graves Registration Service: And the Story of Sergeant John J. Kubinski

 

June 1944 Omaha Beach (Normandy, France) U.S. Graves Registration Service Collection Point for dead American and German soldiers being processed and prepared for temporary burial.  Photograph WW2 US Medical Research Centre. 

 

In WWII the United States Army Quartermaster Graves Registration Service was responsible for the care of the dead in all the branches of military service.  They worked with reverence and respect to preserve the dignity of those who sacrificed their lives.

 

WWII researcher and author, Jennifer Holik, has studied and written in-depth about the United States (U.S.) Graves Registration Service (GRS).  The following excerpts are from two of her articles:  

“In 1867 … Congress gave the Quartermaster General in the U.S. Army the responsibility of establishing permanent military cemeteries, handling burials, keeping records, and handling ongoing maintenance of these cemeteries.

When the U.S. entered World War II  … they planned to establish several cemeteries near the active front and would bring Soldier Dead to these cemeteries. Collection points would be established so the combat units could assist in the collection and identification of Soldier Dead.

The GRS in World War II were not only responsible for collecting, identifying, and burying the Soldier Dead, but also handling personal effects. The men had a system by which they worked on the stripping line to handle effects so they would be returned to the owner’s family.

GRS workers were responsible for locating suitable cemetery sites. They examined the terrain, soil quality, and distance to enemy lines. Upon selection of a site, they plotted the cemetery. Maps were drawn, processing tents were set up and the men assigned tasks. Local civilian workers were called in to dig graves and bury the dead.

It was important to bury all the dead primarily for health concerns. Decomposing bodies out in the open spread disease and lowered troop morale. It was better that the troops didn’t encounter the remains of Soldier Dead very often, lest the fear and panic they already felt increase, making them unable to do their job effectively.

Soldiers were buried for forensic reasons also. Information was gathered from the Soldier Dead to not only identify them but also gather information on how they were killed.

GRS claimed the remains of Soldier Dead from a unit, along the road side or battle ground. They worked on both sides of enemy lines in the mud, rain, deep snow, jungles and on beaches in their recovery efforts.

Effects recovered were bagged and sent to Kansas City, Missouri, for disbursement. They were cleaned of blood and grime.

When a soldier was located after death, every attempt at identification took place. The process began at the stripping line where troops initially removed explosives and equipment. Another soldier took these items to an ammo and equipment area so they could be reissued.

Next, medical sergeants stepped in with a clerk. The sergeants cut pockets and other pieces of clothing to locate identification tags and personal effects.

An Individual Deceased Personnel File (IDPF) was created for every Soldier Dead upon receipt of remains by the GRS.

A Report of Burial contained the soldier’s name, serial number, rank, date of death, place of death, a copy of his identification tag is stamped onto the form using an addressograph machine. The report also contained the grave location of the soldier along with the man buried on either side of him. … A list of personal effects were included if any were found on the body.

If the deceased was unable to be identified then a form that allowed for fingerprinting and dental records was used and inserted into the Soldier Dead file. This form also contained space to list a physical description and information on personal effects or other things that might help identify the deceased.

The Report of Death was a form for the Adjutant General’s Office that listed name, rank, serial number, branch of service, date of birth and death, date of active entry in service, where he was killed, emergency contact and beneficiary information.

Request for Disposition of Remains. This form was sent to the next of kin to complete so the government would know what to do with the remains. The choices were:

  • To be interred at a Permanent American Military Cemetery Overseas.
  • To be returned to the United States or any possession or territory thereof for interment by next of kin in a private cemetery.
  • To be returned to [insert foreign country] the homeland of the deceased for interment by next of kin.
  • To be returned to the United States for final interment in a National Cemetery.

Disinterment Directive.  This form contains the basic identifying information on the Soldier Dead: Name, rank, serial number, date of death, cemetery name and location of grave, name and address of next of kin, condition of remains, date disinterred and remains prepared.

Not all Soldier Dead were identified because of the condition of the body when it was received by the GRS. Unknown Soldier Dead were assigned an X number since there was no serial number by which to identify them. … Unknown remains were placed into a mattress cover and the X number was painted on the bag.

The family was notified of Missing in Action and Killed in Action statuses within a couple of months of the event. When the family was notified, they were done so through the War Department.

After the war ended, the U.S. government began working with overseas officials to secure the authorization to use ports, disinter remains in private cemeteries, and to use rail and waterways to transport remains to major sea ports. Once this was in place, the government was able to contact families of the Soldier Dead to inquire about their wishes for the final burial.

The government began notifying families of the location of their Soldier Dead beginning in late 1946 and continuing for several years afterward. It is possible a family’s soldier had been buried overseas for two or more years before the family was notified of the location.

The disinterment and repatriation process took a couple years or more after the war ended. This was due in part to a shortage of materials for cases for the coffins and a shortage of metal for the coffins themselves. … When a Soldier Dead was placed in these coffins, they were sealed and placed into a wooden shipping case. The shipping case had the name, rank, and serial number of the soldier inscribed on the case.

Soldier Dead from World War II were returned home or reburied in a permanent American Military Cemetery overseas from late 1947 through 1951.”

 

Picture postcard of U.S. Military Cemetery Margraten, Holland, circa 1946.  Note: Identification “dog tags” affixed to the temporary grave markers.  Original photograph by Jean Smeets of Maastricht, Holland.  Postcard photograph courtesy of Josephine Pescatore Reaves. 

 

U.S. military deaths in WWII totaled over 400,000.  Every serviceman and servicewoman had a story.  This is the story of the life and death of  John J. Kubinski and his journey back to his home state of Ohio after WWII ended.

John Joseph Kubinski was born in Ohio on April 10, 1919, to Polish immigrants Stanley and Nellie Kubinski.  He attended Warren G. Harding High School in Warren, Ohio.  John married Susan Billock on November 29, 1941, and he was employed at the Republic Steel Corporation plant in Newton Falls, Ohio, when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on December 7, 1941.

On March 26, 1942, John enlisted in the U.S. Army.  His Enlistment Records noted he was 73 inches tall and weighed 149 pounds.  He was given the military rank of Private.

Private John J. Kubinski was assigned to the U.S. Army 101st Airborne Division, 401st Glider Infantry Regiment, as a Glider Infantryman.  

The 401st Glider Infantry Regiment participated in the June 1944 Normandy Invasion (codenamed Operation Overlord) landing on Utah Beach with the U.S. Army 4th Infantry Division.   

On September 18, 1944, 750 gliders from the 401st Glider Infantry Regiment would land in Holland as part of Operation Market Garden.  The mission of the 401st was to keep open the road between Sint-Oedenrode and Eindhoven.  The road was of vital importance as British armored units advanced north from the Belgium and Netherlands border with the objective to reach the bridge at Arnhem.  Fighting was fierce and combat losses were heavy as the 401st fought 72 days to keep the road open between Veghel and Son, Holland.

 

Waco CG-4 gliders awaiting launch in England as part of Operation Market Garden. Photograph U.S. Army Signal Corps.

 

It was in that 72 day period that then promoted Sergeant (SGT) John J. Kubinski was seriously wounded.  He was transported to the U.S. Army 24th Evacuation Hospital, which at that time was working out of the Saint Maarten Kliniek (Clinic) in Nijmegen, Holland.  It was here that John would die from his wounds.

 

Picture postcard of Saint Maarten Kliniek, Nijmegen, Holland, circa 1940s.  Postcard photograph courtesy of Josephine Pescatore Reaves. 

 

One of SGT Kubinski’s nurses at the 24th Evacuation Hospital was Lieutenant (LT) Josephine Pescatore.  In a 2011 oral history interview she still remembered a courageous young soldier who often spoke of his family and how much he loved them.  John asked LT Pescatore if she could find a priest for him to talk to before he died.  After visiting with the priest, SGT John J. Kubinski, age 25, died at five o’clock in the afternoon on November 16, 1944.

SGT John J. Kubinski was buried in Plot F, Row 3, Grave 50 at U.S. Temporary Cemetery 4655 at Molenhoek, Holland.

After WWII ended, John’s wife, Susan, made the decision to bring his body back to the U.S. for burial in Newton Falls, Ohio.

In November 1948 the remains of SGT John J. Kubinski were disinterred from U.S. Temporary Cemetery 4655 and travelled by train to Antwerp, Belgium.  John’s casket along with the remains of 3,384 WWII dead sailed from Antwerp to New York City on the U.S. Army Transport Barney Kirschbaum.  His casket would travel by train from New York City and arrive in Newton Falls, Ohio, on January 31, 1949.  SGT Kubinski’s casket, draped by an American flag, was met by the James Funeral Home and The American Legion.

John was survived by his wife, Susan;  his parents Stanley and Nellie Kubinski; and his brothers Alex, Edward, Stanley, and Joseph.

John was laid to rest at St. Michael’s Cemetery in Newton Falls, Ohio, on February 3, 1949.

 

Photograph of tombstone from Find A Grave.

 

 

 

Thank you to Jennifer Holik, World War II Research & Writing Center.  Links to the full text of her “The Graves Registration Service in World War II” articles Part 1 and Part 2.

Thank you to Dr. Vernon Williams, Director, East Anglia Air War Project.

Thank you to Mallory Duriak, Reference Associate, Newton Falls Public Library and the Warren-Trumbull County Public Library in Ohio.  

Thank you to WWII historian and researcher Sue Moyer.

Thank you to Carlos Alvarado, Archivist, U.S. Army AMEDD Center of History and Heritage, Fort Sam Houston, Texas.