Moosburg to Liberation

 “Unbeknownst to us rank and file POWs,” said Howard Leach, “the Germans had notified Col. Alkire (Darr H. Alkire, former commander of the 100th) that Stalag 13D was to be evacuated, and all prisoners were to be marched to Stalag 7A at Moosburg.  This came about on April 4.  Guards appeared that late afternoon ordering us to prepare for the march.  Ours was the first compound to leave.” 

 “I had made friends with a P-51 pilot who had spent some time in a German hospital, having been injured bailing out and badly burned about the face.  He was fearful of being put on a train with other wounded, since he had endured a life threatening experience being shipped to Nurnberg.  The Germans would place the POWs in the car adjacent to the locomotive where they would be the most vulnerable in the event there was a strafing attack.  He had experienced such a strafing.  I carried his meager belongings, and he and I managed the first day of the march before he was picked up by a Red Cross truck following the evacuation.”

 “The Germans had allowed Red Cross trucks with food parcels to come in from Switzerland to supplement our ration of mostly potato and bread issue,” said Wally Oldham.  “The trucks were utilized to transport some that were ailing or had various problems in keeping up with the column.  There were about 10,000 POWs in our camp, and to move that many on a march, a column was formed that was over three days long.”  

 “Individually,” added Howard Leach, “we gathered our few possessions, (blanket, Kriegie stove, eating utensils, and what remained of our last Red Cross parcel) and assembled out of doors.  Our only clothing was what we wore and had been sleeping in for months.  We struggled out of the compound in gathering darkness and a cold drizzling rain.  All night the guard relentlessly pushed us until finally, exhausted, we refused to go further.  I collapsed in a swale somewhere in the woods and, gathering my blanket around me, went to sleep.  When daylight arrived I found myself in several inches of water.  We were roused up and pushed back onto the road.”

 “That night we reached the suburbs of the roadside town of Feucht and spent the night crowded in a church with little space to lie down.  The next morning we were taken to a nearby park, where we lined up to receive a cup of hot soup rationed out by a group of townspeople.  As we were marched out of town, I was amused to see chickens scurrying out of the road.  Some of the ingenious Limeys, many who – since Dunkirk – had been on such forced marches before, had fashioned a wire hoop on their walking staffs.  Now and then such a staff would appear, snatch a chicken into the ranks and leave behind a mess of feathers.” 

 “We were envious of the Kriegie stoves carried by many Limeys.  During a break, down would come the stove, wood chips placed in the firebox, and a blower operated by hand crank would heat a spot of tea in a matter of minutes.  Ours was a tin can with air holes cut out, taking seemingly hours to heat a cup of coffee or whatever we had available from our Red Cross parcel or had bartered from the Germans.  Barter goods were: cigarettes, soap, and D Bars, which could be traded for potatoes, bread, or eggs.  Civilians would stand along the column ready to barter.  On one occasion as we were proceeding through a small village, I approached one such German. ‘Ich habe Zigaretten für Brot?’  He replied, ‘ya’ and indicated that he would meet me down the road.  As he hurriedly departed for the bread, he remarked in perfect English, ‘I prefer Chesterfields.’  He was given Raleighs when I finally made the exchange.”

 “The Germans were intent on getting us across the Danube River before the American 3rd Division caught up with us.  We were five days in reaching the river, and hurried across the bridge accompanied by the guards firing overhead.  Once across the Danube, the guards, mostly old Wehrmacht soldiers whose standard remark was ‘Allies ist Kaput,’ soon tired of herding us and became one of the party struggling south.  Kriegies began to appear with confiscated wagons and carts into which they placed their belongings.  I glanced out of the column and there was F/O Led B. Stuart from Auckland, New Zealand, red beard and all looking like Santa Claus, pushing a baby carriage with a wire haired terrier on a leash.  Glancing behind the column, I could see a German on a bicycle in hot pursuit.  He caught up with Stuart, grabbing the leash and taking possession of his dog.  Shortly after, I observed a young boy standing along the road and to my delight, he possessed a sling shot.  ‘Ich habe Chocolate für slingshot.’  I was armed and thereafter, English sparrows and an occasional pigeon fell to my weapon.  I had meat to eat.”

 “As we moved ahead, the guards would billet us at night in farm courtyards.  If a hay barn was available, it provided warm sleep.  Barnyard fowl often fell prey to hunger.  On one occasion, we entered what appeared to be a rather prosperous farm in the middle of which was a large cistern of animal manure and human waste.  This was the ‘night soil’ being used for fertilizer.  Standing in the middle of the cistern was a French slave laborer, and walking around the farmyard was a 40 pound gander honking his disfavor of our presence.  The next morning, a most upset Bauer, accompanied by a guard, came looking for his goose.  One of the Kriegies, who spoke German, took the Bauer to the cistern and showed him what remained of last night’s dinner...the feet of a goose protruding from the manure.  ‘There is your pet goose; it wandered into the shit and drowned.’  The guard broke out into laughter and the farmer stormed off.”

 “While there were humorous times, we were under constant stress not knowing what was in store for us.  Among us on the march were Kriegies who had been on the ‘Death March’ from Stalag 3A at Sagan on January 28, 1945.  Prisoners unable to keep up with the column were shot by the guards.  Some had participated in the ‘Great Escape’ on March 24-25, 1944, when 76 British airmen escaped by tunnel, only to be recaptured.  Fifty of these escapees were executed. Only three were eventually able to reach England.  With the approach of the Russian troops, Hitler, not wanting allied airmen to be liberated by the Russians, had ordered the evacuation of Stalag 3A and other POW camps on the Eastern Front.  “There was a rumor that we were going to be held as hostages by the SS in their final desperate period of resistance.”

 (The RAF and American bombers blasted the Bavarian stronghold, and once General Patton and his 3rd Army were across the Rhine, General Eisenhower ordered him to hasten south to join up with the Russians on the Danube between Regensburg and Linz, ending German plans for a redoubt.  Eisenhower, too, was to notify the Germans that he would not tolerate using POWs as hostages.  We had also learned that Hitler, in the last weeks of the war, had ordered Field Marshal Goering to execute, by gassing, all American and British airmen held captive.  Fortunately, Goering refused to obey this order before Hitler ordered his arrest and replacement as commander in chief of the Luftwaffe.)

 Howard Leach picks up the story again. “Both American and German fighters were often overhead, including ME 262s and German jets.  A tragedy occurred while we were passing through a small town.  A railway was loading as our long column was proceeding by.  Visible was a V-2 bomb.  In came a P-45 blowing up the bomb.  The concussion killed a number of POWs who were unable to escape.”

 “I was marching along side my waist gunner,” said Ralph Kalberloh.  “Tom Ramsey and I were together.  Chappel (Richard G. Chapple-BTG) and Logan (unknown) were ahead of us, and Charlton (William E. Charlton-ROG) and Tooley (Patrick Tooley-TTE) were ahead of them. Then the P-47s came over.  Three of them came down and strafed and bombed.  I looked up and saw the bombs falling, so Tom and I ran under a bridge and lay down next to the wall.  A bomb landed about 25 feet from the bridge.  The bullets were glancing off the ground and flying all around us. Then it was over as quickly as it had started.  Logan didn’t know anything, but he didn’t die for two hours.  His leg was blown almost off and we couldn’t stop him from bleeding to death.  One of the fellows beside me had a piece of shrapnel from the bomb in his foot, but he didn’t know it until his shoe got full of blood.  There were plenty of wounded, but we marched on. Everybody was scared and nervous, and at every unexpected sound we ran.  The Air Force soon recognized us as POWs and every day after that a P-47 flew escort and waggled his wings to us.”

 Howard Leach continues.  “The last day before being marched into the barbed wire compound at Stalag 7A, we were given orders by our American commander not to move.  I recall Colonel Good and the German Hoffman standing that morning in the courtyard in heated argument.  The Hoffman reacted by requesting an SS detachment from Moosburg be sent to move us out.  They arrived, shooting over our heads.  We promptly fell out and reluctantly struggled to Moosburg and into the Stalag.  We were sad to learn later that the SS had executed this Hoffman, who had accompanied us from Nurnberg.  Stalag 7A had been a long established prison camp.  Upon entering, I noticed a compound containing a number of shell shocked POWs in pitiful condition and behavior.  It was a most depressing sight, with a couple of American officers giving us vacant stares.  I appeared in the barracks carrying my slingshot and a pair of wire cutters.”

 “I cannot come up with the April date that the last contingent of Nurnberg POWs entered Stalag 7A.  I’m sure it took nearly a week after I was incarcerated before the Germans had us all behind wire.  Preceding our arrival were 4,000 POWs evacuated from Sagan.  They had arrived on February 10, having endured the 13 day ‘Death March’ suffering great privation and casualties.  There were 70,000 POWs here when we were liberated.”

 “We were crowded into barracks with little room other than the bed we occupied.  There was no heat.  German rations were non-existent, and we could not depend on receiving Red Cross parcels.  We individually cooked on our Kriegie stoves whatever food we brought with us.  At night we could hear the firing of artillery as our troops moved ever closer.  On April 28, the advancing elements of Patton’s 3rd Army were close by.  The firing of 105s occurred all night, with the whining of shells overhead falling into Moosburg.  The next morning, the guards moved out of the compound into trenches just beyond the barbwire fences.  Small arms fire could be heard.  We were out in the street before the barracks, exuberantly awaiting the arrival of our troops, when the SS, held up in a nearby cheese factory, opened fire killing two of us.  We beat a fast retreat into the safety of the barracks listening to the increase in small arms fire.”

 “There was an infantry onslaught on the cheese factory, killing all the SS troops offering final resistance.  I had my last fling at the Germans firing my slingshot at a steel-helmeted German crouched in a trench nearby.  My fellow officers were not so inclined, and I found my weapon wrenched from my hand and broken in half.  So ended the war for me.”

 “At 12:45 p.m., April 29, we observed the Stars and Stripes being raised over the city.  Tears came to my eyes, and I cried with joy.  American troops began to enter the compound.  A jeep appeared nearby to our cheering group, and a sergeant stood up and threw out gold watches liberated in the last few hours from the Germans.  General Patton, with an entourage of VIPs, entered the compound the next day.  I observed him nearby wearing only one of his pearl handled revolvers.  He made a short speech and departed with his troops, headed for Munich.  It was two or three days later that food was brought into the compound. I remember gathering around a loaf of French bread coated with D-Bar being divided up among five of us.”

 “When we were liberated by Patton’s 14th Armored Division, the tanks moved right into our compound,” said Tom Ramsey.  “There was a mad scramble as the GIs threw K-rations out to us.”

 “It was ten days before we were flown out of Germany by C-47s.  No longer contained by wire, Kriegies were roaming Moosburg and going as far as Munich. I found Lt. W. P. Magenti, who was inducted with me at Fresno, disassembling a machine gun, which he was determined to take with him back to San Francisco.” 

 “The second day of liberation, I wandered out of the artillery encampment and was graciously hosted to lunch.  While there, and later at the Stalag, Jews from the death camps at Regensburg and Dachau appeared in their striped clothing covering nothing but skeletons.  A most pitiful sight, they were making their way on foot back home or to whatever was left of them.”

Tom Ramsey was reluctant to wander far from the main compound.  “I was afraid of becoming lost or getting into trouble and being left behind when they shipped us home.  I did, however, venture out one day to the edge of the compound and came upon a large outbuilding.  I opened the door and found the place packed from floor to ceiling with wooden shoes.  I managed to bring a pair home with me, which are now on a rack outside my patio door.”

 “The morning of May 8th,” remembers Howard Leach, “our compound was loaded into 6x6s and trucked to a vacant Luftwaffe airfield at Ingolstadt.  A continual stream of POWs began to appear as the day waned with no C-47s arriving.  That afternoon, there was an announcement that the German High Command had signed an unconditional surrender that day.  The War in Germany was over.  Some of us were fearful that we were destined to end the war over the skies of Japan.”

 “I wandered over to the abandoned Luftwaffe barracks, picking up souvenirs.  As I was walking through the bomb crater filled airstrip, I heard .50 caliber machine guns being fired.  Coming in for a landing was a German Stuka dive bomber containing two German officers fleeing the Russian front.  Oh, were they happy to make a safe landing and fall into the hands of the Americans.  The next day I was loaded into a C-47 and flown to a hospital in Reims.  Here I spent several days recuperating, was given a uniform, and ordered to report to Camp Lucky Strike, Le Havre, France. I had the pleasure of touring the railroad car in which the Germans surrendered. Another former POW and I jumped the train in Paris and spent several days touring the city before hitchhiking to Le Havre.  He had 6 German lugers for trade and I had cigarettes.”

 “Camp Lucky Strike was filled with ex-POWs awaiting shipment to the states.  We were housed in tents with adequate bedding and three meals a day.  There was a PX nearby with doughnuts, coffee and beer.  A terrible accident occurred here when an MP drinking coffee, dropped his rifle.  It discharged, killing one of us standing alongside, a 1st Lieutenant who had survived imprisonment.”

 “When they flew us out of Germany,” said Tom Ramsey, “I was separated from my other crew members.  I was flown directly to Paris and not to Reims. I can only speculate on going directly to Paris rather than Reims because of my physical condition.  My feet had become infected, and I was having a hard time getting around.” 

 “When we landed at Paris, we got off the plane and there was a large honor guard at the terminal.  This puzzled us until we found out it was all set up to greet the returning POWs.  We were herded into the terminal and treated royally, with all the coffee, soft drinks and doughnuts we could eat.  We were served by Red Cross girls in neat blue uniforms – a most emotional affair. I spent my entire time in Paris at an infirmary getting my feet treated.  I was disappointed in not being able to see Paris, but I did get to see the Eiffel Tower as we landed.

 “After Paris, I was sent to Camp Lucky Strike to await shipment home.  Foremost in my mind was to locate my twin brother, who was also a POW.  A search of camp records revealed that he had preceded me home.”

 Like Tom Ramsey, Howard Leach was looking for his brother.  “I was determined to go to the Henri Chapell Cemetery out of Reims, Belgium. This I did with great sadness on Memorial Day, May 30, finding the grave of my brother, Staff Sergeant Roy E. Leach, among the other 30,000 Americans buried there.”

 “I returned to Camp Lucky Strike to find that orders had been cut for me and the other six “permanents” to be trucked to Le Havre to be taken by landing craft to the USS Hermitage for journey home.”

 The trip home was a memorable one for Tom Ramsey.  “I remember the Andrews Sisters singing ‘Rum and Coca Cola’ over the ship’s radio until I was sick of it.  As we approached America, we were all anxious to see the Statue of Liberty; however, we docked in Boston rather than New York Harbor.  The date was June 6, 1945.  All these events had taken place in slightly over five months.”

“I immediately called home to find out from my parents that they had not been notified that I was on my way home.  The War Department had informed them on February 23, 1945 that I was MIA, but never notified them that I was a POW.  After being liberated, I had sent my folks a V-Mail letter telling them that I had been a POW, had been liberated, and would be home soon, not knowing exactly when.  About the time I arrived home, they finally received a telegram from the Adjutant General dated June 4, 1945, that said I was returned to Military Control on April 29, the day we were liberated from Moosburg.”

 Howard Leach could not remember any details from his trip home. “I cannot to this day remember any details of the six day trip to New York or when we arrived. Disembarking late at night, we were taken to an Army installation to be placed on a train the next day enroute to California.  I was setting alongside a colonel when he was asked by the train commander if the boys should be permitted booze.  Every stop for 3,000 miles, we jumped the train to purchase ice and beer.  I arrived at Camp Beal on June 22, received my 60 day furlough and caught a Greyhound for Fresno.  I arrived late at night and walked the streets of Fresno before catching a taxi for home.  The folks found me the next morning asleep with the dog, Sport, in the backyard.”

 Part Five gives us the story that started the search for this Chronicle that we have all been enjoying.  It is the story of a German man reaching out to the 100th and the reuniting of one of the Dixie’s Delight crew journeying to the resting place of his aircraft.”

 -end-