Post a interesting obscure fact about Western Europe during WW2

Post any type of interesting fact about WW2 in western Europe. Just let it be a bit obscure. Please post where you got the fact from as well.

 

I guess i'll have to dig out my copy of Dirty Little Secrets of WWII.

 

Cannot say it is true and is from memory but if verified it would be interesting. Did the British rescue, borrow, abscond with a milk cow for breeding purposes from the Channel Islands after it was occupied by the Germans.

I indeed think it interesting that the channel Islands were left in German hands until the war ended to avoid the trauma of an invasion. the garrison was of no danger to the allies.

I read

 

The British Army did a deal with the Wehrmacht to take over Bergan Belsen concentration camp. The deal was that the Germans would hand over the camp, with its Hungarian and SS Guards to the British.

 

Though neutral through out the second world war Turkey received $26,640,031.50 in US Lend-Lease Aid.

 

That is an interesting fact I had not thought about. New life in a death camp. Makes me wonder about what happened with the babies.

 

The British Dental Invasion

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_King_(British_Army_officer)

 

I was intrigued by your post Lou, and dug into it. She's in the process of canonization by the Catholic Church for her exploits in the camp. Here's what wiki has to say about her.

Auschwitz concentration camp:

After interrogation by the Gestapo, Stanisława Leszczyńska and her 24-year-old daughter Sylwia were transported to Auschwitz concentration camp on April 17, 1943, and tattooed with the camp numbers 41335 and 41336 respectively. Stanisława was relegated to women's camp maternity ward along with her daughter, who had been a medical student before the war broke out. Stanisława met Dr Mengele, andwas advised to euthanize the newborns she delivered. She did not comply. Leszczyńska did not kill a single child, and whenever possible, used to wrap them up in scraps of fabric or paper and put them under the mother's rough blankets.

Years later, she described how she put her life at risk to save newborns in a work called Raport położnej z Oświęcimia (The Report of a Midwife from Auschwitz). She described how the newborns were snatched away, taken to another room, and drowned in a barrel by Schwester Klara from Germany, who was imprisoned at Auschwitz for infanticide, and her assistant, Schwester Pfani. Of the 3,000 she delivered, some 2,500 newborns perished; a few hundred others with blue eyes were sent away to be Germanized. Only about 30 infants survived in the care of their mothers. Expectant mothers did not realize what was going to happen to their babies and many traded their meager rations for fabric to be used for diapers after the birth.[6] Stanisława remained the camp's midwife until it was liberated on January 26, 1945.

Leszczyńska returned to Łódź, and her children also arrived there from the forced labour camps. She settled in an apartment at 99 Zgierska Street and continued working as a midwife locally. Remembering Auschwitz, she prayed over every child she delivered. On January 27, 1970 Stanisława attended an official celebration in Warsaw, where she met the women prisoners of Auschwitz and their grown-upchildren who had been born in the camp. She died four years later. In 1983 the School of Obstetricians in Kraków was named in her honor.

The rest of the story here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanisława_Leszczyńska

This would make a great movie.

 

US wanted to buy a Chilean battleship after Pearl Harbor:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chilean_battleship_Almirante_Latorre

 

Priorities!

In 1937 the British Army riding school budgeted 526 Pounds (about $26,000 in 1994 dollars) per student and the Tank Corps School made do with 83 pounds ($4,100 in 1994 dollars) per student.

Explains a lot.

 

During the D-Day parachuting's the allies deployed dummy paratroopers to distract the Germans from the real paratroopers.

Here's a video about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xfOQuEO9gQg
I know the writing in the video is hard to read (I couldn't even read half of it off my crap monitor) but the video does demonstrate the tactic good enough.

(Before anyone says that this fact isn't very obscure, I am well aware but a lot of people don't know about it so its good enough)

 

montgomery's one-page plan for D-day, written a couple months before the invasion. if my handwriting analysis lessons are of any use, i will say this is a prepared presentation and not a personal note; perhaps to his staff or even to ike and churchill, on how it should be executed.

 

Simplicity is right...pretty obvious plan with little or no surprises. A Captain could have put that one together!

 

I very much doubt if this is "Montgomery's plan for d day".

This looks like some speakers notes prepared to explain the complex landing sequence devised by Combined Operations between September 1942 and June 1943 while Montgomery was doing stuff in the African desert.

 

too many sites are showing it. it was at least a month before the invasion so anyone envisioning d-day can do a one-pager.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/06/montgomerys-one-page-d-day-plan-revealed/

but my own nagging question about overlord was: did every officer (2nd lt.-up) in the invasion force know of the plan and how early were they informed about it? an operation that big, with so many people briefed about it, is sure to produce leaks.

 

We forget how far reaching The Nazi Part was...much more than just "war"...it permeated every aspect of German Society.

I suppose her story is not all that Unique/Obscure.
But it is a fact, and rather despicable.
Eva Justin was a Nazi Nurse/Psychologist/Racial Anthropologist.
She was a horrible creature that was actually employed to, again, work with Children After The War.
These things probably happened all the time. What could you do.?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eva_Justin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67C4DdBrcNc

For many years, i lived next to a woman who claimed to have survived Eva, when the children home nuns hid her from the SS. She was the right age, and her story all made sense, but who knows.......

I also worked with a German Guy (he looked like a text book Nazi) that said he was a product of one of those SS Baby factories

 

The War Ministry in London settled 19 paternity cases without question "arising" from the British occupation of the Faroe islands.

The islands' gene pool was/is so small, families...fathers, brothers - even husbands!...encouraged daughters'/wives' fraternisation with the occupiers, often Scottish soldiers posted there so their cultural similarities would make the occupation smoother. Thus the islanders welcomed their protectors with open arms...and legs.