Today is the 65th anniversary of the liberation of the Dachau Concentration Camp by the 45th (3rd Battalion, 157th Infantry Regiment) and 42nd Infantry Divisions. http://www.kz-gedenkstaette-dachau.de/index-e.html It is a day we ought to remember as well, when 32,000 men, women and children were rescued from the evil of the Nazi regime. The best account of the day is in Flint Whitlock's The Rock of Anzio. Lest we forget. Dave
The very first of these camps was situated at Oranienborg. I believe it is still the only camp that we have surviving footage of filmed by the Germans themselves, a propaganda piece for public consumption. I may be wrong in assuming that no other films were issued by the Nazi Partei other than this one. Does anyone know of a link to this film, or any others like it, should they exist? What other film was taken inside these camps whilst they were still under Nazi control? Do we have any amateur footage? ( I do realise this was forbidden, but has any come to light?) P.S. Czechoslovakian radio has an archive recording of a radio broadcast "live" from Oranienborg, with commentary, even interviews with inmates. Would be nice if anyone could share that here....would certainly make a nice link here. Thanks....
The 45th Thunderbird Division and the 42nd Rainbow Division are also in dispute regarding who actually liberated Dachau first. You may have read recently the 442nd liberated Dachau. Myth. Dachau was liberated by the 45th and 42nd Infantry Divisions not the 442nd RCT The 442nd was not in Germany. Their organic artillery battalion was in Germany but artillery battalions do not liberate anyone. Infantry units do and since a forward observer from an artillery battalion usually travels with the headquarters of an infantry unit in combat, that may explain why a few Japanese Americans may have been on the scene. If this is so, there may have been a few Japanese Americans at a sub camp of Dachau. I read the ABC News article and George Will's commentary regarding this and was astounded at the historical revisionism.
Darn I had a Thread ready to post on this I did last night, a well better luck next time. Ok I can add, the 442nd liberated Dachau I don't think so. Which Division really liberated Dachau? [SIZE=-1]Soldiers of the 45th Infantry Division were the first to arrive at Dachau[/SIZE] The 45th Division had been ordered to liberate the Dachau concentration camp, according to Lt. Col. Felix L. Sparks, the commanding officer, but Brig. Gen. Henning Linden of the 42nd Division, was the one who accepted the surrender of the concentration camp from Lt. Heinrich Wicker on April 29, 1945. Which Division really liberated Dachau? Now according to other sources It was the 42nd. Now there was also the Massacre of Dachau but that's for a completely different thread, Which I'm about to post
I pity the poor folk living in the village with this former hell-hole right on it's outskirts. wonder how many of you folk have even visited the quaint little town with the too well known name.. . . ? full of oldness and several very good artisans. Sadly this name/C.C. will live with this quite old town forever
I was visiting the BAUMA Exhibition (an exhibition for construction and mining equipment) in Münich in 1998. A few friends and I took a detour to the former concentration camp and afterwards we went to the village Dachau for dinner and a couple of beers. A nice town really, I took some pics there but I can't find them right now. I'll upload them when they show up.
Finally I found the pics, they were hidden in a closet. Time flies, twelve years have already passed since I visited Dachau. It's Wednesday April 1st 1998 and we are sitting outside the Schlossberg Bräuerei drinking Zieglerbräu according to my notes in the album. It's late and the sun is low, so soon it's getting too dark to take pictures. The rest were almost black... We were struck by the wast space and the emptiness of the former concentration camp. Only the concrete buildings were left. One barack had been reconstructed, the original ones were burnt down shortly after the liberation for sanitary reasons. Only the foundations were left. Despite the big exhibition nearby we were the only visitors there. The weather was lovely, but only a handful of people had been there during the day. The fair was huge, but it was a boring event with dozens of crane and excavator brands. It was a sort of 'mine-is-longer-than-yours' competition, if you could reach a few inches longer/higher/wider than your neighbor/competitor then you had won. In the rock drilling business we can count our competitors on one hand and there will still be fingers left...
Here is the link to the film "memory of the camps" which was filmed by American and British troops as they liberated the camps. First, choose "watch the full programme online" and from there part 3 is about Dachau. There's no need to say that if you haven't seen this film before, watch the whole film from the start. frontline: memory of the camps | PBS
I have scanned at 300 dpi the After Action Report of the 222nd Infantry Regiment, 42nd Infantry Division, for April 1945, which I copied 17 Sept 2010 at the NARA. The pdf is twenty-seven pages and 12 megabytes in size. If anyone would like a copy, just let me know, and I will email it in two parts. Page 18 of the AAR was missing from the folder at the Archives. It is one of the pages discussing Dachau. In addition, I have 14 pages of the Unit Journal covering 28 - 30 April. I did not scan these because they require my large scanner. Of note is the entry for 1210, 29 April, which is the first in the clear reference to Dachau: "Fury 6 to Furn 6: Concentration camp at Dachau will be guarded by uncovering unit until relieved." Dave
