Hereford, Texas WW2 POW camp!

[Earl Needham]

During World War 2, the were many POW camps actually here in the United States. Many people today don't know this. There was one just outside Hereford, Texas, in the panhandle, and along about 2009, the chapel there was refurbished. A group of ex-POWs came over from Italy to take part in the ceremony.

This picture shows the interesting difference between men's fashion in Texas and Italy -- and I thought the Italian General Consul was really stylish.

 

[C44Antelope]

There was a POW camp around here as well. Camp Ellis. Several of buildings that were used for the camp were moved to a Christian camp that is close by. We were at that camp back a few years ago and one of the internal walls still shows some "grafiti" from the German prisoners. Very elaborate script written in German. I didn't think to take a picture.

 

[Espee]

I don't know if it was any good, but there was a Kristy McNichol tv-movie called "The Summer of My German Soldier."
(She lives near a POW camp...)

 

[Dixon Cannon]

Camp Papago Park was located here in Phoenix, AZ. A real 'Great Escape' took place back in 1944. http://www.historynet.com/the-not-so-great-escape-german-pows-in-the-us-during-wwii.htm and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Papago_Park

-dixon cannon

 

[Two Types]

Growing up in England in the 1970s, one of my neighbours (a German from East Prussia) was a former inmate of a US PoW camp. He was amazed how well treated he was and how much freedom he was given, considering his status as a PoW. He worked on farms in the South and was amazed to be given the role as a foreman/overseer. He told me it was a bizarre to be a prisoner of war, far away from home, and yet have black farm labourers working under him, calling him 'Sir' and doffing their caps to him.

 

[Dixon Cannon]

My dear late friend Gerhard Franzky once told me that it was his life as a POW in Britain after capture in Normandy that really changed his point of view. He had been Waffen SS and couldn't believe how nicely and fairly he was treated by the British. It really opened his eyes to what propaganda had done to his thinking and what it was like to witness true freedom. He eventually came to the U.S. in the late '50's and he truly was glad to live in peace and freedom. -dixon cannon

 

[Two Types]

Similarly, the man I referred to came to the UK after being released from the US PoW camp. He worked on rebuilding bomb damaged areas of Liverpool then married a local girl and settled in the UK. As a child I don't recall him talking much about his experiences apart from as a PoW. My main memory was that he didn't have much time for the Latvian living in our street: they too were former members of the German military, they difference was that they seemed to have retained their old views. Neither of them could ever return home, but he seemed much happier to with his adopted homeland. I've always felt quite proud about how former prisoners of war settled so well into British society and were so easily accepted.

 

[Earl Needham]

BTW, the story where I got the leading picture in this thread is at http://www.herefordbrand.com/index.php?mact=News,cntnt01,detail,0&cntnt01articleid=327&cntnt01origid=15&cntnt01returnid=26