Murder, Retribution, and the Forgotten Story of Nazi POWs in America
February 1, 2025
When Germans were imprisoned in America. Nearly 400,000 German POWs spent WWII in America. Journalist Geroux delivers an expert, unsettling story of this little-known aspect of the war. Author ofThe Mathews Men: Seven Brothers and the War Against Hitler's U-boats, Geroux adds that the POWs were better fed and housed than their families in Germany; many yearned to remain in the U.S. after the war. Senior German officers set the tone in every camp. A minority were fanatic Nazis, certain that Germany would win the war, despising flabby, undisciplined Americans, and determined to enforce fierce loyalty to the Fuhrer. Most POWs went along, but there were always a few who expressed unflattering opinions on Hitler or made themselves obnoxious to their companions. Warnings or beatings were the usual response, but Geroux recounts several cases where guards found prisoners beaten to death or strangled in clumsy attempts to fake their suicides. Suspects underwent investigations and trials, and 15 of those convicted received the death penalty. Following the Geneva Convention, the Germans were informed of it. Geroux then describes conditions of over 70,000 American POWs in Axis camps, focusing on a group tried for trivial offenses such as disobeying guards and sentenced to death in an effort to force a prisoner exchange. Using Swiss diplomats as intermediaries, the Roosevelt administration began negotiations, but these extended into 1945, when the Nazi regime was crumbling and messages were delayed and sometimes lost. In the end, no American was executed; in July 1945, two months after Germany's surrender, the U.S. hanged 14 of the condemned Germans. There is no lesson, but readers will have no doubt that America, despite its warts--many German defendants were badly roughed up, but on the other hand, the POWs were often treated better than Black American soldiers--deserved to win. Good, unfamiliar World War II history.
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February 1, 2025
Geroux (The Ghost Ships of Archangel, 2019) chronicles the experiences of prisoners of war in the U.S. and Europe during WWII. After the Axis defeat in North Africa, German soldiers from the Afrika Korps were placed in internment camps throughout the U.S. Geroux looks at the camp system and argues that the government failed to separate soldiers along ideological lines, which led to several murders of POWs by their own men. He explores the murders, trials, and aftermath. Meanwhile, the German government condemned several American POWs to force a prisoner exchange, and Geroux relates their experiences. He draws a stark contrast between the treatment of POWs in the U.S. and Europe and explores both the American and German governments' diplomatic maneuvering and the impact of the Geneva Convention. He closes by reflecting on the legacy and impact of the U.S. camps and the postwar lives of the U.S. POWs. A compelling exploration of the experiences of prisoners of war in WWII.
COPYRIGHT(2025) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.