Hi all! I am hoping you can tell me about any labor camps you liberated that contained American GI's held as POWs. The attached document describes the camps where my father was held but I am unable to confirm where he was liberated from and by whom.

My father didn't talk much about his captivity. I was born 10 years after my father was liberated, so the only reason I am here is because of my father's will to survive. My Dad, Walter Blair Brinegar, was in A Company of the 27th AIB/9th Armored Division. I have been researching his captivity in the hope of finding out where he was liberated from. I have been in contact with some WWII historians in Germany that suggested he may have been held in Ammunition Factory in Siegburg, or in the bordering town of Troisdorf. I believe your corp liberated that area on or around April 8, 1945 (that is the day my father said he was liberated).

My Dad passed 30 years ago, when I was much younger and didn't realize the significance of his experience. Now, that I am older and wiser, I want to commerate his life and his will to survive by finding the places where he was held and taking my children and grandchildren to those places. I want to make sure they never forget why they are here and to also make sure they tell their children and grandchildren.

If you have any information you believe may be relevant, please contact me. Thank you in advance for any assistance you provide. This is a quest and labor of love andhonor for my Dad.

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Dear Mary:

Thanks for the photo too. I am going to start looking through the documents from April 1945, from the 540th Combat Engineer Regiment, to see if there is any mention. It could be any VI Corps unit, which includes MANY. I'll look to see if my dad's unit was anywhere in the area at the time.

Warmly,

Marion

I don't know how much of their actual history you know, but am also including some vital links for you.

http://www.history.army.mil/documents/eto-ob/9ad-eto.htm

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10006146

http://www.battleofthebulge.org/fact/fact_...armored_di.html

http://www.historyshots.com/usarmy/Division.cfm?did=209

http://www.google.com/search?q=9th+armored...ved=0CFgQ5wIwCg

http://www.eucmh.com/2009/04/14/oob-9th-ar...sion-1944-1945/

http://www.awon.org/discus/messages/14/450.html?1277434327

http://www.criba.be/index.php?option=com_c...my&Itemid=6

http://140.194.76.129/publications/eng-pam...0-1-25/c-18.pdf

Found this at NARA

You can contact NARA in Maryland and request specific dates of documents for his unit.

http://www.archives.gov/dc-metro/college-park/index.html

These are detailed, official documents which the army kept during the war.

Mary:

From looking at the map, none of the VI Corps Engineer units were in that area. We were located south during March and April of 1945. In early April, the 540th were in and around Heidelberg, Germany.

More later, gotta work in our store in a couple of minutes...

Later...

Here's a map of VI Corps/7th Army movement, the first week of April, 45. Note how far north your father would be. The First and Third Armies were north of us. It would be one of their units who freed your father and his buddies.

http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&q=si...ved=0CBMQ8gEwAA

Hi all! I am hoping you can tell me about any labor camps you liberated that contained American GI's held as POWs. The attached document describes the camps where my father was held but I am unable to confirm where he was liberated from and by whom.

 

My father didn't talk much about his captivity. I was born 10 years after my father was liberated, so the only reason I am here is because of my father's will to survive. My Dad, Walter Blair Brinegar, was in A Company of the 27th AIB/9th Armored Division. I have been researching his captivity in the hope of finding out where he was liberated from. I have been in contact with some WWII historians in Germany that suggested he may have been held in Ammunition Factory in Siegburg, or in the bordering town of Troisdorf. I believe your corp liberated that area on or around April 8, 1945 (that is the day my father said he was liberated).

 

My Dad passed 30 years ago, when I was much younger and didn't realize the significance of his experience. Now, that I am older and wiser, I want to commerate his life and his will to survive by finding the places where he was held and taking my children and grandchildren to those places. I want to make sure they never forget why they are here and to also make sure they tell their children and grandchildren.

 

If you have any information you believe may be relevant, please contact me. Thank you in advance for any assistance you provide. This is a quest and labor of love andhonor for my Dad.

Mary,

Your father was liberated by Combat Command A, 13th Armored Division, the "Black Cats." On 8 April 1945 CCA captured Siegberg and nearby Troisdorf after CCB had by-passed that latter. It is fitting that your father, an armored infantryman, was liberated by his comrades of the Armored Force. At the time the 13th AD was attached to XVIII Corps, First Army, and operating on the left flank of the 97th Infantry Division.

Your father was probably on the roles of Stalag VIG as a POW although it appears from your comments he may have been one of those men who was out on a labor detail. Stalag VIG was closed out and moved several times during the war, and as near as I can tell was set up in or near the town of Bergeneustadt some miles to the east. You might want to follow up on the various locations of this POW camp, but it appears that at one time it was quite near Bonn, Germany.

Hope this helps.

I am living 4 km away from Siegburg. The ammonition factories in Siegburg closed already after WWI, the ones in Troisdorf are still working

The next POW camp to Siegburg was in Rösrath: Stalag VI G Arb-Kdo 281. Concededly this camp was freed not on 8 but on 12 April 1945, by taskforce Delnore of the 46th Tank Battalion, but German sources say that the German soldiers left the camp alone a few days before the Americans reached it. It was not only a camp for prisoners of war but also for foreign forced laborers. The next camps were in Bonn, about 20 km away and taken already on 8 March, and in Bergisch Gladbach which was taken on 13 April. Today there is a memorial stone and a cemetery for prisoners of war and forced laborers, and kind of child care center, where at least one of the old barracks is still in new use.

Translation of the memorial stone:

This was the POW camp Hoffnungsthal in the second world war, where people of different nationalities were victims of hunger, disease and violence. Their sufferings and their death urge for peace.

Christoph

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Christoph:

First, welcome to our forum. Have been enjoying our email conversations.

Thanks for posting that information here for all our readers. Greatly appreciated.

Hello,

I have looked for more information concerning the POW camp Hoffnungsthal:

There were 1500 POWs, 187 of them American soldiers when the camp was freed, most of them captured after "Market Garden".

Here you can find a German text with an aerial view of the camp in March 1945, on the roof of one of the buildings you can read "POW". These pages seem to come from a book of a local history association in Rösrath.

There is a memorial exhibition with a model of the camp, photos etc in a chapel near the camp, perhaps I can visit it this year.

This camp is also mentioned in a new book about the Wahner Heide (heathland), I'll try to translate a paragraph:

On 04-11-1945 the first American tanks came from Spich. The camp was already left and marauded. Some few German paratroopers still offered resistance for three days, then the Wahner Heide and the camp were taken without bigger defense.

I will try to get that book I have mentioned and contact the association and the exhibition whether they have lists of the prisoners or other useful information.

Christoph

Edit: Here another link with a photo of the remaining barack today and the Polish Marshal Kerlikov visiting the exhibition.

After reading the timeline I am quiet shure that the camp Hoffnungsthal is the one Mary Durst is looking for. The last link mentions also Italian prisoners.

The monastery in Siegburg is still a monastery (but no hospital), but the last 7 friars will leave this year.

Good work. I'm sure Mary will be pleased with the results.

Do not praise too early...

 

Looking at the dates, he was perhaps in the camp in Bonn-Hardthöhe/Hardtberg), which was freed on the 8th. This camp was much bigger with ten-thousands of POWs. The area was later (1955)used for the German Department of Defense. There is also a memorial stone:

Secretary of defense inaugurating memorial stone

 

The next POW camp to Siegburg was in Rösrath: Stalag VI G Arb-Kdo 281. Concededly this camp was freed not on 8 but on 12 April 1945, by taskforce Delnore of the 46th Tank Battalion,

 

Christoph

Christoph,

The camp at Bonn-Hardthöhe/Hardtberg was liberated by the 1st Infantry Division between 7 and 10 March 1945, not April. This action eliminated German resistance west of the Rhine in the First Army area of operations.

The 46th Tank Battalion was organic to the 13th Armored Division. Any task force of an armored division was made up of the combined arms. To clairfy, this means the liberators of Rösrath: Stalag VI G Arb-Kdo 281 included units of the division other than the 46th Tank Battalion. Any attempt to determine the specifics of the liberation would require an examination of the reports and journals of those units, as well as the 46th Tank Battalion, and the combat command to which it was attached. Since CCB was refitting and reorganizing in the Dunnwald area on 11-12 April, the liberating parent unit was most likely CCA.

Christoph,

 

The camp at Bonn-Hardthöhe/Hardtberg was liberated by the 1st Infantry Division between 7 and 10 March 1945, not April. This action eliminated German resistance west of the Rhine in the First Army area of operations.

Of course

The 46th Tank Battalion was organic to the 13th Armored Division. Any task force of an armored division was made up of the combined arms. To clairfy, this means the liberators of Rösrath: Stalag VI G Arb-Kdo 281 included units of the division other than the 46th Tank Battalion. Any attempt to determine the specifics of the liberation would require an examination of the reports and journals of those units, as well as the 46th Tank Battalion, and the combat command to which it was attached. Since CCB was refitting and reorganizing in the Dunnwald area on 11-12 April, the liberating parent unit was most likely CCA.

I've found my information here:

History of the 46th Tank Battalion

For me it is not so clear whether the 67th Armored Infantry Battalion or the 46th Tank Battalion lost its A, B and D company and whether Task Force Sheffy and Task Force Feldman were parts of Taskforce Delnore or separate Taskforces. And I'm also not sure whether this is caused by the quality of the text or by my English.

Christoph

Of course

 

 

 

I've found my information here:

History of the 46th Tank Battalion

For me it is not so clear whether the 67th Armored Infantry Battalion or the 46th Tank Battalion lost its A, B and D company and whether Task Force Sheffy and Task Force Feldman were parts of Taskforce Delnore or separate Taskforces. And I'm also not sure whether this is caused by the quality of the text or by my English.

 

Christoph

Hi Christoph,

Thanks for the link. The History of the 46th Tank Bn. is typical of those written by units of armored divisions. Since we know CCB was busy, we are talking about CCA. The Order of Battle for CCA, as described in the History of the 46th Tank Bn. is as follows.

The primary combat units of Combat Command A are the 67th AIB, 46th Tank, and apparently the 498th AFA Bn. Two task forces were created, each built around the headquarters of the 67th AIB and 46th Tank. CCA and its task forces also had Cavalry (Mechanized) Armored Engineers, AAA units, Medical Detachments, Trucking Companies, Service Companies, etc. which are not mentioned in the history.

Task Force Satt was built around the headquarters of the 67th AIB, and consisted of A and B Companies of the 46th Tank along with A and B Companies of the 67th AIB.

Task Force Delinore was built around the headquarters of the 46th Tank and included: C Company 67th AIB and C Company 46th Tank, along with additional units of the types listed above.

D Company 46th Tank was probably not in CCA "Reserve," but were used as flanking units and security operations withing the combat command's interior line of communications. Why? Because D was a light tank company which was poorly suited to act as any sort of reserve, but perfectly capable of carrying out the types of missions I mentioned. Besides no commander worth his salt would keep a company of light tanks as the reserve for a combat command.

The 498th AFA Bn. belonged to CCA headquarters, and Armored Force doctrine and tactics required batteries of the supporting AFA Bn. to travel far forward in each column with other batteries farther back.

On 10 April, TF Delinore received A Company 124th Armored Engineer Bn. and a platoon of the 630th Tank Destroyer Bn. Task Force Delinore was then broken down into two sub-task forces, TF Sheffey and TF Feldman. A few days later we see TF Delinore augmented by the return of two tank companies, A and D, and A Company of the 67th AIB.

These were combined arms units in the purest sense, and were tailored by higher headquarters to best fulfill the mission given them. So as you can see, it is not possible for any individual unit of CCA to honestly claim credit for liberating any camp they may have come across.

Hope this helps.

Jim