When Germany unconditionally surrendered and Victory in Europe or VE Day was announced on May 8, 1945, American GIs were in a mood to celebrate. For Russell Darks in France and Charlie Toole in London, it was an unforgettable night of celebrations. But, in Germany, Murray Shapiro found that German civilians had nothing to celebrate, and all was quiet. Tom Carr wanted to celebrate, but he was recovering from war injuries in a Czechoslovakian hospital. Within days of VE-Day, Tom Morris had to establish a camp for German POWs and civilian refugees who now numbered in the thousands. Lloyd Huggins was already questioning whether the Soviet soldiers, our so-called allies, were any better than the Germans we defeated when he was kept awake all night by the screams of German women being raped in the Soviet occupied quarter. Harry Koty figured he was pretty lucky. His 97th Infantry Division was one of the first to be sent home to the US. Then, he learned they were sent home so quick so they could be redeployed in the Pacific. But his luck continued. En route, the Japanese surrendered and Koty had an enviable assignment once he arrived to occupied Japan – guarding a house full of Geisha girls and preventing GIs from visiting them. The invasion of mainland Japan was expected to be costly for both American and Japanese lives. 370,000 Purple Heart medals were ordered by the U.S. Army in preparation for the invasion. They weren’t needed. Instead, the US became the only country in history to drop the atomic bomb first in Hiroshima killing 80,000, then in Nagasaki, killing 70,000. Almost all of the dead were civilians. Fearful that more cities would soon be obliterated, Japan quickly surrendered. While the US action remains controversial even today, most GIs supported the decision crediting the dropping of the bombs with saving their lives and that of their buddies. But some GIs saw the dropping of the atomic bombs on innocent civilians as an immoral, dirty act, and would have preferred to have kept fighting. In any case, all of the GIs fighting in the Pacific were glad the war was finally over when VJ-Day was announced. These stories and more in Part 2 of our Victory at Last episode.

Russell Darkes

Murray Shapiro

Charlie Toole

Tom Carr

Tom C. Morris

Lloyd Huggins

Harry Koty

Robert B. Nett

Joe Lawhn

Ralph Keller

Rex Whitehead

James and Eva Mae Spaulding

Raymond Komro

Charles Wysocki

Having led his country through the most devastating and consequential war in world history, President Franklin D. Roosevelt died just as the war’s end seemed in sight. For GIs like Roland Schump, Murray Shapiro, and Samuel Erlick, the loss of the only President they had ever really known, was as unsettling as it was shocking. In the final weeks of the war, as Germany’s defeat seemed all but certain, GIs still didn’t know what to expect as they liberated city after city. Many German soldiers couldn’t wait to surrender to the Americans who they preferred over the Russians, while other Germans fought on ferociously. No GIs wanted to lose their lives, or see their buddies lose theirs, so close to the end. Commander of A Company, Michael J. Daly felt so protective of his men in the final days of the war that he took out Four machine gun nests and fifteen Germans on his own during fierce fighting at Nuremberg. Most of the German soldiers Roland Schump now met didn’t seem to want to fight any more than he did. In the confusion of the final days, Sherril Hayes nearly accidentally shot an elderly grandfather and his grandchild. Hayes would never have forgiven himself. In fierce fighting at Cheb in Czechoslovakia, Harry Koty’s outfit found themselves outnumbered and outgunned by ten German tanks. Charles Savage exchanged fire with a deadly sniper in Pilzen, Czechoslovakia before he liberated a baby factory in Marienbad. Arnold Dutch Nagel was nearly taken out by friendly fire in the final days of the war. Earl Lovelace remembered a man from his company that was. An excited Dallas Finch couldn’t wait to pen a letter home as he stood guard outside the War Room at the Supreme Headquarters of the Allied Expeditionary Forces as the Allied commanding officers accepted the unconditional surrender of the German forces. These stories and more in this episode of Always Remember World War II Through Veterans Eyes.

Roland Schump with his wife Phyllis and their grandchild

Murray Shapiro

Samuel Erlick

Harry Koty

Michael J. Daly

Arnold "Dutch" Natel

Earl Lovelace

Dallas Finch in the War Room

Dallas Finch returned to the War Room in 1995

Adolph Hitler’s “Final Solution” was carried out in an estimated 44,000 concentration camps, ghettos, and forced labor camps spread out throughout Europe. An estimated 15 to 20 million people were murdered in these camps including six million Jews. For the young American GIs who liberated them, the horrors of the Nazi concentration camps far outweighed anything they had experienced in war. Alex Bourdas liberated an auxiliary camp that had housed 20,000 POWs. Their bodies were now stacked on carts and covered with lime to cut down the odor. Tom Carr entered a small camp, the name of which he could not remember. But he could never forget the emaciated prisoners still housed in the cells or the bodies stacked in piles outside. General Patton himself sent down orders for his personnel to see what they were fighting for and against by visiting a small concentration camp near Erfurt, Germany. Mark Wilson recalled the few survivors they found there walked around in a daze, looking more like living skeletons. In 1997, more than 50 years after the war had ended, Charles Savage returned to Marienbad, Czechoslovakia. Accompanied by a local historian, Savage searched for the remains of Flashenhutten, the small camp that Savage had helped liberate and the mass burial site that had shocked him. These stories and more in this 17th episode of Always Remember World War II Through Veterans Eyes.

General Dwight D. Eisenhower himself visited the first concentration camp liberated by GIs - Ohrdruf

General Eisenhower cabled General Marshall requesting that a Congressional delegation and reporters be sent to the camp so that the atrocities committed there would not be forgotten.

Fewer than 75 prisoners were found alive at Ohrdruf

Alex Bourdas liberated an auxiliary camp near Ranshofen, Austria

Tom Carr may not have recalled the name of the camp he liberated, but could never forget the horrors he witnessed there

Charles Savage liberated a small concentration camp near Pilsen, Czech Republic. The camp was largely forgotten until he returned to the Czech Republic and, along with a local historian, found its remains. Savage donated all of his photographs of the camp to the local museum.