Camp near Siegberg Germany?

[Jean Jacobson]

Hi Christoph!

 

I had no success trying to communicate with Dr. A. K.-B. That is a great accomplishment you had. The fact she responded and then her answer, while not giving us information, has helped us narrow down that they have no obvious records.

 

Early on I had more success with the Tourist Office and an incredibly helpful person there, Jan Bitterburg. I have wanted to go back to my records and revisit the responses and send them to you. At the time what was significant to me was that Jan was able to determine that after my Dad's escape Siegburg was never bombed again and the inhabitants were somehow moved out.

 

She wrote:

 

I will translate the main points in your mail to our historian and hope she can answer some of your questions. From what I know about the war in Siegburg myself I can tell you the following:

 

The pictures you took at your first visit in the 1980s are of the Benedictine abbey of Siegburg. From May 1940 to March 18^th 1945 the abbey was used as a military hospital. I do not know if American prisoners were treated there. The POW camp your father was in, STALAG VI G, was actually situated in the city of Bonn, which is about 10 miles from Siegburg but it may well be that the wounded or sick POWs were send to Siegburg for treatment. During the December ‘44 bombings you mentioned the abbey had already been heavily damaged and there was another bomb attack on March 6^th. After that there were no more bombings so maybe your father was successful in convincing the Americans not to bomb the city anymore.

 

From March 9^th on Siegburg lay under constant fire by artillery for four weeks until by April 9^th the city was finally taken by US troops of the 97^th Infantry Division, 303^rd Regiment. 25% of Siegburg’s buildings were destroyed and another 32% heavily damaged. Compared to many other European cities Siegburg has been relatively lucky. The abbey were the hospital had been was almost completely destroyed though, as it had taken lots of artillery fire because the Americans suspected the German artillery fire was directed from this elevated position.

 

From 1947 to 1953 the Abbey was rebuilt and today it is inhabited by Benedictine monks again as you may have noticed during your last visit. What happened to the graves of the comrades your father had to bury I do not know. In Siegburg there are only a few minor monuments to WW2. On the biggest cemetery – Nordfriedhof - there is a monument to the fallen of the war. Beside that, there are a number of monuments related to the crimes of Nazi-Germany especially the Holocaust but that is all.

We do have a museum that covers the city’s history from prehistoric times until today and of course the Nazi Rule and the Second World War have their own department in this exhibition. There are no tours especially about the war.

 

It seems that because of the approaching US troops and the constant shelling the military hospital was evacuated shortly after your father was able to break free and shortly before he was able to contact the Americans. That is all I can write to you right now but I hope to get some more information with the help of Mrs Korte-Böger, the city’s archivist.

 

I want to say one more thing: Even if your father’s attempt to save the hospital from further bombings might have not been necessary anymore – we don’t know for sure – I am glad and thankful that men like him were willing to risk their lives to end the tyranny of Nazi-Germany in Europe. I hope he did know that most Germans today feel this way.

 

I will write you again when I have more information.

Best regards

 

Christoph, I do not recall who Dr. Zenker is?

 

And Thank you for sharing those posters! Very unusual to get see them.

 

I will look for Jan's other response and send it hopefully tomorrow.

[Christoph]

Hello Jean!

 

Dr. Zenker is mentiones by Mary on page 2 of this thread.

 

Have you seen Marion's poster collection http://www.6thcorpscombatengineers.com/posters.htm?

 

Christoph

[Jean Jacobson]

Christoph, What a Memory you have!

 

How on earth could you find 2 posters that were not in Marion's collection! And you are correct, I had not ever seen the collection. Pretty Awesome!

 

And the name Dr. Zenker had definitely slipped away from me. Thank you for sending me to correct place in the thread.

 

With all of our new knowledge I want to go study everything over again. Not sure when though. Saw the names Mary mentioned and want to look in the 6G document you sent for them.

 

I am on way out and when return will get the 2nd and I think last, Bitterberg response to you. You will see there is a document that maybe you do not know about mentioned. It was never sent to me and I did not want to be too pushy and figured one day I would get to Siegburg and find it - that was over 3 years ago! I am so curious to know if you know of it. But now we must wait I am out the door - well almost.

 

Jean J

[Christoph]

No, its not my memory. I made the photos of the posters and then back home looked into Marion's pdf files which are sorted almost alphabetically. And I already knew some of Dr Zenker's other works before entering this forum

 

I'm curious what kind of document you'll have!

 

Christoph

[Jean Jacobson]

Oh Christoph, I don't actually have the document. I was told about it by Jan Bitterberg but never got it. But it will be interesting for you to know that such a document exists or maybe you already know about it or even have it.

 

So here was the 2nd response from Jan. Incidentally I assumed Jan was a female and then I realized Jan may be was a male. So I have to be careful not to say he or she but just Jan. (I am very familiar with the he/she situation because I have my Dad's name. Whenever the phone rang, we had to ask 'do you want the male or the female Jean?' Then in a panic the people would hang up.)

 

 

Dear Jean,

 

I am very sorry for not answering earlier. The last few weeks at our office have been so busy that I simply could not spare enough time.

 

Attached you should find a clip of the map you have sent me with the location of the abbey marked by a red box.

 

Mrs. Korte-Böger, our historian, pointed me to an article concerning the closing of the field hospital. I have read it but there was no relevant information in regard to the case of your father. However, if you are interested I could try to scan the article and mail it to you.

 

It is difficult to find official records concerning the last days of the Nazi regime since at that time the enthusiasm for keeping those records was not as it used to be and everything was rather chaotic. I am afraid that for the moment we cannot tell you much more. I hope you have more success with the US army’s military records.

 

Please feel free to write again if you have more questions.

I wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year!

 

 

Jan Bitterberg

 

 

Tourist Information Siegburg

Europaplatz 3

53721 Siegburg

Tel.: 02241 / 96985-32

Fax: 02241 / 96985-31

 

Can you believe how helpful Jan was. I sent Jan the map I sent you. I never located the attachment but it was okay because I had an idea of where the Abbey was.

 

Jean J

[Jean Jacobson]

Christoph, I could not resist looking up those 4 names that Mary told us about back on May 28, 2012. I used the listing you sent in a prior message here. I only found the 4th one, a Daniel P. Gibbs. I will put that in my list of names to check on in St. Louis. Maybe there will be a clue to Mary's puzzle. The list does not show what State they are from.

 

I am glad you sent me back to the Doctor Zenker thread. I am not sure what his specialty is.

 

And as for the article that is referred to by Jan about the closing of the hospital, I wonder if you have seen it.

 

Jean J

[Jean Jacobson]

Well, I heard, another group that Dad did not run into on his escape path.

 

More to follow,

Jean J

[Jean Jacobson]

Thanks to that great Archivist, Kevin Bailey, at the Eisenhower Library and his very thorough analysis we know that the 86th Division is not the group that was in the area where Dad was on March 21st, 1945.

 

Shucks, well eventually by process of elimination we will find the group and the information.

 

Here is what Kevin wrote:

 

Here is what I have been able to find regarding the activities of the 86th Infantry Division during the time period you asked about; March 15 to March 25, 1945. We have about 1500 pages of records for the division and

its component units. By sampling the historical reports and after action reports of regiments, battalions and companies the following picture emerged.

 

The 86th arrived in France in early March, 1945 and most of its troops moved to Camp "Old Gold" near the towns of Doudeville and Ourville, France during the first week of the month. Sampling the records of several units showed that they spent most of March there before moving out for Germany starting on the 23rd. From March 23rd through the 27th the troops left by truck convoy or by railroad for Cologne, Germany with some parts of the division going to the town of Duren. A couple of the narratives I looked at also mentioned going to Weiden, near Cologne.

 

What they were doing at Camp Old Gold during most of March is provided by a narrative history of the 342nd Infantry Regiment (one of the 86th's three infantry regiments; the other two were the 341st and the 343rd)

 

From "A Narrative History Compiled and Edited by the Information and Education Office of the 342nd Infantry" :

 

" . . . After lying at dock from 1 March to 4 March, we debarked. In large troop trucks, too crowded for men to sit down, we moved a full sixty miles up into Normandy, to Camp Old Gold, located near the small town of Ourville. In the following period we de-waterproofed equipment, got new vehicles from Cherbourg, Paris and Antwerp, underwent physical conditioning, made fast marches over country lanes, hedge rows, and cobblestoned village streets, and attempted to converse with French farmers (and their daughters)."

 

Starting on April 1st, the mission assigned to the 86th was to relieve the 8th Infantry Division and set up a line along the Rhine River and to initiate patrols on the east bank to determine the location and strength of enemy defenses. According to various after action reports the month of April is when the division first began to have direct contact with enemy forces.

 

I hope this will somewhat clarify the picture of what the 86th Infantry Division was up to during March of 1945.

 

Once again, I am so grateful for Kevin's efforts and as always to you Christoph!!! I would never be this far along without you!!!

 

Jean J

[Jean Jacobson]

Christoph,

 

I finally decided to write Otto's Pharmacy last night. I received a message today that he is not up for visitors. Not a good sign.

 

Happy Holidays to you and your family and everyone! I wonder if you go to a lot of those amazing Christmas Markets that they have in Germany. And, if they have one in Siegburg, I wonder if they do it in that center area down below the Abbey.

 

Bye for the moment,

Jean J

[Christoph]

Of course we have those markets. The one in Siegburg is a medieval market and got quiet famous over the yeras: http://www.mittelalterlicher-markt-siegburg.de/web/mittelalterlicher_markt/01121/index.html

 

Christoph