Our days in the hospital were quite uneventful, but those nights were something else! Twice a night about 10:00 and 2:00, the RAF would come over and drop their 2000lb bombs helter skelter all over the city. The racket of the bombs exploding along with the German antiaircraft guns going off was deafening……and scary. I believe that I was more scared on those three nights than I was on all my combat missions put together. The hospital personnel locked us in our room and then went down to their underground air raid shelters.

The last day I was there, I was lying on top of the bed, fully clothed, awaiting the guards to take me to the train depot, when a German civilian who worked in the hospital, came over to me with a pistol in hand and aimed it at my head. He said in broken English that I was a “terror bomber” and that I had bombed and destroyed his home. Well, I just laid there and told him, it must have been someone else……..not knowing what to say. Don’t know what would have happened if the nurse hadn’t come into the room at that time and told him where to go. I didn’t think much of the idea of being shot in a German hospital after going through what I did.

There must have been about ten of us prisoners that they collected at the depot. They took me from the hospital in a police wagon (that's what it looked like to me) about 4:00 in the afternoon. The ten of us sat at a round table in the waiting room of the depot while two older German soldiers stood guard. The German civilians in the depot didn’t seem to pay much attention to us, as they probably had seen plenty of prisoners before this day. We received good treatment from the old guards, even receiving a glass of German dark beer each. The train finally pulled into the station and we got aboard, all in two compartments with a guard in each. After going a few miles, the train suddenly stopped and we all wondered what was going on. We were told later on, when the train started again, that there were American fighter planes in the area and the engineer thought it best to remain still. Wouldn't that have been something if we would have been blown up by an American! We slept as best we could sitting up, and the next morning we passed a train going in the opposite direction, probably to Berlin to shoot at the next group of Americans coming over. The antiaircraft guns were on flat cars and were all manned by women. They waved at us and shouted something in German, after which they all broke out in laughter. Must have been a great joke to them!

After a few miles more, the guard stood his rifle up in a corner, started to talk to us in broken English, and offered us cigarettes. Then he told us that we shouldn’t tell the other guard that he gave us smokes. When we went to the other compartment, the guard there offered us cigarettes and told us that we shouldn’t tell the other guard. Guess those Germans didn't trust anyone!

Later that day we arrived in Stendahl, Germany, at the interrogation center. We were each placed in a separate cell, about 8 x 10 feet with a tiny barred window near the ceiling, so high up that one couldn’t possibly see out. The bed was a wooden slab, no mattress, no spring and no blanket…to say nothing of no sheets! Because I was burned around the eyes from the bomb bay fire they must have taken pity on me and gave me a blanket for the wooden slab. The cells were along a corridor with each cell opening onto the hallway through a steel door which had a small opening at the very bottom of the door. Twice a day the guard slid my plate of food through that opening. Needless to say the food was terrible, absolutely the worst I’ve had any place! The cell was cold and damp with walls made of concrete blocks, I think. They sure didn’t have any wallpaper on them!

I spent three days at Stendahl, and the only time I left that cell was to go to the bathroom, escorted by a guard, who never said a word at any time. You did what you came for and went immediately back to your "home." The purpose of keeping prisoners in solitaire, so I’m told, was so that when they were interrogated, they would open up and talk about anything. A friend of mine spent two weeks in solitaire—three days was plenty for me!

On the third day the guard opened the door and said that the major wanted to speak with me. I followed him to a modern office with a large desk behind which sat a young major. He introduced himself and offered me a cigarette, which I took willingly because I hadn't had one since before takeoff six days ago. He asked me what I did before the war. I told him that I attended college, studying administration, and he said that I would be a well paid executive later. Boy, was he wrong …at least, for a long time anyway. I was still bandaged around my head due to the cut I received, and the sun was streaming through the window. I must have appeared as though the sun bothered me, and he offered to pull the shade. I agreed so he jumped up and did so, probably trying to let me know that they were very humane after all, which they were! I can attest to that as I received very favorable treatment after the German civilians were chased away when I hit the sidewalk upon landing.

He then switched his tactics and came right out with, "What can you tell me about the Privateer’ plane? You know, the same as your B-24 except that it has only one tail”. I told him that I could tell him only my name, rank and serial number. Then he said, "We know all about you." He proceeded to tell me the names of my crew members who were killed, the name of my base in England, and my advanced flying school in Fort Sumner, New Mexico, where I got my wings. I said if you know that much about little me, then you certainly know all about that plane.

Just after that, the air raid siren blared, and he told me that I would be going to prison camp the next day. I said that I was glad because the food was lousy at the center. He laughed and agreed with me. Just before going out the door, I asked him how long the war was going to last. He said, "Oh, about three months." Then I asked, “Who is going to win?" He looked at me and then grinned,”That's a hell of a question. You know who”

After interrogation, we were allowed to talk to each other in the outside compound and we certainly did! After a while, though, the rest of the prisoners told me to go and sit by myself, because my burned flesh smelled so bad that they were getting sick. The bandage was now over a week old and I even could hardly stand myself! I knew that they told me to go away not because of me personally but because of my odoriferous self. After a short period we were escorted back to our cells to await the next day.

All this time, I was walking around in my flying boots, which were way oversized, and my feet became full of blisters. The rest of the guys had on their regular shoes and were fine. How they got those shoes, I don't know. Maybe they didn't have on their shoes, but their flying boots fit better than mine. The next day we started off to Stalug Luft I near Barth, just across from the Scandinavian countries way up north. The train only went as far as the town, and the prison camp was a few miles away. After walking a mile or so in those boots, I complained to one of the guards about my plight. I sure picked the right one. Maybe it was because I looked pretty helpless with my burns, bandages and part of the top of my head shaved, but he commandeered a small horse-drawn, two-wheel cart from a civilian and told me to jump on. Maybe the civilian was going our way anyway. I don't know, but that was one of the best rides I ever had!

After going a few miles, we saw the camp in the distance with its double row of high barbed wire fences. As we came closer, we saw a large number of prisoners standing by the fence and heard them shouting something at us. When we finally made out what they were saying, it brought memories of all the times we changed flying bases during our training. Every time we advanced from one base to another as cadets, the upperclassmen would holler as we marched by, "You ain't gonna like it here!" Well, that's what we heard from the prison camp's upperclassmen!

The guards opened the big gate and we walked in, wondering how long we would stay here. The first thing they did to us was takeaway our American uniforms, put us through a delousing program by spraying us, and then issue G.I. winter uniforms with the letters, POW, on the backs. I often wonder where they got all those uniforms…from prisoners who had died or what? Then they marched us outside and lined us up for the German commandant’s “welcoming" speech. He told us who he was and that we were all under his command and subject to his orders. That lasted about 10 minutes and then we were assigned to various barracks through out the camp. Because I was still pretty weak, and must have looked quite a mess, they assigned me to the camp hospital.

This hospital was run by American and British doctors who were also prisoners. After I was examined by one of them, my bandages were finally changed and my burns cleansed with epsom salts. They did this to me twice a day in order to keep scars from forming around my forehead and eyes. Along with this bathing, they removed any scabs that were forming. At the time,I didn’t think too well of this idea; however,I think now that this treatment prevented any permanent scars from forming. While in the hospital and later when in the prison compound, I saw men scarred for life from burns received during combat. Some had their eyes closed, some didn’t have one ear, and some were badly changed from the burns. I guess when these men later went back to America, they received skin grafts which did a great deal to bring them back to their former selves.

I was in a room at the hospital, which in itself was only another wooden barracks, with about another 10 men. We had bunks, and I got a top one which was a little bit warmer than those on the bottom. One of the hospital orderlies was a English man, about 40 years old, who had been captured at Dunkirk in June 1940. This was now March 1945, so he was a prisoner for almost 5 years. He had some very interesting stories to tell about his life as a German POW. During the first part of his capture, he worked on farms helping to harvest the food for the German army and civilians. At that time, he received very good treatment and plenty of food. After "D Day", when the war started to go against the Germans, he didn’t receive this good treatment or such good food. They marched the prisoners around constantly in order to keep them tired and well occupied. Then after the Germans knew that the war couldn't be won, he received better treatment and was assigned to this camp, Stalug Luft One. His story about the day he was captured was interesting as he almost made it aboard one of the British ships that were being used to carry the men back to England from Dunkirk. He said that he would have made it if he had another hour or so.

Another interesting person we met during our stay at the camp hospital was the former heavy weight champion, Max Schmeling, who at this that was a German paratrooper. This guy was big and handsome in his uniform and could speak English quite well. He went around the room and shook hands with all of us, so we all got a good close-up view of him. His hand was so big that mine seemed like a child’s in his. He said that we were lucky as we would soon be going back to America while he would remain in Germany. One of the guys said to him, "Hey, Max, the last time I saw you was when you were flat on your back looking up at the lights." He said,”Ya,das is so!" They were referring to the time when Joe Louis knocked him out in the second round of their return match. Max had knocked Louis out in the first bout, so Joe wasn’t going to let Max get too far in this one,

I spent about 10 days in the hospital and was glad to hear that I was being assigned to one of the barracks the next day. The complete camp was divided into four compounds of about 4,000 men in each. The compounds were all separated by the same double row of
high barbed wire fences that were on the outer perimeter of the camp. When I arrived at my room--I say mine very freely as there were about 16 other men assigned to this room-‐ I was greeted by, "What were you flying?" They had heard that a new "kriege" was coming and that he was a pilot.
When I told them that it was a B-24, some of them collected packages of cigarettes from others as they had previously bet on the type of plane that we flew, B-17or B-24. As I sat down at the table in the center of the room, all eyes were on me. They wanted to know of my experiences. While I was telling them, one of them gave me a bowl of "grass" soup for lunch. I say grass, because that's what it tasted like. I remember my hand shaking as I lifted the spoon to my mouth. Telling about them was almost like living the experiences all over again. When I told them where I lived in the USA, one of them, Chuck Arnoa, came over and said he was from Wayzata, Minnesota. He said that he didn't have any war experiences to talk about as he was shot down on his first mission over Germany. They were flying along very nicely, no fighters, no flak, when he heard the command to bail out along with the bell ringing. As he was the navigator, he was stationed in the front of the plane, and bailed out the nose wheel door. To that day, he didn’t know why the pilot gave the bailout command. I don't know if he ever found out to this day!

We met only two formations a day, one at 8 a.m. and the other at 4 p.m. for the roll call. There we would form up by barracks, row upon row, behind one another, so that the count was easy to take and give to the German commander. The older prisoners told me of one time during the roll call after days of heavy rain, the German officer, while giving the “Heil Hitler" salute, disappeared from sight as he fell down one of the escape tunnels that had been dug some years ago. The rain had weakened the ground and away he went. That day that the prisoners all had a big laugh! After roll call in the morning, we all went back to our barracks to eat breakfast.

By this time, the Germans had released the Red Cross parcels of food to the prisoners. Up - to about a month before I arrived, they had been holding up the parcels as they had planned to move the whole camp to another area. The Russians were advancing to Barth, and they didn’t want to have anything to do with those wild men. So now all prisoners had plenty to eat as each parcel was about one foot square and about 6"high. In each box were enough of the energy foods that were necessary to exist. Foods such as Spam, margarine, corned beef hash, a couple cans of jams, a large square bar of chocolate called “D Bar,” and five packs of cigarettes! The Germans supplied us with bread (mostly dark) and as many vegetables as possible. They didn't have too much to give us as their citizens were starving in many places. A small can of coffee was also included in the box so prisoners had their morning coffee to wake them up just as regular people.

In each room, there were certain committees set up to take care of the daily chores of prison living. There was a committee for establishing a weekly menu, one for cooking, one for cleaning up the room, and one for card playing or other recreation. The only one that I was on was clean-up. Thank goodness I was not on the cooking committee--the men really would have suffered if I was.

For breakfast we might have had toast, margarine, jam and coffee or perhaps the Germans supplied us with oatmeal, I can't remember. There were so many Red Cross parcels stacked around the halls that no one had to go hungry at any time during the day. For lunch you were on your own and for supper we usually had some potatoes, from the Germans, Spam or corned beef, maybe some grass soup from the Germans, etc. At 4 p.m. we again had to go outside to be counted. Then there were no scheduled events until “lights out” at 10p.m. Before my arrival, when the Germans were holding up the parcels, the doctors in camp said that the men received only about 800 calories of food each day from the Germans. My roommates told me that they were always all tired out and slept on their bunks most of the day only going out for roll call twice a day. I didn’t have to go through that anyway as we all got plenty to eat now that the parcels were there.

During the day, we would either play poker, using packs of cigarettes for money, or play softball, pitch horseshoes, walk around the compound or just sit around and talk, mostly about back home and our loved ones. As there were five packs in each carton ,and as these cartons were stacked all around (with the cigarettes missing), some big poker winners had tons of cigarettes on or around their bunks. In fact, later there was so many packs available that they lost their value for bartering. To keep the table from becoming completely covered with cigarettes, we placed a different value on the various brands. I believe that Lucky Strikes, Camels and Old Golds were tops in that one pack of those was equal to two Phillip Morris, Chesterfields or others. Some poker players had several stacks of various brands around the mat the table. I played some, but wasn’t as good as other guys so stayed mostly with softball and horseshoes for pastime.

About the third day that I was in the compound, I met Ed Galbreath and Stan Simpson, our waist gunners, and Jessie Watkins, our nose gunner. We were all glad to see each other again and proceeded to tell each other our stories of that fateful day. I never did see Bill Shinn or Dick Cisco, the tail gunner, after takeoff on March 18, but I heard that Cisco was okay and have corresponded with Shinn after the war. Simpson was at the hospital with me so I knew all about his story previously.
Galbreath's story was interesting . ..so was Watkins! Ed said that everything happened so fast after he heard the command to bail out , he dove out the bomb bay without: his parachute harness strapped around his legs. In other words, the only thing that held him to the chute was the strap across his chest and over his shoulders. By the time he hit the ground in Berlin, his arms were almost paralyzed from the strain of holding on the strap. He said that they were almost over his head and if he hadn't hit when he did, he might have slipped out and lost the chute. He was a pudgy guy, strong but pudgy, so there must have been a great strain on his arms and shoulders.

Jessie Watkins was young, only about 18, and quite small. His size was the reason that he was our nose gunner and toggler. The nose gunner aboard a B-24 was the man responsible for releasing the bomb load when he saw the lead ship's first bomb leaving the bomb bay. If his release was too late, our bombs would drop beyond the target. His was an important job; in fact, everybody's job was important depending on the time and circumstances. When he heard the command to leave, he turned the turret around so he was facing the tail of the plane as was the proper thing to do in his case. He opened the small doors of the turret and was about so climb out when his parachute harness caught on one of the doors. Being so small, he could wear a chest pack chute and still fit into the turret. The last thing he remembers is our navigator, Al Janns, going under the pilot's compartment back to the bomb bay. The navigitor and nose gunner were supposed to go out the opening for the nose wheel, but evidently Janns couldn't open the door so he was about to bail out the bomb bay. Jessie remembers the behind of Janns going along the small passage and then the ship blew up. Luckily, he had that chest pack on. Had he been too large to be able to wear that type chute,he wouldn’t have been talking to us then. He said he woke up, falling through space, and then pulled the ripcord. The only thing that bothered him was a small burn across his nose. I could hardly see it when we met.

The lavatories were outside of the barracks and contained the bare necessities, like toilets and urinals. The wash basins were outside and were large circular affairs that about 10 men could use at one time. The water was turned on by stepping on a foot activated bar that we circled around the entire basin so that each man could start the cold water flowing by a touch of his foot on the bar. There was no hot water. Each man had his own soap, wash cloth and towel that he kept near his bunk.

Before I arrived, the prisoners used to smuggle radios in the camp by receiving small parts from friends outside camp. How they got in was a mystery to all except to those “in the know." Then they would listen into the BBC and pass on the information by word of mouth. Each day we knew exactly where the American, British and Russian battlelines were for that day. When I was there, the Germans didn't care what we knew or how we knew it. On the building next to the barracks was a large map, about ten feet by five feet, showing the battle lines of each country by means of different colored ribbons pinned to the map. As each line of the allies advanced, the prisoner in charge would move the ribbons to coincide and the prisoners would cheer. It seemed that General George Patton's line would move about 2 to 4 inches each day for a while.

We knew just how far away the Russians were, but sure didn't know what type of an army they were. About April 25, during the night, all German guards pulled out and we had our own American guards in the towers, shining the big spotlights all around the camp, even helping some Krieges find their way to the bathroom building. We had heard the previous day that the Russians might be here very soon, so we weren't too surprised to see all the Germans gone with the exception of just a very few old men. I guess they figured that the Russians wouldn't hurt or bother them.

The next day, here come those rough looking wild men. It was an advance unit composed of men looking like Mongolians—at least some of them looked like that. They came with tanks and drove through the double rows of barbed wire fences flattening them, Well, some guys took off. Where they were going, nobody knew, including them. I guess they were in camp a long time and just wanted out. The American Colonel, Zemke, I think, told us not to leave camp as there was still a war going on and we might get shot, or worse, killed. The Russian commander didn’t understand what Zemke was talking about. He pointed his pistol at Zemke’s head and said to let the men do what they wanted. After an interpreter explained why we shouldn't leave camp, everything was okay with the Russian and he agreed with the colonel.
Ed Galbreath was one of those who left for the neighboring town of Barth, and he was accompanied by one of those wild men, who looked, according to Ed's story later, like he hadn’t been near water for days, probably not even to drink. This guy carried a machine gun on his back and, believe it or not, a bottle of vodka which he shared with Ed. He probably even washed with that liquid.

They sat together on a river bank and proceeded to get drunk, passing the bottle back and forth. Neither one could understand the other, but Ed says there was a lot of sign language going on. On the way to Barth, they went over a bridge, where the Russian--I'll call him Ivan--took his machine gun and sprayed the river with bullets . . .just for the fun of it. Ed says he was quite loose with that gun and watched him very closely. When they got to town, Ivan went from house to house looking for some loot. They came to one place where an old German man stood in the doorway and said, "nix," when Ivan wanted to enter. With that, Ivan unstraped his machinegun, sprayed the German with bullets and stepped over the body. Galbreath right then took his leave from Ivan. When he saw how little life meant to the Russian, he got out of there, not knowing when the vodka might get the better of Ivan and Ed could be the next victim.

Ed said that he was glad that the Russians were our allies, not our enemies, and that he felt sorry for the Germans who got in the Russians’ way. Little did he know that only a couple of years later we would be locked in a war with them over the rights to Germany. It was only a “coldwar,” but still cost us plenty in men, time and money. I will say this about those wild men, however, they treated us great! After only a couple of days, they brought in cattle, hogs and chickens, from the German farms, I imagine, and had their butchers slaughter them and fed all of us prisoners, This was a feast for me, as I hadn’t tasted anything like this in two months. However, for those prisoners who were in for over a year, or two, or even three, it was a god send! Some of the “longer time” prisoners ate so much that they became sick as their stomachs weren’t used to such rich foods.

The committee for entertainment asked for men who had some music experience as they fixed up a large building for the officers’ club and wanted some music for it. Well, after a few days of practice, these musicians sounded like Glenn Miller’s band to us. We would have nightly entertainment at the club with prisoners performing skits and comedy routines which were quite funny . . . at least to us they were. Colonel Zemke and his staff outlined on the map the area around the prison camp where we were allowed to roam. The town of Barth and our camp were on a fairly large peninsula and this was where we could go. We couldn’t go off this body of land, but anywhere on it. We would go north to the seaside and look out over the water, wondering when we would get out of here. Some guys found a small row boat and proceeded to take this out aways and row around. The weather by then, about May 5, was really like spring back home. We would sit on the banks and talk about what we did in the past and what the future would have in store for us. We knew that the war wasn't going to last too much longer as we heard all the latest war happenings. Sure enough, just a few days later, the armistice was signed.

Things didn't change too much for us as we were still limited in our wanderings, but one day we all went to the jet plane factory that was nearby, built underground! The Germans used this plant for building the bodies only, if I can remember correctly, for the twin engine jets. This was quite interesting for us bomber pilots, but even more so for the fighter pilots, some of whom had seen and fought these planes. I had only seen these planes in action twice, that I can remember, but they were fast! We spent about two hours there. There must have been at least 100 of us who took the tour. It was the most interesting thing we had seen in quite a while. Each day seemed to get longer for us as we waited to be evacuated from camp. We were finally told that the 8th Air Force, in B-17's and B-24's, were going to fly us out to France for reclassification. The bomb bays were to be boarded up to carry prisoners in place of bombs. After we were told about this, the days even became longer as each day rumors spread that the planes had taken off from England and were on their way to pick us up.