Lawrence Rudmann was a paratrooper and member of the 82nd Airborne Division during World War Two. After joining the Army, he learned that paratroopers received $50.00 more pay on the month, so he switched to the paratroopers. He thought the $50.00 more in his paycheck each month would be extra money for a married man with a young wife and baby girl.
Lawrence received basic training at Fort Benning, GA, and then later was sent to Ireland for more training, and later to England. All of this training was in preparation to the D-Day invasion. This was an Allied plan to hit the cold, dark beaches of Normandy, France instinctively committing acts of soundless heroism that gave the world hope that the Nazi forces would not overpower.
On June 6, 1944, 160,000 Allied troops hit 50-miles of French coastline to meet the Nazis. There were 5,000 ships and 13,000 aircraft supporting the invasion as more than 100,000 soldiers began the march through France.
It was 2 A.M. that Tuesday morning when Rudmann jumped out of a C-47 twin-engine cargo plane, crammed in the hold with 30 other soldiers. For the next hour 12,000 men pulled their parachutes and jumped and jumped and jumped. Lawrence said he was somewhat scared; I landed in a tree and had to wiggle myself down. I had my bayonet with me and cut my lines off me. Down on the ground he met up with his buddy, George Hickey from New York, and joined the march through France. Their first stop was the tiny village of Sainte-mere-Eglise in northwestern France located on a main route the Nazis would take to battle back the Allies as they took over the Normandy beaches.
For the next four days the Allied troops and Germans exchanged fire. In the middle of the night Rudmann was captured, his buddy was mortally wounded and Rudmann was taken prisoner. There were nine in his group captured and the Nazis marched them half way across Europe. When they got to Paris, the prisoners were packed into box cars for part of the way, but mostly they walked. From June to September, they marched, always at night to hide from the strafing by American aircraft. The first POW camp Rudmann saw was Stalag 7A at Mossberg, Germany.
There was barbed wire, dogs and hardly any food. We slept on the ground and I thought I would never get home. Days were a jumble of sick-to-your stomach fear and mind-numbing boredom. You stood around and walked around and looked at the fence, he said. And always Rudmann’s thoughts were on his wife, Margie, and their 2 year-old daughter, Rita.
In December the POW’s were taken by rail to a village near Munich and a farm slave labor camp. They worked sun up to sun down, finding rest in a cold dark stable at night. Sometimes the snows were two feet deep. My shoes were worn out and they gave me a pair of wooden shoes to wear. Some days you didn’t have anything to eat. Some days they gave you potatoes. Rudmann stayed there through winter until spring when finally that day he thought would never come did arrive. The defeat of the Nazis had come. It was liberation, freedom and home.
Now as the oldest living POW survivor of Lawrence County, Rudmann wants the sacrifices of the military never to be forgotten. We certainly ought to remember and be thankful the troops did what they did, he said. I am certainly thankful I got back.
In 2012 Lawrence is the oldest living WW2 POW of Lawrence County, OH. He is 87 years old.
