The Wartime Memories Project - The Second War

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238095 Sgt. James Delameter Bates United States Army 143rd Infantry Regiment from:Caldwell, Texas Sgt James Bates left North Africa in early September 1943 and landed on the beaches at Salerno, Italy on the morning of 9th September. Over the next few days they fought their way inland. On 11th September the 143rd was ordered to an area between the Sele and Calore Rivers and encountered heavy resistance. On the night of the 12th German tanks surrounded the area and on the morning of the 13th began pounding the 143rd. Dad's company was pinned down in a trench. The machine gunners on the German tanks shot into the dirt piled in front of the trench, knocking the dirt in on them and slowly burying them alive. There was nothing they could do but surrender. Dad removed the bolt from his machine gun and threw it away so the Germans could not use it, and as the Germans rounded up the prisoners, dad slipped into the communications tent and disabled the decoder. After several days travel, Dad arrived at Stalag IIIB in Furstenberg, Germany where he spent the remainder of the war. His recollection of his time there was limited, but he remembered always being hungry and miserably cold in the winter. The usual meal was a small piece of bread and rutabaga soup, which consisted of mostly water with a few rutabagas thrown in for flavor. Dad recalled one on the men receiving a package from home which contained a set of sheets. The men boiled the sheets and drank the water off them for the starch. In one letter to my mother he says that they had an unusually good soup on Sunday with some meat in it because one of the horses had died. Cigarettes were a big commodity and could be used to bribe guards for various items. Dad once told me that he bribed a guard to let him out to go to a nearby town. Once there, he bought a full suit of clothes from a tailor for a few cigarettes. He didn't try to escape because he was so far inside Germany he didn't believe he would make it out. Sgt. James Bates survived the POW camp and came home. He passed away at age 76 in 1987. John R. Bates Add to this record.  Related Content: 143rd Infantry Regiment, US Army Italian Campaign Stalag 3B Prisoner of War Camp Operation Avalanche - Salerno Landings Can you help us to add to our records? Add a record to our website. The names and stories on this website have been submitted by their relatives and friends. If your relations are not listed please add their names so that others can read about them Did you or your relatives live through the Second World War? Do you have any photos, newspaper clippings, postcards or letters from that period? Have you researched the names on your local or war memorial? Were you or your relative evacuated? Did an air raid affect your area? If so please let us know. Help us to build a database of information on those who served both at home and abroad so that future generations may learn of their sacrifice. Contact us. Celebrate your own Family History Celebrate by honouring members of your family who served in the Secomd World War both in the forces and at home. We love to hear about the soldiers, but also remember the many who served in support roles, nurses, doctors, land army, muntions workers etc. Please use our Family History resources to find out more about your relatives. Then please send in a short article, with a photo if possible, so that they can be remembered on these pages.

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