240367 Pvt Herman C Goelitz United States Army from:Maplewood, NJ My Uncle was captured in Italy on 21 January 1944 and was detained in Stalag 2B, Hammerstein. He was released on April 13, 1945. He seldom spoke of his experiences but mentioned the march in the dead of winter and said that since then he had difficulty breathing in the cold. He worked on farms and said the food was better on the farms than in camp. As he spoke German, he could better communicate with the farmers, but that often made the other prisoners suspicious. The farmers in that northern part of Germany spoke Platt Deutch (Low German) as my uncle once told me. I wish I had asked more, but it is too late.
|