December 2025 - bruckfamilyblog.com

POST 196: DR. WALTER ROTHHOLZ’S FIRST-HAND ACCOUNT OF JEWISH MISTREATMENT IN THE GRINI CONCENTRATION CAMP IN NORWAY

Note: In a follow-up to a post published in 2019, I present the testimony submitted by Dr. Walter Rothholz, my second cousin once removed, about the mistreatment of Jews held at a Nazi detention center in Bærum, Norway. I also discuss the “White Buses” mission negotiated between Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler and the Swedish Count Folke Bernadotte in the closing months of the war, a humanitarian effort that resulted in over 15,000 people being saved from German concentration camps, many of them Scandinavians.

POST 66: DR. WALTER ROTHHOLZ, INTERNEE IN NAZI-OCCUPIED NORWAY

This post tiers off Post 66 written in 2019 about Dr. Walter Rothholz (1893-1978) (Figure 1), my second cousin once removed, who was interned in Nazi-occupied Norway from the 2^nd of December 1942 until the 2^nd of May 1945. Walter provided testimony on the 4^th of October 1945, five months after his liberation from the Nazi Grini concentration camp/detention center in Bærum, Norway, a suburb southwest of Oslo, describing the mistreatment of Jews there. It was sent to me by Hans Peter Lindemann, a Norwegian gentleman from Oslo, whose grandmother, Emmi Skau, née Gronemann (1907-1979), coincidentally was among the seven Jews released from Grini in early 1945, a group that included Dr. Rothholz.

Figure 1. Dr. Walter Rothholz (1893-1978) in 1964

Along with 45 surviving Jews at the nearby Berg concentration camp, approximately 90-100 kilometers (55-63 miles) away from Grini, Walter and Emmi were sent to Sweden. It was indirectly part of the “White Buses” mission agreement negotiated between Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler and the Swedish Count Folke Bernadotte in the closing months of the war. More on this below.

Walter Rothholz and Emmi Skau, as it turns out, were born and grew up meters apart in Stettin, Germany (today: Szczecin, Poland). It’s unclear whether they knew one another, though it’s likely their families were aware of each other. Walter’s father, Dr. Hermann Rothholz, was an ear, nose, and throat specialist in Stettin, while Han Peter’s grandmother’s maternal uncle, Dr. Alfred Peyser, was also an ear, nose, and throat doctor.

Before quoting Walter’s words on the treatment of Jews detained in Grini, let me explain the White Buses mission. Ignorant of this humanitarian operation prior to Hans Peter Lindemann’s email, Walter Rothholz benefited indirectly from this action. Knowing my family’s history can be of limited interest to followers, I try to frame the events that impacted them in the context of the geopolitical climate of the time. I reckon this will be of broader interest to readers.

During the Second World War, many Scandinavians, mostly Norwegians and Danes, were deported and imprisoned by the Nazi regime. They were imprisoned for various reasons. Some were Jewish, some held opposing political views, others were part of the resistance, and some were Danish border police. Many of the deportees were sent to concentration camps and labor camps in Germany.

By 1944, it became clear Germany was losing on the battlefield and that the Second World War would soon come to an end. This raised concerns in Sweden about the safety of the Scandinavians held in the concentration camps and labor camps; the Swedes feared the Germans might liquidate all their prisoners. Thus, in early 1945, as the war was nearing its end, the Swedish government asked the Swedish Red Cross to help rescue Scandinavian inmates.

One sidebar. Sweden was the only Nordic country that remained neutral during the Second World War. Not only did Sweden remain neutral, but they provided Nazi Germany with crucial raw materials, primarily high-quality iron ore, which was indispensable for German steel production, along with other strategic goods like ball bearings and timber; they also facilitated troop movements through its territory. Sweden’s neutrality involved a delicate balancing act, trading with both Allies and Axis countries. Its economic support for Germany, especially early on, was crucial to Germany’s war effort. Some historians have argued Sweden’s early support prolonged the war. Notwithstanding the merits of this claim, Sweden’s neutrality would have positioned it as a logical intermediary between the Allies and Germany had any negotiations ever taken place.

Back to the topic at hand. White Buses was a Swedish humanitarian operation aimed at freeing Scandinavians held in German concentration camps in Nazi Germany in the waning days of the Second World War. Though the goal was to rescue Scandinavian prisoners, slightly less than half of the 15,345 people estimated to have been removed from concentration camps and transported to Sweden in March and April 1945 were of other nationalities. The number of Jews among those rescued has never been determined as the former prisoners were registered by nationality rather than by ethnic group or religion.

The Swedish diplomat Folke Bernadotte, a nephew of Sweden’s King Gustav V, negotiated the humanitarian operation primarily with Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler. While Hermann Göring was officially designated as Hitler’s second-in-command, Heinrich Himmler was generally considered the second most powerful man in Germany after Adolf Hitler during the Second World War. This stemmed from the fact that Himmler came to preside over a vast empire that included the SS, the Gestapo, the Reich Security Main Office (RHSA), and the concentration camp system.

Realizing the war was lost, Himmler attempted to open peace talks with the Allies in March 1945 without Hitler’s knowledge. The negotiations with the Swedes on the White Buses mission was similarly conducted without Hitler’s awareness as he opposed prisoner or inmate releases. When Hitler found out about Himmler’s machinations on April 28, 1945, he was furious, stripped Himmler of all his offices and ranks, and ordered his arrest. Himmler attempted to go into hiding but was captured by British forces.

The buses used to transport the prisoners from German concentration camps were painted white with red crosses painted on the roof, side, front, and back, ergo how the mission got its name. They were thus marked so they would not be mistaken for military targets by the Allies. Those freed from the various concentration camps were transported by the white buses and trucks and gathered at the Neuengamme concentration camp near Lübeck, Germany. Swedish ships took most of the former prisoners onward to Malmö, Sweden though the Danes continued by land on the white buses to Denmark.

The White Buses mission, notwithstanding that it was deemed a humanitarian success and saved the lives of many who would otherwise have died of malnutrition and/or deprivation or been executed in a final paroxysm of Nazi violence, is not without its detractors.

The key criticisms of the mission are:

(1) Nationality Bias: The initial mandate focused on rescuing Danish and Norwegian prisoners, leading to accusations that other nationalities, especially Jews and Eastern Europeans, were neglected or abandoned.

(2) Cooperation with the Nazis: The Swedish Red Cross, led by Count Bernadotte, negotiated directly with Himmler raising the obvious moral quandary of compromising with the enemy, specifically the odious architect of the Holocaust.

(3) Selective Rescue: Volunteers initially had to leave people behind who were not on an approved list though the operation was later expanded.

(4) Moral Trade-Off: As already discussed, some felt that Sweden’s neutrality and trade had already prolonged the war, making the rescue efforts ethically complex even though they saved lives.

As noted above, the agreement between the Swedish Red Cross and Himmler required gathering the prisoners at the Neuengamme concentration camp. At some point, the Germans announced the camp was full and could no longer receive any more prisoners from other camps. The Germans demanded that the Swedes, using their buses and other vehicles, transport around 2,000 non-Scandinavian prisoners to other camps. The Swedish drivers initially refused this request. However, because the Germans insisted the transfer of Scandinavian prisoners could not continue unless space was made in Neuengamme, higher unidentified, presumably Swedish, authorities ordered the drivers to cooperate and so the transports began.

The outcome is that between March 27 and 29, 1945, about 2,000 French, Russian, and Polish prisoners were transported to concentration camps in Hannover and Braunschweig. Each bus was escorted by two SS guards, one condition of the agreement between the Swedish Red Cross and the Germans. Many prisoners were obviously seriously ill, weak, or dying, and several died during the journey. Cruel to the bitter end, German guards beat some of these prisoners to death.

Readers can draw their own conclusions as to whether the moral compromises that were made during the White Buses mission were worth it.

Earlier I alluded to the fact that my relative Dr. Walter Rothholz benefited indirectly from the White Buses mission. Recall that Walter was freed from Grini concentration camp in Norway, not transferred from a camp in Germany. Walter explains this in his testimony of October 1945 quoted below but suffice it to say that because he was married to a non-Jewish Norwegian woman, Else Marie “Elsemai” Bølling (1915-1976) (Figure 2), he was therefore exempt from deportation to a German concentration camp. However, he’d already been stripped of his German nationality through the Reich Citizenship Law of September 15, 1935, and by the Eleventh Decree to the Reich Citizenship Law of November 25, 1941, and thus was deemed “stateless.”

Figure 2. Else Marie “Elsemai” Rothholz, née Bølling (1915-1976) in 1964, Dr. Walter Rothholz’s wife

Knowing Walter was interned in Norway, I became curious why he was transported to Sweden shortly before liberation on May 2, 1945. Jewish internees liberated from Norway on May 7, 1945, like those from Grini, were sent to Sweden in 1945 because neutral Sweden provided sanctuary and a crucial staging ground for rescue efforts, especially through the Swedish Red Cross.

It appears that prior to liberation the Swedish Red Cross and Count Bernadotte had not only negotiated the release of Scandinavian prisoners from Germany but had also negotiated safe passage for Scandinavian Jews from Nazi camps in Norway like Berg and Grini to safety.

Following arrival in Sweden, the former prisoners were quarantined and then sent to refugee centers, like Kjesäter, for treatment and care as “The Rescued of 1945,” with the goal of eventual repatriation to their home countries or resettlement elsewhere. In essence, Sweden served as a vital humanitarian haven and a place for former prisoners to recover from years of starvation and inhumane treatment.

After May 1945, Norway began prosecuting thousands for collaborating with the Germans. Grini and other Norwegian camps became holding facilities for these accused collaborators. These people were processed within Norway for treason. The primary reason for holding people at Grini post-liberation was to detain collaborators for trial, not to deport them to Sweden or elsewhere.

Below is the testimony Dr. Walter Rothholz provided in October 1945 (Figures 3a-c):

Figure 3a. Page 1 of Dr. Rothholz’s October 1945 testimony describing the mistreatment of Jews at Grini typed in Norwegian

Figure 3b. Page 2 of Dr. Rothholz’s October 1945 testimony describing the mistreatment of Jews at Grini typed in Norwegian

Figure 3c. Page 3 of Dr. Rothholz’s October 1945 testimony describing the mistreatment of Jews at Grini typed in Norwegian

Walter Rothholz witness testimony 4 October 1945, at Victoria Terrasse, translated with Google translate

Questioned at Vict. Terrasse on 4.10.45: Walter Rothholz, born 24.4.95 in Stettin, Dr. Juris, lives at St. Hallvards vei 8, Jar, tel. 35020, familiar with the case and the responsibility to testify, willing to explain himself and explained

regarding the mistreatment of Jews at Grini

“I came to Grini on 2.12.42 and was there until 2.5.45, when I, together with 6 ladies, was sent to Sweden at the expense of the Swedish Red Cross. When I came to Grini there were about 25-26 Jews there. We lived in rooms 1 and 2 in barracks 6. The rest of the rooms in this barracks were inhabited by Norwegians.

In Jan.–Feb. 1943 I participated in two punishment exercises. The first began at about 19 in the evening and was held with the entire barracks 6, both Jews and Norwegians, while the second was held less than 14 days later and then with only Jews from 2:30 to 5:30 at night. Both of these exercises were held on the old roll call square.

The first exercise lasted about an hour. It was very hard and I remember that many of the prisoners were quite upset afterwards. However, I cannot with the best of my ability remember who was in command, whether it was ZEIDLER or someone else, nor can I remember which Germans were present. However, I believe that Feldwebel FIEDLER was not there.

The Jews this time were treated better by the one who conducted the exercise than the Norwegians for the reason that we Jews understood the commands and could immediately obey them, which was not always the case with the Norwegians. I saw that several Norwegians were beaten and kicked during this exercise, but I cannot remember any names. I do not remember that Prof. Jaroczy was beaten. I lived in the same barracks as him, and I have no recollection that he had any signs of abuse after the exercise. Nor do I remember that he spoke of having been abused.

The second exercise took place about 14 days later. Then only the Jews were present. We were woken up in the middle of the night and had to stand at the old roll call square. I cannot say who woke us up, but when we got beyond the barracks and ran towards the roll call square we were beaten by the driver SCHLEGEL, who had positioned himself there and punched some one or two who he thought were coming too late.

When we got to the roll call square I seem to remember that ZEIDLER was there, as was apparently Feldwebel FIEDLER. I cannot say who else was there. HEILMANN was not there at first, but came later.

Before the exercise began ZEIDLER took the Jew BLUMENFELD out of the line. Then, as far as I remember, he handed over the command to FIEDLER and himself went out with BLUMENFELD and disappeared for a while. I did not hear if he said anything to FIEDLER when he gave the latter the command.

The exercise began at 2:30 and lasted until 5:30. During this whole time, we were chased back and forth across the roll call area in a chorus, ‘Hinlegen’, ‘Auf’, ‘Hinlegen’, ‘Auf’, ‘Laufen’. [EDITOR’S NOTE: ‘LIE DOWN’, ‘UP’, ‘LIE DOWN’, ‘UP’, ‘RUN’] Once during the exercise, FIEDLER heard someone talking to each other, he then became even more furious, lined us up and asked who had spoken, at first no one wanted to say anything, but eventually someone pointed to a Lurje from Oslo. FIEDLER then went up to Lurje and hit him several times in the face. I cannot say whether FIEDLER hit with a clenched fist, but he hit him so hard that Lurje fell over. Lurje was then ordered to run around and immediately knock him down again. How many times this was knocked down, I cannot say, but it was several times.

During the exercise, Prof. Jaroczy came to say that he was a front-line soldier from the last world war and that for that reason he thought he was subjected to brutal treatment. When FIEDLER heard this, he was completely furious, went over to Jaroczy and the latter then received the same treatment as Lurje. He was first knocked down and while he was lying down FIEDLER kicked and stomped on him everywhere. He then had to get up again, was knocked down and kicked and stomped on again. Whether he was knocked down as many as 12 times, I dare not say, but I will not rule out the possibility of it either.

I did not directly see FIEDLER directly mistreat anyone during the exercise, but he kicked right and left with his shaft boots when he walked between us during a “Hinlegen” [EDITORS’S NOTE: ‘LIE DOWN’]. I for one also got a kick from his boots in passing, and they hurt quite a bit. When ZEIDLER had been gone for an hour he came back. I was then called forward and he read me an anti-Semitic song that he said I should get the Jews to sing. The song itself was only one verse and it ended with ‘und dann nicht mehr’ [EDITOR’S NOTE: ‘AND THEN NO LONGER’. When he had instructed this, ZEIDLER disappeared and FIEDLER was to make sure that we practiced correctly. After a while ZEIDLER came back and we had to sing the verse for him too and kept singing the verse over and over for at least half an hour.

ZEIDLER then disappeared again and was gone for a while. During that time FIEDLER was again doing ‘hinlegen’ [EDITOR’S NOTE: ‘LIE DOWN’] etc. HEILMANN was then present but he did not like it and I saw that he tried several times to slow down FIEDLER, who was still just as furious. Then HEILMANN left too.

During the time between ZEIDLER’s return after being gone for about an hour, and at 5:30 when the exercise ended, ZEIDLER was only partially present. He came earlier to see that everything was going as it should. FIEDLER drove us the whole time, either we had exercises or we had to sing the aforementioned song, but it was not as hard as the first hour.

As far as I could see, ZEIDLER did not hit us once during the entire exercise. He made speeches to us and mocked the Jews for being unintelligent and cowardly, etc., but he did not hit.

When the exercise was over, 6-7 of the oldest ones were so badly injured that we had to carry them from the square to the barracks. In the barracks we were received by BLUMENFELD whom I had not seen since he was taken away by ZEIDLER at the beginning of the exercise. Where he had been during that time I do not know.

The next morning 5-6 of the Jews were in bed, including Jaroczy, Lurje, Rothkopf and Pintzow. The latter was over 60 years old. They all looked bad, their faces swollen and bloody. Rothkopf had, among other things, been hit on the nose at the beginning of the exercise so that the blood flowed. For this reason, his nose became completely blocked, but he still had to do the exercise at the same time as the rest of us. It was probably FIEDLER who had hit Rotkopf too, but I did not see it. Dr. Poulsson and Dr. Halvorsen came to see them, and one of them determined that Rotkopf had suffered a concussion.

The rest of us who had not been so ill that we had to stay in bed had to go out to work as usual in the morning. I heard that WARNECKE had been to the barracks in the morning and recorded a report on what had happened, but I was not there at the time. A couple of days later, ZEIDLER came into the barracks and asked if the exercise had been so terribly hard, but he did not get any answer.

The morning after the exercise, the entire roll call area was covered in bloodstains.

I remember that Frau FIEDLER was present during the exercise, but I did not see her hitting or kicking any of the prisoners. When I noticed her, she was standing on the main stairs and shouting: ‘Schneller, schneller!’ [EDITOR’S NOTE: ‘FASTER, FASTER’]

Apart from these two exercises, I do not remember that the Jews were subjected to any mistreatment. They were of course treated worse than the Norwegians, were constantly subjected to insults, etc., but violence was not used against them.

I remember that ZEIDLER decided that we should work on both Christmas days in 1942, when other prisoners had the day off. Moreover, it was impossible for us to receive visitors. I know that my wife was at Vict. Terrasse in Feb. or March 1943 and that she had been granted a visitor’s permit there. When she came to Grini with this, she was placed and rejected by ZEIDLER. The same was twice the case with the wife of a Jew named BLUMENAU, she too was rejected by ZEIDLER after permission had been granted at Terrassen.

Most of the Jews were sent from Grini to Germany on 1 Feb. 1943, only about 10-14 days after the last penal exercise, and many of them were not completely recovered from the treatment they had received when they were sent. Only those Jews who were married to Norwegian or German women avoided being sent.

For the above reason I was not sent to Germany and remained at Grini until just before the capitulation. At one time or another during this time I spoke to ZEIDLER about the treatment the Jews had been subjected to. This did not only apply to Grini, but in general. ZEIDLER then said: ‘Ja, das haben wir getan, und wir entschuldigen uns nicht dafür’ [EDITORS’S NOTE: YES, WE DID THAT, AND WE MAKE NO APOLOGIES FOR IT’].

At Grini the Jews were not allowed to go to hospital. If any of us got sick, we had to stay in the barracks. Fortunately, no one got so sick that the matter was brought to the fore, but the order was that no Jews were to be admitted to the hospital.

The Jews were also given the worst and heaviest work, they were preferably put to dig ditches and do other heavy work. It was completely impossible for a Jew to enter a workshop or kitchen. In 1944 things improved, and Jews could then enter workshops, such as broom making, etc. The latter was, for example, the case with me.

I have never seen ZEIDLER and DENZER beat prisoners. On the other hand, I saw both HEILMANN, KUNZE and POHL beat, but I cannot remember any names or cases. It was especially when they thought that the prisoners were cheating their way out of work, or that they had caught them in some violation of the camp regulations. They beat both with their hands and with the sticks they were carrying.

The first day I arrived at Grini, I was beaten by KUNTZE right at the reception. When he heard that I knew German, he put me in charge of the other prisoners ‘Augen rechts’ and ‘Augen links’ [EDITORS’S NOTE: ‘EYES RIGHT’ AND ‘EYES LEFT’]. When some of them did the exercise wrong, it affected me and I was hit in the face with a clenched fist.

Adopted

Walter Rothholz”

While the affidavit speaks for itself, let me explain a few things.

According to Walter’s statement, he and six women were sent to Sweden at the expense of the Swedish Red Cross on May 2, 1945, five days before the formal German surrender in Norway on May 7^th. This is the clearest evidence we have that the prisoners at Grini were released before liberation day because of the agreement Count Bernadotte and Himmler negotiated on behalf of Scandinavians held in German concentration camps.

The Grini detention center in occupied Norway was primarily administered by Gestapo and SS personnel. The camp commander at Grini at the time of liberation was a German SS officer whom Walter merely identifies as “Zeidler.” His full name was Alfred Zeidler, and he held the rank of SS-Hauptsturmführer; he was the last commander of the Grini detention center, a position he held from July 1942 until the end of WWII in May 1945. This encompassed the entire time Walter was imprisoned. Upon being appointed commander, Zeidler promised the prisoners they would get used to “Prussian discipline,” something clearly reflected by the two “punishment exercises” Walter was forced to endure.

On the day of German surrender in Norway, May 7, 1945, Zeidler handed over command as he’d been ordered. Later he attempted to disguise himself as a regular member of the German army, the Wehrmacht, along with a group of 75 other members of the Gestapo but was apprehended. Though sentenced to a life of forced labor in 1947, he was released in 1953 after an all-too-short incarceration.

Walter Rothholz mentions the name “Denzer.” This seemingly is Julius Denzer, who along with Alfred Zeidler and Hellmuth Reinhard, were the three primary commanders who oversaw the Grini concentration camp. Denzer was transferred from Grini to another camp, Tromsdalen, in August 1944.

Another name Walter mentions is “Heilmann.” This corresponds to Eugen Wilhelm Heilmann, who was a guard at the Grini detention center. He was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment after the war, but, like Alfred Zeidler, was released early on the 7^th of September 1951. On page 62 of Odd Bergfald’s book entitled “Hellmuth Reinhard, soldat eller morder?,”the author details the evidence Walter provided in Heilmann’s trial. During his trial, when Heilmann pretended he knew nothing about Auschwitz and the open mass grave he’d boasted having seen during a wartime visit there implying this was the fate that awaited Norwegian Jews, Walter Rothholz was called to testify to the contrary that Heilmann knew precisely what would happen to deportees.

As Walter Rothholz testifies, as a Jew married to a non-Jewish Norwegian woman, he was not deported to a German concentration camp when most other Jews were sent from Grini to Germany on the 1^st of February 1943. In 1936, Walter had married Else Marie “Elsemai” Bølling, a move that permitted him to emigrate to Norway in 1939, seemingly escaping the Nazi scourge. However, after the Nazis invaded Norway on April 9, 1940, as part of “Operation Weserübung,” Walter was eventually arrested on October 26, 1942 (Bergfald: p. 62). Regardless, the Nazis offered “privileged” status to “mixed marriages” such as Walter’s. Compared to other Norwegian Jews, many such couples survived. Walter was later granted Norwegian citizenship.

As previously noted, Walter was transported to Sweden with six women. He mentions that upon his arrival at Grini there were 25 or 26 Jews there. Since Walter makes no further mention of them after they were beaten, one can assume that unlike him they were deported to German concentration camps and murdered.

In closing, I would only say that reading firsthand accounts of historical events is perhaps as close as we’ll come to knowing what happened at the time. What makes Walter’s testimony very believable is how dispassionate he is about describing his experiences and what he witnessed.

REFERENCE

Bergfald, O. (1967). Hellmuth Reinhard, soldat eller morder? Unknown binding.

POST 195: RATIBOR’S NATIVE SON CLAUS OGERMAN, RENOWNED GERMAN CONDUCTOR, COMPOSER, MUSICAL ARRANGER

Note: This post again proves, as an unknown writer much wiser than me once said, that there’s a short story to be found on every street corner. When the short story happens to be about my father’s hometown of Ratibor and involves one of its famous native sons, Claus Ogerman, who came to America and became one of the most prolific 20th century musical arrangers working with a string of singers who are household names, the tale is even more tantalizing. But it’s topped off by a curious discovery I made comparing two photographs sent to me by separate individuals that serendipitously overlap and relate to Claus.

POST 138: INTRIGUING DISCOVERIES ABOUT RATIBOR’S HELIOS PHOTO STUDIO

POST 190: FURTHER CONNECTIONS WITH RATIBOR’S “PHOTO-HELIOS” STUDIO, A MANUFACTURER OF CABINET CARDS

A reader recently sent me a photograph taken on the Rynek, the Market Square, in Ratibor (today: Racibórz, Poland), my father’s hometown, probably in the early to mid-1940s. The photo was sent to me by “Monika,” a lady I introduced to readers in Post 190. Monika stumbled upon Post 138 while researching photo studios that once existed in Ratibor. Her interest stems from the fact that for a brief period between 1942 and 1944 her father, Leopold “Leo” Simon (Figures 1a-b), lived in Ratibor and apprenticed in a photo shop. From Post 138, she discovered the studio where Leo briefly worked was “Photo-Helios,” which has been the subject of several posts.

Figure 1a. Monika’s father, Leopold “Leo” Simon, who apprenticed in Ratibor’s “Photo-Helios” between 1942 and 1944

Figure 1b. Backside of photo of Leopold “Leo” Simon showing it was taken on the 15th of November 1944 in Ratibor

Post 138 included photos taken inside “Photo-Helios” of staff that once worked there that were sent to me by a lady named Jessica Nastos, whose great-grandmother also once worked there. As I also discussed in Post 138, the original proprietors of Photo-Helios were Hans and Emma Ogermann. The group photos included staff as well as Emma Ogermann and someone I assumed was her husband, Hans. To her surprise and delight, Monika realized it was her father Leo and informed me I’d misidentified him. (Figures 2a-b)

Figure 2a. Group photo taken inside of “Photo-Helios” of staffers working there

Figure 2b. Closeup of Leopold “Leo” Simon from group photo whom I’m misidentified as Hans Ogermann

A brief digression. Following publication of Post 72 dealing with cabinet cards from Ratibor and Berlin, Jakub “Kuba” Stankiewicz, the Director of Jazz Studies at the prestigious Karol Lipiński University of Music in Wrocław, contacted me. A gentleman I now consider a friend whom I met in August in Racibórz (Figure 3), Kuba explained that Ratibor’s famous native son, Claus Ogerman (Figure 4), born Klaus Ogermann, was the son of Hans and Emma Ogermann, owners of Photo-Helios. I refer readers to Post 138 for more background.

Figure 3. Kuba Stankiewicz and me in August 2025 in Racibórz

Figure 4. Claus Ogerman (1930-2016) (photo credit: by httpswww.imdb.comnamenm0644659, Fair use, httpsen.wikipedia.orgwindex.phpcurid=58608757)

Continuing. Monika is a professional photographer, as was her father. Being the curator of some of her father’s surviving pictures, I was curious whether any might have been taken during the short period Leo Simon lived in Ratibor between 1942 and 1944. She could only find one, but it is a remarkable photo as I will explain.

The photograph (Figure 5) is hauntingly alluring made so by the fact the picture was taken at night, and the surface of the image is “crazed,” that is, it has a network of fine cracks and fissures, like those in glazed pottery, old paint, or concrete. These were likely caused by drying or improper storage. Regardless, the structural integrity of the photo has not been compromised, and the architectural elements recognizable.

Figure 5. Photo of Ratibor’s Market Square, likely taken by Monika’s father Leopold “Leo” Simon, in the early to mid-1940s

The picture shows Ratibor’s Rynek during the Second World War before most of the buildings surrounding the extant market square were destroyed by the invading Red Army in 1945. The photo looks towards the south. The Christmas tree proves the picture was taken during the holiday season. Two recognizable architectural features appear that still exist today. These include the Virgin Mary Column (Kolumna Matki Boskiej w Raciborzu) to the right of the Christmas tree, and the so-called Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Parafia Wniebowzięcia Najświętszej Maryi) in the background.

The Virgin Mary Column (Figure 6) was built between 1725 and 1727 by a renowned Baroque sculptor Johann Melchior Österreich as a votive offering to thank St. Mary for saving the town from a cholera epidemic. The column incorporates images of angels and figures of St. Florian (patron saint of fire), St. Sebastian (patron saint of epidemics), and St. Marcel (patron saint of Racibórz). According to prophecy, Racibórz will be flooded should anyone dig up the column’s plinth.

Figure 6. The Virgin Mary Column in Racibórz as it looks today

The Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Figure 7) is one of the oldest Upper Silesian parish churches and the only one that preserves features of early Silesian Gothic architecture. It is Racibórz’s oldest and most significant church with a history dating back to 1205. The Racibórz parish was probably founded in the mid-thirteenth century during the foundation of the town, which took place around 1240.

Figure 7. The Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Racibórz as it looks today

Let me switch gears and discuss a separate photograph sent to me by Michał Fita, the former Vice-Mayor of Racibórz. Michał is a collector of Claus Ogerman discography. My wife Ann Finan and I met him at the same time we met Kuba Stankiewicz in Racibórz in August. (Figure 8) This is when I donated memorabilia from the former Bruck family establishment, the Bruck’s “Prinz von Preußen” Hotel, to the local museum, the Muzeum w Raciborzu.

Figure 8. Group photo from left to right of Michał Fita, me, Kuba Stankiewicz, and my wife Ann Finan in Racibórz in August 2025

Adjacent the restaurant on market square where my wife and I met Kuba and Michał for lunch, the city of Racibórz has erected an interpretive sign incorporating a photo looking towards the nearby corner where Claus Ogerman’s childhood home once stood. (Figure 9) Recently, Michał sent me a high-quality copy of this photo with an arrow pointing towards the apartment building where Claus grew up. (Figure 10) As readers can see, the house was located on the Rynek in front the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Figure 9. Interpretive panel on Raciborz’s Market Square (Rynek) showing the no-longer existing apartment building where Claus Ogerman grew up

Figure 10. High-quality closeup photo sent to me by Michał Fita showing the same apartment building where Claus Ogerman grew up

Once I realized the photo sent by Monika was also taken on the Rynek (Figures 11-12), I compared it to the one sent by Michał and serendipitously noticed there is overlap between them. The photo sent by Michał does not show the Virgin Mary Column meaning it was shot closer to the apartment building where Claus grew up; the column is centrally located in the square. However, both photos include the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and appear to have been taken looking roughly towards the south.

Figure 11. 1927-28 Ratibor map with red arrow pointing towards the Rynek, Market Square, referred to as the “Ring”

Figure 12. Present-day map of Racibórz looking towards the north showing the Rynek and the outline of the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary

In Monika’s photo, readers can clearly see the complete sign for the business establishment “Kaufhaus Silbermann,” seemingly owned by “D. Silbermann.” Barely visible to the right of this establishment is one named “Gebruder Freund.” In Michał’s photo, only the last five letters of Kaufmann Silbermann’s sign are visible, “rmann,” though the complete sign for “Gebrüder Freund” is legible.

To the right of the Christmas tree in Monika’s picture, “Feinkost” can clearly be read below most of the Paul Ackermann store sign. Examining Michał’s photo, these same signs can be seen.

In Monika’s picture, the building that stands in the hazy glow between the Christmas tree and the Virgin Mary Column is the apartment building where Claus grew up. Few details can be made out.

The cars visible in Michał’s photo appear to date from the late 1920s-early 1930s, so the photo was likely taken at least 10 years before Monika’s image.

Curiously enough, Jan Krajczok, another Polish friend from Rybnik, a town 16 miles to the east of Racibórz, sent me yet another historic photo showing the Rynek. (Figure 13) As readers can see, the photo is an aerial shot, in this instance looking roughly towards the north. It is an equally compelling image to the ones sent by Monika and Michał. I’ve pointed out Claus’ childhood home. In this picture, readers can clearly make out the Virgin Mary Column and the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Oderstrasse, the street where the Bruck’s Hotel once stood, can also be seen caddy corner from the Ogerman home on the Rynek (i.e., the Ogerman home was on the south corner of the market square and Oderstrasse (see Figure 13) entered the square from the north). While difficult to point out to readers, I believe I can make out the roof of the former Bruck’s Hotel.

Figure 13. Historic aerial photo of Ratibor looking towards the north showing the Virgin Mary Column in the center of the Market Square and the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the center-right of the picture. Red arrow in the foreground points to apartment building where Claus Ogermann grew up and the red arrow in the background points to start of Oderstrasse

Admittedly, this post will be of limited interest to readers. Nonetheless, I find myself drawn to finding connections between random occurrences such as two historic photos of Ratibor suddenly materializing in my inbox that overlap and happen to show the childhood home of one of the city’s famous native sons.

In the spirit of the holidays and given the who’s who of famous singers for whom Claus did musical arrangements and compositions, I thought I would include YouTube links to a few of his productions.

Frank Sinatra’s major collaboration with Claus Ogerman was on the iconic 1967 bossa nova album, “Francis Albert Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim,” where Ogerman served as the orchestrator and conductor. The album was a commercial success and was nominated for Album of the Year at the Grammys.

The Girl from Ipanema

Change Partners

Barbra Streisand and Claus collaborated on her acclaimed 1976 album, “Classical Barbra.” Ogerman arranged the orchestral scores, conducted the Columbia Symphony Orchestra, and composed the song “I Loved You,” featuring lyrics from a Pushkin poem.

After moving to the United States in 1959, beyond working with Sinatra and Streisand, he also worked with:

Bill Evans

Wes Montgomery

Kai Winding

Ogerman also arranged many pop hits, including Solomon Burke’s “Cry To Me” and Lesley Gore’s “It’s My Party,” “Judy’s Turn to Cry,” “She’s a Fool,” and “Maybe I Know.” Ogerman charted under his own name in 1965, including the album “Watusi Trumpets.” Ogerman also arranged and conducted Diana Krall’s 2001 album “The Look of Love.” (Figure 14)

Figure 14. Diana Krall in the middle between Michał Fita and Kuba Stankiewicz in Zabrze, Poland in October 2025

POST 194: BRINGING TOGETHER FORENSIC GENEALOGY & ARCHAEOLOGY TO THE STUDY OF MY FATHER’S FIRST COUSIN HEINZ LÖWENSTEIN’S ESCAPE FROM A GERMAN STALAG

Note: In this lengthy post, I bring together two of my passions, archaeology and forensic genealogy, to examine my father’s first cousin’s escape from a German stalag in October 1943. A recent visit to see the ongoing archaeological work at the former British lager where he was interned, located in Łambinowice, Poland, allowed me to stand atop the escape tunnel through which he escaped. This gave me another opportunity to time travel.

POST 137: MY FATHER’S FIRST COUSIN HEINZ LÖWENSTEIN: DISCOVERING HIS WHEREABOUTS DURING WORLD WAR II

POST 137, POSTSCRIPT-MY FATHER’S FIRST COUSIN HEINZ LÖWENSTEIN, DISCOVERING HIS WHEREABOUTS DURING WWII—ADDITIONAL FINDINGS

POST 163: THE WARTIME ESCAPADES OF HEINZ LÖWENSTEIN, FEDOR LÖWENSTEIN’S BROTHER

POST 163, POSTSCRIPT: THE WARTIME ESCAPADES OF HEINZ LÖWENSTEIN, FEDOR LÖWENSTEIN’S BROTHER: FURTHER FINDINGS

POST 181: JOE POWELL, ESCAPEE FROM A GERMAN STALAG WITH MY FATHER’S FIRST COUSIN HEINZ LÖWENSTEIN

POST 189: CEREMONY FOR THE RESTITUTION OF THREE PAINTINGS LOOTED FROM MY FATHER’S COUSIN FÉDOR LÖWENSTEIN DURING THE SECOND WORLD WAR: SEPTEMBER 16, 2025

This post brings together two of my passions, archaeology and forensic genealogy. While my professional work as an archaeologist was primarily administrative, the skills I learned as a field archaeologist have come in very handy in doing forensic genealogy. It’s simply a different type of “digging.”

Let me explain the genesis of this post and in the process reintroduce my English friend, Brian Cooper (Figure 1), who has been instrumental in my learning as much as I have about one of my father’s first cousins, Heinz Löwenstein (1905-1979). (Figure 2) What has always drawn me to Heinz’s story was that I met him as a child. His wartime exploits were alluded to in tantalizingly vague enough ways they conjured childlike fantasies that he helped Jewish internees escape from detention camps. As implausible as this seems in retrospect, his actual Houdini-like escapades are nonetheless movie-worthy.

Figure 2. Heinz Löwenstein in July 1965 in Rheinfall, Switzerland

Heinz has been the subject of multiple earlier posts, as has his older brother Fedor Löwenstein (1901-1946). (Figure 3) To quickly remind readers about Fedor, he was an accomplished artist whose works were deemed by the Nazis to be “degenerate art,” meaning they destroyed many of them. I most recently wrote about Fedor Löwenstein in Post 189. In that publication, I detailed the culmination of an eleven-year struggle involving the French Ministry of Culture to retrieve three of his surviving paintings confiscated by the Nazis at the Port of Bordeaux in December 1940. For years the artworks were warehoused and languished in the National Museum of Modern Art in Paris, unrecognized as looted art until 2010.

Figure 3. Heinz Löwenstein (right) with his older brother Fedor

Back to Heinz Löwenstein. I invite readers to peruse or reread earlier posts for the background about him, specifically, Post 137, Post 137, Postscript, Post 163, Post 163, Postscript, and Post 181. However, let me briefly review Heinz’s wartime experiences and incarceration including how Brian and I first became acquainted.

Brian Cooper specializes in the study of British and Commonwealth World War II prisoners of war. For many years, Brian has been researching the fate of his uncle, Harold William Jackson from the 2^nd Battalion Northamptonshire Regiment, who was taken prisoner in 1940 in France. (Figure 4) Following his capture, his uncle was interned in Stalag VIIIB, later renumbered Stalag 344, in Lamsdorf, Silesia, then part of Germany (today: Łambinowice, Poland). Brian’s uncle’s fate is unknown though it seems unlikely he died in Lamsdorf or attempting to escape from there. What appears more probable is that he died during the latter stages of the Second World War when the Nazis began marching still able-bodied prisoners of war westward as the Red Army was on the verge of liberating Lamsdorf in January 1945. Brian remains hopeful that a fellow inmate may have recorded in his postwar memoirs his uncle’s death as prisoners were being force marched, a hope that remains unfulfilled.

Figure 4. The German Record card (WO 416/193/291), “Personalkarte,” for Henry William Jackson, Brian’s uncle, showing he was captured in Lille, France on the 25th of May 1940, and interned in Stalag VIIIB in Lamsdorf, Silesia, like Heinz Löwenstein

Brian first emailed me in February 2023. At the time, he intriguingly mentioned he’d come across a prisoner named “Heinz Loewenstein” (spelled “oe” without an umlaugh over the “o”) in connection with his research on his uncle and other Commonwealth prisoners of war incarcerated in Stalag VIIIB/344. Having found “Heinz Löwenstein” mentioned in Post 16, Brian naturally wondered whether “his” Heinz Loewenstein was the same person as “my” Heinz Löwenstein. Two clues in my publication convinced him they were one and the same person. Firstly, his Heinz Loewenstein used the alias “Henry Goff,” a surname I’d mentioned in Post 16. “Goff” as it turns out was Heinz’s older sister Jeanne “Hansi” Goff, née Löwenstein’s (1902-1986) (Figure 5) married name. It was a sensible alias for Heinz, one he could easily have remembered if questioned under duress. Secondly, Brian discovered that my Heinz Löwenstein had the identical date of birth, the 8^th of March 1905, as the prisoner of war records indicate for the Heinz he’d been researching.

Figure 5. Heinz Löwenstein’s older sister Jeanne “Hansi” Goff, née Löwenstein in Monte Carlo in October 1941

Having resolved to our satisfaction that we were dealing with the same individual, Brian used the primary source documents he’d collected to develop a detailed timeline of Heinz’s activities and whereabouts during the Second World War. As I wrote in Post 137, Brian found these records in the United Kingdom’s National Archives: “Specifically, records created or inherited by the War Office’s Armed Forces Services containing ‘German Record cards of British and Commonwealth Prisoners of War and some Civilian Internees, Second World War,’ found in Catalogue WO (for War Office) 416 are pertinent.” The National Archives includes records mentioning both Heinz Löwenstein (spelled “Loewenstein”) and his alias “Henry Goff.”

The most informative German Record card for tracking Heinz Löwenstein’s family background and emplacements during his captivity is his Personalkarte, his personnel card, record number WO 416/412/223. (Figures 6a-d) It includes his photograph, his father’s first name, his mother’s maiden name, his religion, and his date and place of birth, information all previously known to me. It also includes details previously unknown to me, such as his service number, his service (i.e., Palestinian Army), his regiment (i.e., Corps of Signals), his profession (i.e., electrician), place (i.e., Greece) and date of capture (29^th April 1941), his POW number (i.e., 8576), and the Stalag he was initially interned (i.e., Stalag XVIIIA (Wolfsberg, Austria)).

Figure 6a. Page 1 of German War record WO 416/412/223 for “Heinz Loewenstein,” referred to as his “Personalkarte”

Figure 6b. Page 2 of German War record WO 416/412/223 for “Heinz Loewenstein,” referred to as his “Personalkarte”

Figure 6c. Page 3 of German War record WO 416/412/223 for “Heinz Loewenstein,” referred to as his “Personalkarte”

Figure 6d. Page 4 of German War record WO 416/412/223 for “Heinz Loewenstein,” referred to as his “Personalkarte”

Knowing the place and date of Heinz’s capture confirms he was taken prisoner during the Battle of Greece, also known as the “German invasion of Greece” or “Operation Marita.” Brian surmises he was ensnared in or near Kalamata on the Peloponnesian Peninsula. As I described in Post 137, he was likely quickly moved to the prison compound at Corinth, then perhaps a month later transferred to Salonika via Athens and the Brallos Pass. The “Salonika Transit Camp Frontstalag 183” was known to be a gateway to the Central European stalags.

As just mentioned, Heinz was initially imprisoned in Stalag XVIIIA in Wolfsberg, Austria after being transported by cattle truck from the Salonika Transit Camp. A map found in John Borrie’s book, “Despite Captivity: A Doctor’s Life as Prisoner of War,” indicates roughly the route by which the author arrived in Stalag VIIIB in Lamsdorf via Wolfsberg from Salonika, probably the identical path which brought Heinz to the same stalag. (Figure 7)

Figure 7. A map from John Borrie’s book “Despite Captivity” showing the train route the cattle truck he was transported on took to travel from Salonika to Lamsdorf, Silesia in October 1941

Obviously, Brian’s interest in Heinz Löwenstein is that both Heinz and Brian’s uncle were interned in Stalag VIIIB/344, though there is no evidence their paths crossed.

As I discussed in detail in Post 137, between September 1941, likely shortly after Heinz’s arrival at Stalag VIIIB/344, and June 1943, Heinz was assigned to work at eight detached work labor camps affiliated with Stalag VIIIB/344; assigning and using prisoners of war as labor in work camps was a common practice.

Most attempted and/or successful prisoner escapes took place from these work camps as these were easier to flee from. In Heinz’s case, his Personalkarte notes three attempted escapes, including one from a labor camp designated as “E479” in Tarnowitz. In Post 137, I quoted at length from a book by Cyril Rofe, “Against the Wind,” where Heinz’s remarkable flight and eventual recapture in Danzig, Germany (today: Gdańsk, Poland) with a man named Joe Powell (Figure 8) was described. What facilitated Heinz’s escapes was his fluency in German since he’d been born in Danzig. What Rofe states and what the entries on Heinz’s Personalkarte confirm is that the repercussions for his attempted escapes were minimal, typically no more than seven days in solitary confinement.

Figure 8. Joe Powell in his airman’s uniform circa 1942

An illegible notation on Heinz’s Personalkarte dated the 15^th of September 1943 (see Figure 6d) suggests a fourth escape, a successful one. As I learned, thanks once again to Brian, and discussed in detail in Post 137, record number WO 224/95 from the UK National Archives places “Heinz Loewenstein” among 20 POW escapees interned at Camp Siklós in Hungary in November 1943. As a related aside, we know from elsewhere that the holding facility at Camp Siklós, where sanitary conditions were deplorable, had by then been relocated to the nearby castle estate of Count Mihály Andrássy in Szigetvár in August 1943, where conditions were excellent.

In any case, record WO 224/95 is an inspection report written on the 16^th of November 1943 by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in its capacity as a Protecting Power based on an 8^th of November examination of the holding facility at Szigetvár. The fact that “Heinz Loewenstein’s” name is listed (Figure 9) in the report among the 20 POWs being held there confirms he successfully made it to Hungary following a fourth escape attempt from Stalag VIIIB/344. In Post 163, Postscript, I discussed the means and likely route by which Heinz ultimately wound up at Szigetvár.

Figure 9. “Annex” to the report written by the International Committee of the Red Cross on November 16, 1943, listing “Heinz Loewenstein” as one of the POWs interned at Count Mihály Andrássy’s castle

A little background. A state of war did not exist between Hungary and the Allies until March 19, 1944, when the Nazis invaded and occupied Hungary. Before the Nazi invasion, any escaping Allied prisoners caught in Hungary by the authorities would expect no more than internment within the country; there was no concern that any POWs would be returned to German control. This explains Heinz’s detention at Count Andrássy’s estate in Szigetvár, Hungary. However, upon the German occupation of Hungary on March 19^th, the Wehrmacht immediately headed there and recaptured most of the POWs detained there. This unfortunately included Heinz Löwenstein.

A little more background. The British and Commonwealth POWs at Szigetvár had always intended to reach the Allied lines by linking up with local partisans who would guide them through the treacherous terrain to the south in then-northern Yugoslavia occupied by the Germans to safe areas further south where they could then be flown out to southern Italy and beyond. Written accounts confirm that the multi-lingual Heinz had already been tasked and had established contact with the Hungarian partisans, and that the POWs at Szigetvár were at most weeks away from fleeing Hungary.

Things got complicated, however, following South African Lt. Col. Charles Telfer Howie’s escape from Stalag VIIIB/344 after he successfully reached Budapest, Hungary; I wrote about Howie’s escape from Stalag VIIIB/344 in Post 163, Postscript and write more about it below. Before the Germans invaded Hungary on March 19^th, Howie was actively working with the underground to try and “flip” Hungary to the Allies. While their efforts were ultimately undermined by spies and the Nazi-affiliated Arrow Cross Party, the POWs at Szigetvár were supposed to have played a critical role. An Allied negotiating team had been expected to land near Szigetvár and be rounded up with their help; the POWs were threatened with a post-WWII court martial if they tried to escape before the negotiating team arrived. Howie, however, had promised to warn the British POWs at Szigetvár if the Germans invaded, but the message alerting them to the German occupation was never delivered and the POWs were retaken. More about this can be found in Post 163, Postscript.

As I alluded to above and discussed in Post 137, the ICRC’s inspection report listed Heinz under his given name. This is a list that would presumably have been available to or seized by the Germans when they occupied Szigetvár on March 19, 1944, and recaptured the escaped POWs detained there. For this reason, it is an enduring mystery how Heinz magically “transformed” into his doppelgänger “Henry Goff” and was later assigned a brand-new POW number. Given how meticulous the Germans were about record keeping, logically this should not have happened.

Brian continues to play a pivotal role in terms of finding relevant written accounts and uncovering postwar interrogation reports discussing the escape of British POWs from Stalag VIIIB/344. Let me get into these now as I will eventually tie them into recent archaeological discoveries that support the written accounts.

Brian interacts with Facebook in a way that I don’t. I’m not directly involved in social media, no doubt to my detriment. Let me provide two examples.

A few years ago, Brian discovered some group pictures of Commonwealth POWs interned in Stalag VIIIB/344 that someone had posted on Facebook. I continue to be amazed that one of these photographs includes a barely recognizable photo of an understandably very haggard-looking Heinz Löwenstein. (Figure 10) It was likely taken between 1941 and 1943. Heinz, born in 1905, would have been among the older POWs. And, in fact, some POW accounts describe him as an “elder statesman.”

Figure 10. Group photo found by Brian Cooper on Facebook of British POWs at Lamsdorf, astonishingly including my father’s first cousin Heinz Löwenstein

The second instance where Brian found pertinent information on Facebook was precisely on the 24^th of July 2025. It involved a post by a Polish gentleman named Cuba Kubacki on a private group chat that Brian is active on. Brian sent me a screen shot of Cuba’s English-language post. (Figure 11)

Figure 11. Screenshot of Cuba Kubacki’s Facebook postdated July 24, 2025, describing the work of the “Wataha Group” at the British lager at Lamsdorf

As followers can read, Cuba is part of a research and exploration group called “Wataha” (formerly “Wataha Grupa Badawczo Ekspolacyjna”). (Figures 12-13) The group is working under permit in collaboration with archaeologists conducting research in the former prisoner of war camp in Łambinowice, currently focused on the section of the camp that housed British POWs. Using metal detectors, the group has found a vast number of artifacts lost or left behind by the prisoners; these are being precisely mapped, then handed over to the Central Museum of Prisoners of War in Łambinowice-Opole (“Centralne Muzeum Jencow Wojennych”) for curation. Łambinowice is today a “Site of National Remembrance.”

Figure 13. Members of the “Wataha” Group

Just a brief history on Łambinowice. In the 1860s, the Prussian Army established an artillery range near the village of Lamsdorf (today: Łambinowice, Poland). During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871, between 3,500 and 4,000 French soldiers were detained at Lamsdorf, several dozen of whom died. During WWI, the POW camp at Lamsdorf was one of the largest camps in the territory of Germany with 90,000 soldiers of various nationalities interned here, about 7,000 of whom died. After the Treaty of Versailles, the camp was decommissioned.

It was recommissioned in 1939 to house Polish prisoners following the German invasion of Poland which started the Second World War in September 1939. Later during the war, over 300,000 POWs of different nationalities were kept at the camp, including Brits, Poles, French, Yugoslavians, Belgians, Italians, Americans, and Russians. The most numerous were the soldiers of the Red Army. In 1941, a separate camp, Stalag VIIIF was set up for the roughly 200,000 Soviet POWs; about 40,000 of them died.

Polish insurgents, including women and children, were brought to the camp in October 1943 after the Germans had crushed the uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto. The camp was liberated on the 17^th of March 1945.

In 1945-1946, the camp was used by the Soviet-installed Polish Ministry of Public Security to house some 8,000-9,000 Germans, both POWs and civilian. Polish army personnel being repatriated from POW camps were also processed through Łambinowice and sometimes held there for several months. Some were later released, others sent to Gulags in Siberia. About 1,000-1500 German prisoners died from things such as malnutrition and violence.

In 1968 the area of the former camp and the POW cemeteries at Łambinowice were recognized as a Monument of National Remembrance, altered later to a Site of National Remembrance.

Ongoing archaeological work has been focused on searching for the escape tunnels within the British part of the camp. What obviously caught my attention in Cuba’s post was his mention of Heinz Löwenstein. Though not specifically cited, it is clear Cuba had stumbled on my blog and the posts about Heinz. He had obviously found the map of the escape tunnel from Barrack 19B included in Claerwen Howie’s book that I reproduced in Post 163, Postscript. (Figure 14)

Figure 14. A diagram (not to scale) showing the escape tunnel by Hut 19, as well as other features of the camp enclosure (from Claerwen Howie’s book)

Knowing my wife and I would be in southwestern Poland in August, and that Łambinowice is only 100km (~62 miles) from Wrocław, one of our destinations (Figure 15), I asked Brian to put me in touch with Cuba Kubacki. In very short order Cuba and I were in direct contact, and he gladly agreed to meet us at Łambinowice on August 23^rd to give us a guided tour of the site.

Figure 15. Map showing the distance from Wrocław to Łambinowice

In the interim, Cuba and I stayed in touch, and he continued to send me photographs of the Wataha Group’s work. (Figure 16) He also sent a link with astonishing photos secretly taken by one of the POWs while the escape tunnel from Barrack 19B was under construction. I’ll discuss the source of these photographs when I introduce a firsthand account of the construction of the escape tunnel Brian found in a book by John Mellor entitled “Forgotten Heroes: The Canadians at Dieppe.”

Figure 16. Members of the Wataha Group excavating and screening dirt from the ruins of one of the POW barracks

As planned, my wife and I met Cuba and his colleague Aram at Łambinowice on August 23^rd and were given a general tour of the extensive site and introduced to the current director of the museum, Michal Jabacki. Among other things, the museum includes a 3D model of the site allowing visitors to visualize the layout of the various prisoner “lagers” (i.e., term referring to labor or concentration camp). (Figure 17)

Figure 17. At the Central Museum of Prisoners of War in Łambinowice-Opole from left to right, Aram, Cuba Kubacki, Michal Jibacki, and my wife Ann Finan in front of the 3D model of Lamsdorf

Cuba’s July 24^th Facebook post mentioned the anomalies the metal detectorists had found near the British lager that they were getting ready to examine; the Wataha Group thought these pointed to the existence of perhaps two escape tunnels likely including the one from Hut 19B and another from Hut 20B. (Figure 18) They were excavating the anomaly they believe is from Hut 19B when we visited so we had an opportunity to see for ourselves what they’d exposed.

Figure 18. Map drawn from various POW diaries showing the probable location of escape tunnels emanating from Hut 19b and Hut 20B

A brief interjection. The prisoner barracks in the British lager lie in ruins. However, wartime aerial photographs survive showing their original layout. Using these photographs, the metal detectorists have outlined and mapped the former barracks. This is enabling them to narrow their search for the escape tunnels, most pertinently the one from Barrack 19B.

Let me quote from John Mellor’s book a section discussing the construction of the escape tunnel from Barrack 19B that Brian Cooper found:

“At the early meetings of the escape committee, various plans were discussed and in most cases discarded as being impractical. Sgt. Larry Palls [sic] of the Essex Scottish, who was of Dutch descent, belonged to an intelligence section of the Canadian Army. Initially, he was elected Chairman of the Escape Committee. Bill Lee was to be his assistant. Escape attempts were to be confined to people considered essential to the war effort who could also speak a foreign language, preferably German. Escape from the camp was a difficult accomplishment, but without an adequate knowledge of German, the escapee would most likely be picked up within 24 hours.

A red-headed sergeant named McMurray from the Royal Canadian Engineers was selected to engineer and build an escape tunnel. Under his direction, many men were approached to work on the construction or to dispose of the excavated soil. Other men were chosen as lookouts to be posted at all strategic points and to give advance warning of the approach of a guard.

Sgt. Lee’s hut, 19b, was chosen for the entrance to the tunnel because it was the nearest hut to the wire. Taking all precautions, a cunningly disguised trap-door was cut in the concrete floor under one of the bunks, and construction begun.

The shaft was sunk and tunneling commenced. Tools were non-existent. Improvised trowels, knives, even spoons were used to dig and hack the red soil, which was then packed into Red Cross boxes and handed to the disposal men. Under cover of darkness, the soil was mixed in with the earth in the vegetable patch, which, fortunately, was raised some 12 inches above the ground. The 40-holer latrine was another favourite dumping ground. Periodically, the human waste was carried away in a wagon drawn by two horses. Russian prisoners had been given the hideous job of cleaning out the latrine; they must have wondered at the large amounts of soil in the human waste—perhaps they thought it was due to the unwashed vegetables in the soup.

The shaft constructed by Sgt. McMurray sunk vertically nine feet beneath the bunk before the tunnel was begun in the direction of the wire, 100 feet away. The sandy soil provided a very treacherous support for the tunnel, so the leaders approached trustworthy men to sacrifice some of their bed-boards; Red Cross string was substituted for the boards. Teams of men worked day and night in rotating shifts. Many of the sappers digging in the tunnel had been hard-rock miners from Timmins; hour after hour they patiently clawed at the soil. Quite a few of them were French Canadians from the Gaspé Peninsula, hard-working men who worked under atrocious conditions without a murmur of complaint.

Light was provided by home-made lamps using pyjama-cord wicks soaked in margarine. The dense black fumes from the lamps soon filled the tunnel with choking carbon dioxide. Work was halted temporarily until some form of ventilation could be provided.

Besides Larry Palls [sic], the head of the escape committee, Bill Lee who would take the escapees through the tunnel, perhaps the most important man was the ‘Procurer’—Jimmy Maitland from Sarnia, Ontario. Larry Palls [sic] had chosen Jimmy for this special job because it required a great deal of nerve, ingenuity, and cheek. A supply of air required a pump and a pipe. Jimmy sat down and wrote ‘Pipe’ on a piece of paper. The tunnel would be approximately 100 feet long; therefore, opposite the word pipe, he wrote 100 feet. Taking a team of engineers, he marched them smartly over to the gate to the German sentry and waved the piece of paper under his nose. In the administrative compound, the Germans were erecting some new wooden huts. Eavestroughs on the roofs were connected to down-spouts, each 10 feet long. What better piping could be provided? In calm, detached fashion, Jimmy and the men proceeded to dismantle the downspouts. On the way back to the Canadian compound, he ordered ‘eyes right’ and gave the sentry a magnificent salute. The sentry blushed at this splendid example of military courtesy extended to a mere private soldier. With a rattle and a great flourish, he presented arms as the men marched proudly past carrying their booty.

A French Canadian named Robichard manufactured the bellows from an old groundsheet. A make-shift valve was fitted, then connected to the lengths of down-spouting; fresh, clean air flooded down the tunnel. Day after day for the next six months, Sapper Robichard would lie in a terribly confined space under the bunk and pump his bellows at a steady, monotonous rate. Such was his splendid contribution to the building of the escape tunnel.

The supply of bed-boards was running low as the tunnel grew in length. Again, Jimmy Maitland came to the rescue with his piece of paper and his ‘working party.’ By now, the sentries were becoming accustomed to the sight of Jimmy marching his men smartly through the gate. Der Canadian was a good soldier—very smart. This time Jimmy returned with a load of prime oak planks for the tunnel, which was then passing under the roadway and required a firm roof.” (Mellor, p. 108-110)

There is a lot to unpack in John Mellor’s account. I’ll touch on only a few details. As an aside, I note that part of the story reminds me of the famous 1963 movie starring Steve McQueen, “The Great Escape,” which was about a mass breakout of 76 Allied prisoners from the German POW camp Stalag Luft III on the night of March 24-25, 1944. I’m also reminded of the 1985 TV series “MacGyver,” where a resourceful secret agent uses his intellect, scientific knowledge, and improvisation to escape dangerous situations, often using everyday items, such as paper clips, much as the POWs constructing the escape tunnel at Lamsdorf were obviously compelled to do in manufacturing a pipe and bellows, etc.

Above, I alluded to rare photographs Cuba found posted on Facebook taken at Stalag VIIIB/344 including some taken during the construction of the escape tunnel from Barrack 19B. It was initially thought they might have been taken at Stalag Luft III in Żagań, the inspiration, as just mentioned, for the movie “The Great Escape.” However, Brian found a 1955 magazine article with the photos confirming they’d been taken at Stalag VIIIB/344 in Lamsdorf by Warrant Officer Kenneth Thomas Hyde of the Royal Canadian Air Force. (Figures 19a-e) Brian also tracked down Ken Hyde’s liberation questionnaire (i.e., UK National Archives WO 344) and a special questionnaire (i.e., UK National Archives WO 208) he completed, both of which place him at Stalag VIIIB/344 from 1942 until the end of 1944 or January 1945. (Figures 20a-b) Ken was never at Stalag Luft III in Żagań so obviously his photos were not taken there.

Figure 19a. Page 1 of 1955 newspaper article about Ken Hyde’s pictures taken at Stalag VIIIB/344

Figure 19b. Page 2 of 1955 newspaper article about Ken Hyde’s pictures taken at Stalag VIIIB/344

Figure 19c. Page 3 of 1955 newspaper article about Ken Hyde’s pictures taken at Stalag VIIIB/344

Figure 19d. Page 4 of 1955 newspaper article about Ken Hyde’s pictures taken at Stalag VIIIB/344

Figure 19e. Page 5 of 1955 newspaper article about Ken Hyde’s pictures taken at Stalag VIIIB/344

Figure 20a. Ken Hyde’s military questionnaire showing he was at Stalag VIIIB through 1944

Figure 20b. Ken Hyde’s military record showing he was at Stalag VIIIB from 1942-45

Additionally, Brian found two of Ken Hyde’s pictures in the book “In Enemy Hands: Canadian Prisoners of War 1939-45” by Daniel G. Dancocks, and another in John Mellor’s book “Forgotten Heroes: The Canadians at Dieppe,” providing further confirmation the pictures were taken at Stalag VIIIB/344.

On familysearch.org Brian found the following description about Ken:

“Kenneth was known as Ken. As a young man he gained skills in photography. He left home at the age of 17, later joined the Royal Canadian Air Force and was a navigator. His plane was shot down, and he became a German Prisoner of War during World War II and remained in captivity until the war ended in 1945. He took photos through the buttonhole of his coat, and later these were published. He donated proceeds received to the Red Cross, stating that without their help they should not have survived. He was head of the escape committee in the prison camp, escaped twice. He was able to build a radio and help forge passports for the prisoners. After his repatriation in England, he returned to Alberta and earned his living as a photographer. He was involved in aerial photography and mapping. Lived in Calgary.”

Not to diminish Ken Hyde’s service, but I would simply note it is well known that the head of the Escape Committee at Stalag VIIIB/344 was not Ken Hyde but the Canadian Sgt. Laurens Pals, as his surname is correctly spelled. Nonetheless, Hyde’s photos prove he played a pivotal role in the construction of the escape tunnel. See discussion below.

Let me discuss a few things about John Mellor’s account of the construction of the tunnel coming from Barrack 19B at Stalag VIIIB/344. As I also talked about in Post 163, Postscript, South African Lt. Col. Charles Telfer Howie escaped through this tunnel. As Howie’s daughter Claerwen Howie recounted in her book about her father, “Agent by Accident,” he suffered a lifetime of nightmares from the claustrophobic imaginings of being trapped in the tiny, dark escape passage.

John Mellor correctly identifies the head of the escape committee at Stalag VIIIB/344 as the Canadian “Sgt. Larry Palls,” who I discussed in Post 163, Postscript. He was captured during the Dieppe operation on the 19^th of August 1942 and incarcerated in Lamsdorf from the 1^st of September 1942 until the 6^th of March 1945.

Sgt. Pals himself escaped in May 1944 but returned to the camp of his own volition when the partisan at an address in Metz he’d been given warned him he was being watched by the Gestapo; knowing six future escapees were headed there, Pals returned to Stalag VIIIB/344 to ward them off. Upon his recapture, for this valorous act the Germans gave him 28 days solitary confinement.

Brian transcribed the lengthy report prepared by interrogation officers following Sgt. Pals’ liberation at the end of the Second World War from a place named Hohenfels. The source of the interrogation report is “UK Archives Catalogue Reference WO 208/3336/98.”

In his interrogation report, Pals remarks the following: “By that time [EDITOR’S NOTE: JULY 1943] I had an assistant, Pte. LICHENSTEIN, a native of DANZIG who had enlisted in the Palestinian Army and was a P/W at LAMSDORF.” Clearly referring to Heinz Löwenstein, while not surprised that Heinz had been part of the Escape Committee, I’d previously been unaware of this fact.

Regarding the construction of the escape tunnel, Pals provides more details: “It took about eight weeks to complete this tunnel, the length of which was about 60 ft. About six men did the actual digging, while about 15 assisted in watching and in the disposal of the dirt.”

Regarding Howie’s and Löwenstein’s escape from Stalag VIIIB/344 along with those of others, Pals writes the following:

“In Aug 43 a party of about 40 officers arrived at the Stalag from somewhere in ITALY. They were supposed to go to STRASSBURG. Amongst these were Lt-Col. HOWIE (South African) (SKP/4296) [EDITOR’S NOTE: HOWIE WAS CAPTURED DURING THE SIEGE OF TOBRUK IN LIBYA] He suggested that he wanted to make an escape and go to HUNGARY. He made contact with me through R.S.M SHERRIFF. Lt-Col. HOWIE was fitted out with the necessary papers, in company with a Jewish Pte. who spoke Hungarian – Pte. WEINSTEIN (Palestinian Army). They escaped through our tunnel about two days after the Lt. Col.’s arrival at the Stalag.

Lt-Col. HOWIE reached Budapest successfully and worked there with the Underground until the occupation of HUNGARY by the Germans. He was not captured but I do not know what happened to him. Pte. WEINSTEIN was captured during the occupation of HUNGARY and was returned to Stalag VIIIB in 44.

Several of the other officers who arrived with Lt-Col. HOWIE came to me and I instructed them how to escape. I also gave them samples of documents and rubber stamps. Capt. WILLIAMS (Brit) and Pte. SMITH (Brit) escaped two days later through the tunnel but were recaptured on the Swiss border and returned to the camp. Pte. SMITH, who belonged to SOE and whose name was a ‘nom de guerre’ was with us on the DIEPPE operation and it was felt necessary that he should return to the UK as soon as possible. He [Williams] made a successful escape later.

Six men had made escapes in one week and I considered it necessary to cement the tunnel up again. These six people had been missed by that time. To cover up the escapes through the tunnel I had arranged that holes were made in the barbed wire to make the Germans believe that the personnel had escaped through the wire. At the same time, I made arrangements for several ‘nuisance’ escapes from the different Working Parties.

In Oct 44 (sic, 43) we reopened the tunnel and six more people escaped. CSM McLEAN (FMR) (SDIC/CMF/EAST/SKP.4(a)) and Pte. LICHENSTEIN (Palestinian) (SKP/4574) [EDITOR’S NOTE: HEINZ LÖWENSTEIN] went to Budapest; Pte. DAGENAIS, G (FMR) and Pte. SPAH (Palestinian) went to FRANCE; CSM PARRY (Brit) and A.B. MASON (Royal Navy) escaped but were recaptured at the border with SWITZERLAND and eventually returned to the camp. CSM McLEAN and Pte. LICHENSTEIN were successful and as far as I know reached the UK eventually. [EDITOR’S NOTE: HEINZ LÖWENSTEIN WAS RECAPTURED IN SZIGETVÁR, HUNGARY WHEN THE GERMANS INVADED ON MARCH 19, 1944, AND NEVER MADE IT TO ENGLAND] Pte. SPAH and Pte DAGENAIS have not been heard of to date and as far as can be found out through Canadian Records, Pte. DAGENAIS from the FMR is still missing.

We again sealed up the tunnel after having made several holes in the barbed wire fence to cover up our actual means of escape.”

Pal’s description brings us to the work that the archaeologists in collaboration with the metal detectorists are now undertaking. As mentioned above, the day my wife and I visited, the Wataha Group was excavating one of the anomalies they believe was the escape tunnel from Barrack 19B. Astonishingly, later that same day they fully exposed the remains of the tunnel. Cuba sent us pictures of some of the artifacts they recovered and the rubble-filled tunnel. (Figures 21a-b; 22)

Figure 21a. Escape tunnel from Barrack 19B through which Heinz Löwenstein escaped, filled with rubble and rocks, discovered on the day my wife and I visited Łambinowice

Figure 21b. Another photo of the escape tunnel from Barrack 19B through which Heinz Löwenstein escaped, filled with rubble and rocks, discovered on the day my wife and I visited Łambinowice

Figure 22. One among hundreds of artifacts found at Łambinowice; this one reads “Stalag VIIIB”

In his interrogation report, Pals remarked the following: “In Nov. 43 the Germans walked directly to the entrance of the tunnel, which had been cemented over, in Barrack 19B and dug up the tunnel. It is unknown who gave away the information to the Germans.” Pals remarks the same thing happened in January 1944 to an escape tunnel coming from Barrack 22B which had been partially completed to a length of 40 ft. Collaborators were a constant worry. Pals notes the construction of yet a third tunnel: “In the spring of 44 we built another tunnel in Barrack 9B with the intention of making an organised mass break of about 12 men. On 17 May 1944 the tunnel was ready. I intended to go myself.”

A contemporary photo Brian found in John Mellor’s book shows the tunnel exit from Hut 19B after its discovery by German guards. (Figure 23) In the case of both escape tunnels, upon their discovery, the Germans demolished the escape tunnels and, according to Ken Hyde, had the POWs fill them back in with rubble, bricks, and rocks. This is what the Wataha Group exposed on the day we visited.

Figure 23. Figure from John Mellor’s book shows the tunnel exit from Hut 19B after its discovery by German guards

As a side note, in his Facebook post, Cuba remarked that the metal detectorists had identified two anomalies near the British lager. As shown in Figure 18, one is the tunnel coming from Barrack 19B, and the other is possibly from Barrack 20B. However, in his interrogation report Pals mentions the never completed tunnel from Barrack 22B and another completed one from Barrack 9B, so more sleuthing will be needed to find these.

In any case, standing in the very spot that my father’s first cousin had escaped Stalag VIIIB/344 through the tunnel from Barrack 19B was exhilarating, literally imagining where he experienced a life-changing event 82 years ago! (Figure 24)

Figure 24. Cuba and me standing alongside the “channel” that would later the same day be identified as the escape tunnel from Barrack 19B

As readers can appreciate, there are so many moving parts related to the escape of British Commonwealth POWs from Stalag VIIIB/344, most that transcend Heinz Löwenstein’s own escape. Inevitably, there will be inconsistencies between the various accounts due to, among other things, faulty POW memories, brutal living conditions, aliases and swapped identities, unknown names of fellow prisoners, a natural desire to portray oneself in a most favorable manner, etc.

Archaeological investigations provide an opportunity to answer some unanswered questions, such as the length of the escape tunnel. For example, Mellor writes the tunnel was 100 feet long, Pals’ interrogation report says it was 60 feet long, and Claerwen Howie’s map claims it was 44 meters (~144 feet). Excavations can reveal the actual length and depth of the tunnel. The various POW diaries and post-WWII interrogation reports tell us something about the construction of the tunnel and the number of men involved but there will always be some discrepancies, something archaeological studies won’t necessarily answer.

In terms of other things, we can only surmise based on the preponderance of evidence, for example, the approximate date of Heinz’s fourth escape from Stalag VIIIB/344. His Personalkarte implies he may have escaped in mid-September 1943; Pals’ interrogation report says he escaped in October; and Claewen Howie claims he escaped in December 1943. The ICRC inspection report placed Heinz in Szigetvár on November 8, 1943, so Heinz probably escaped in October 1943, perhaps late September.

Let me conclude this very lengthy and involved post with a few remarks. It’s likely given the various and divergent accounts from which I’ve drawn information that I’ll revisit and update this post. Brian’s research continues to uncover additional POW biographies which may change the narrative. In addition, Brian has been accessing and reading the interrogation reports for the multiple POWs identified by Sgt. Laurens Pals as having escaped to Hungary using the tunnel leading from Barrack 19B. In combination with the ongoing archaeological work this is likely to yield some unexpected surprises that may compel an update to this publication.

REFERENCES

Borrie, John. Despite Captivity: A Doctor’s Life as Prisoner of War. Whitecoulls, 1975.

Dancocks, Daniel G. In Enemy Hands: Canadian Prisoners of War, 1939-45. Hurtig, 1983.

Howie, Claerwen. Agent by Accident. Lindlife Publishers CC, 1997.

Mellor, John. Forgotten Heroes: The Canadians at Dieppe. Methuen, 1975.

Rofe, Cyril. Against the Wind. 1st ed., Hodder & Stoughton, 1956.