My grandfather...

[Klaus]

...served in the DAK (Deutsches Afrika Korps). He spent 3 months in Africa, driving food to the soldiers at the front. Unfortunatly with his last visit to the front he was captured by the british. Altough captured by british soldiers he spent the rest of the war in the United States in Roswell. He was treated very well by the Americans. They only had to pick cotton or pluck tomatoes. In my grandfathers case it was plucking tomatoes. To this day my grandfather Ferdinand Franz Falger hates tomatoes. He realy hates them.

I still got his book "Englisch für den deutschen Kriegsgefangenen" (English for the german POW).

regards,

Klaus

[Tom Houlihan]

Interesting! I don't suppose he ever wrote down any of his experiences? A journal perhaps?

[Klaus]

No he didn´t. He kept a diary but he left it in America by accident when he got back home. He doesn´t even talk about it very much. I have been to Roswell when I visited the States. I even found the place where the camp was. My grandfathers discriptions were very accurate. There is nothing left of it of course.

regards,

Klaus

[slayer]

You know what is interesting about the whole point of this forum is that here everyone can talk on what happened to them or what happened to their relative or in your case your grandfather...(no insulted or bad manners intended).....I sometimes wish that there were any members of my family who I wish they were in WW2....so they can talk about it....I mean its a honor to fight for your country.......I am sure your grandfather must have thought the sme thing.........May I ask why does he hates the tomatoes just because he worked on a tomato farm?......Adil

[Klaus]

Why he hates tomatoes? My guess is, that he is fed up seeing them.
He never mentioned it when he was younger (according to my father)
But you know how it is with grandparents. The older they get, the better they remember the past.

I asked him once if he is proud to have served. He answered that he was back then. And still is a little. At least that he served in General Feldmarschall Rommels Army.

ragards,

Klaus

[Jim O]

I'm sure his "love" of tomatoes is related to picking them all day. And yes, that was probably better than picking cotton. Our summers here in the southern US can be fairly steamy, so I'm sure it was tough work.

Was that Roswell, Georgia? In the US we have this annoying habit of having cities/locales with the same name in several states.

On a side note, my father was in the US Army Air Corps from 1941-1946. Most of the time he was stationed in various bases in Florida. He encountered Japanese POW's who performed basic maintenance tasks at the bases. He said that they had wide brimmed hats for sun protection. Allegedly this was in accorance with the Geneva Conventions, and the hats were better than what the GI's had. He also said that the POW's were paid a menial sum for their efforts, also in accordance with the Geneva Conventions, but in the case of the Japanese soldiers it was far better than what they were paid by the Japanese government. He said many of them went home with a fair bit of money.

[slayer]

Hi Klaus........Well, anyone who works that long on anything is bound to get bored and hates that stuff........I do when I work........it gets so boring.........but what Jim said about the Japanese POW's is something i am hearing for the first time.

[Klaus]

If memory serves me right it was in Arizona. Where the U.F.O went down? Is it in Arizona?

Boring work is why I am here.

Schöne Grüsse,

Klaus

[Jim O]

Originally Posted by Klaus

If memory serves me right it was in Arizona. Where the U.F.O went down? Is it in Arizona?

Boring work is why I am here.

Schöne Grüsse,

Klaus

That's Roswell, New Mexico I think.

BTW, According to MapQuest, there are Roswells in Georgia, New Mexico, Ohio, South Dakota, Alabama, Colorado, Idaho, and Texas. So I wasn't kidding.

[Wurzburg]

The Roswell camp was in texas.

I used to collect letter from the German POW's.

I had a few from their.

I think i still have some from some camp.