German Prisoners of War: Rommel’s Dessert Foxes in the Georgia Wiregrass

The voyage to the unknown

As in the War between the States, during World War II Americans again were faced to deal with large numbers of prisoners of war; only this time the POWs were foreigners. Initially the military grossly underestimated the number of POWs they would have to accommodate. The British government asked the United States as early as 1942 to take over some of the Axis prisoners of war because England was no longer able to maintain the vast numbers of prisoners. Their prison camps were filled to the absolute maximum, and the ongoing war made it difficult to obtain the necessities of life to support the islanders; the enemy prisoners became a liability. Originally, the American government was unwilling to accept Britain's prisoners of war. The United States military did not posses the necessary infrastructure to house and care for POWs. More important however, was the fear that enemy prisoners would sabotage war-related installations in the United States. Despite these concerns, and after several months of negotiations, Washington agreed to accept German prisoners from the British in two shipments. The first shipment brought 50,000 POWs to the United States. A second shipment of 100,000 POWs was agreed on for a later time preceding a four-week advance notification.

When American troops entered the war against Germany, fighting General Erwin Rommel's elite German troops in Africa, they captured their own Axis prisoners. In April of 1943 alone, Allied Forces in Africa captured 10,500 German soldiers. The number of captured prisoners in Tunisia was so large, lines of prisoners just walked into the makeshift collection camps with minimal guarding by American soldiers. They did not resist because the German and Italian supply lines to Africa had been cut off by the British and the Americans weeks ago, this caused the Axis troops to run out of ammunition, food and gasoline. They fought to the last bullet; now all that was left was surrender. An Italian officer gave a good description of how the men felt at their surrender:

"I had seventy-eight men of my unit with me, no more ammunition, and four trucks without a drop of gas. I had imagined surrender as a highly dramatic scene, but nothing of the kind. Everything was all so plain and common that, emotionally, I felt very let down."

Upon their capture many prisoners were used by American soldiers as walking souvenir stores, except they were not paid for the items the American soldiers took freely. Once interned, men whom the American Army regarded as not having any special skill or value to the army in the war guarded them. They were used as "custodians", never seeing actual fighting and of course deprived of the glory that came with it and deprived of obtaining war loot. One way of obtaining WWII memorabilia was to steal it from the prisoners. German soldiers were often searched several times by American guards before they reached their destination camp. Often the thieves did not stop at medals, jewelry and valuables; they stole personal documents such as a soldier's "Soldbuch", which was not only a German soldiers identification, it also provided information about his rank and units he had fought in. In many cases this became a problem for the prisoner later, when he was unable to prove what his rank was when they were forced to labor for the American Government.

After their capture the prisoners went through a registration process where they were assigned identification numbers and put in holding camps until transportation to the United States could be arranged. The assigned numbers consisted of several components, but differed depending on the location where they were assigned. It was sometimes necessary to move the prisoners out quickly because a homebound vessel became available. If the identification number was assigned outside the United States, the first two numbers represented the place of capture and the letter following the numbers indicated the country the soldier was fighting for at the time of his capture. The numbers following the letter were individual consecutive numbers. Registration was not an easy process due to the language barrier. Americans who were able to speak German were sent to the European War Theater to work with American intelligence units; most of the German prisoners did not speak English at all. The few Germans who did speak English were used as interpreters at several locations; they traveled from camp to camp within a certain area.

Before their capture most German soldiers were used to the deprivations of the most basic things of life, such as adequate food, or just a simple bath. The situation did not improve after their capture until they were on route to America. The war-ridden countries of Europe were in shambles, agriculture almost nonexistent; food was so scarce American forces had to import all the food supplies for their soldiers and additionally for some for civilians. Feeding captured prisoners was not a priority, especially after seeing the horrors of the concentration camps. It was not rare that the captured Axis soldiers in Europe went without food for several days. This changed dramatically once the prisoners were embarked and on their way to the United States. The food situation on route to the United States became one of great surprise to them. For the first time in months they had so much food, they were unable to eat everything. Fearing this situation was not going to last, the POWs stuffed their pockets for hard times to come.

The voyage to America took twenty-four days by cargo ship. The ships brought the prisoners either to Port Shanks, New York or to Norfolk, Virginia. Upon their arrival in America, the prisoners went through a delousing process before they were transported to their destination camps. The long train rides to their destination state provided more surprises for the POWs. The beauty of the country, the many cars and trucks and the nicely dressed people amazed them. Once the POWs arrived in the State of their destination, they were channeled to collection camps, from there to holding camps, and eventually to their permanent camps. They were placed in camps that were bigger then some of the villages the POWs came from; they held several thousand prisoners. This turned out to be impractical when work programs were started. They were too far away from where they were needed. This led to the distribution of the POWs to smaller camps holding anywhere from one hundred to two or three thousand prisoners.

Prison camps were located all over the country, with a 2/3 majority in the southern states. When the war ended there were 511 branch camps and 155 base camps in the United States. The preferred place of camp locations was in the South and the Southwest because of the weather and the need for farm related workers. In Alabama, they were sent to camps such as Aliceville and Camp Opelika. And uncountable temporary work units.

First feared by the American people, the German POWs soon became an important, reliable labor source. The Joint Staff Planners assumed that the prisoners of war were mostly unskilled. Why they thought this is not clear, but based on this assumption it was decided, in order to employ the POWs, it would be necessary to establish the camps in locations where unskilled labor was in demand. The South had little war industry, which eliminated the fear of sabotage to a great extent. It also offered large, isolated agricultural areas, with a heavy demand for farm labor. Keeping POWs in isolated areas played a role in the few escape attempts. Locating the camps in the south made good sense for several reasons. One was the mild climate. This made building housing for them inexpensive and the buildings could be finished fast. The buildings were made from two-by-four beams covered with tarpaper for walls, tin roofs, and raised off the ground. Tarpaper barracks were considered adequate quarters for the unwanted guests in the hot climate of the south and the southwest. According to the Geneva Convention, housing for prisoners of war had to be close to the same quality as the hosting countries Army barracks.

In Georgia the prisoners were distributed from Fort Benning near Columbus to various smaller units all over Georgia. Spence Field near Moultrie, Camp Wheeler near Macon, Moody in Valdosta, Fargo in the middle of the Qkeefenokee swamp, Axson, Bainbridge, Tifton, Ashburn, Brunswick, Dublin, Savannah, Thomasville, and many more...all were side camps of Fort Benning.