Can you find the tall, blond, American officer?

By   L. Martin Jones

1329 Kasold Dr., M-1

Lawrence, Kansas 66049

At 5:30 in the morning on Saturday, Dec. 16, 1944, I was rudely awakened in Born, Belgium, by the sound of heavy artillery fire several miles to the east along Belgium’s border with Germany. The WWII Battle of the Bulge had started with a massive German artillery barrage along a front of 65 miles.

I was a platoon leader in Company G, 423rd Regiment, 106th Infantry Division. Because my platoon was in reserve, my men and I were assigned to homes in the village of Born. I had a very cold second-floor bedroom in the home of the Theissen family where twenty-six year old Johanna, her brothers Charles and Bernard, and their mother shared their home with American soldiers. The family had diverted water from a nearby stream to provide power for the operation of a sawmill in their basement. In November, 1944, the family had turned over operation of the sawmill to a US Engineering unit that was stockpiling timbers for use in bridging streams when the Allied advance into Germany resumed.

When the surprise attack began on the over-extended front line positions of the 106th and 28th Infantry Divisions in the Schnee Eifel (Snow Mountains), I assembled my men and moved by truck to the front lines near Auw, Germany. Several days later, after being surrounded for three days without food, water, ammunition, or medical supplies, the remaining men of two regiments of the 106th Division were ordered to surrender. Along with almost 7,000 other American soldiers, I became a prisoner of war. We walked in freezing temperatures along snow-covered roads for two days before being locked in railroad boxcars for a week and transported to prison camps in Germany.

The Theissen family was known to be anti-Nazi. On May 10, 1940, the day Germany invaded Belgium, Johanna’s newly-married sister, Gertrude, was shot and killed by a German sniper when she went to the railroad station to board a train for Brussels, where her husband was a policeman. Johanna, Charles, and their mother were on a list of Belgium civilians scheduled to be sent to concentration camps in Poland. During the 52 month German occupation of Belgium, Charles was forced to join the German army, from which he deserted. On many occasions, Charles hid in the woods to avoid being captured by German soldiers. Johanna often took food to him. Because the family had turned their sawmill over to the US Army, Johanna and her brothers knew they would likely be killed if they were captured by German troops.

Abandoning their home when the Battle of the Bulge started, Johanna’s mother stayed with relatives while Johanna and her brothers jumped on their bicycles and fled west along dangerously-slick roads. They managed to stay barely ahead of the rampaging German tank and infantry columns.

After riding the pushing their bicycles for more than 50 miles in a week, Johanna, Charles, and Bernard crawled on the ground under fire from German and US tanks near Dinant to reach American lines. Because Germany had caused great confusion among American troops by infiltrating American lines with Germans who spoke English fluently, American soldiers were suspicious of all "strangers." After what Johanna described as a "nasty interrogation", the troops were about to throw Johanna and her brothers back into no man’s land between American and German tanks. Suddenly the tall US engineer officer whose men had operated the Theissen sawmill in November "appeared like an angel". He vouched for Johanna and her brothers, who were sent to Brussels where they received care from the Red Cross on December 24.

In 1988, 44 years after these life-threatening incidents took place, Johanna asked me, "Can you find the tall, blond, American officer who saved my life and my brothers’ lives?" Over the years, she had forgotten his name, but she desperately want to contact him and "give him a thousand thanks" for savings their lives.

The fact that I was seeking a "tall, blond American officer" was not much on which to start my search. However, I knew that he and his men had operated the Theissen sawmill. My brother placed a notice in the VFW Magazine: "Need to contact US engineer officer who operated Theissen sawmill in Born, Belgium, in November, 1944."

Several weeks later, I received a letter from E.D. "Dan" Weppner of Greeley, Colorado. He had been a member of a combat engineer platoon that operated sawmills in the villages of Born and Montenau. He told me his platoon leader was 1st Lt. Archibald Taylor, who was rather tall. His last contact with Taylor had been more than ten years earlier when Taylor was a postmaster someplace in North Carolina.

The postmaster of Lawrence, Kansas, gave me addresses of seven postal service administrative offices in North Carolina, but the five administrators who responded knew nothing about Taylor. However, one suggested that I write to the Office of the Postal Service Historian in Washington, DC. Several days after I wrote, Mike Lilly called to tell me that Archibald Taylor had retired ten years earlier as postmaster in Oxford, North Carolina. Though his information was 10 years old, Lilly gave me Taylor’s address and phone number at the time he retired.

I called the telephone number and visited with Elizabeth, Arch’s wife. Because Arch, as prefers to be called, has some hearing loss, he does not speak often on the telephone. Elizabeth said Arch had been a platoon leader with the 291st Eng. Combat Bn in WWII, and indeed, he and his men had operated the Theissen sawmill. I had found the tall, blond, American officer who, by identifying Johanna and her borthers in 1944 and making certain they were sent to the Red Cross in Brussels, had saved their lives.

A short time after I located Arch and Elizabeth Taylor, my wife and I had a rewarding visit with them in their home. Several years later, when Elizabeth and Arch made a trip to Europe, they met Johanna in Brussels.

I felt great satisfaction in putting Johanna and Arch in contact with one another and knowing that a courageous lady gave heartfelt thanks to a true American hero for saving her life and her brothers’ lives in that cold and bitter December of 1944.

A Prison Vow Fulfilled

By Bill Baugh

Editor, NamPOW Free Press

It all began in a North Vietnam POW camp we called the Annex. I was living in room six with eight other, (as the V. called us), "Criminals."

It was during the Christmas season of 1968 and for some unknown reason the V played an album by Frank Sinatra over the camp PA system. Mind you the camp PA system was normally used to pipe their propaganda into our rooms. They had never before played American music, nor did I ever hear such music again after that holiday season.

In Frank’s album he would sing a song then do a short monologue. One of the songs, (I don’t know the title), went something like: "The house I live in, the people that I meet, the butcher and the baker...and the people on the street, etc, etc,....then it ended with, "The tree that’s been a growing for about a hundred years, that’s America to me."

Then in his monologue Frank made the statement that he would rather be a ditch digger in America than a big shot behind the iron or bamboo curtain. Well let me tell you...that was a tremendous morale booster to me and all my roommates, we were all smiles and cheering out loud. We could not figure out why they would play something as patriotic and powerful as that for us.

At that very moment I vowed that if I ever got out of this prison alive I would personally thank Frank for that Christmas gift. A gift that he wasn’t aware of. A gift we had received in a foreign dingy, smelly, dirty prison cell half way around the world. For years I would meditate and invent various scenarios on how I could fulfill my vow. I practiced and played the event over hundreds of times.....I was determined to make this pledge come true!

Well a little over four years later the war finally ends. We are released in Feb & Mar 1973. We are free. Soon after release President Nixon invites us all to Washington DC as his guest for a great weekend, ending with a visit to the White House and a gala banquet. At the banquet every table had a celebrity as the table host. Vic Damone hosted our table and he brought along his friend Bill Fugazy. Mr. Fugazy was an owner of Diners Club credit card. He also owned a large Limo service in Chicago & New York City. We had a great evening and exchanged names and addresses.

Around late July, while I was attending Air War College at Maxwell AFB, Montgomery, AL., I received an invitation to be Mr. Fugazy’s guest at the All-American Collegiate Golf Dinner being held at the Waldorf Astoria in NY City. The dinner was to acknowledge that year’s College All-American golfers. Bill Fugazy just happened to be the general chairman/MC at the dinner. Another interesting coincidence was...the evening’s guest of honor was Frank Sinatra. Bill thought it would be a nice touch to have a couple Vietnam POWs present Frank with a traditional honorary All American Blazer.

Well, in all my years of fantasizing, I had never planned a more perfect way to fulfill my vow...I mean an All American golf dinner at the Waldorf Astoria.... come on no one would have dreamt that up. Now I just had to convince Mr. Fugazy to let me say a few words before I presented Frank with his coat.

I waited until just before the banquet and talked with him. I explained in detail the whole story. I told him of my prison vow, how I had practiced this moment over and over again for all those years. I gave him a basic idea of what I wanted to say, how tonight a long time dream of mine could come true and that I promised not to embarrass him or Frank. He thought for a while, looked at me, then said...."Go for it!"

When the time came to present Frank with his coat, I walked to the podium, all decked out in my formal AF Mess Dress, with Frank’s jacket draped over my arm. I took the microphone and said: "Mr Sinatra, before I present you with this coat I must tell you about a vow that I made years ago in a prison cell in Vietnam." I then told my story. When I finished, I walked over to Frank. He stood up, I helped put his coat on, we shook hands and before he went to the podium to say a few words, he had to set back down and compose himself.

He was physically moved and yes...there was a tear in those Old Blue Eyes.

My prison vow was fulfilled.

Those who become POWs

Max Lockwood

PO Box 688

Douglas, GA 31534

Us441edc@alltel.net

My father waited for his four sons to come home from the war. Edwin Brown worked among the falling bombs dropped from the Japanese planes as they bombed Pearl Harbor. As an army Combat Engineer, he embraced the invasion of all the Pacific Islands, which had been taken by the Japanese and he helped to free the people on their Islands and made them safe again. His last years were filled with the terror of those days as he continued to pay the price of freedom. His death came years later, but he never regained his freedom from hurt and pain.

Tarrer Lockwood spent his war years in Europe and came home a broken man. Joe Lockwood was a victim of the European Theater and died earlier this year after years in a nursing home in Atlanta. The President of the United States, George W. Bush, sent him a certificate of appreciation, which came from the White House, for his services. Max was fortunate. He survived the Nazi POW camp and by the grace of God continues to live a challenging and useful life.

Those Americans and others who do not understand our need to use our resources to destroy the forces of Saddam really have no understanding of the terror his evil forces impact on the millions who live under his control. Unless all nations live together to rid the world of his ilk, we risk the loss of all that which is important in the living of our lives.

In the POW camp where I lived, there were more than ten thousand POWs. Each one trusted in his country to fight until they were free from the terror and hurt of those days. In one section of our camp there were African American pilots who had protected us as we flew to and from our bombing targets deep into Nazi Germany, including Berlin.

During my captivity, I walked across most of Germany from Austria to the Baltic Sea and I witnessed the horror which resulted from the bombs I had helped drop on the German cities. Many thousands had died as a result, and the horror of those days remains with me after all these years. Almost every night the sound and fear return to my consciousness. In the first weeks of captivity, the German soldiers guarded and protected us from certain death by the German civilians as they watched us walk amid the ruins of their cities and towns.

Once in Berlin, they almost succeeded in taking us from these soldiers who were charged with transporting us to the POW camps. All ten members of my crew were POWs and all ten were freed and nine of us are alive today. My pilot, Dan Joba, who lives in Michigan, still stays in touch with me.

During these sad days in the prison, where we had almost no food, we were fed by parcels furnished by the International Red Cross. Had the Red Cross not been there, we could not have survived.

During one period, we were forced to dig trenches throughout the camp. We were told they were to protect us from Allied attacks. Later we learned that Hitler had issued orders to shoot all of us as we stood along the trenches and Allied troops neared our camp. We also learned that the Air Force commander, Herman Goring, had stopped this order by Hitler and saved our lives.

We awakened one morning in early May 1945 and became conscious of a strange quietness in the camp. We looked outside and realized that the guard towers were empty and the German guards were gone. Hours later, the camp was filled by Russian soldiers. We had been freed by war allies from Soviet Russia and they all became heroes to us all. We could not understand them, but we understood and cherished the meaning of their presence.

Even during the long years of the Cold War, I still held this feeling of appreciation deep within my soul. We must continue to stand up for our country, here in the fifty states and anywhere else in the whole wide world. In all the world, only America stands for freedom from oppression for all people of all facets. God bless America and all that we mean to all the people of the world.

As age takes its toll, ex-POW chapter disbands

By Mike Johnson

Copyright 2003 Journal Sentinel Inc., reproduced with permission

Mildred Beltmann opens a scrapbook and points to the snapshots. "He’s gone. He’s gone. . . . He’s still with us," says the 81-year-old Beltmann, ticking off the names of the members of the Clarence Beltmann Chapter of American Ex-POWs.

They survived the Battle of the Bulge and the Bataan Death March and endured harsh conditions - near-starvation and disease - in German and Japanese prisoner-of-war camps.

But now the chapter has lost a battle.

The blitzkrieg of age has taken its toll, and no amount of courage can stop it. With too many ex-POWs having died or become too frail, the chapter decided to disband.

What’s happening isn’t new, of course. The Department of Veterans Affairs projects 655,000 deaths in America’s population of veterans in fiscal year 2003 - roughly 1,800 veterans per day, said Steve Thomas, American Legion spokesman. Of that figure, the department projects 392,000 World War II veterans will pass away, a rate of about 1,100 per day.

For the Beltmann ex-POW chapter, it means the days of marching in July Fourth or other parades have ended. No more picking up the trash on three miles of highway it adopted in Fond du Lac County. And the last $50 and $100 U.S. savings bonds have been handed out as prizes in the chapter’s annual essay contest.

"We could see the handwriting on the wall that we could just not function," says Mildred Beltmann of the decision to disband the chapter named in memory of her husband, who founded it. "I got all choked up," said Beltmann, herself a WWII veteran.

For chapter member Paul Fergot, 80, of Oshkosh, "It would have been harder, except we could see it coming. We’re down to eight or 10 who are physically able to go to the meetings. One guy’s without a leg. There’s one with a walker and one with a wheelchair."

One of the chapter’s most widely known members, the Rev. Ernest Norquist, a retired Presbyterian minister who survived the Bataan Death March, is in a nursing home. He is the father of Milwaukee Mayor John O. Norquist.

In its heyday, the Clarence Beltmann Chapter - first called the American Ex-POW North Kettle Moraine Chapter when Beltmann organized it in 1985 - had about 40 members, including wives.

Fergot said he never gave much thought to joining veterans organizations. "You just went about carrying on your life," he said.

But in 1985, he met Clarence Beltmann, who was organizing the ex-POW chapter in West Bend. Fergot decided to join and signed on his wife, Loa, 79, too. Fergot was a prisoner of war from Dec. 15, 1944, to May 1, 1945. A second lieutenant in the Air Force, he was a navigator on a B-24 bomber that was shot down in Italy.

For a couple of months, Fergot and the plane’s co-pilot evaded capture, living with an Italian family and later in haylofts. But then they decided to surrender to German soldiers.

"The Italian family told us the best thing for us to do was to be a prisoner of the Germans, otherwise the Fascists would kill us," he said.

Beltmann, who died nine years ago, was with the U.S. Army’s 9th Armored Division fighting near Luxembourg. He was captured after a fierce night of fighting during the Battle of the Bulge.

He kept a journal recounting how he was captured and his life as a POW from Dec. 18, 1944, to May 4, 1945. He wrote about how the "German war machine outnumbered us 20 to 1" on Dec. 17, 1944. His unit was surrounded, and it retreated to a nearby house where troops spent the night in "some thrilling combat."

"In the early hours of the 18th, an explosion from a German bazooka hurled our small group to the floor and flung a few others to the opposite wall," he wrote, saying he dislocated a knee and wrenched his back.

Down to four men, they surrendered when a group of Germans entered the house. Later, they would be crammed with other prisoners into train boxcars to be transported to a stalag. "The only way they could get moisture was to scrape the frost off the sides of the box car," Mildred Beltmann said.

As a prisoner, Clarence Beltmann wrote: "We barely existed as food was really scarce."

Mildred Beltmann has dozens of mementos collected by her husband, including a leather belt that has many buttons from soldiers’ clothing stitched to it. Since he didn’t smoke, he often traded cigarettes for a button from other POWs from the United States and other countries.

Beltmann said she plans to donate some of the mementos and the chapter’s scrapbook to a veterans museum in Madison.

Although the chapter will no longer exist, Fergot and Beltmann said some members still plan to get together from time to time. "As a chapter, it’s ended. But we’re family," Fergot said. "We all are very close to each other."

Two Days to Remember

By Diana Thomasian

300 Continental Avenue

River Edge, NJ 07661

When Karnig Thomasian of River Edge, NJ, was asked by S/Sgt. James Wunderler, stationed at McGuire AFB, NJ to speak of his experiences to the 605th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron, he accepted with great pleasure. I said, "It was at once one of the most humbling yet proudest moments of our lives. To be honored, respected, and escorted throughout the base reaffirmed to us that the training, diligence, and alertness of our Air Force is top notch, and worthy of our trust in the defense of our country."

When Karnig and I arrived on Tuesday, Jan. 7th, at McGuire AFB, we showed our ID at the base and were directed to our lodgings. S/Sgt. Wunderler ushered us into a beautiful immaculate suite complete with everything one could wish. That evening we were introduced to the 605th Squadron Commander, Lt. Col. Richard Vrogindewey. Karnig’s first lecture was at 0700 Wednesday, Jan. 8th; his second one at 1500. Needless to say, we needed some shut-eye.

To our amazement, we awakened at 0500 before the alarm clock, and were eating at the Dining Facilities at 0600. The S/Sgt. drove us to the auditorium. We were there at 0700. The Squadron stood at attention as we were escorted in. After some military orders of the day, we were introduced, and Karnig stated his speech. He had large boards of photos with him of Rangoon, Burma and the Jail in which he was imprisoned. After a standing ovation, a Q&A period followed. I had the privilege of offering my part on behalf of the women who also served during WWII as military volunteers, bread winners, coping with dreadful news, and all the unpleasantness of war. This all was repeated at 1500. Karnig was presented a large, colorful plaque, which was designed by M/Sgt. Charles Morris. We were also presented with a beautiful gift from the 605th AMXS through the efforts of the Booster Club’s President, the same, S/Sgt Wunderler for our fiftieth anniversary. (Somehow the personnel found out).

Among the highlights of the two days was the privilege to see the KC-10A in her hangar, the gigantic, colossal, mid-air refueling aircraft. The KC-10A not only is capable of refueling other aircraft 30,000 feet in the air, but it also carries troops and cargo in direct support of Operation Enduring Freedom. It can transfer fuel to another aircraft flying at 450 miles per hour. Top speed is 619 miles per hour. The dedication and commitment in maintaining the KC-10A and the stamina and courage to fly such an aircraft cannot be denied.

As Karnig and I left McGuire AFB, we realized we had made many new, vibrant, young friends. Two, energetic, bright women, 2nd Lt. Leslie Weiterhausen and Airman Tiffany Huckoby were my companions. To the 605th AMXS…we thank you and salute you.