May 8, 1945
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310.159.1-4.2017 Transcription
V-E DAY
My Most Precious Being,
Europes war is over! The
emotions in my heart (& the hearts of every
116th Evac[1]er & 127th Evacer) just are more
tumultous than millions of others BECAUSE
Emily, we are sweating, stinking,
“existing” in The-Hell-On-Earth-DACHAU!
[Let every word of Jan or Dec Readers Digest bore-
through the middle of your guts—AND MULTIPLY
it 100 fold][2]. Dearest, the atrocity reports
are true—and more! For over 8 days
Ive seen-lived-smelled-“existed” it as
one of 78 doctors to try correct the medical-
horror-component of The-Hell-On-Earth.
Bodies starved to 50 pound men pilled like
rotting cord-word! Huge gas chambers
built like shower rooms (as a ruse)!
Hangmans scaffolds! Cremating ovens
for dead-dying-or still conscious skin-&-
bone wrecks of humanity! Stepping high
as you walk to work over dead bodies
in the street—Storm Troopers (The S.S.),
riot prisoners, & man-eating doberman
pincer dogs—all rotting!
[2]
We roared through the gates of Dachau
figurative “minutes” after its liberation—
while 40,000+ wrecks-of-humanity milled,
tore, looted, screamed, cried as/like
depraved beasts which the Nazi SS has
made them. In those early “minutes”
I saw captured S.S. tortured against
a wall & then shot in what you Americans
would call “cold-blood”—but Emily!
God forgive me if I say I say saw it
done s̅[3] a single disturbed emotion
BECAUSE THEY SO “HAD-IT-COMING,”
after what I had just seen, & what every
minute more I have been seeing of
the SS-Beasts actions.
Why! the horror is so unbelievable
that they flew Congressmen to see it
the day we came. That famous W. DC
woman correspondent (“Life” mag.) ate c̅[4] us this
noon to see it. Ambassador Caffery (to France)
saw it today. Eisenhower is expected any
minute. All Europe’s biggest Cabinet,
Ambassadors, news-reelers, etc have been
or are here to MAKE SEEING↔BELIEVING.
Look for me in a news reel.[5]
AND!—to think this is only
“The Queen Bee” camp—others are worse
[3]
though much smaller & it is here the “policies”
were worked out for other lesser camps.
Infact, this Dachau is The-“Home” of SS
Bestiality—Himmler’s[6] “laboratory” &
hang-out.
Being “The Home” of SS it is not only
structurally the equivalent of a city of 50,000
but it is the warehouse/supply point
for hundreds of thousands more SS troopers.
Thus, I (yes I!) c̅ the others have
“liberated” (call it looted if you will) warehouses
for 3 intensive days & 5 less intensive
days. Dear, I just cant even start to
touch upon all that it stored here after
years of Nazi looting the Continentent [sic]
of Europe. let me describe it as thus:—
if I turned you loose in the Chicago
downtown loop of 5 square miles you
would find every item there AND HERE.
Maybe I’m raised “different” but Im
still not a “good” looter. However I have
hundreds of smallish items that are of
practical value. You migh[t] think some to
be junk but by & large its worthwhile.
[4]
We regret only that we each dont have
one freight car apiece to go to the USA
in—ITS PHENOMENAL/STUPEDOUS!
Ill only mention a few:— a fine deer
rifle, twin sweaters for you & I; silk
smock for your house-“hasty” work;
bea[u]tiful & expensive punching bag; I
passed over most of the beautiful Dresden
ware; Anesthesiology equipment; fine
optical lens equipment (I “missed” the best);
swords-tools-machinests apparatus;
fountain pens; lotions; Swastika & SS
banners to decorate our Rumpus Room; etc
etc. Yet, darlin’, I still [by comparison][7]
am a very “poor” looter {at least in actuality[8] ∙ BUT,
hold-your-breath on this—I hope,
I hope, I hope, my “leads” for about an
$800 F2 (lens) camera materializes.
Hundreds of Zeis “Ikon,” “Robot,” Leica, etc
(all ($300 to $800) have been “liberated” by
the 116th, but as yet I havent “hit it”
quite right. My prospects are very good
so keep your breath held really tight!
Which leads to one point too lengthy
to put on paper & every word is only a
[Missing pages.]
[1] Evacuation Hospital.
[2] Bracketed text is part of original.
[3] Medical abbreviation meaning “without.”
[4] Medical abbreviation meaning “with.”
[5] In fact, his daughter Clarice did see him on such a news reel years later, in the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.
[6] Heinrich Himmler, the Reich Leader of the SS.
[7] Bracketed text is part of original.
[8] In original, “at least” is written above “in actuality.”