by John Shearer
posted August 29, 2008
) Photo by Wes Schultz Marker inscribed in German |
However, a closer inspection reveals that the writing on this marker is in German.
The memorial had been erected in 1935 by the German government to honor the 78 Germans who died as prisoners of war under the authority of the United States during World War I.
Some 105 Germans who died in POW camps during World War II are also buried in the cemetery.
As Chattanooga makes way for the planned Volkswagen Inc. plant at the Enterprise South industrial park, the city’s past connections to Germany have come to light more.
With the German POWs, little detail seems to have been documented about them in newspaper articles over the years.
What is known is that 22 of the 78 World War I POWs were German sailors who had initially been interred in Hot Springs, N.C., and were re-interred in National Cemetery in early February 1933 with Dr. T.S. McCallie, city chaplain, officiating.
Many of the other prisoners from World War I likely came from Fort Oglethorpe, and some may have died from the horrific influenza outbreak that struck about that time.
An article on World War I POWs at Fort Oglethorpe by Dr. Smith Murray found in the most recent Chattanooga Regional Historical Journal said that POW camps were also located at Fort McPherson near Atlanta and Fort Douglas, Utah.
However, Fort Oglethorpe was the largest POW camp in the country, with 3,400 prisoners at its peak, Dr. Murray writes.
He said that some of the Fort Oglethorpe prisoners were German military sailors and merchantmen found on German ships in U.S. ports when the war against Germany began. Others were radical labor supporters, while another group consisted of Americans of German descent who were rounded up much in the same manner that Japanese Americans were in California at the time of World War II.
Among this latter group -- who were later released -- were several prominent Americans, including Count Minotti, the son-in-law of meat magnate Lewis Swift, and Karl Muck, the conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
During a concert in Providence, R.I., Dr. Muck – a native of Bavaria in Germany – had refused to play the American national anthem. The decision had actually been made by another orchestra official, not Dr. Muck.
However, Dr. Muck was criticized and later arrested at his Boston home late one night and sent to Fort Oglethorpe.
He apparently made wise use of his time while there. With the former Cincinnati Symphony conductor Earnest Kunwald, he formed an orchestra, and Chattanoogans lined the area around the prison to hear the group perform.
Little information could be found related to the German memorial marker’s dedication in 1935. A newspaper article on the 1933 re-interment quotes the cemetery superintendent, Capt. W..L. Henderson, saying that space had been set aside for a monument, which would likely be erected by the German government.
The superintendent also said that the German ambassador had visited National Cemetery and been favorably impressed with the care given the graves. He told the superintendent in a letter that the care at the cemetery seemed far better than at most places he had seen where foreign solders were buried.
When the German memorial marker was dedicated in 1935, nearly 20 years had passed since World War I ended. Of course, many Civil War markers were erected a generation or so after that war as well.
In Germany, however, 1935 was shortly after Adolf Hitler had ascended to power and a time when fervent German nationalism was apparent. Americans and other European countries were also becoming increasingly skeptical of the aims of Nazi Germany in 1935.
Where the stone was quarried and sculpted, who was involved in its construction and dedication, and what kind of unveiling ceremony was held all seem lost or hidden in an old newspaper article or documents.
Using the Internet, photographer Wes Schultz determined that the upper part of the German memorial marker says something like, “During the war years died here far from the homeland.” The lower section says, “Germany will always remember you.”
World War II would also bring other German POWs to the unlikely place of National Cemetery as a final resting place.
Besides the 105 Germans, the cemetery also contains the graves of one French solder, one Italian and one Polish from World War II.
Two of the World War II prisoners were interred directly in the National Cemetery, while 94 were re-interred from a cemetery in Crossville, Tn. The others were disinterred from Camp Butner, N.C., in March 1947.
All or most of the World War II prisoners were apparently military veterans.
In 1981, the late Chattanooga News-Free Press staff writer George W. Brown interviewed local veteran Bart Allen, who discovered that decorated German Lt. Gen. Karl R.M. Buelowius, whom Mr. Allen had once faced on the battlefield, was buried at National Cemetery.
Gen. Buelowius, who served under Gen. Erwin Rommel, had defeated the Americans at Kasserine Pass in North Africa and had driven the Allies back early in the war.
He evidently hanged himself in his prison camp, the article said.
He and the others are remembered every year when the German consul general from Atlanta or a representative of the office lays a wreath by the memorial marker in connection with Germany’s National Day of Mourning, which is always two Sundays before the start of Advent. This year, the day falls on Nov. 16.
A spokesperson for the office said the consul also lays wreaths at cemeteries at Fort McClellan by Anniston, Ala.; Fort Benning at Columbus, Ga.; and Fort Gordon by Augusta, Ga.
Some 26 German and three Italian POWs are buried at Fort McClellan, 44 Germans at Fort Benning, and 21 Germans and one Italian at Fort Gordon. Unlike at National Cemetery, all of these veterans are from World War II.
While the ceremony has likely been similar since the marker was erected, Germany and the world have changed greatly. Both Nazism and Eastern Bloc communism have faded into the past
Germany is now an economic power friendly with the United States and sharing many common goals, not the least of which is to see Volkswagen sell a few vehicles.
The VW announcement also refocuses attention on Chattanooga’s other connections to Germany: its Sister City relationship with Hamm, the number of local families of German ethnicity, the popular Rathskeller restaurant that was in downtown Chattanooga, and Germantown Road.
At the cemetery, the stories behind the graves and the treatment of them are microcosms for the relationship between the U.S. and Germany over the last century.
Veterans of the two countries that were apart in war are together at the cemetery in rest, just as the two countries are now often joined in work – especially at Enterprise South.
Jcshearer2@comcast.net
) Germans buried in Section C |
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