Post 1.475 on Sunday December 24 2023
This 1995 story, was written –in German- for a German newspaper after a call for war stories in remembrance of the 50th anniversary of the end of WW II , by Frauke Elber from the USA.
She is WSPA’s [Women Soaring Pilots Association] editor for the Hangar Soaring newsletter,s published four times a year.
She also wrote the book ;” The tall man in the dark suit,….The diary of a World War II naval cadet.
Published by CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform (2014)
“As it has become a tradition I send with my Holiday Greeting a story. I wrote this year’s story in 1995. But since then not much has changed.”
” Christmas 1944
Christmas 1944, “PEACE ON EARTH” was the dream of many people. WW II had raged for five years. Many countries and cities lay in ruins. Fathers, sons, brothers had become victims of this devastating war. Millions of people had been uprooted and driven from their home countries.
St. Wendel, a town of 12 000, had not been touched by the war yet. There were no war-time industries. But a major rail line and a spur line converged in St.Wendel. There was a marshalling yard, a locomotive repair facility and a locomotive roundhouse. The town had on its west side a garrison. A FLAK battery protected the town and the rail lines.
In 1953, my parents built a house in St. Wendel. In 1985, doing some research at the National Archives in Washington, DC on the air war in Germany I stumbled on documents and pictures dealing with bombing raids on the town during the Christmas Season 1944. Targeted were the railroad facilities and rail bridges. The human toll is not mentioned in these documents. But at the town’s cemetery stands an obelisk type monument showing the human side of these raids. The monument has the following inscription:
HERE REST IN PEACE
ANNEROSE SCHNEIDER 1932-1944
RUDOLF SCHNEIDER 1935-1944
CHRISTEL SCHNEIDER 1940-1944
PAUL SCHNEIDER 1904-1944 (RUSSLAND)
MARIA DETEMPLE NEE SCHNEIDER 1895-1944
On Christmas Eve 1944, a bomb hit and destroyed the house in which the family had sheltered in the basement. They probably prayed for PEACE ON EARTH. Instead two generations of one family perished that day.
I did not know anyone in the family although I grew up in the same neighborhood during the 50s.But every time I see the monument at the cemetery, I get goose bumps.
Yet, another thought comes to my mind. On this Christmas Eve 1944, ten young men, most of them under the age of 25, flew in their bombers over a small German town in 30,000 feet altitude. They too hoped for PEACE ON EARTH, while releasing their deadly bomb load. Did these sons and brothers return to their families overseas or are somewhere in Europe ten simple white crosses on a military cemetery with the inscription UNKNOWN 1944?
(note: the paper did not publish the story because of the last paragraph. I refused to take it out)
This war is now 50 years in the past and is history. But there are still wars going on. Humans kill each other and get killed in senseless wars. And still people hope for PEACE ON EARTH.
Christmas 1944-continued.
Back in the 1990s, I befriended an American WWII fighter pilot, Jack Curtis from Roger, Arkansas, who was in the European war theater 1944-45. Via e-mail we exchanged our views and experiences of the war, he being a dashing aviator doing his thing in the air, while I was a three-year old experiencing the war on the ground. As it turned out, our lives intersected three times during that time. When I sent him the above story, he responded with a story of his own of that fateful day:
Christmas Eve 1944, he flew bomber escort on the raid on St. Wendel. He lost his wing man north of town somewhere between St. Wendel and Trier. The crash site was not found until summer of 2000. Thanks to Jack’s tireless efforts, the wreck and human remains were found and identified as the plane and remains of Lt. James Baxter. The remains of Lt. Baxter were flown to the US and buried in his home soil of Kansas. Jack attended the funeral and later received recognition from the Defense Department. The following is an excerpt from the letter:
“I am moved by your commitment to Lieutenant Baxter and commend you for your selfless devotion. The extraordinary dedication you exhibited in accomplishing your quest to find your friend is evidence by the manner in which you resolutely refused to yield to many difficulties you encountered. Your determined efforts not only resulted in locating the crash site but provided the United States Army Central Identification Laboratory the evidence it needed to recover, identify, and return the Lieutenant’s remains to his family and his native Kansas soil. Your actions are a testament of strength of your character; and Lieutenant Baxter was truly fortunate to have a friend like you who could not forget, could not abandon him on a foreign field of battle, and could not be daunted by barriers encountered along the path to accomplishment of this noble feat.”
footnote: Jack also was instrumental in identifying the airplane that was discovered in the Mediterranean in the 1990s as the one of author and aviator Antoine de Saint Éxupery (author of “The Little Prince”). Jack died in July 2007 at age 85. My husband and I were the last ones seeing him alive when, on the spur of the moment while driving westward on I-40, we decided to make a detour of about 60 miles to visit Jack in Roger, Arkansas.
I keep hoping for PEACE ON EARTH “
I do too. Thanks Frauke!!!!
MERRY CHRISTMAS to you ALL!!
