For 99-year-old Guy Stern, a German Jew whose entire family was killed by the Nazis, the Allies' victory over Hitler was the culmination of a public crusade and a private one as well. Guy Stern: I think it was the continuous flow of reliable information that really helped expedite the end of the war. And I made sure he knew that it was a Jew who controlled him. WebThe surviving Ritchie Boys are in their eighties now. David S. Frey,a history professor and director of the Center for Holocaust and Genocide at the United States Military Academy,said that in the late 1930s, Gen. George Marshall, then the Army Chief of staff, realized that if the United States was going to war, it needed battlefield intelligence capabilitywhich its military lacked. All SS members were subject to automatic arrest. Jon Wertheim: Why did you want to enlist initially? Approximately 14%, or 2,200, of them Guy Stern: Well I think not (laugh) but I don't run as fast, I don't swim as fast but I feel happy with my tasks. Just two weeks shy of turning 100, Guy Stern drips with vitality. David Frey: Right. Background. Guy Stern speaks at the opening of the Holocaust Memorial Centers Ritchie Boys exhibit and reunion at Farmington Hills, Michigan in 2011. He was born in Berlin to a Russian Jewish family. Surviving soldiers were among the attendees. Web4.73K subscribers The Ritchie Boys of World War Two were more than 15,000 servicemen who fled Nazi Germany and Austria, becoming instrumental in the allied war effort with I can look anybody straight in their eye and say I think I've earned the right to be an American. Victor Brombert, now 98 years old, is a former professor of romance languages and literature at Yale and then Princeton. Guy Stern: Handkerchiefs, I couldn't know at that point that I would never see my siblings or my parents again nor my grandmother and so forth and so on. Max Lerner: You know how to tell an SS man? Jon Wertheim: Give us a sense of the kinds of courses they took. There were Ritchie Boys who were in virtually every battle that you can think of and some actually suffered the worst fate. Germany surrendered on May 8th of that year. David Frey: Part of what the Ritchie Boys did was to convince German units to surrender without fighting. The Ritchie Boys, some of whom landed on the beaches at Normandy, helped to interpret documents and gather intelligence, and conducted enemy warfare. Fred Frommer is a historian and writer, and author of several books, including You Gotta Have Heart: Washington Baseball from Walter Johnson to the 2019 World Series Champion Nationals. So little was known about the Ritchie Boys until the excellent documentary film The Ritchie Boys came upon the scene in 2004. Singer. He grew up in a close-knit family in the town of Hildesheim, Germany. Naturally, I turned to Dan Gross, the unofficial archivist for the Ritchie Boys. Some faced antisemitism from their fellow soldiers. It was Sunday, May 13, 1945, Henderson marvels. It turns out that author J.D. But the Sterns could only send one of their own to the U.S. Another was, , a member of the Mormon faith, who was awarded the prestigious Medal of Honor posthumously for his heroic actions in the Battle of the Philippines. Jon Wertheim: So physical combat training as well as intelligence? Jon Wertheim: That's what you were told. But within a few months the government realized these so-called enemy aliens could be a valuable resource in the war. David Frey: The purpose of the facility was to train interrogators. Every day, Americas service members selflessly put their lives on the line to keep us safe and free. I have some that were shot. Paul Fairbrook: When the soldiers said "I'm not going to talk" they could say "wait a minute. Guy Stern: Yes, doing my job interrogating. By highlighting those individuals who, in the midst of evil, stood for the best, rather than the worst of human nature, the Holocaust Memorial Center seeks to contribute to maintaining an open and free society, he added. The very aspect of these SOBs now being at my command (laugh) gave me also some personal satisfaction. Jon Wertheim: Did the Ritchie Boys redefine what it means to be a soldier and contribute to a military? David Frey: It was a very broad range And they did it all generally in eight weeks. That was the biggest weakness that the Army recognized that it had, which was battlefield intelligence and the interrogation needed to talk to sometimes civilians, most of the time prisoners of war, in order to glean information from them. On the front lines from Normandy onwards, the Ritchie Boys fought in every major battle in Europe, collecting tactical intelligence, interrogating prisoners and civilians, all in service of winning the war. So to get that kind of information, particularly from those you capture on the battlefield, you need people who are trained to get that information. David Frey: Because it involves military intelligence, much of it was actually kept secret until the - the 1990's. Many of these soldiers landed at Normandy, France, on D-Day, June 6, 1944, and others followed to perform their specialized tasks, which provided advanced intelligence to allied forces regarding German war plans and tactics. Victor Brombert: Yes, I realized that I was afraid. Many of the Jewish refugees lost family members, and at the end of the war, they searched for them. The so-called Ritchie Boys were among roughly 15,000 graduates of training programs at Camp Ritchie, a former National Guard Camp in Maryland named for the late Maryland Governor, Albert C. Ritchie. Director, Communications did not have the opportunity to serve overseas, he was able to make a significant contribution as an interrogator at Fort Hunt and as the principal facilitator in the integration of German Paperclip scientists and engineers such as Wernher von Braun into our society. Guy Stern: I had my whole uniform with medals, Russian medals. Many of them were Jewish refugees from Europe, who fled their homeland, came to America and joined the U.S. Army. Jon Wertheim: This dog tag says Hebrew. The Ritchie Boys were members of a secret American intelligence unit that fought in World War II. Jon Wertheim: Sixty percent of the actionable intelligence? Web34K views 1 year ago. You on one side and we on this side. The Ritchie Boys exhibit at the Holocaust Memorial Center in Farmington Hills, Mich., July 24, 2011. The soldiers were sent for training to Camp Ritchie, Maryland, beginning June 19, 1942, where they trained at the Military Intelligence Training Center thus their nickname, the Ritchie Boys.. The case of, stands out in my mind as the essence of the reason why the Ritchie Boys were able to use their intelligence (and motivation) to make an enormous difference. Jon Wertheim: SS men, you're saying, have a tattoo under their left arm with their blood type? Through the power of Holocaust history, the Museum challenges leaders and individuals worldwide to think critically about their role in society and to confront antisemitism and other forms of hate, prevent genocide, and promote human dignity. There were 1,985 German born Ritchie Boys. And they were motivated like few other American soldiers. David Frey: Much of it originated at Camp Ritchie because it had never it hadn't been done before. Guy Stern: I was called to the company office and told you're shipping out. It's important for people everywhere to remember those who perished and those who survived the Holocaust and, in a world increasingly faced with sectarian strife and intolerance, to set forth the lessons of the Holocaust as a model for teaching ethical conduct and responsible decision-making, Stern said. Victor Brombert: We improvised according to the situation. The unit got its name from where they did their training, Camp Ritchie, Maryl Cast & Crew Read More Christian Bauer Director Essentially they were intellectuals. Some of the prisoners were actual German POWs brought to Camp Ritchie so the Ritchie Boys could practice their interrogation techniques. Find History on Facebook (Opens in a new window), Find History on Twitter (Opens in a new window), Find History on YouTube (Opens in a new window), Find History on Instagram (Opens in a new window), Find History on TikTok (Opens in a new window), The Ritchie Boys train at Camp Ritchie, Maryland during World War II. The soldiers were sent for training to Camp Ritchie, Md., beginning June 19, 1942, where they trained at the Military Intelligence Training Center thus their nickname, the Ritchie Boys. Ritchie Boys were a military intelligence unit made up of mostly German, Austrian and Czech refugees and immigrants, many of whom were Jewish. Tonight, we'll introduce you to members of a secret American intelligence unit who fought in World War II. "By highlighting those individuals who, in the midst of evil, stood for the best, rather than the worst of human nature, the Holocaust Memorial Center seeks to contribute to maintaining an open and free society," he added. Contact. Early on in World War II, the Army realized it needed German- and Italian-speaking U.S. soldiers for a variety of duties, including psychological warfare, interrogation, espionage and intercepting enemy communications. Elie Wiesel, the Museums founding chairman, was the first recipient of the award, which was subsequently named in his honor. Some didn't even go over to to Europe. Sixty-plus percent of the actionable intelligence gathered on the battlefield was gathered by Ritchie Boys. As a Jew, I knew I might not be treated exactly by the Geneva rules. We were crusaders.. That was potentially lethal in Europe under fluid battlefield conditions, especially during the Battle of the Bulge, when the Wehrmacht infiltrated American lines with soldiers dressed in U.S. uniforms. When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941, Stern, by then a college student, raced to enlist. Washington, DC 20024-2126 Guy Stern recalls arriving at Buchenwald Concentration Camp three days after its liberation, alongside a fellow American sergeant. Since Stern spoke German he was tasked with the interrogation of prisoners of war and defectors. very important because you save life if you know where the mine "where is the machine gun nest?" Their subjects ranged from low-level German soldiers to high-ranking Nazi officers including Hans Goebbels, brother of Hitler's chief propogandist, Joseph Goebbels. First published on January 2, 2022 / 6:52 PM. All Rights Reserved. It was an impact on war crimes. The Ritchie Boys consisted of approximately 15,200 servicemen who were trained for U.S. Army Intelligence during WWII. Not just any Nazi party member. Edited by Stephanie Palewski Brumbach and Robert Zimet. Web"The Ritchie Boys" is the untold story of a group of young men who fled Nazi Germany and returned to Europe as soldiers in US-uniforms. Paul Fairbrook: You can learn to shoot a rifle in six months but you can't learn fluent German in six months. The largest set of graduates were 2,000 German-born Jews. I wanted, desperately, to do something. It was published by Stackpole Books and has a total of 432 pages in the book. The Ritchie Boys key asset was language skills, and the militarys hunger was for battlefield POW interrogators. Of late, the Ritchie Boys have been the subject of growing media attention including, in May, on the television news program 60 Minutes. And there's nothing that forges unity better than having a common enemy.This is Guy Stern 80 years ago. "How to kill a sentry from behind." This particular edition is in a Hardcover format. Other Ritchie Boys were able to express their motivation and accomplishments in memoirs with titles such as I Must Be a Part of This War and A Few Who Made a Difference. The Ritchie Boys: Americas Secret Weapon Against the Nazis | by United States Holocaust Memorial Museum | Memory & Action | Medium 500 Apologies, but something went wrong on our end. Guy Stern: My fellow students it was an all-male school withdrew from you. Jon Wertheim: This was really a broad range of intelligence activities. Jon Wertheim: That's the kind of thing you would know. Never. When they landed on the beaches of Normandy, Wehrmacht troops were waiting for them well armed and well prepared. They also drafted and dropped leaflets from airplanes behind enemy lines. Victor Brombert: One had to playact with some of the people were acting as prisoners and some of them were real prisoners. They crossed into Germany with the Allied armies and witnessed the horrors of the Nazi concentration camps. After the war, the Ritchie Boys continued their work. Jon Wertheim: Did you ever ask yourself why me? That is the key to being a good interrogator. After following in his familys footsteps and serving in the military, Air Force veteran Lyle Apo turned to USO Hawaii for the opportunity to volunteer and help current service members. Already available are biographies and memoirs by and about individual Ritchie Boys as well as the book by the NYT best-selling author Bruce Henderson and books about Austrian-born Ritchie Boys by Robert Lackner and Florian Traussnig. What what did that entail? Because Eisenhower had signed it and the Germans had an incredibly nave approach to everything that was signed and sealed. And incredibly, they were responsible for most of the combat intelligence gathered on the Western Front. Guy Stern: Thank you for asking. Sons and Soldiers concentrates on six of them, two deadincluding Selling, who passed away at 86 in 2004but who left detailed memoirs, and four still flourishing One of these was. This was our kind of war. Fortunately, some of the Ritchie Boys are still around to tell their tales, and that includes the life force that is Guy Stern, age 99. Then shaping the cold war era, they really played a significant role. Fort Ritchie, as it later became known, closed in 1998. This books publish date is Sep 01, 2021. David Frey: The work they do in the field, being able to glean information simply by from the uniform that a captured POW is wearing or the type of weapon that they have or the unit that they've just captured. WebThe Ritchie Boys were the US special military intelligence officers and enlisted men of World War II who were trained at Camp Ritchie in Maryland. Even after the Pentagons change of heart about handing weapons to enemy aliens, suspicion of their bearing and accents remained widespread among regular American soldiers, sometimes reaching higher ranks. According to the Holocaust Museum, two Jewish soldiers were taken captive and executed after being identified as German-born Jews, and there were about 200 Ritchie Boys alive as of May 2022. After Hitler's defeat, many of them took on a challenging new assignment using their language and interrogation skills to find and arrest top Nazi war criminals. And so I fell back behind because I didn't want to be seen crying to a hardened soldier and then he looked around to look where I was, how I was delayed, and he, this good fellow from middle of Ohio was bawling just as I was. Guy Stern: I preferred not having it. Those were the heroes. Investment banker David Rockefeller and civil rights activistWilliam Sloane Coffin were among the Ritchie Boys, who were assigned to every Army and Marines unitand to the Office of Strategic Services and the Counter Intelligence Corps. One of the ways they identified subjects wanted for interrogation was by consulting a book - the Central Registry of War Criminals and Security Suspects which listed enemy nationals suspected of committing tens of thousands of war crimes in Europe everyone from low ranking members of the armed forces to top Nazi officials. July 20, 2017, Martin Selling questions German prisoners near the front in France, 1944. Readers may be amazed to learn that the Ritchie Boys included five Marines who died on Iwo Jima, including two who graduated with a specialty of Terrain Intelligence) and were killed in action on the day the Marines stormed Iwo Jima (19 February 1945). David Frey: I think they did. 2022 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. Jon Wertheim: You work 6 days a week, you swim every morning, you lecture, any signs of slowing down? In the Ardennes region of Belgium, the Germans mounted a massive counteroffensive, which became known as the Battle of the Bulge. (Photo: US Army/US Department of Defense), https://www.history.com/news/ritchie-boys-wwii-jewish-refugees-military-intelligence, The Jewish Refugees Who Fled Nazi GermanyThen Returned to Fight. 60-plus percent of the actionable intelligence gathered on the battlefield was gathered by Ritchie Boys. Jon Wertheim: As a former German who understood the psychology and the mentality. Not all the boys were immigrantsfuture banker David Rockefeller and writer J.D. Fred is a former longtime Associated Press journalist, where he worked as a reporter and editor. The appearance of DoD visual information does not imply or constitute DoD endorsement. There were recruiting posters all over town, The story of Camp Ritchie and the men (and women) who came there is a story that needs to be broadcast more widely. Eventually, "I had no choice." The group also included large numbers of first- or second-generation Americans who still spoke German or other languages at home, Frey says. We had to-- we got a lot of German prisoners who were willing to help us catalog all those documents. As members of the Ritchie Boys, German and Austrian refugees offered language skills and knowledge that proved vital to American military intelligence. Stern also said that its important for people everywhere to remember those who perished and those who survived the Holocaust and, in a world increasingly faced with sectarian strife and intolerance, to set forth the lessons of the Holocaust as a model for teaching ethical conduct and responsible decision-making. WASHINGTON The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum will confer its highest honor, the Elie Wiesel Award, on the Ritchie Boys, a little-known special World War II US military intelligence unit that included many Jewish refugees from Nazism and was instrumental to the Allied victory. David Frey: All in service of winning the war. David Frey: They were incredibly effective. Nina Wolff Feld told her fathers story in Someday You Will Understand: My Fathers Private World War 2. Following the war, some of the Ritchie Boys were interrogators during the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals. Making such a distinction in this case is very difficult. Jon Wertheim: So it sounds like this gave the officers in the field a guide to the German Army so they could then interrogate the German POW's more efficiently. Most of the guys in basic training were Southerners who hated the Jewish boys from New York and busted our chops most of the time, George Sakheim, who had fled to the United States by way of Palestine, told POLITICO Magazine. Embedded in every Army unit, they interrogated tens of thousands of captured Nazi soldiers as well as civilians extracting key strategic information on enemy strength, troop movements, and defensive positions. Essentially they were intellectuals. Jon Wertheim: Do you remember saying goodbye to your family? Many of these soldiers landed at Normandy, France, on D-Day, June 6, 1944, and others followed to perform their specialized tasks, which provided advanced intelligence to allied forces regarding German war plans and tactics. Victor Brombert: The shared experience, exactly. Victor Brombert was with the first American armored division to land on Omaha Beach. After recruiters found out he spoke four languages, they dispatched him to Camp Ritchie, where strenuous classroom instruction was coupled with strenuous field exercises. And I said "Well, huh, in slang, there ain't nothing special about you, but if you were saved, you got to show that you were worthy of it. | told the story of his fathers motivation and bravery in the book Unavoidable Hope. They all became American success stories, businessmen or academics. And we were strafed and I said to myself, uh, "now, it's the end' because I could you could feel the machine gun bullets. Most chose the eldest son, to carry on the family name. As was philanthropist David Rockefeller and media baron and billionaire John Kluge. Many landed on the beaches of Normandy soon after D-Day. It was wonderful to see these people again. A website by Dan Gross and Ritchie History Museum. We were briefed that the Germans were not going to welcome us greatly. Jon Wertheim: What was it like for you, leaving Nazi Germany, escaping as a Jew, and the next time you go back to Europe it's to fight those guys? David Frey: Techniques where you want to get people to talk to you. Ritchie Boy Wannabe Dan Gross and several invited guests joined the Ritchie Boys for the photo. Readers may be amazed to learn that the Ritchie Boys included five Marines who died on Iwo Jima, including two who graduated with a specialty of Terrain Intelligence) and were killed in action on the day the Marines stormed Iwo Jima (19 February 1945). This was our kind of war. "I would have been killed if I hadn't gone along. Originally a resort, Camp Ritchie was a curiously idyllic setting to prepare for the harshness and brutality of war. After the war, a number served as translators and interrogatorsespecially during the Nuremberg Trials. Jon Wertheim: You let him know you were Jewish? Jon Wertheim: I understand there are some Ritchie Boys [that] became fairly prominent figures. 4.39. They then typed up their daily reports in the field to be passed up the chain of command. G. Guy Ritchie's The Covenant is an intense action movie, full of gunfire and explosions that make you feel caught in the midst of danger. What was that like? Jon Wertheim: I see a tent in the background of that photo right in front of you. Paul Fairbrook: I was proud to be in the American Army and we were able to do what we had to do. Sometimes entire German towns were forced to pay respects to the dead. Martha Cesaro, a military spouse, shares what inspired her to start giving back to the military community through the USO. Message & data rates may apply. Copyright 2023 Camp Ritchie Museum, Inc. Many had fled Nazi Germany but returned as American soldiers, deploying their knowledge of German language and culture to great advantage. All had experienced harrowing escapes from Europe and dangerous but productive returns. Approximately 20,000 menmany of whom were immigrants and refugees from more than 70 countries, including 2,800 German and Austrian refugees who fled Nazi persecution and had arrived in the United States as enemy alienswere trained there. Ritchie Boys Image by Sons and Soldiers. The Ritchie Boys, as they were known, trained in espionage and frontline interrogation. You sort of swing it around the neck from behind and then pull. To Allied investigators it became a sort of Nazi hunter's bible. What could be more appropriate than to honor them with an award bearing the name of Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel.. And it was not until a few years ago that the son of Italian-Jewish Ritchie Boy Alessandro Sabbadini told the story of his fathers motivation and bravery in the book Unavoidable Hope. We were all on the same wavelength. Jon Wertheim: What you describe, it almost sounds like these were precursors to CIA agents. Be the first to learn about news, service member stories and fundraising updates from USO. WebOne can readily point to the case of Ritchie Boy William R. Perl who outwitted Adolf Eichmann and saved an estimated 40,000 lives. Victor Brombert: By complicity I mean, "Oh we are together in this war. Victor Brombert: Yes, well with a stick. How do you appeal to people in their own language? What's most extraordinary about this group: many of them were German-born Jews who fled their homeland, came to America, and then joined the U.S. Army. Mothers Day.. Victor Brombert: Yes of course.
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