7 Things German Prisoners Found Strangest About America

A German prisoner in Texas, July 1944, is handed a glass of water with ice floating in it — ice, in midsummer, from a humming refrigerator in an ordinary farm kitchen, given free to an enemy. He stared at it the way a man stares at a magic trick. He was not alone. Across more than 500 camps in 45 states, 371,683 German prisoners were quietly keeping a list of the things about America that simply could not be true. Drawing on the prisoners' own letters home and the records of the camps — Arnold Krammer's classic study of German POWs in America, the U.S. Army's official utilization history, and the Provost Marshal General's files — this is the German list, not the Japanese one: ice in every drink, white bread soft as cake, women driving tractors and running farms, guards who slouched and used first names, houses with window screens and hot water from a tap, a private car at every door, and mail that actually arrived — and was answered. None of it was staged. The abundance was ordinary, the decency was policy, enforced by ration scales and neutral inspectors. And the audience was the one audience propaganda can never usually reach: the enemy himself, held for three years with nothing to do but look. THE SEVEN THINGS • Ice in everything — ice plants, delivery trucks, and a refrigerator in every farm kitchen • Bread like cake — white, soft loaves beside jam, butter and peanut butter • Women at the wheel — wives and daughters driving tractors and trucks, running the farms • The guards — no saluting culture, first names, jokes through the fence • Screens and taps — window screens, indoor plumbing, hot water, telephones, appliances • A car for every family — millions of private cars, teenagers driving, a filling station at every crossroads • The letters came back — mail and Red Cross parcels that arrived, and were answered CHAPTERS 0:00 He Expected a Cage 0:57 Tunisia, 1943 1:55 The Camp System 3:04 One: Ice in Everything 4:05 Two: Bread Like Cake 5:06 Three: Women at the Wheel 6:04 Work Beyond the Wire 6:56 Four: The Guards 7:55 Five: Screens and Taps 8:57 Six: A Car for Every Family 9:52 Seven: The Letters Came Back 10:57 What the Letters Did 12:01 The War Ends 13:03 The Numbers 14:11 Going Home — Eventually 15:08 The Returners 16:07 The Reckoning 17:05 The Verdict SOURCES Arnold Krammer — Nazi Prisoners of War in America (Stein and Day, 1979) George G. Lewis & John Mewha — History of Prisoner of War Utilization by the U.S. Army (1955) Office of the Provost Marshal General — POW records, National Archives (371,683 German prisoners) Der Ruf & camp newspaper scholarship — the Special Projects Division re-education program Photographs: U.S. Signal Corps, FSA-OWI and U.S. Army, via the National Archives and Wikimedia Commons (public domain). #WWII #POW #GermanPOWs #MilitaryHistory #WorldWar2 #HomeFront Displaying desc68.txt.