Mémorial de la Shoah, Paris France

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The Mémorial de la Shoah in Paris France is Europe’s primary Holocaust research and remembrance center, dedicated to the 76,000 French Jewish victims, including 11,000 children, deported to camps like Birkenau, Sobibor and Auschwitz between 1942 and 1944. The memorial was inaugurated in 2005, it features a permanent museum, archives, a wall of names, and a crypt. Many of the rooms were dark showcasing detailed history of the atrocities of the Nazi regime.

Shoah is another name for the Holocaust. During the Shoah (1940–1944), approximately 77,000 of the 350,000 Jews in France were deported and murdered, mostly in Auschwitz. While the French Vichy Regime collaborated with Nazi occupiers in persecuting, registering, and interning Jews. The Vel’ d’Hiv roundup which resulted in the arrest of 13,152 Jews in Paris by French police, including 5,802 women and 4,051 children being sent to Dracy.

About 75% of the Jewish population survived, a high rate for occupied Europe, due to the efforts of local, religious, and underground organizations. Children were hidden in non-Jewish homes. Jewish underground organizations, alongside non-Jewish efforts, played a crucial role in saving lives.

In all, the Shoah in France victimized close to 80,000 Jews. Three thousand Jews died in French-run internment camps like Gurs and Drancy.

I was fascinated by a series of stations where oral histories could be heard from survivors of the Shoah. I listened to several interviews with Larissa Cain. She was born in 1932 in Poland to family with deep rooted Jewish traditions. Her mother and father belonged to a community deep rooted in Zionist ideals. She spent her early childhood in Warsaw, surrounded by books, languages, and a strong sense of community. Her parents ran a candy shop in the Jewish quarter. This small shop helped keep the family from absolute starvation. The family was confined to a small two-room apartment shared with seven other people, they faced extreme conditions: hunger, disease, and relentless oppression.

In July 1942, the first deportations to Treblinka began from the ghetto. The Nazis came to the building and started searching floor to floor. There was not enough time to get dresses so her mom held Larissa and they sat quietly on the bed in the top floor. Though young Larissa knew to stay quiet. Her life depended on it. For some unknown reason the Nazi soldier stopped on the floor below them and went back down the steps without searching the top floor. This arbitrary moment of impatience meant their survival on that day. Her mother was later arrested in her workplace and disappeared. She would never see her mother again.

Larissa is a survivor of the Nazi established Warsaw Ghetto. She is one of the few children to survive the Warsaw Ghetto destruction. She was rescued by the Polish Resistance at the age of 10. She lived hiding until the end of the war. Her father also escaped the ghetto, but their paths diverged. She never saw him again.

I don’t know if this was a purposeful design, but it is very hard to exit the memorial. Iron bars block all the obvious exit and entry points. I finally had to ask a member of the staff where the exit was. It was to the right just past the wall of names of those murdered by the Nazis engraved in granite. But even so I could not figure out which door to use. There was a green security light on one of the doors and I remembered having to wait for a green light to enter. I opened that door and discovered that I was entering a guard booth. The guard was annoyed that I had invaded his space. He angrily pointed to another unmarked door.

Adolph Hitler in Paris France

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Adolf Hitler made a quick three-hour surprise visit to Nazi-occupied Paris on June 23, 1940, shortly after France signed an armistice. Accompanied by architect Albert Speer, sculptor Arno Breker, and architect Hermann Giesler, he toured landmarks like the Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe, and Napoleon’s tomb, calling it the “greatest and finest moment of my life”.

Arno Breker was a German sculptor who is best known for his public works in Nazi Germany, where he was endorsed by the authorities as the antithesis of degenerate art. He was made official state sculptor and exempted from military service. One of his better known statues is Die Partei, representing the spirit of the Nazi Party, which flanked one side of the carriage entrance to Albert Speer’s new Reich Chancellery. Ninety percent of Breker’s public works were destroyed during the bombings of Germany toward the end of the war.

Arno Breker’s sculpting career flourished after WWII. Breker was offered a commission by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, but Arno refused, saying “One dictatorship is sufficient for me”. He continued to receive commissions for sculptures, producing a number of works in his familiar classical style, working for businesses and individual patrons. He also produced many portrait busts.

Albert Speer was a German architect who served as Minister of Armaments and War Production in Nazi Germany during most of World War II. Hitler commissioned him to design and construct structures, including the Reich Chancellery and the Nazi Party rally grounds in Nuremberg.

In 1937, Hitler appointed Speer as General Building Inspector for Berlin. In this capacity he was responsible for the Central Department for Resettlement that evicted Jewish tenants from their homes in Berlin. Speer became a close friend and ally of Adolf Hitler, he was convicted at the Nuremberg trials and served 20 years in prison.

After the war, Speer was among the 24 major war criminal defendants charged by the International Military Tribunal for Nazi atrocities. He was found guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity, principally for the use of slave labor, narrowly avoiding a death sentence. Having served his full term, Speer was released in 1966. Speer was intimately aware of and involved in the Final Solution, evidence of which has been conclusively shown in the decades following the Nuremberg trials.

Kristallnacht accelerated Speer’s ongoing efforts to dispossess Berlin’s Jews from their homes. From 1939 on, Speer’s Department used the Nuremberg Laws to evict Jewish tenants of non-Jewish landlords in Berlin, to make way for non-Jewish tenants displaced by redevelopment or bombing. Eventually, 75,000 Jews were displaced by these measures. Speer denied he knew they were being put on Holocaust trains and claimed that those displaced were, “Completely free and their families were still in their apartments”. He also said: ” … en route to my ministry on the city highway, I could see … crowds of people on the platform of nearby Nikolassee Railroad Station. I knew that these must be Berlin Jews who were being evacuated. I am sure that an oppressive feeling struck me as I drove past. I presumably had a sense of somber events.” Matthias Schmidt said Speer had personally inspected concentration camps and described his comments as an “outright farce”. Martin Kitchen described Speer’s often repeated line that he knew nothing of the “dreadful things” as hollow—not only was he fully aware of the fate of the Jews, he actively participated in their persecution.

Also with Hitler on this day was architect Hermann Giesler and a few Military officers. Giesler was entrusted by Hitler with the reorganization of the entire city of Linz. Beginning from 1942, he worked on plans and a large model for the Danube Development of the Banks. In August 1943, Giesler was appointed as a deputy to the Reichstag for electoral constituency. Starting from 1944, he also worked on designs for the cultural center, which Hitler regarded with particular interest.

In 1945, Giesler initially was arrested by the U.S. military and interned as a Nazi, and charged in 1946. In 1947, he was indicted by a U.S. military court for war crimes in the concentration camp Mühldorf, a subcamp of Dachau. Giesler was sentenced to life imprisonment, but on May 6, 1948 his sentence was reduced to 25 years imprisonment. On July 7, 1951, it was lowered once again to twelve years. Giesler was freed on October 18, 1952.

Living in German Occupied Paris France

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Les Invalides in Paris France was occupied by German forces during World War II, serving as a site for administrative purposes and military control from 1940 to 1944. Following the 1940 defeat, the Germans took over the complex, which even included a visit from Adolf Hitler to Napoleon’s tomb in June 1940.

When it seemed clear that the city would be captured by the Germans, curators at the Louvre, summoned back from summer vacation, began cataloging and packing the major works of art, which were put into crates and labeled only with numbers to disguise their contents. The Winged Victory of Samothrace statue was carefully wheeled down the long stairway on a wooden ramp to be put on a truck for its departure to the Château de Valençay with the hope that the Germans could not find her.

Iconic hotels and buildings were requisitioned by the Nazis, turning the “City of Light” into a somber, occupied, and often hungry city.  Parisian had to endure the humiliation of being second-class citizens in their own city. Living in German-occupied Paris from June 1940 to August 1944 was characterized by severe food shortages, strict curfews, fear, and a loss of freedom, with the city’s atmosphere defined by the Nazi flag atop the Eiffel Tower. Parisians lived under constant rationing. Food was scarce, leading to long lines and, for many, severe malnutrition. Adults were limited to 2.5 ounces of meat per week. Essential items like coal, soap, and clothes were strictly rationed, leading to a flourishing black market where goods were expensive.

Private cars were reserved for the occupiers, forcing Parisians to rely on crowded buses, the metro, or bicycles. Strict curfews, often starting around 9 p.m., meant being confined to homes, and nightlife ceased to exist as it once did.

The presence of the Gestapo and German soldiers created an atmosphere of fear, with frequent identity checks, searches, and the threat of arrest. The architectural landmarks of the city were protected by sandbags.

The Jewish population suffered immense persecution, including mandatory wearing of the yellow star, and exclusion from public life. On July 16-17 1942, French police, on orders of the Germans  rounded up 13,152 Jews, including 4,115 children, who were sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp where they were murdered on mass.

Thousands of Frenchmen were conscripted for mandatory forced labor in Germany to make munitions for the war effort. Parisian had to endure the humiliation of being second-class citizens in their own city. While many citizens quietly tried to survive, some collaborated with the Germans, while others joined the French Resistance, risking death to fight back. After the city was liberated, the collaborators would be publicly humiliated. Particularly women who dated German officers would be striped and have their hair cut off publicly by the angry mob.

The French Resistance in Paris launched an uprising on August 19, 1944 seizing the police headquarters and other government buildings. Resistance fighters and everyday citizens including children blockaded streets by cutting down trees and removing cobblestones. The week between August 19 and the 25th the city saw the resistance fighters and any citizen with a firearm fighting to free their city from German oppression. The city was liberated by French and American troops on  August 25, 1944, the next day, General De Gaulle led a triumphant parade down the Champs-Élysée and organized a new government.

May 7, 1945, Late Pasta Lunch in Paris

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A block from the hotel I was staying at in Paris was a breakfast place that was really popular. I tried to get in, and the hostess pointed out the door. There was a long line of people hoping to get inside waiting in the street. That was not going to work for me. I walked past the place every morning and there was always a long line. It was too popular for me. I walked a few shops down the street and walked into Ricci which was a pizza and pasta restaurant. I sat at a table towards the back of the restaurant and ordered a plate of pasta.

I sat at this table because there was a group of men eating across from me at a long table. However, they were close to being done. I noticed their cups near empty and there was no food left on the plates. Sure enough as I started laying in my sketch, they got up to leave. I was left with a large empty table and a small family tucked away in the corner. Their, two children were squirming and impatient. The waiter was really good with the kids, entertaining them as their parents also got up to leave.

I was left to sketch the gaudy and tasteless painting of Marilyn Monroe, Audrey Hepburn and I think Leslie Caron as Gigi, hanging on a mirrored wall. Each of the women was blowing a big bubble. The tacky paintings had gold leaf and bright colors. The owners might have thought this is the type of art that tourists wanted to see. Maybe they think that people come to Paris for gaudy pop art rather than to see classical masterpieces in the world class museums.

The German Generals signed the surrender document on May 7, 1945, in a red brick schoolhouse in Reims France in a room whose walls were covered with war maps. This was General Eisenhower’s headquarters. I thought this was too humble a spot for signing such an important document. It really should have been signed in a more opulent setting. The Russians had the same idea, and they insisted that a second document of surrender should  be signed the next day at the former Soviet engineering school in Karlshorst, Berlin Germany. This room felt more like a courtroom with dark wood paneling, dark leather chairs and above was a golden chandelier.

Then I thought to myself it might be more fun to sign the Document of Unconditional Surrender in a gaudy Paris restaurant with Marilyn, Audrey and Gigi blowing bubbles. What the occasion needed was plenty of mirrors, cheep restaurant chairs and pop art. Of course, pop art wasn’t a thing until late in the 1950s and it didn’t become popular until the 1960s, long after the war was over.

My spaghetti Marinara was good and I ordered two Cokes for the caffeine rush. I also ordered a dessert since the sketch was taking some time to create. I nursed my desert taking my time to complete the sketch. The waiter walked over to my table. I was the only person in the place. He informed me that they needed to shut the restaurant down. I did not realize that some restaurants took a break between lunch and dinner. I tended to eat at odd time on my trip since I would only eat between sketch opportunities. I apologized and wolfed my desert down. The sketch was as done as it was going to be. I kept hoping that someone might sit down at the large table I was drawing but that was not going to happen.

I got up to pay my bill. I got some stink eye from a second waiter. He must have been annoyed that the American tourist would take so long to eat a plate of spaghetti. He wanted his afternoon break. I walked back to my hotel and made plans for what I might sketch the next day.

Paris Bomb Shelter

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The Paris Liberation Museum features an original 1940s underground bomb shelter used as a Resistance command post. Located twenty meters under the museum, the command post used during the Liberation by Colonel Henri Rol, head of the French Forces of the Interior (FFI) which was the unified military wing of the French Resistance that played a crucial role in the August 1944 liberation of Paris. It has 10-foot thick concrete walls, pedal-powered ventilation, and gas-tight doors. The memory of World War I gas attacks made keeping the bunker airtight a priority.

Built in 1938 as an air raid shelter. It was constructed to protect against potential aerial attacks.. The bunker, which features a 250-line telephone exchange, served as the operational command post for the final battle to liberate Paris, rather than as a civilian shelter. The bunker never really saw any action as a shelter, Paris was largely spared from air attacks during WWII, and there was little danger of poison gas.

The bunker was used as the headquarters for French Resistance leaders including Colonel Rol-Tanguy during the August 1944 uprising. It features a restored “disinfection room” gas masks, and a bicycle used to generate electricity. In this bunker, plans were set in place for the city’s liberation. In one room there are still telephone switchboards and a typewriter as if staff had just left yesterday.

Starting on August 15, 1944, thousands of FFI members and Parisian police initiated a general strike and armed insurrection. They seized police stations and barricaded streets before Allied forces arrived. The FFI hoped to liberate the city themselves, but their limited, mostly light, weapons cache forced them to rely on the arrival of General Leclerc‘s 2nd Armored Division and U.S. 4th Infantry Division, which entered the city on August 24-25, 1944.

The Allies were still pushing the Germans toward the Rhine River and did not want to get embroiled in a battle for the liberation of Paris. The Allies thought that it was too early to take Paris. They knew Adolf Hitler‘s Nero Decree required the German military to destroy the city if the Allies attacked.  Charles de Gaulle persuaded them to attack.  De Gaulle,  learned the French Resistance had risen up against the German occupiers and he was unwilling to allow his countrymen to be slaughtered like the Polish Resistance during the Warsaw Uprising. He petitioned for an immediate frontal assault. He threatened to detach the French 2nd Armored Division and to order it to single-handedly attack the German forces in Paris, bypassing the chain of command in so doing, if Eisenhower delayed approval.

Paris was considered to have too great a value, culturally and historically, to risk its destruction. The Allies were also keen to avoid a drawn-out battle of attrition like during the Battle of Stalingrad when Germany was stopped in it’s tracks by the Russians. Ultimately the Allies liberated the city.

The FFI’s actions, including securing key Paris buildings, prevented the German garrison from destroying the city. The actions of the FFI allowed the city to be liberated on August 25, 1944, with relatively light resistance.

Paris France: Foch’s Tomb

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This Tomb of Marshal Foch is in the Cathedral of Saint-Louis of the Invalids. Also in the cathedral is the Tomb of Napoleon. Adolph Hitler saw himself much like Napoleon conquering all of Europe. The Dome of the Invalids is the tallest church building in Paris France at a height of 351 ft.

Ferdinand Foch’s tomb has a really nice statue of soldiers carrying his body still clutching a sword. Foch was a French General and Marshal of France. He was born in 1851 and died in 1999. He distinguished himself as the Supreme Allied Commander on the Western Front during the First World War. Foch became Supreme Allied Commander in late March of 1918 in the face of the all-out German spring offensive. He successfully coordinated the French, British and American efforts. He stopped the German offensive and launched a war-winning counterattack. In November 1918, Marshal Foch accepted the German cessation of hostilities and was present at the Armistice of November 11, 1918.

Foch was seen as a master of the Napoleonic school of military thought. It seems appropriate therefore that his tomb would be within yards of Napoleon’s tomb.

The Cathedral of Saint-Louis of the Invalids was not significantly damaged during WWII. While many cities in France were heavily bombed, Paris was declared an open city and escaped major strategic bombing during the conflict, preserving its major landmarks.

With Paris under German occupation, there were severe food shortages, strict curfews, constant surveillance, and systematic persecution of Jewish residents. Life was characterized by long lines, a thriving black market, German soldiers occupying luxury hotels, and a tense, silent atmosphere where the swastika flew over major landmarks. The French government moved to Vichy France.

A 9 p.m. curfew was enforced, and only Germans were allowed to drive cars. While many Parisians struggled to survive, some collaborated, while others joined the Resistance. I am left wondering how I might act under such circumstances, and yet the situation isn’t that abstract as history repeats itself. The Gestapo operated with extreme brutality, leading to widespread fear of arrest and torture

The Nazis, supported by French authorities, systematically registered, arrested, and deported Jews to concentration camps, including the 1942 Vélodrome d’Hiver Roundup, which was a mass arrest of over 13,000 Jews in Paris by French police, acting on behalf of German authorities. Victims were held in brutal conditions at the Vélodrome d’Hiver cycling stadium before being deported to Drancy, then Auschwitz.

 

Paris France: The Army Museum

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My last stop before flying back to the States was Paris France. I stayed in a small hotel at the Ecole Militaire metro stop. Returning the rental car was an adventure in itself since the parking garage was unmarked and I ended up driving backwards up some winding exit ramps to finally find the level I was supposed to be on.

My goal in Paris was to explore all the World War II museums and there are many. The hotel was situated walking distance to several of the war museums as well as the Eiffel Tower. My first stop was to the Army Museum at Les Invalides. There are actually several war museums in this complex.

Louis XIV initiated the project by an order dated November 24, 1670 to create a home and hospital for aged and disabled soldiers, the veterans of his many military campaigns. Les Invalides is a complex of buildings containing museums and monuments, all relating to the military history of France, as well as a hospital and an old soldiers’ retirement home. The buildings house The museum of the Army of France, the Museum of Plans-Reliefs, and the Museum of C0ntemporary History. The complex also includes the Cathedral of Saint-Louis-des-Invalides. It is adjacent to the Royal Chapel known as the Dome of the Invalides, the tallest church building in Paris at a height of 351 ft.

The Army Museum (Musée de l’Armée) was created in 1905. On display are all things related to weapons from the late Middle Ages through to World War II. They include weapons, armor, works of arts and technology. I of course spent most of my time on the floors devoted to World War II. The floors were dedicated for uniforms, weapons, and documents. I made my way through the chronological displays several times before settling on this spot to sketch.

One display caught my eye. It displayed all the things an American GI might carry into battle. There were 3 boxes of K Rations, an old can of what might be green beans, a Coke bottle, foot powder, shoe polish, a razor for shaving with Gem double edge blades, a large syringe, a tiny tin can camping stove, mess kit, canteen, several pockets full of shaving cream, tooth paste and a shaving brush, armed services editions of several books including Big Ben and Fireside Book of Verse, Pal Mall Cigarettes, a wrist watch, some Chiclets, dog tags, a lighter, whistle, a small satchel full of bobby pins, tweezers and a nail file, a knife fork and spoon, a small folding shovel, a flashlight and some V Letter envelopes, and a pin up girl photo. I can’t imagine any one soldier would carry all of these items. In the Netherlands I remember being told that the Americans were known for leaving plenty of Coke bottles behind. Some of them were still full. Another item often left behind was foot powder. Cases of this were left behind. So much so that the curator of the military museum offered me a tin of foot powder but I had to refuse. My backpack was already too heavy.

As I sketched there was a WWII video playing in the room to my left. There were the sounds of aircraft hurling towards the earth along with fires and ling lines of displaces persons searching for a place to call home. The video always zoomed on  a young girls face as she boarded a box car. I saw that image repeat over and over. I still haunts me.

Digital Future

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A Digital Artist Meetup was held at the Internal Operations Center (450 Esat South Street Orlando Florida). Those who attended were encouraged to help shape the future of the digital landscape in Central Florida. Since I am an Analog Artist in a Digital World, I was curious.

After introductions from everyone in the room there was a presentation by Kunal Patel, Orange County’s Innovation Manager. Kunal’s background was as a game designer. He spoke about how he thought outside the box to promote his games. At a conference He wore a suit and handed out information about the game he was working on to everyone in the room. He used to believe in converted into a digital workspace. People will be able to use the space to learn about projection mapping, augmented reality, digital painting, 3D modeling, animation, vector art and other mediums. I made sure to sketch digitally to document the meeting.

The Innovation Center is scheduled to open on March of 2026. Kunal showed those gathered on the room a virtual walk through of the space. Creative lighting was being considered and there was plenty of blank wall space the could feature art. He likes the idea of presenting that art via projections. He feels that physically hanging art is a cumbersome process, but with projections, the art could be easily changed out.

Orange County’s investment in this project must be sizable. Digital tech becomes outdated quickly, so that investment will have to keep growing. It seems like the large studio areas could be a fun place to experiment. I plan to stop by the Innovation Center when it opens. I like the idea of a limitless digital playground.

Reims France: Cathedral Notre Dame

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While under German occupation, the cafes in Reims France were typically restricted, serving limited goods, and often frequented by German officers or, in secrecy, by members of the French Resistance.

Reims was liberated from German occupation by Allied ground forces on August 30, 1944, during the Northern France Campaign. Following its liberation, the city served as a key Allied logistics hub, and significantly, General Eisenhower’s Supreme Headquarters was located there, where Germany signed its unconditional surrender on May 7, 1945. My father, 1st Lieutenant Arthur Thorspecken would have likely entered the city between June 1, 1945, and September 15, 1945, on leave from his duties helping run Camp Cleveland which was a short distance south east of the city. He would have explored the city as an American GI.

American soldiers on leave in WWII Rheims frequented the city center for relaxation, with key spots including the iconic Notre-Dame de Reims cathedral, the Lycée Roosevelt (site where Germany signed the unconditional surrender in the war room), local cafes for coffee, and areas to enjoy Champagne, capitalizing on the city’s role as a major hub for the U.S. Army. There was an American officers’ club in Reims, France, known as Club du Chateau.

The Reims Notre Dame Cathedral was not destroyed during World War II; it remained largely untouched during that conflict, although it suffered severe damage and near-total destruction during World War I. The cathedral underwent a major restoration between 1919 and 1938, allowing it to survive the 1940s conflict relatively unscathed. This magnificent structure was the traditional coronation site of French kings, with more than 30 monarchs crowned here between the 11th and 19th centuries. It was recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1991. Reims is also known as the “city of cathedrals” and is home not only to the Notre-Dame de Reims but the Basilica of Saint-Remi, the Church of Saint-Jacques, and the Protestant Church of Reims.

After World War I, much of Reims was rebuilt in the Art Deco style, giving the city a distinctive architectural identity. Walking through the city center, visitors will notice elegant facades, geometric designs, and decorative details that reflect the optimism of the 1920s. This blend of medieval landmarks and early 20th-century architecture makes Reims visually unique among French cities.

After the sketch was complete, I wandered the streets of the historic city searching for a nice restaurant to have my meal for the day. I found a nice little café on my walk back to the rental car. I ordered a chicken dinner which was delicious. The proprietor let me know that all the food was purchased fresh from local farmers markets. An older couple in the corner was celebrating a birthday. From behind the bar, the proprietor pulled out a bouquet of flowers and he offered it to the woman celebrating her birthday. I considered doing a sketch, but decided to just enjoy my meal and soak in the ambiance.
Walking back to the rental car I enjoyed the magnificent historic homes and there was yet another World War statue in a public park I passed through. History felt alive on every street I walked down.

Reims France: Museum of the Surrender

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My second stop on the drive back to Paris was Reims France. Rheims was the city where Germany unconditionally surrendered on May 7, 1945, at 2:41am. However, the Soviets had not yet officially approved the text of the Instrument of Surrender signed in Reims. The Soviets insisted that the proper signing ceremony must not take place in France, but right in the fallen Reich’s heart, in Berlin. They also insisted on certain changes in the text of the Instrument of Surrender, insisting it state unambiguously that all German troops were required to give up their arms and hand themselves over to the Allies. Therefor on May 8, 1945, there was another, grander, more formal ceremony in Berlin Germany.

There were no immediate celebrations. The ceasefire was set for 11.01pm on 8 May, and the news correspondents present at the Rheims signing were sworn not to report the surrender until further notice. A few hours later, however, German radio did – and the news was out.

My Father 1st Lieutenant Arthur Thorspecken was serving occupation duty in the area of Hemer where Stalag VI-A was located as well as Iserlohn and Plettenburg Germany when Germany surrendered. He held on to the Stars and Strips newspaper announcing the surrender for the rest of his life. I now have that very yellow and fragile newspaper with the full-page headline NAZIS QUIT! Arthur must have been ecstatic that the European war was over. The 75th Infantry marching band celebrated by marching through the streets of Plettenberg Germany playing patriotic music.

Although Arthur Thorspecken wasn’t at the signing on May 8, 1945, he was reassigned to Camp Cleveland just 11 miles south east of Reims on June 1, 1945. Leaves to Rheims and Paris were common for the 75th Infantry soldiers who ran Camp Cleveland. I have no doubt that Arthur would have taken a leave to Rheims and come to the this site where the war in Germany had ended.

The newspaper announced that, German officers formally surrendered the German forces at a meeting in the big red schoolhouse which was General Eisenhauer’s headquarters. Grand Admiral Doenitz, successor to Adolph Hitler, ordered the surrender and the German High Command declared it effective. The signing of the surrender declaration took place in secret in the “map room” located in the technical college (now called Lycée Roosevelt)

The red schoolhouse in Rheims is now a museum memorializing the end of World War II. The museum has archives, uniforms, and artifacts which bring the period of May 1945 to life. Unfortunately, when I was there, the museum was under renovation. It is slated to re-open in March of 2026.

The text serving as the “Instrument of Surrender” had already been written by the Allies in mid-1944, after the D-Day Landings in Normandy France. Reworked sections of the text were also the subject of the Yalta Conference in early 1945. The main points were that the surrender had to be unconditional and must be signed by the German Military High Command. When Germany’s surrendered in WW1, only the civilian government signed. This later paved the way for the “Dolchstoß”, or ‘stab-in-the-back’, legend that militarily Germany had not actually been defeated on the battlefields, but that it was “betrayed” – by republicans, social democrats, and Jews. This propaganda fueled the hatred that allowed Hitler to be voted into office and begin a massive build up of armed forces.

Adolph Hitler’s suicide, in the Fuhrer bunker in Berlin on 30 April 1945, opened a real chance for surrender to come quickly. Yet it came in stages, drawn out over the course of more than a week, partly because of the chaos the German military was experiencing.

Today the museum looks quite nondescript, a simple red-brick complex. Only the four flagpoles flying the British, United States, French and Soviet flags hint at its significance.