It started to rain as I sketched. Rain drop blasts littered the surface of the sketch. I could not protect the page. I closed the sketchbook and sat as it rained, thinking it might stop. I was sheltered in a rain jacket. I finally gave up and put the sketchbook away. After walking half way out of the cemetery, the rain stopped. I went back to my spot and sketched again quickly. I managed to cover the page before another wave of rain started. As I was leaving, I noticed a headstone for Fritz and Gerta Torspecken. My last name is Thorspecken and in America that is quite unique. With just one letter missing, I thought these might be long lost relatives. I know that my original ancestor, Dr. Elias Julius Thorspecken emigrated to America in 1830 or so to build a new life. He served his new country as a doctor during the Civil War. Arolsen Germany the city that Augustus left, is just 142 miles due west. This headstone left me thinking that I might have deep roots in this area of Germany.
Oespel is a district in Western Dortmund Germany. The attack by the 75th Infantry Division continued through April 9-10, 1945 with the 2nd Battalion advancing south to capture Oespel and Dorney Germany with light enemy opposition to their regimental objective which was ultimately the Ruhr River.
Searching the Arolen archives online, I found 225 Forced Laborers listed as being in Dortnund-Oespel. The first was named Marta Albert born Butschgau. She was 55 years old in 1945 and was born in Belgium. I was left wondering if she survived the war and returned to Belgium.
The Oespel coal mine was in operation in 1945 and this is possibly where Marta would have been forced to work. The mine had up to one thousand nine hundred and twenty workers in the underground shafts and in the sorting area. The Oespel coal mine was one of four mines in the village of Oespel.
Stalag VI-D POW camp was in Dortmund Germany. Over 70,000 prisoners-of-war were imprisoned here in World War II. The camp was closed in March of 1945, one month before my father’s unit was fighting to take Dortmund. Prisoners in the camp were primarily from Poland, Belgium, France, Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union and Italy. The POWs were forced to perform labor in armaments and industrial plants, in mines and in private and municipal enterprises under inhumane conditions. Several thousand of the POWs died from chronic illness, malnutrition and Allied bomb attacks. There were no air raid shelters for the POWs.
From September 1, 1939, Oespel suffered from Allied bombing raids, direct casualties, and soldiers killed in action during World War II.
On June 4, 1941 there was a low-level air raid that claimed ten lives. Residents sought refuge in the air-raid shelter at the Oespel 3 mine. Forced laborers were not granted shelter in the mines although they were forced to work there.
On March 23, 1944, an American B-17 bomber with a crew of ten, was shot down by an anti-aircraft gun stationed at Dorney Germany. The plane crashed on the spoil heap of the Oespel 3 mine and landed in two gardens in Heuerlingsweg Germany, just south or Oespel.
On December 1 and 12, 1944, the Protestant church, parsonage, community center, and the school were severely damaged in air raids.
On April 10, 1945, after a heavy artillery duel, American troops, including the 75th Infantry Division captured Oespel and Kley and looted valuables. My father, 1st Lieutenant Arthur Thorspecken was leading C-Company during the capture of Oespel Germany and the surrounding area.
On April 13, 1945, with the end of World War II close at hand, the Allies began efforts to repatriate foreign forced laborers from the coal mines. Once liberated, forced laborers became known as displaced persons. Rebuilding lives torn apart by war was a task above an beyond what any soldier could accomplish.
On June 7, 1945, the Americans withdraw from Oespel Germany. The British took over the occupation, and Oespel citizens were transferred to Allied prisoner-of-war camps.
As Allied troops along with my father, 1st Lieutenant Arthur Thorspecken who was leading C-Company of the 1st Battalion of the 75th Infantry Division, were attacking Dortmund Germany and moving south, the German Gestapo were looking to hide atrocities before they retreated.
Hundreds of thousands of forced laborers were exploited in the armament factories and coal mines around the Ruhr River during the Second Word War. An estimated 30,000 forced laborers were deployed in Dortmund during the Second World War. They were accommodated in about 300 camps, one of those being a branch of the Buchenwald concentration camp.
In Dortmund Germany, I searched for an old building that might have stood back in 1945. The Altes Stadhaus was hosting a wedding when I stopped to sketch. People were gathered outside at the entrance to the building despite the intermittent rain. A woman released a metallic helium balloon and people cheered as the balloon floated up to the grey sky. I hunched over my drawing trying to block the rain before the page became a liquid mess. Saint Reynolds Church could be seen down the street.
On April 12, 1945, the 95th Infantry Division attacked attacked Dortmund from the southeast and liberating the central and southern part of the city. Edward D. Snell, in F-Company, 2nd Battalion, 378th Regiment, said he couldn’t believe how much of the city was destroyed by years of bombing. There was nothing left of the center municipality of Dortmund, it was completely gutted.
I knew of several photos of the partially destroyed Saint Reynold’s Church in Dortmund Germany after the Allies had captured the city in April of 1945. I found the exact location where one of the 1945 photos was taken but I would have been run over if I sketched from that spot. I decided to sketch from the next street over which was more pedestrian.
Saint Raymond’s is the oldest church in Dortmund. St. Reinold’s was built from 1250 to 1270, and is located in the center of the city, The church was heavily damaged in World War II.
A dawn attack on April 8, 1945 resulted in the 75th Infantry Division capturing Kirchlinde and Marten Germany, cutting the rail lines leading into Dortmund, thus effectively isolating the city from the west. Marten is a district in western Dortmund, Germany, It is directly south of Kirchlinde.
The 75th Infantry Division freed thousands of Forced Laborers from Nazi Camps. Once freed, the laborers became known as displaced persons and it fell on the 75th Infantry Division to feed and care for them. If they fed the starving inmates too fast they would die. They then needed to send the displaced persons back east where they had been abducted and sent to German forced labor camps. The problem is that the displaced persons would be seen as traitors once they were sent back to Russia or Poland. Many would face certain death back east, or they would be treated as pariahs for the rest of their lives.
Frohlinde means Joyful in German. The plague cross, known locally as the Bookenkreuz, dates back to the time of the Thirty Years’ War, when the plague raged (1618 and 1648). The farming communities of Frohlind95h e, Obercastrop, and Rauxel, as well as other surrounding villages, erected plague crosses and obligated themselves to hold annual processions to these crosses and distribute alms, bread, money, and other donations to the local poor.
The overall objective of General Ray Porter’s 9th Army Group was to drive east after crossing the Rhine River, and then attack south to defeat the estimated 370,000 German defenders trapped in the Ruhr Pocket. Dortmund Germany was the largest industrial City in the area of attack and Frolinde was on the north West outskirts of Dortmund.
Near each coal mining town in Germany there is a halde which means dump in German. These man made mountains are built up from all the stone that comes to the surface that is not coal. It was extremely windy up there. I had a great overview of Castrop-Rauxel and the Erin Shaft 7. On the distant hill, Erin Shaft 3 can be seen along with several wind turbines. Clean energy is slowly replacing dirty carbon energy.
Lieutenant Allen and several other soldiers were separated from the Company and found themselves behind enemy lines. They made their way back towards the road block. Along the way they found two wounded men. It was difficult to get to the men since enemy automatic weapons fire would blast in all directions any time they got close. On the second attempt the wounded men were recovered. They managed to get the wounded men through a basement window of a German duplex.
On April 7, 1945, the 291st Infantry of the 75th Infantry Division faced increasing fire from snipers and 120mm mortars. I have come to the conclusion that my father’s 290th Infantry Division didn’t enter Castrop-Rauxel because they were busy liberating the towns of Frohlinde and Kirchlinde Germany. The battle faced by the 291st Infantry is however right in line with what my father, 1st Lieutenant Arthur Thorspecken might have faced in the Ruhr.
Erin Shaft 7 is located right outside of downtown Castrop-Rauxel Germany. Next to this are several new office buildings that have a very modern steel beam grid on the facades that blend well with the industrial look of the mine. The Erin Schacht shaft was sink in 1951, so it is a post World War II coal mine shaft. 68-meter-high Dörnen-type head frame became a landmark of Castrop-Rauxel and was preserved as an industrial monument after the mine’s closure in 1983.
The 291st Infantry Division attack on Castrop-Rauxel Germany resumed on April 7, 1945. Two squads of the 1st Platoon of G-Company rode into Castrop on two lead tanks, followed by a tank destroyer. The two other tanks found positions on the outskirts of town and supported the attack with fire. Machine guns were set up in the upper stories of two houses to support the attack.
C-Company continued to move into town from the left killing Germans who were trying to escape. About 15 Germans ran towards the woods on the opposite side of town and they were in the sights of one of the machine gunners. He didn’t fire because he wasn’t sure if they were Americans or Germans.