In Kirchlinde Germany, I decided to sketch the Zeche Zollern I/III coal mine which was functioning to fuel the German war machine in 1945. It was closed and empty when I sketched it. Many of the windows were broken. I sat in a German grocery store parking lot to get the sketch. A cemetery was across the street behind me.
Kirchlinde Germany and the surrounding communities north west of Dortmund were critical for final Allied combat operations in the Western Theater of WWII from April 7th to 10th, 1945. It was hit hard by 75th Infantry Division artillery essentially flattening the city. The 290th Infantry Division captured the city and cleared it. My father, 1st Lieutenant Arthur Thorspecken was leading C-Company in the 75th Infantry Division during the attack. My father lost 12 men under his command in the attack on Dortmund. Around April 7-10, 1945, US forces faced, among others, the German 2nd Parachute Division, which conducted counterattacks in the area.
Kirchlinde (a western district of Dortmund, Germany) was the site of intense fighting during the final stages of the Ruhr Pocket battle. American forces, including field artillery units, encountered enemy machine gun fire in the area, resulting in casualties while pushing through the region. Forward Allied observation units directed the Allied artillery fire.
The Zeche Zollern Mine founded in 1873, used forced labor from Russia and Poland as well as Allied Prisoners of War. Forced laborers were starved and literally worked to death. During World War II, the German war economy, including the mining industry, relied heavily on forced labor to replace conscripted German soldiers. By 1944, over 40% of the Ruhr mining workforce consisted of forced laborers, totaling around 163,000 people.
Over 12 million people were brought to Germany as forced laborers in the course of World War II. In the summer of 1944 alone, in addition to six million civilian laborers, two million prisoners of war and over half a million concentration camp prisoners were forced to work in the German Reich. Many were forced into the depths of the earth to mine coal to fuel the German war effort.
Also in the occupied territories, millions of men, women and children were forced to work for the enemy. It was the forced laborers who kept the agricultural supply and arms production going. The industry profited from the expansion of production. German employees advanced to supervisor positions, until the 75th Infantry Division captured the mine and liberated the forced laborers. All these displaced persons became a logistical nightmare to feed and house.
Other C-Company soldiers who died on the approach to Dortmund Germany…
John Romero (Private First Class), From Las Animas County, Colorado died in the Dortmund area.
Harold E. Rosen (Private First Class), Died near Dortmund Germany.
Richard C. Ruggles (Private), From Orleans County, New York died April 7, 1945 in the Dortmund Germany area.
John R. Sockich (Private First Class), From Riverside County, California died in the Dortmund area.
On On January 24, 2026, Alex Jeffrey Pretti, a 37-year-old American intensive care nurse for the United States Department of Veterans Affairs, was executed by multiple masked ICE agents in Minneapolis Minnesota USA. I was in Europe documenting the final stages of America defeating the Nazi fascist regime, but Nazism seems very much in force in America with brutal misconduct of ICE agents on the streets of my fatherland.
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.
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.
Castrop-Rauxel was an important Coal mining town North West of Dortmnd Germany. Castrop-Rauxel is near the Rhine-Herne Canal, in the eastern part of the Ruhr industrial district. The 75th Infantry Division, which included my father 1st Lieutenant Arthur Thorspecken’s C-Company would have entered the city on April 6, 1945.
My father 1st Lieutenant Arthur Thorspecken was approaching Dortmund with his C-Company in the 75th Infantry Division. They were clearing the approaches to Dortmund which was being heavily defended. Casualties were high.
Despite the Allied bombing campaign which leveled 66% of Dortmund’s homes and 98% of the inner city. Workers kept rebuilding the factories. It therefore made perfect sense that Dortmund would not surrender easily. Even after a heavy bombing raid on March 6, 1945, it become clear that the soldiers in Dortmund was determined to fight to the bitter end. Dortmund and the surrounding towns suffered immense destruction from Allied bombing. Unexploded bomb ordnance, especially near sites like the stadium, remain to this day.
Bodelschwingh is just a 7 minute drive south of Mengede, on the North West outskirts of Dortmund Germany. My father, 1st Lieutenant Arthur Thorspecken was leading C-Company in the 1st Platoon of the 75th Infantry Division. Their goal was to secure and cut off the western approaches to the city of Dortmund.
By May 1939, only 1.444 Jews remained in Dortmund. Some escaped Germany shortly after the start of WWII, leaving only 1,222 Jewish Dortmund residents by June 1940. They were not allowed to use public facilities such as bomb shelters or use radios or televisions. Eventually the Jews were confined to “Jewish Houses”. This made it easy for the Nazis when they began the Final Solution.
I thought that the villages in the Ruhr Pocket of Germany would all be industrial wastelands. I was quite mistaken. Mengede is the picture-perfect German village. German architecture is famous for its timber beams, primarily in the traditional Fachwerk (half-timbered) style, using exposed oak beams forming geometric patterns with infill of plaster, creating iconic, fairy tale-like buildings.
I have to wonder where church leadership stood on the question of the final solution. Generally, the leadership of both Protestant and Catholic churches in Germany adopted a cautious approach, during World War II. They often tried to compromise with the Nazi state or avoided confrontation to prevent internal division or antagonizing authorities. Historically the German Evangelical Church viewed itself as one of the pillars of German culture and society, with a theologically grounded tradition of loyalty to the state.
Lünen is just a half hour drive north of Dortmund Germany. My father, 1st Leutenant Arthur Thorspecken in the 75th Infantry Division would have passed just west of this village as the 75th pushed south towards Dortmund.
The majority of forced laborers were Poles, Slavs, and Soviet prisoners of war, who faced brutal and discriminatory treatment, including inadequate rations, poor sanitation, and constant surveillance. These individuals were forced to work in key war-related industries, such as coal mines (Lünen is in the heart of the Ruhr coal-mining region), steel plants, chemical plants, and armament factories.
From April 5 to April 15, 1945, Bambauer Germany was a command post for the 75th Infantry Division. The troops got some much needed rest and relaxation. After the 75th Infantry Division crossed the Dortmund-Ems Canal they held a line from the Zweg Canal just south of Ickern to Brambauer Germany.
The original Martin Luther Church was was a neo-Renaissance style church built between 1904 and 1906. It was largely destroyed during World War II. Only the tower stood at the end of the war. During the Nazi period, the broader German Protestant church was divided between the “German Christians” movement, which aligned with Nazi ideology and antisemitism, and the “Confessing Church”, which resisted state control. Pastor Karl Friedrich Stellbrink, a member of the Confessing Church preached in Lübeck until his arrest and murder by the Nazi regime.
n Ickern Germany I decided to sketch former coal miner’s homes. This was the week leading up to Halloween, and I was surprised that Germans celebrate the holiday very much the way we do in America, with commercial inflatables and plastic spiders. The addition of a human wrapped up and hanging upside down was new to me.
The XVICorps which included the 75th Infantry Division, attacked to the south to the Ruhr River from its position north o f the Lippe Canal. Troops moved across the Dortmund-Ems Canal which ran parallel to the Rhine River to the west. German opposition consisted of the 116th Panzer Division, composed of the 116th Panzer Grenadier Regiment and the 116th Panzer Reconnaissance Battalion, as well as reported elements of the 180th Division and none other miscellaneous units.