March 26, 1945: Gahlen Germany

Posted on by Thor

After crossing the Rhine River, and expanding the bridgehead on the opposite side of the river, American forces  including the 75th Infantry Division, crossed the Lippe Canal around March 30th, leading to rapid advances eastwards as German defenses crumbled.

Gahlen Germany is between Hünxe and Dorsten Germany on the Lippe Canal. My father 1st Lieutenant Arthur Thorspecken advanced with his C-Company, in the 75th Infantry Division through this small hamlet. German troops were offering stiff resistance to slow the advance into Dorsten.

On the push to Dorsten, , the Americans encountered resistance from the remnants of German 116th Panzer-Division and 15th Panzer Grenadier-Division. The US troops of XVICorps, including the 75th Infantry Division, the 30th Infantry Division and 8th Armored Division forced the units of German 116th Panzer-Division to withdraw to Gahlen, east of Hünxe, on March 26, 1945.

On March 27, 1945 the bridgehead on the opposite side of the Rhine River had been expanded and the crossing site sectors had been united. This site became a safe zone where command posts could plan the advance into Germany and supplies could be moved east for the advancing army.

Gahlen was heavily bombed and suffered greatly from the heavy fighting at the end of March 1945. An air raid siren sounded and all the residents of Gahlen rushed to bomb shelters. School children ran from their school to join their parents in the shelters.

While I was sketching, school children were wandering the street in groups. I think they were searching for items in a scavenger hunt. There was plenty of laughter as they searched. One boy shouted for joy when he found me sketching. I don’t know everything he said. But I said “Danke” and gave him a thumbs up. He shouted to his teacher to take a look. At another moment, a little girl and her mom wanted to see what I was doing. The little girl said something in German and I said “Danke.” As she was leaning forward, she dropped a small glass bead into my art bag by mistake. She was afraid to take it out. I reached in and found it and gave it back. Her mom smiled, and they walked away, happy to have seen an artist at work.

In 1945 the residents of a Gahlen huddled in the dark listening to the explosions above. Then it grew quiet. The air raid siren cut off and people slowly emerged from their shelter. Many of the children wandered back to school. They found an UXB (unexploded American artillery shell) stuck in the ground in front of the school. Curious, the children slowly got closer to see the dud. It glinted in the sun. One student backed away and then ran. At that moment, the shell blew up killing several of the children.

Frederichfeld Cemetery

Posted on by Thor

The Friedrichfeld Cemetery in Hunxe Germany was one of the creepiest places I sketched. In front of the monument I drew was a field of tiny headstones lying in the grass all  of which were for children who were less than 1 year old. I didn’t know the story behind these children until I got home and did some research.

In World War I Frederichfeld was the site of a prisoner of war camp run by the Germans. What I sketched was a memorial for the 246 French prisoners who died in the War of 1870–71. In 1916 a memorial was erected for the prisoners of war from the German Frederichfeld POW camp. French, British, Italian, Russian, Spanish Serbian, and Portuguese prisoners who died in the camp were all buried here. Memorial plaques in the cemetery were mutilated by vandals. One plaque said, “To their comrades who, after fighting bravely, lie in exile, their comrades erected this memorial with the greatest reverence, in remembrance in the year 1916.”

During World War II all the forced laborers from the present day city of Voerde Germany were buried in the cemetery. Men and women were forced to work in the armaments industry in Krupp and Essen Germany. The forced laborers camp was build in Voerde in 1944. Most were from the Ukraine and were buried here. There are 99 graves for  children who died in the Camp. They died mainly of malnutrition and infectious diseases in the winter of 1944-45.

The Voerde camp served as a collection center for babies born to Eastern European (primarily Polish and Soviet) forced laborers employed in the German war industry. German pure blood doctrine considered Soviets and Polish to be inferior races. The camp was designed  to ensure the children of “racially inferior” forced laborers would not survive, reconciling the Nazi need for labor with their goals of racial cleansing. The makeshift nurseries guaranteed the infants’ death if “race experts” determined the child was not capable of “Germanization”.  Some women tried to sneak into the camp to steel back their children. An unsuccessful attempt would mean certain death. It would be a rare miracle for a mother and her baby to be reunited.

Women in Nazi forced laborer camps were also systematically subjected to forced sterilization, both as part of the broader eugenics program and through brutal medical experimentation.

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Tor to the Rhine

Posted on by Thor

In Orsoy Germany just south of Rhineberg Germany, I was walking back from sketching the ferry across the Rhine  River and decided to sketch the city gate. Orsoy used to be a walled in medieval fortress town. This gate or Tor in German faces west towards the Rhine. Steel doors have been added which can be shut if the river floods and gets to the city gate, or Tor in German.

My Air B&B host told me that the other gates to the city had to be demolished by the American troops because the American Sherman tanks could not fit through them.  This gate is larger than the rest and therefore survived the war. By March 31, 1945 there were 3 Treadway Bridges, 2 Bailey Bridges and a Heavy Pontoon Bridge built across the Rhine. No bridge was build at Orsoy, so I don’t think the 75th Infantry would have crossed there. I also know that the 75th crossed before the first of the bridges was built, they went across with landing craft.

The 79th Infantry Division likely did cross the Rhine on a treadway bridge north or Orsoy Germany  as they invaded Dinslaken Germany. A  Treadway Bridge was built by the 17th Armored Engineer Battalion, The M2 Steel Treadway Bridge, is a modular floating bridge system used by the U.S. Army to cross rivers with heavy vehicles, . had over 1152 feet of  steel runway treads and 93 pneumatic floats. The project required just six hours and fifteen minutes to complete, setting a record for the size of the bridge. The Treadway Bridge was the fasted to build. The Bailey Bridges built were much sturdier.

Regardless of the bridge crossing sites, I believe the 75th Infantry Division, C-Company, lead by my father 1st Lieutenant Arthur Thorspecken  would have crossed much further to the north. They would have crossed just south of Wesel Germany and then crossed the Lippe Canal to clear the area between the Canal and the Lippe River. I thought the canal locks likely were used to make their way north across the canal, but the German military destroyed bridges over the Lippe Canal near places like Hunxe as Allied forces pushed into Germany in 1944 and 1945. It only makes sense for the 75th Infantry to cross the Rhine right where the Lippe Canal and the Lippe River empty onto the Rhine. That small strip of land they would mean they crossed at or just south of Buderich Germany. So you can see that knowing exact;y where the troops were is a bit of a guessing game, but new facts help to zone in on the truth.