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. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ★ c h a p t e r t h i r t e e n ★ ........................................................... victory, russian camaraderie, and a visit home On May 7, 1945, the Germans signed an unconditional surrender with all hostilities ordered to cease by midnight, May 8. Twenty-five months earlier, Gavin had written his first wartime letter to Barbara, happy to hear that she was going to use her allowance to buy a war bond, thereby helping to end the war and hopefully bring the soldiers home soon. His daughter had done her part on the home front while he had done his part fighting overseas. Though happy, with the difficulty of giving ‘‘full expression to one’s feelings while in uniform in command,’’ Gavin didn’t know whether he should ‘‘cry or cheer or just simply get drunk’’ in celebration.1 One thing was certain: Gavin had repaid West Point—his ‘‘Spartan mother.’’ He had accepted and met the Academy’s ‘‘challenge ‘to move toward the sound of the guns,’ to go where danger was greatest, for there is where issues would be resolved and decisions made.’’2 Though the fighting was over, the full horror of the war came to bear on the Division’s troopers when shortly after their arrival in Ludwigslust they discovered a concentration camp nearby. Recently built to hold political prisoners moved west away from the advancing Russians, it held ‘‘4,000 men . . . forced to live like animals.’’ Rather than share the town’s food reserves, the mayor and the town’s citizens had allowed the victims of Nazi oppression to starve, ‘‘deprived even of the food you would give to your dogs.’’ Those who perished were left in the camp, unburied. Gavin declared Ludwigslust’s town square their cemetery —ordering the town’s most prominent citizens to dig the graves, remove the bodies from the camp and bury them. The Division’s Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish chaplains jointly conducted the burial service, committing the dead ‘‘into the hands of our Heavenly Father in the hope that the world will not again be faced with such barbarity.’’3 Ordered to file past the graves, with their markers of wooden crosses or Stars of David, many of the town’s citizens wept, insisting that they had been unaware of the nearby horror. ★ ★ ★ May 7, 1945 Dear Babe, These have been busy days. Today is V/E [Victory in Europe] Day in the States I guess. Yesterday I received word of the unconditional surrender of the remaining germans. It had been expected daily. Well, I hope that everyone celebrates to their heart’s content, there could hardly be a better occasion. Our days have been rather filled. Two days ago we discovered that we had a concentration camp of our own. By now you have probably heard about it through the press. It is about four miles from my Command Post. Probably the less said about it the better. The enclosed [burial address by Division Chaplain George B. Wood] covers it all rather well. Our continued exchange of visits with the Russians proves to be our most exacting occupation. The day before yesterday I had a delightful meeting with the commanding general of the 5th Guards Cossack Division . He presented me with a lovely silver plaque inscribed with the date and place of the meeting as well as the name of his division. That called for another toast to the spirit of ‘‘the Cossack cavalry.’’ That called for another from them to the spirit of ‘‘the American paratrooper.’’ Two essentials are always to our President and Marshal Stalin and to our continued association in combat and out. By the time we get around to toasting ‘‘The Jeep’’ (they think that the jeep is a wonderful thing), it is time to take down the shutters and take the guests home. Our toasts are straight scotch whiskey in sizeable glasses, theirs are the same in vodka. Very rugged affairs. But I believe that we think that they are fine people, and by now we fully appreciate why they do to the germans what they do. At the moment we are up to our ears in german prisoners and slaves (more euphemistically, displaced persons). Goodness knows when anyone will get to go home. We’ve got lots of work to do yet. The Division fought wonderfully well in the final two weeks, they got in some very good and effective licks. I’ll be seeing you. Love to everyone, Pappy 178 : The...

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