Lawrence was site of POW camp / LJWorld.com

Archive for Monday, October 16, 2006

October 16, 2006

In the spring of 1945, some newcomers to Lawrence caused a great deal of excitement.

On April 30, more than 100 German prisoners of war were trucked in from Fort Riley to a recently built prison camp on the northeast corner of 11th Street and Haskell Avenue.

Erminia Gauna, who was in grade school at the time, lived with her family only a short distance away. They saw the trucks bring the prisoners to the camp and later often saw the POWs being taken by truck to various job sites in the area.

"At first my parents were concerned about the camp being so close," Gauna said. "But they seemed friendly. They would just go by and wave at you. Sometimes mom would say, 'Get away from the windows,' but we always liked to watch them go by."

Construction on the Lawrence camp began in February 1945, when the area was facing a labor shortage because of the war. Four area businesses - the W.J. Small Co. Inc. of Neodesha, Cerophy Laboratories Inc. of Kansas City, Mo., Kaw Valley Potato Growers of Lawrence and Columbus Foods Corp. of Lawrence - teamed to bring in extra help.

The Small Co. entered an agreement with the U.S. Army to establish a POW camp in Lawrence. The prisoners would be used to help the Potato Growers and Columbus Foods. On March 30, 1945, about a dozen POWs arrived to help build the camp.

The camp consisted of three buildings used for a mess hall, toilets and laundry, and guard quarters. The prisoners were housed in six tents with wooden floorboards. The camp was surrounded by barbed-wire fences.

Employers were responsible for transporting the prisoners to and from work. According to letters on file at Watkins Community Museum of History, 1047 Mass., the prisoners often were commended for their hard work.

In addition to helping several area farmers, they helped build Danforth Chapel and part of the power plant on the Kansas University campus.

There were about 371,000 German POWs held in more than 500 camps in the U.S., including 15 in Kansas, which was sometimes referred to as "Stalag Sunflower." The Lawrence camp closed in November 1945.

"They were there so long, we forgot they were there most of the time," Gauna said.

Watkins also has a letter from a former POW who later wrote from Germany when he heard about a special exhibit the museum had in 1995. He commended the local community for being good to him and his fellow POWs.

"With this letter I want to express my thanks to all the Americans who were kind to us, who didn't treat us as enemies or Nazi criminals but as human beings," wrote Willi O. Jager.

Discussion

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16 October 2006
at 7:34 a.m.

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blue73harley (Anonymous) says…

Remnants of the buildings could still be seen at this site until somtime in the'80s. I wish I would have taken some pictures.
16 October 2006
at 9:06 a.m.

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roger_o_thornhill (Anonymous) says…

Plus, wasn't the war w/Germany over in June of '45? I guess they needed to keep the labor until after the harvest.
16 October 2006
at 9:26 a.m.

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heysoos (Anonymous) says…

This comment was removed by the site staff for violation of the usage agreement.
16 October 2006
at 10:05 a.m.

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heysoos (Anonymous) says…

Weak.

Marion turns an interesting historical story into something political.
16 October 2006
at 10:12 a.m.

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nomorebobsplease (Anonymous) says…

my sibilings and I discovered this camp in the 70's (our grandmother lived nearby). She told us it was a German prison camp. We used to play in the buildings. I, too, wish I had photographed them before they were removed. I also remember being regarded with disbelief when I mentioned there was a prison camp in Lawrence.
16 October 2006
at 10:24 a.m.

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jrlii (Anonymous) says…

As I understand it, POW labor was strictly voluntary and was paid.

IIRC (according to Don Benz, wwii pow) in Japanese POW camps, labor beyond the gates was not only voluntary and paid, but considered a significant privilege.
16 October 2006
at 10:48 a.m.

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LHS76 (Anonymous) says…

One word… Reparations! Get Jesse Jackson on it.

16 October 2006
at 5:57 p.m.

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jg (Anonymous) says…

My Dad always talked about how the prisoners at Concordia got out to work on the farms, and at the end of the war, many of them “escaped” (were allowed to walk away) instead of going back to Germany. Some stayed in the area.
16 October 2006
at 6:36 p.m.

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crazyks (Anonymous) says…

There were a lot of places back then that had German POW camps. Ottawa was one of them, too. I've heard all the stories about it, though I don't recall where it was located.

Being of German descent, I was always of two minds about this. My family had been in this country for about 40 years at the beginning of WWI, and about 60 years when WWII happened.

Because of the government's need to dehumanize the enemy, my family experienced discrimination during both wars. But at least these POW camps were just for German soldiers, not anyone who was of German descent.

One of my favorite movies is “The Summer of My German Soldier”, which was about a prisoner in one of the POW camps.
16 October 2006
at 8:03 p.m.

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bearded_gnome (Anonymous) says…

victory in europe, against the germans occurred in the first few days of may, 1945. however, ending such a war didn't mean it was like ending a football game! much was left to do to set up new governments in the two germanies, and the occupied zones. so, prisoners were returning to germany as late as fall 1946 from u.s. and british camps. in britain, german pows also assisted in food/ag work.

and, by the way, none of the german POW's got habias corpus either.