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| This post is dedicated to the survivors of Dachau Concentration Camp (link ), as Halsey will discuss in the letter, and the work done by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum to keep the memory alive (link) |
Dear Readers,
I believe this letter was written on May 13, 1946, but it is rather hard to tell with the cross-outs. I have tried to share notes on the days they were written (73 years ago). But exceptions must be made as done previously in my "Dear Folks" post, this post, and probably more in the future. As I along with my older sister's family and aunt will be off on a cruise, I wanted to share this letter with you now instead of waiting.
Halsey is back in Munich, Germany and though on the first page he writes "I don't have a lot to say this is the longest letter I have transcribed for him (7 pages). There is a sad portrayal of German citizens scavaging through trash just to sale on the black market and description of the Dachau Concentration Camp he visits. This part gripped me the most to think about not only him seeing it, but the horrors that came from the reality of WWII, and I couldn't help what his parents outside of Liberal, KS thought of all he was writing. After describing the concentration camp, he goes on to talk about farming,
In this letter, there are a few parts that are crossed out, but I could still read them, so I have included them, but they will look like
Thanks to all my readers who helped me transcribe the words that caused me problems.
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| Picture of the crossed out date- and yes you can almost see my desk through the thin paper. |
Munich G
11 PM
M [cross out] 13, 1946
Dear Folks,
packages*
I just received 3 boxes from the states 2 from Norma containing 4 rolls of film, candy, also a coffee can with chocolate flavored cookies.
My little radio is playing pipe organ music (Bob Mitchell^ at the Consol) while I write. Its quite a lot of enjoyment to me.
I don't have a lot to you in a letter at this time of night. But today I took a truck and hitched onto a trailer load of old grocery boxes and garbage and was to take then to the junk yard and when I got there. There must have been about 75 or 100 German children hunting around in the tin cans etc.for what they could find and when my truck pulled in the people came running
{2}
toward me like a group of hungry cattle. I stopped and left my truck about fifty feet. I really didn't know what it was all about. I was unarmed, but I picked up a heavy 2x2, the people were only after what the could find in the rubish they jumped into old trailer men women and all and began to dig + throw trash out. It was the first time in my whole life I ever saw people act like that. These people didn't appear to be dirty but are just salvaging what they can and are selling in through the black market + trading it. I took a photograph* of that sight which I'll send as soon as I get it developed.
Last Sunday a boy + I took the truck and drove to Dauchau^ about 15 miles out of Munich
{3}
There is an old concentration camp, and there we are keeping P.Ws, and it was formerly during the war used as the Germans used it as their prison camp and crematorium there is enough billets there to house about several thousand but the sad part of it was the place for cremation. I took some pictures of this I will send to you. It was a place with a cement wall about 8 feet high which was enclosed about 1/2 square block. There was a place where they shot their prisoners also a large building with a room where half shot prisioners were pushed into. The walls were dirty from blood and I could see where the half shot prisioners had scratched the walls with finger nails. The next room was a large room with
{4}
several large brick furnaces with a sliding tray which the Germans would place a person then push him into the fire. From the storys that some fellows tell me here the prisoners would work for several hours pushing others into the fire then they would be placed on the tray and go through the same. I was told by an officer who was in some in some the raids around Munich that the Germans
made about 280,000 go through this. There was also about a large chamber where they would put some prisoners go to take a shower so they could clean up then when they would get in they would turn the gas on them + kill them. With in this are they also had a pen where
{5}
they kept a lot of large hungry dogs. If a man escaped or didn't perform his duties as he was ordered they would brutally treat him then through throw him over to those hungry dogs. Some of the boys in my outfit saw part of this also see some pictures of bones etc. Seeing this and hearing the story. It puts blood into my bones + makes one feel like he'd like to ____ _____ ___ _________ ______ any German he sees. But [cross out] well maybe they were forced the same as I am to do what I am, but I'm beginning to understand enough German [cross out] I can tell when a German is talking good to my back or not.
{6}
These Germans look like very ordinary people but I never saw any thing that looked like any more like a Democrat
Ha*
Papa you asked me if farms were very big I don't know how big they are I've never been able to talk to a farmer. They don't go for live stock here and they don't have fences around places but it seems to me that grow in styles about 5 or 10 rod wide + 20 rod long. I'm going to try to get some pictures from the air so I can explain them to you. I've never see but one tractor working in the field but I have seen several oxen + horses working. One who never has been here would expect to see one thing but would see another.
{7}
People don't live on farms so much but in small communities or small towns then go out to farm garden plot. I don't know what the people expect to live on I don't see any large acreage of anything.
It's now twelve o'clock.
So will sign off,
Your son
Halsey
You might make this {a} R.R.
{Reverse side}
Please send
R.R. then to
720 N. Wash ^
{Reverse side}
Please send
R.R. then to
720 N. Wash ^
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| Pic of Munich in 1946 vs. 2017 link |
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| Bob Mitchell- link |
*- If I come across any photos from Halsey, I will post them, but thus far I have not found any.
^- Dachau Concentration Camp- was the first of the Nazi concentration camps opened in 1933, intended to hold political prisoners. It is located on the grounds of an abandoned munitions factory northeast of the medieval town of Dachau, about 16 km (10 mi) northwest of Munich in the state of Bavaria, in southern Germany. Opened by Heinrich Himmler, its purpose was enlarged to include forced labor, and eventually, the imprisonment of Jews, German and Austrian criminals, and ultimately foreign nationals from countries that Germany occupied or invaded. The Dachau camp system grew to include nearly 100 sub-camps, which were mostly work camps or Arbeitskommandos and were located throughout southern Germany and Austria. The camps were liberated by U.S. forces on 29 April 1945. (Wikipedia)
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| Survivors of the Dachau concentration camp demonstrate the operation of the crematorium by pushing a corpse into one of the ovens.- Link |
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| Polish prisoners in Dachau toast their liberation from the camp.- Link | . |
*- This "Ha" is written off to the side and not in cursive (which Halsey wrote this letter in), so I imagine it was added by the reader.
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| Don't worry I didn't mark this letter up, added this line on my phone |
Rural Route- is mail delivery in a rural area. The Condit family lived on a farm outside of Liberal, Kansas however a letter sent earlier that year (pic below) was addressed to 720 N Washington, but then was sent on to the farm or even sent around for others to read, as was common, and Halsey has responded in past letters of his parents sharing his letters with the newspaper. As I am still learning more and more about Halsey, Liberal, KS and the lingo of 1946 I will see if this appears again. I did try to Google Map "720 N. Washington" (link) I could find much, so I am still in the dark.
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| Envelope from February 5, 1946 |
