Alfons Landwehr
Jason Koke
Mr. Thomas
U.S. History, Period 3
23 April 2006
Personal Interview of Alfons Landwehr
Alfons Landwehr is my grandfather who served time in the military of Germany. As a boy, he was enrolled in the Hitler Youth through his school. When he was older, he was served his mandatory period in the army, but he ended up being forced to serve until the war ended in 1945.
Q: What was life like as a child when Hitler came to power?
A: When Hitler came to power life was pretty much the same in our little town. Many people did not have work at that time. When Hitler came to power, many new projects came up like building new buildings. What gave Hitler the chance to get started was mainly because people had been poor ever since World War I, and it was pretty rough time from 1918 to the early 1930s. People were al of a sudden given work and money. This was a big factor in that Hitler came to power. Because he did so many good things, people were impressed, and they overlooked the negative parts. As far as my family was concerned, we were a big family in a small town.
Q: Were you, in any way, involved in the Hitler Youth?
A: Yes I was. Practically no boy was not in the Hitler Youth at that time with maybe a few exceptions. In 1934, our teacher was a leader in the Hitler Youth and the entire class was involved. No one really questioned it, and that was just the thing to do at that time. Many people went from Boy Scouts to the Hitler Youth. I wasn’t very eager to study at that time, but I was still pretty bright, so my teacher selected me and another boy to be group leaders of 20 or 30 boys. We would march and we would have our bugle corp. and this was a big thing for us. We would get to march down the street with our bugle corp., and we thought we were big cheese then. My parents my have thought I was too active in this or maybe they just didn’t like the teacher. One night we had some Dominicans over, and they talked to my parents. Later that night, my brother woke me up and asked me if I wanted to go to the Dominican school which was a very good school. Anyhow, I was half awake and I said yes and went back to sleep. The next morning, my mother packed up some things, and by that afternoon I was on a train to the school where I stayed for the next few years. And even in the Dominican school, everyone was enrolled in the Hitler Youth. They were told that they had to be or else the school would be closed. They had to participate in the events of the Hitler Youth. Eventually, the Nazis removed all of crosses from the school, and we lived in an area that was 99% Catholic. This angered the people and the teachers, so our school did not march in a demonstration of loyalty to the Nazis. Our whole group was then expelled from the Hitler Youth.
Q: How did you get involved with the military?
A: After graduation from high school, the Nazis gradually built up the army. Germany was not supposed to have any military power at that time, but Hitler didn’t care about this, and he built up the army. Everyone was obligated to serve sic months in a pre-military group where we would learn to shoot and march. Our main object though was to work in areas where some special projects were needed. In our case, we were working to build a canal to improve the drainage of an area. Anyhow, for six months, you were supposed to enter after your graduation, and I entered after my graduation in 1939. During that time, the war with Poland started and lasted for only seven or eight days, and things were very hectic. Our time in this pre-military unit was prolonged. In November, I was discharged so they could use people like me that had graduated later. At that time, I wanted to go to medical school, but my dad said that we couldn’t afford it, and I had one semester of being a teacher. Then, in August of 1940, I was called back into the army, and then stayed until the end of the war. I was soon put in an infantry unit and moved to an area called East Prussia. It was kind of anticipated that a war would begin with Russia. We eventually marched across the Russian border and initially there was very little resistance. We went up to the area right near St. Petersburg, and that’s where we were stopped
Q: How did you feel when you were called into the army?
A: As a young person, you didn’t think very much of it. Everyone had to do it, you didn’t have any choice, and it was part of a time when everyone had to do something for their country, the Father Land. You really did not know the things that were going on outside Germany. Everything that we were doing was right, and everything France and America was wrong. There was no way to listen to the radio or read a paper that said anything negative about what was being done in Germany. We felt that we were just defending ourselves against the entire world. Unfortunately, it was very successful in winning some battles. We did not think much about this. As a young person, you really wanted to do your best to help the Father Land.
Q: Did you ever have any injuries in the war?
A: Yes, in early 1942, I was sent back to Germany to go to officer school because they maybe thought I was smart enough to do it. So I became an officer. I was transferred to the eastern front in late 1942 where we were more or less in bunkers. An attack was planned to repel to Russians later in 1943. One morning, we were preparing ourselves in the snow during a very cold winter. As a matter of fact for a week or so, we stayed outside, and we had only snow walls to protect us from the winds. Things were very stern in ways of discipline. We stayed outside quite often because we had no tents or anything. You were required to get up every 15 minutes or so to warm yourself because it was a crime, and you would be punished, if let your feet freeze. That was one way to get out of the front. Anyhow, we stayed behind snow banks for a week or so until the actual attack. One day, some of the officers were walking along the lines to make sure everything was ready, and all of a sudden I felt something I had never felt before like someone hit me with a sledgehammer. I fell down and turned over to see that it was a shot through my abdomen. That ended my career at that time. I was taken on a sled and dragged for about 10 or 15 miles to the first doctor that could see me. I was then taken to hospital in an ambulance. There I was operated on and put in very close quarters. People were dying all around me there and the only rest I could get was after taking morphine. After about a week or 10 days, I felt better, and I was able to be transported to a hospital in Poland which was a very nice hospital with very good service. I stayed there for about 2 weeks until I was moved by a train to a hospital in southern Germany. There I recovered until I was ready for the last battle of the war. I was always enrolled in the service, and in November of 1944 I was transferred to the western section of Germany to protect the coast from possibly invasion. Eventually, after the war ended, I caught a ride in the back of a truck back to my home town where things had pretty much stabilized. I didn’t receive my regular discharge from the army until I was at the university for med school. That was a year or so after the war ended.