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TYLER, Texas (KLTV) - As the unprecedented D-Day invasion in France got underway in June 1944, German prisoners of war were arriving in Texas by the thousands.

According to the Texas Historical Commission, more than 50 thousand German soldiers were held at nearly 70 prisoner of war internment camps in Texas during World War II.

Many were captured in southern Europe and North Africa after the surrender of Germany’s Afrika Korps, commanded by Erwin Rommel.

German prisoners of war in a barbed-wire enclosure on Utah Beach in Normandy, France, on June... — German prisoners of war in a barbed-wire enclosure on Utah Beach in Normandy, France, on June 6, 1944.(Source: National Archives)

In September 1943, Tyler’s Camp Fannin, a 14 thousand acre infantry replacement training camp, was designated a POW base camp.

“Isolated in the northeast portion of Camp Fannin and surrounded by barbed wire and towers with 30 caliber machine guns, fifty barracks, each housing twenty men, were built along with support buildings,” former Smith County Historical Society president Robert Reed wrote in a 2008 article.

Smaller branch camps were later established in East Texas at Alto, Atlanta, Bannister (San Augustine County), Chireno, Lufkin, Patroon (Shelby County), and at San Augustine.

By 1946, several smaller branch POW camps of the Camp Fannin internment camp were established... — By 1946, several smaller branch POW camps of the Camp Fannin internment camp were established in communities across East Texas.(Source: KLTV staff)

Other German prisoners were assigned as orderlies at Harmon General Hospital in Longview.

According to a historical marker at the former site of Camp Fannin, more than one thousand prisoners were held at the internment camp, located near the present-day intersection of Interstate 20 and State Highway 155.

“As a result of a home front wartime manpower scarcity, upon the request of local representatives, the war department allowed the use of POW labor in forestry and agriculture in East Texas.”

An issue of the camp’s official newspaper, ‘The Camp Fannin Guidon,’ confirmed 250 POWs were being used in the timber industry around East Texas due to a shortage of workers.

Tyler native James Oliver, who was a Master Sergeant for the POW camp at Camp Fannin, said in a 1985 interview with ‘Tyler Life’ that most of the prisoners were not Nazis and were paid for their work under the Geneva Convention.

“I know some people who still resent the fact that we had German prisoners out there… but we have to forget and forgive. All those people who us were not our enemies. They were put in the military like we were – to serve our own government.”

The Camp Fannin POW camp was inactivated in May 1946 when German prisoners were repatriated.

According to the Texas Historical Commission, “at least one former German prisoner returned to East Texas to settle after the war.”

In 1947, another German wrote to the former commanding officer of Camp Fannin, thanking him for the humane treatment of prisoners. In 2008, Sam Kidd transcribed the original handwritten letter for the Smith County Historical Society.

Dear Sir:
Very likely you will be greatly surprised to receive a letter from Germany. But no doubt you will recollect the years, when you were a C.O. of a P.W. camp. Well, and I was one of the prisoners under your command.
Having returned home now from England and being a free man again, an overwhelming feeling of gratitude urges me, to write this letter. When we met last time at Camp Fannin, timidity and embarrassment kept my mouth shut. But this is a patient piece of paper I can talk to, and which will transmit to you, how everyone in old P.W. Company #2 felt and still feels about you.
When we arrived at Fannin back in 1943, we were full of distrust and suspicion, thanks to the so-called, candid propaganda of our then leaders. We expected everything - but not the kind understanding, deep interest in us as individuals, and excellent and just treatment with which we met. Everyone in Co. #2 became rather rapidly aware of the amazing fact that you, an American, an enemy, did more for us, cared more warmheartedly for us, than our own Co. leaders used to do, when we were (the so justly termed) arrogant members of the German Army. You see, that was the moment, when our unshakable belief in what our military and political leaders were saying, received its first crack. Every word they said turned out to be the contrary of what you really were and are. And when so many Germans of your old Co. #2 turned away from nazism long before the war ended, it was entirely due to the fact, that you showed us, perhaps unconsciously, the better and only way of life, the democratic way. You taught us critical thinking, and you brought us back into the road to real humanism.
Well, Sir, to cut my flow of speech short, I wish to thank you sincerely for everything you did for us. We are paying tribute to a perfect gentleman and American. Be assured, that we shall never forget you.
Hoping that your family and you are keeping well and wishing you the very best of luck and health,
Yours respectfully,
Fritz Haberland
Thank you America!

KLTV & KTRE anchor Lane Luckie is traveling to France for the 80th anniversary of the D-Day invasion at Normandy. Click here for more coverage.

FREEDOM FIGHTERS

In their own words, East Texas veterans who served during the D-Day invasion reflect on the war. Click the video gallery below for a selection of ‘Freedom Fighters’ reports from the KLTV archives.