US military; displaced Germans; liberation of camp

Film | Digitized | Accession Number: 1991.256.1 | RG Number: RG-60.0118 | Film ID: 152

Overview

Description: A caravan of United States Army tanks, trucks, and Red Cross vehicles move along a dusty road. Smoking rubble and desolate buildings line the road and landscape. Four German prisoners walk towards camera, followed by a group of liberated French prisoners cheering tankers and walking along the road, opposite direction as the US vehicles, one with a spearhead. Dark shots of prisoner group walking. 01:06:17 Two Americans attend to a wounded German soldier laying near the road. German troops march in surrender on sidewalk, with hands over their heads. White flags hang from civilians’ windows. A German woman gives some of the men something to drink. Blurry footage of a burning German town. Fires and smoke rise from farms along the landscape and continue to burn into the night. An American officer talks to some German officers as civilians walk around them. Destroyed homes, a crashed airplane is still smoldering. 01:14:01 Victims of a German concentration camp. A survivor talks to an American soldier. Pyre with burned bodies of the victims. Large pile of rubble from destroyed crematorium. Soldiers load and shoot guns from the ground and from a tank on April 8, 1945.
Duration: 00:18:25
Date: Event: March 24-April 8, 1945
Production: 1945
Locale: Germany
Credit: Accessed at United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives & Records Administration
Contributor: Producer: United States. Army Air Forces.
Camera Operator: Kelley

Language: Silent
Genre/Form: Unedited.
B&W / Color: Color
Image Quality: Good
Time Code: 01:01:07:00 to 01:19:32:00
Film Format: Master
Master 152 Video: One Inch - b&w and color - NTSC
Master 152 Video: One Inch - b&w and color - NTSC
Master 152 Video: One Inch - b&w and color - NTSC
Master 152 Video: One Inch - b&w and color - NTSC
Preservation
Preservation 152 Video: Betacam SP - b&w and color - NTSC - large
Preservation 152 Video: Betacam SP - b&w and color - NTSC - large
Preservation 152 Video: Betacam SP - b&w and color - NTSC - large
Preservation 152 Video: Betacam SP - b&w and color - NTSC - large

Conditions on Access: You do not require further permission from the Museum to access this archival media.
Copyright: Public Domain
Conditions on Use: To the best of the Museum's knowledge, this material is in the public domain. You do not require further permission from the Museum to reproduce or use this material.

Keyword: CIVILIANS CONCENTRATION CAMPS (LIBERATION) CORPSES CREMATORIA FIRES FLAGS GERMANS MILITARY VEHICLES PRISONERS (FRENCH) SOLDIERS/MILITARY (AMERICAN) SOLDIERS/MILITARY (GERMAN) SURVIVORS TANKS USHMM (PERMANENT EXHIBITION)

Legal Status: Permanent Collection
Film Provenance: The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum purchased this from the National Archives and Records Administration in September 1991. The footage was obtained as research for the Museum's Permanent Exhibition.
Note: Footage is also available on sub-master PD#27: Liberation Color Footage Reel 3.

USHMM replaced the online streaming video with a new, higher resolution digital file produced for the VHH project. The 16mm film source from NARA was scanned by the Austrian Filmmuseum in 2021.
Copied From: 16mm Kodachrome
Film Source: United States. National Archives and Records Administration. Motion Picture Reference
File Number: Legacy Database File: 1281
Source Archive Number: 18 SFP 9123
Special Collection: Steven Spielberg Film and Video Archive