- Description
- Two German boys and an old man push a cart laden with belongings past the camera. A family with cart pulled by a cow moves down a road. German soldiers, one of whom is barefoot, walk down the road. American soldiers resting. Red flags hang from windows in the town of Carlsbad. According to the NARA story card, the flags indicated the town's surrender to the Russians, who had not yet arrived. Low aerial shots of surrendered German troops and equipment. 01:19:19 Newly released British POW's smoke cigarettes and smile at the camera. A truckload of liberated French drives down the street. More red flags in windows; Soviet soldiers, including a woman, share cigars, talk, and laugh with Americans. German vehicles drive around a corner. 01:21:15 German officers surrender to American soldiers. 01:22:03 German officers turn arms over to Americans. Germans POW's ride a horse-drawn cart. Close-up shots of a German general. He speaks to and then salutes an American soldier. More shots of horse-drawn carts, cars, and bicycles carrying Germans, including officers. A long line of vehicles waits to surrender. 01:25:42 A good shot of a pile of surrendered arms, helmets, other equipment, and a Nazi flag. An officer walks up to the pile and discards three helmets. Two women talk to GIs who are unloading piles of arms from a truck. Close-up of an SS medal on a German's lapel. A large group of American Air Force personnel walk past the camera on an airfield. More shots of American soldiers and captured Nazi officers. 01:27:31 A Nazi officer salutes an American officer. In a garden setting, German Luftwaffe Colonel Hans-Ulrich Rudel and an aide talk to an American Air Force intelligence officer. The men get up (Rudel uses crutches) and walk into a house. 01:29:13 High ranking Nazis climb into a C-47 plane for evacuation to England. The Nazis are not named in the NARA story card and are only seen from the back.
Hans-Ulrich Rudel was a highly decorated fighter pilot who had to have a leg amputated near the end of the war. He deliberately flew into the American zone to evade capture by the Soviets. After the war he lived in Argentina and returned to Germany in the 1950's. He continued to espouse Nazi ideology and wrote a pro-Hitler memoir, as well as a book condemning those members of the German army who had not supported Hitler.
- Duration
- 00:13:20
- Date
-
Event:
1945 April
- Locale
-
Germany
- Credit
- Accessed at United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives & Records Administration
- Contributor
-
Producer:
United States. Army Air Forces.
