Posted on 09/26/2011 4:30:28 PM PDT by nickcarraway
At the climax of World War II, a symbol of hate — a Nazi flag — was transformed into a dazzling red dress for a female secret agent. A gift from a lost love, today it is helping brighten the twilight of her life.
When 91-year-old Beatrice Jackman put the dress up for auction recently, her colorful background at last came to light, along with the fascinating story behind a romantic memento she had carefully preserved for 66 years. And all because she needed a big-screen TV.
Symbol of hate, symbol of love
The saga of the dress begins at the climax of World War II, when Jackman’s fiance, an American soldier named Parsons, stole a Nazi flag from a balcony of the Reichstag building in Berlin. Arriving with it in a Mercedes stolen from Nazi leader Hermann Goering, the young major gave it to Jackman as a romantic gesture. The flag was made of high-quality cotton — a rare commodity during the war. Backman had the swastika removed from the flag and took the remaining red fabric to a dressmaker, who crafted it into a scoop-necked gown. Decked out in dazzling red, she wore the dress regularly to parties celebrating the end of the war.
Jackman had more reasons than many to celebrate the Allies’ victory in vivid style, because she had spent the war fighting Nazism from the shadows. Her career as a secret agent began where she grew up: in Denmark, where she delivered government messages on her bicycle as a teen-ager.
(Excerpt) Read more at today.msnbc.msn.com ...
What a story!
Wow!
You two still have the fohole pinglist handy?
How did Parsons, an American GI, end up in the middle of Berlin at the climax of the war? My understanding is that during the Battle of Berlin when the Russians stormed the city, there were NO American troops there. Something here does NOT compute.
This is what the Reichstag looked like at the end of the war:
No, you twisted freaks at MSNBC. It was a spoil of war and a trophy. He deserved ever fiber of it.
Err.. that should read as “Foxhole”... me an my typos..
But the lady's life story shouldn't be tarnished by either fading memories or typically lax reportage.
(After all - a "stolen Mercedes" and the Reichstag sound a lot more newsworthy than "a jeep and a flag found in a retreating divisional headquarters".)
I hope the lady enjoys her soaps for many years to come.
You are CORRECT. As far as I know there were NO American GI’s in Berlin during the final assault by the Soviets. I’m thinking this story is the result of POOR fact checking on the part of MSNBC. When you have little knowledge of history, you will let a dubious story like this get by. Meanwhile MSNBC declines to even report on the glaring FACTS of the ATF Fast & Furious scandal.
Not piling on here, but I'm pretty sure Goering wasn't anywhere near Berlin at the end of the war either. He spent his final days far away from Berlin in a bunker, until Hitler had him arrested for suggesting that he take command. What are the chances he would have an abandoned Mercedes left sitting around intact?
This story is obviously PHONY starting with the idea that an American GI was in Berlin when it was being stormed by the Soviets. I call BULL on this story and am amazed by the historical ignorance of the NBC reporters.
Anybody here know where I could find video of this Today show story?
In the story, he took the flag from a balcony in September 1945. Just what he was doing there, and what the flag was still doing there months after the war ended, I don’t know. She didn’t get the flag until months after the war ended and there may have been some embellishment about where it came from. Clearly, the US officer didn’t get the flag from the Reichstag “before it was turned into ruins.”
Which the allies allowed to fly months after the war ended? Sorry, I'm not buying it.
Now if it was September, 1944 and he swiped a flag from a Reichstag balcony and boosted Goering’s car, THAT’S a story.
Great post. Thanks.
She may believe her story. The American GI (if there was one, they aparently never married) perhaps told a tall tale to impress the then young lady. In any event, it was probably from a real Nazi flag during the war. A Soviet flag would have been just as good.
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