| ReformedLiberal Posts: 1,223 Registered: 9/11/04 |
| Re: Barack's War Torn Uncle Posted: May 27, 2008 6:16 PM (5 of 32) |
| "The 89th Infantry Division in World War II was the first unit to actually come upon a Nazi concentration camp. The discovery of the Ohrdruf camp, by the 89th Infantry Division, is memorialized in the Holocaust Museum located in Washington, DC. Ohrdruf was a work camp, not an extermination camp, but the difference is difficult to discern. Prisoners were literally worked to death and disposed of by burning in incinerators, which was the most "cost-effective method". As the Allies approached, panic set in for the guards. Those inmates who couldn't walk were shot. Others were forced to march towards a "safe haven", with most of them dying in the effort. It was a horrible and unbelievable scene which seared its way into one's memory. " http://www.89infdivww2.org/ohrdruf/index.htm |
| T. A. Gardner Posts: 2,947 Registered: 8/12/05 |
| Re: Barack's War Torn Uncle Posted: May 27, 2008 6:17 PM (6 of 32) |
| The only camp liberated by the 89th was Ohrdruf. It was a slave labor camp not a death camp. Most of the prisoners there were Eastern Europeans, mainly Poles. Its only connection to Buchenwald was that it was a administrative satellite of that camp. The 89th subsequently headed south into Germany and Czechoslovakia missing Buchenwald. |
If Obama had ANY relative who helped liberate ANY German prison camp I’ll give him a pass. Whether it was actually a death camp, labor camp, or concentration camp seems to be a rather small nit to pick. Old stories you hear from the family are not the most accurate or reliable.