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A little note on the German-American experience ~ notice that tcrlaf's uncles had lived in Southwestern, Indiana. They were far from alone ~ many areas there were already 90% German ancestry. Even Indianapolis and the state of Indiana on the average come in at 43%.

Popular belief is that Indiana draftees tended to get rotated to the Pacific War for that reason. Some small towns like Seymour had hundreds of men sent to the Pacific, and the European Theatre veterans were few and far between.

It's difficult to tell at this late date.

Regarding his uncle who interpreted for Camp Atterbury, he was undoubtedly there when the POWs rioted over being served "cake" every day. That was resolved easily when it was found (through the hard work of the translators) that they wanted rough brown bread ~ American white bread being too much like pastry to them.

The camp command put out requests to the German-American churches in Southern Indiana (gazillions of them) for German bread.

The riots stopped.

The command also put an end to housing Nazis with the enlisted personnel since they were finding reasons to stir them up.

My sister in law's father was sent to Germany in the Infantry. He appears in some combat films made during the war where the American troops and the Germans both encounter a dead cow which they then agree to butcher separately and avoid shooting at each other. Her dad spoke German and did a good job working this out.

PBS owns that material.