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Praise for Words from the Heart

    Individuals who did not have the opportunity to hear about the military experiences of their loved ones, perhaps because many were hesitant to share their stories, as well as others who simply want to better understand what war time military service was really like, will benefit from reading this book. Redmond and Prouty share first hand accounts of men and women who served in World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf, Iraq and Afghanistan. Redmond has been interviewing veterans for the Library of Congress Veterans History Project for nearly 20 years.


"From the War to end all Wars Redmond takes us to Normandy in Europe, the Inchon landing in Korea, the rice patties of Vietnam, the Mother of all Battles and the other campaigns in the Middle East where our nation’s heroes tell their story in their own words. On the ground, sea and in the air, these words tell of heroic actions where ‘all gave some and some gave all.’ Her book reminds us that we live in the Land of the Free because it was also the Home of the Brave—may it always be!” - General Dennis J. Reimer, U.S. Army (Ret), 33d Chief of Staff


“Stories about African-American women who served in the military during WWII are rare. Despite unfair treatment, Ms. Indiana Hunt-Martin and the Six Triple Eight represent an untold history of resilience, courage and patriotism.” – Colonel Edna W. Cummings, U.S. Army (Ret), Six Triple Eight Advocate


“Redmond has probed the minds of our armed forces, young and old, spanning a wide spectrum of sexes, races, and service experiences, and presents an eclectic selection of memories taken from these historic interviews. Such interviewees don’t mince words; they tell it like they remembered, filtered only by the therapeutic passage of time. They talk about what was important to them, needs to be heard, respected, and even remembered as their input is immutable fabric of American history. Such messages can only come from the heart.” – Lieutenant Colonel Tom Middaugh, U.S. Army (Ret), West Point Class of 1962


“Anyone who knows about war or doesn’t will be enthralled by the intriguing stories of a soldier’s everyday life. It is unique because unlike other books, it shows what veterans felt rather than just stating the facts with no first-person intel to back it up.” – Lucas Bloomberg, Student and History Enthusiast, age 12

ALBERT FRUMKIN                                        
U.S. Army Corporal
World War II   Prisoner of War
DOB: June 19, 1923      DOD: May 3, 2015
 
Corporal Albert Frumkin became a Prisoner of War (POW) at a Nazi prison camp, Stalag IV-B, following his capture during the Battle of the Bulge. Fought during the winter of 1944-45, this battle was the last major German offensives and one of the bloodiest battles of World War II.  Although Germans were unsuccessful in their attempt to push the Allies back from their occupied territory, they took approximately 7,500 prisoners.  Stalag IV-B was one of the largest POW camps in Germany. Unbelievable brutality was faced by individuals in this camp! Allied soldiers had to bury the bodies of friends who were executed by German guards. To boost morale, there was also a lighter-hearted side of camp, drag shows put on by the POW.   
 
Corporal Frumkin shared his story. “I enlisted in the service on April 1, 1943, April Fool that I was! My brother and all of my friends were drafted immediately after Pearl Harbor. Not me! I went to NYC and took a job for the Navy as a messenger for about a year. Everyone kept asking me why I haven’t gone yet, wondering if I was 4-F. Finally, I went down to the draft board and asked them to take me. They thought I was a little crazy because everybody was trying to avoid it and I was asking to go!”
 
After basic training, Corporal Frumkin was assigned to the Advanced Schooling program and sent to college where, after two years, he would earn an engineering degree and a commission.  Prior to D-Day, troops who had training were needed. He was assigned to the 590th Field Artillery and sent overseas in October, 1944. After time in England, they were sent to Europe to replace divisions that had been fighting constantly.
 
“I was the battery recorder who sat up the guns for firing then kept track of how many rounds were fired from each cannon. I was on 24 hours and off 24 hours. When we first got our position in the line, we were firing at a steady distance of nine and a half miles, because that’s where the enemy was. When the Bulge began, the first indication I had that something was amiss was that we were starting to fire at a shorter and shorter distance. Several days of fighting later, I got out of my fox hole and it looked like there was a picket fence walking towards us! It turned out that this was our Infantry who was supposed to be in front of us, protecting us. They had walked through us and were behind us now. We had nobody in front of us but the enemy!  Lo and behold we were given orders to pull out. We started back and had gone about two miles at the most, when we got orders to go into this field and start firing! I was in the weapons carrier and did something I was told never to do; I sat on the back of the weapons carrier on a bunch of duffel bags, our clothes. They told us when we were on the weapons carrier, or any truck, that we sit with our back to the cab, nothing hangs over the back end because you might hit a mine. We pulled into this empty field to set up, and a flare goes up right between my legs and shoots up into the sky and lights off! The Germans had put mines and flares and rockets all over the empty fields when they were there. We were in Germany territory. Had it been a mine, I would have been dead! Or at least lost both legs. As it was, I just changed my underwear! The next thing I know, we get orders to go back to where we came from!
 
We re-hooked the Howitzers to the trucks and headed back to the original starting point, wasting a whole day! That was December 15. On the 16th we were given orders to ‘spike the guns and join the Infantry.’ That meant to disable the guns so it they couldn’t be used against us.  We did that and joined up with one of the Infantry groups. On the 18th of December we were surrounded completely by the German Army! We were at the top of the hill and the colonel was told that there were wounded down below and he could come get them. So I used my common sense again and volunteered. Three guys and I were about a third of the way down the hill and we heard the sound of rifles being cocked! We knew what that sound meant and dove to the side of the road! We were in a ditch behind a log. The log got completely demolished by the rifle fire! But none of us was hurt, since we were in the ditch. Radio contact between the Germans and the colonel gave us time to get back to the top of the hill. They told the colonel that he could either surrender or die. That was the only alternative! He surrendered along with anybody who cared to. It was our choice to go with him or stay. Most went with the colonel. That day, December 19, 1944, we were captured! 
 
We started walking to the prison camp. The guard said it would be ten kilometers but didn’t say that only he would walk that far. We walked 258 kilometers...160 miles! It was approximately 13 days, all without food. The line was six abreast and about 10,000 long with guards everywhere. The front of the line moved at a steady pace. The middle and back end were like an accordion, going very fast or very slow. It was easier to be in front. My buddy and I had a small experiment. We heard that if you were at the end of the line and couldn’t walk, they’d put you in a truck. We slipped back about two thirds of the way and heard gunshots. They were killing people and putting their bodies in the truck! We rushed back to the front.
 
We stopped at night, and once there were huts from a former camp. We were about fifty in a hut. A German guard came to the door and spoke to our Sergeant who turned to us and said to put our dog tags in the middle of the floor. We did with no questions asked. He then let the guard in. It appeared that the German guard was looking for all soldiers who had an ‘H’ on their tag, signifying Hebrew or Jewish. Our sergeant said to the guard, ‘I’m not picking them for you; you pick them out yourself!’ There was no way he could pick out who had an H because we didn’t have our dog tags on. The German guard, in disgust, just turned around and left. That was another time my life was spared!” The dog tags denoted a religious affiliation for each soldier. Frumkin, who is Jewish, was one of three prisoners with an “H” on his tags.
 
“You can go a long time without food but not long without water before you die. They did let us go to the bathroom. God in his wisdom saw to protect us and save us. He sent snow down! We were cold, but we could pick up a handful of snow and it melted in our mouths. That was the main thing that saved us! After 13 days we were put on box cars and went another six days without being fed. We were attacked repeatedly with bombs or machine-gun fire by our own Air Force and British for the six days on the train, because they thought we were a German troop movement. Approximately 10,000 men started the march and approximately 7,500 arrived at Camp Stalag IV-B.
 
The first thing they did was give everybody a shot in the left breast without telling us what it was for. Nine or ten years later I developed a cyst and 20 years later I developed breast cancer and my left breast was removed. I had a good Army doctor. It was a clean cure because the cancer had not spread to my chest wall and the lymph nodes were clear.
 
Stalag IV-B was the biggest German camp with approximately 100,000 people there. Only a small portion, maybe five or ten percent were military prisoners. The rest were refugees from other countries, and were segregated from us. I was introduced to that fact on the day that I entered the camp. I saw a Russian reach into a wagon for a raw potato. The German guard shot him! The bullet went through the Russian and hit a British soldier across the street. That was in violation of the Geneva Convention; you were not supposed to have a loaded gun in camp. The Russian died instantly; the Brit did not. They didn’t torture us; these were military camps and they treated them such. The Germans evidentially took us there because the other camps had been taken over and they wanted to keep us in Germany.
 
Camp life was very boring, nothing to do. We couldn’t have worked if we wanted to. I had gone from 185 to 100 pounds. I can’t explain what they were feeding us. The first day, after 19 days of not eating, what they gave us as food was moving around and alive. I couldn’t eat it! That night I had a long talk with myself and asked if I wanted to go home? I knew we would win the war or die here. The next day when they gave us the same type of slop, I ate it. I can’t tell you one ingredient. It kept me alive, that’s the reason that I ate it.
 
We slept six bunks high. I had a top bunk and I had befriended a mouse. That sounds stupid, but this mouse was very knowledgeable and he would not take food that was not offered to him. I ran a rope from the ceiling beam to my bunk, so he could come down and eat when I had food that I could leave out for him. He kind of kept me company.  
 
The bathrooms were out houses. In order to take a shower, we had to take our clothes off in one building and run about 30 yards to another where the showers were...through the snow...naked!  Very few of us took showers on a regular basis. There was no point in taking a shower; I couldn’t change my clothes. I was lucky, everything in my Army uniform was warm. I had a woolen sweater, a woolen jacket, a field jacket and an overcoat. I had to take the overcoat off during the fighting. I gave the coat to someone who was wounded and I’m sure he appreciated it.  I was fairly warm; I slept in my clothes. There was nothing to do all day. We sat and talked, played cards...that was the only thing that kept us busy. Once in a while we would go outside the camp in groups to collect branches for firewood for the stoves. Other than that, we didn’t leave the hut.
 
 I stayed in the prison camp until April 28, 1945 when the Russians came to free us. They said we could come with them or stay at the camp. Since the war was not over, we didn’t go. On May 8, when the war was over and the fighting had stopped in Europe, we were told they were sending us to Russia, so they could repatriate us and they would be paid. I didn’t want to go a thousand miles to Russia, so I went a mile and a half to where the Americans were. 
 
Another guy and I walked to the American lines. If we saw a Russian eating, we’d ask for some food. They would give us some but made us take a snort of vodka first! If you didn’t drink the vodka, you got no food. I wasn’t a drinker, but I drank the vodka. I found out later that a lot of those that came home had stomach problems. The vodka must have killed the bacteria in our stomachs, because I never had any bad stomach problems. So they did us a good service. We were still in Germany, but it was under Russian control. They were going to ship us to Camp Lucky Strike. All of the camps had cigarette names...Camel, Pall Mall, Chesterfield, and Lucky Strike. The Germans doled out the food in the chow line. When the guy in front of me asked for a second helping, the German said no. The American grabbed the front of his shirt and cold-clocked him. He had himself a second helping. We all did. It was an interesting thing; he wouldn’t take no from the German at that point. 
 
After two 500-mile trips in airplanes, I reached Camp Lucky Strike. Although the Army was giving everyone a three-day pass, I decided to stay at the camp so I wouldn’t miss my flight home. I’m glad I did, because General Eisenhower came to the camp to hand out Eisenhower jackets. We were chatting with him when the captain came over and told him they were ready to do his presentation. He turned around to the captain and said they would just have to wait until he finished his conversation with these fellows. He made us feel like a million bucks! And he handed us our Eisenhower jackets!
 
I reached home the end of May, 1945 and stayed until August, to fatten up. Then I went to Ashville, NC for an examination. They decided I was unfit for active duty, but was fit to be a cadre and do the training. The war in the Pacific was still going on. I went to Fort Braff as Cadre and trained new troops.”
 
After Albert was discharged in November 1945, he went back to college on the GI Bill and became an engineer. He married Helen and raised three children. They had been married for 65 years when I interviewed him. While editing his transcript, I called Albert and asked him if he knew what the Germans were doing to Jews during the war. He said that he did not know; he had been unaware. He didn’t ask why the dog tags with “H” were being sought out. “When you were in the service, you didn’t ask questions. The sergeant must have known, but he didn’t tell us.” He said that he never discussed this issue with his family. “I was in the Battle of the Bulge, the last big battle of the war and managed to survive. I’m just fortunate to be sitting here talking to you!”