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The Enemy Among Us: POWs in Missouri During World War II

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History books generally get a bad rap because so many end up dry in the details, dry in the telling. Thankfully, the Enemy Among Us avoids this trap, and with an emphasis on telling the story in the words of the people who were there, David Fiedler offers a delightful account of when 15,000 German and Italian POWs came to Missouri in WWII.

The Enemy Among Us is richly spiced with first-person accounts from many perspectives of the POW camps, from prisoner and guard, camp worker and ordinary citizen, and beyond. Accounts of friendship, escape, mischief and romance keep it lively, and Fiedler's eye for detail and human interest make his narrative sparkle.

The Enemy Among Us offers first an overview of the POW program, and then works its way geographically through the Missouri camps. The four big camps (Clark, Crowder, Leonard Wood and Weingarten) each merit their own chapter, and subsequent chapters examine the smaller branch camps as they were clustered in the Kansas City and St. Louis areas, in the Missouri Bootheel, in central Missouri, and other parts of the state. Fiedler closes his book with a chapter that details the POWs' return to Europe, their experience after the war, and in some cases, their return to the U.S. as visitors or immigrants. Over a hundred photographs put faces on the people involved and provide a nice accompaniment to the text.

Because of its easy-reading examination of a fascinating, yet little-known subject, The Enemy Among Us will appeal to just about anyone, whether WWII history buff or someone simply interested to hear about the time when 30 POW camps dotted the Missouri landscape, and German- and Italian-speaking soldiers worked in the fields.

David Winston Fiedler provides a noteworthy read with this study of Prisoners of War held in captivity throughout Missouri. He exposed the shortcomings and successes that the America's POW program achieved. Obviously a student of Dr. Krammer's work "Nazi Prisoners of War in America", Mr. Fiedler delves into details and places that Krammer didn't have time to cover concerning particular states - in this case, Missouri. The author uses numerous primary source documents to recollect the treatment of many prisoners. It is particularly fascinating that many former German Nazi's were treated with better regard in certain areas of the state than were American black soldiers who had fought for their country. In that, the Germans were allowed to frequent "white only" establishments that blacks were restricted from entering, a peculiar and disheartening dichotomy to say the least. Certainly some regions in Missouri were quicker than others to accept these POW's as would be understandable. The very kind treatment and acceptance that many of these men, particularly Germans soldiers in German communities in Missouri witnessed, seems to have served to promote a positive image of the victorious America.

There are photos expressively dispersed in the book, which help to bring lucidity to the overall picture. The fact that so many prisoners were in America will shock the non-historian, as well as the casual reader. It will be equally surprising for most to read the elaborate measures taken to accomodate these POW's. How they retained their culture and discipline is also very interesting, especially the Germans. Although, to Germans this"Gehorsamkeit" or obedience to authority is not shocking, it is fascinating nonetheless. The references are well annotated throughout the book, although my only qualm (and it's a small one) is the failure to employ some of the original language if only in short exerpts akin to the writing of William Manchester. I think some things are lost in translation and would have been interesting to read. All in all a very fine work. A must have for collectors of WW2 history, and Missourians,(which I am not, although I attended Wash U) as well as worth reading for anyone interested in obtaining greater depth of American military history post WW2. Bravo Herr Fiedler.

Growing up in Missouri, I never knew about Enemy POW's being here during WWII. This book really does a fine job of painting a picture of life for both the POW's and the Missourians that worked with and befriended them.

The photographs are excellent and Fiedler does a wonderful job of sharing a fascinating story!

Especially in light of the current news about POW's, this book is very timely and interesting.

I grew up hearing stories of my grandfather being an Italian officer prisoner of war in Missouri. Now I understand why he always spoke about the USA with affection. This book allowed to find the historical details of his life after he was capture in north Africa. The most moving thing was seeing him in a group picture with other prisoners. Thanks to the author to bring information to an almost unknown part of my family history.

There's not much I can say about this book that hasn't already been said. It is absolutely wonderful, very colorful and easy to follow, it doesn't bore you to death with useless facts. The stories are rich and fascinating and the pictures captivating.
If you have even the tiniest bit of interest in POWs in America or Missouri - this is a definite must-have.

"The Enemy Among Us" is a history of life in the World War II POW camps in Missouri. Author David Fiedler introduces the reader to the POW experience from the perspectives of the prisoners, the host communities, the Missourians who worked with them and the troops who guarded then.

This book confirmed some things that I had heard and raised several aspects of the program of which I had never thought. Fiedler organizes the book by camp with sections concerning the aspects of each. He relates the nationality and attitudes of the prisoners at each camp along with their work, recreation, worship and their relations with the surrounding civilians. The camps were spread across the state including rural areas, in which the prisoners were sought as farm laborers, to the outskirts of St. Louis and Kansas City, where work was often in nurseries or construction projects. It seems that clerics, prominently among them St. Louis Msgr. John Cody, who would later serve as Archbishops of New Orleans and Chicago, made diligent efforts to ensure that religious services would be available to the POWs. I found the prisoners' wish lists for musical instruments to be surprising, but consistent with that of the British POWs who "jammed" with Thomas Jefferson at Monticello.

The political rivalries that the prisoners brought to the camps created challenges for the guards and ring true to stories that I have heard. My uncle, who was a guard of Italian POWs at a camp in Texas, once told me that they had to keep the King's men and Mussolini's troops. The need to separate the King's loyalists from militant Fascists came up at least twice in this book. It also brings up the methods, sometimes fatal, by which strident Nazis enforced discipline among the German troops.

I found "The Enemy Among Us" to be interesting in several ways. As a Missourian, I enjoyed reading about familiar names and places with whom and at which POWs lived and worked. While I was reading this I drove past a nursery mentioned as having employed prisoner labor. As a reader of histories of World War II, this brought to light a facet of the war about which I had not thought of previously. Although this book is limited to Missouri, I presume that similar issues were present in camps elsewhere. The book is well written and even topics that appear in the sections on each camp are sufficiently different as to avoid boredom. This book belongs in the library of anyone with an interest in World War II and any Missourian who wonders who has been here before.

When I was a kid in the '50s, I remember going by this facility and asking what these buildings were. My mother told me that they were POW barracks and that they were on her grandfather's farm. My grandmother, whose maiden name was Helwig, would work there as a child before WWII and before the barrack were built. The book brought back great memories of growing up in the area. It's well worth the time for people to pick up the book and learn a little about this local history.