Customer Reviews

Hitler's Soldiers in the Sunshine State: German POWs in Florida (Florida History and Culture)

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With a love of history in general and World War II history in particular I got a great deal out of this book. This book essentially tells the story of German POWs in Florida from 1942 to their repatriation in 1946. Mr. Billinger goes into a great deal of detail explaining the POW camp hierarchy (Main camps and their branches) and the dates that various camps were in operation. Sometimes this detail got quite tedious and made sections of the book a chore to read. The book has a number of interesting narratives throughout it, but has just as much volume dedicated to less interesting subject matter.

There is also a substantial amount of dialogue devoted to the various political factions that the German POWs belonged or subscribed to (Nazi, anti-Nazi, German patriot, communist, democrat, etc.) I found it interesting that there were such diverse political views held by the German POWs.

Another interesting point was that Afrika Corp soldiers considered themselves the "Real Soldiers" and thought of latter arriving POWs from the French/Italian campaigns as "sissies".

The book had several interesting annecdotes about the POWs escape attempts, their interactions with the Americans (their guards, civilian foremen, and even female lovers!). The Germans were fascinated by the wildlife in Florida and some of the POWs had small alligators for pets (very briefly) and highly prized snake skins to make belts out of. The narrative about the POW who escaped and committed suicide after hazing by his fellow POWs was quite compelling. A more humorous narrative was about a POW who everyone had thought escaped but was actually still living on the base and would sneak food from the mess hall. By the time the Americans found him the war was over and the other Germans had long since left to return back to Europe!

My favorite part of the book was the narrative at the very end that dealt with a POW who traveled for a week around Florida with a Red Cross Representative visiting POW camps. His description of the University of Tampa and the Promenade with the fine old homes on Tampa Bay sound just like I remember them myself (I was there some 50 years after him!).

An very good read for lovers of WWII history.

I admit I'm a fan of this type of book...state university press, obscure topic...but when it comes to WWII POWs in the U.S., it is even more fascinating, because not only are the truths stranger than fiction...your parents and grandparents probably remember some of this.

German POWs were held in virtually every state, mixed with civilians, were treated generally better than any kind of prisoner or "minority", and were among us. Some took their memories back to Germany, and some became U.S. citizens. Perhaps nowhere is the story more interesting of compelling than in Florida, where there remain many "denazified" and "nondenazified" Germans.

The conditions they lived in were horrendous. Yet, Florida remains a popular destination of Germans on vacation or "Urlaub". How many are visiting places their parents and grandparents told them about?

The documentation and book do focus on one particular camp, Camp Blanding, where prototypical problems amongst Nazis from different countries, regions, and classes of origin found themselves frequently mixed (reminiscent of Katzenbach's "Hart's War") where black fliers from Tuskegee were imprisoned in a Luftwaffe POW camp.

If you want a primer on the problems presented by housing foreign POWs in a host country, with concomitant social, political, economic, and ecological ramifications, this is a great book to start with!

This is a particularly interesting book on rural Florida history from the perspective of an historian whose interest is clearly German POWs in Florida.

For years I had heard stores that Camp Blanding, Florida had held POWs and even had a small German Cemetery. These stories had permeated as local stories and regional ledges for years. In fact, recently I had a conversation with a National Guardsman who found German graffiti in one bunker. But I had nothing really strong to go on as far as information goes.

Then I found this fascinating book. Not only did I find out the true story about Camp Blanding, that it held POWs from all branches of German service. But that they worked there on a verity of projects. The POWs were expected to work and provide for themselves and provide services to their respective camps.

The most fascinating aspect of this book concerns the number of camps in the state of Florida. There were many more than I thought, covering the entire state including the Deep South where POWs harvested sugarcane. Also interesting to note that while the conditions were not the great, they were not that bad either.

From additional reading I suspect that most of the states had their own POW camps and the situation was similar in most of them. They had their problem POWs and an occasional escape. So you could see these as a series of books on the topic.

This is a fast, entertaining read, published by a university press. This leads me to think that this book was published as either a Master's Thesis or Doctoral Dissertation...with the possibility that it might have been produced by a college professor in the course of his work. I found it to be worth reading in a regional sense and the book would appeal to those interested in Florida History.

Our relatives and home towns were involved in WW II W/O our knowledge