"Not in vain may be the pride of those who survived and the epitaph of those who fell."
-Winston Churchill
June 30, 1944, fifty members of the United States 460th Bomb Group embarked on an important mission to attack German oil refineries in Silesia, Hungary, only to come under heavy attack. Firing 20-millimeter canons, a large formation of German fighters blasted seven B-24s out of the sky. Seventeen U.S. airmen were killed, 24 were captured. Many were badly burned or wounded, others beaten to death by Hungarian peasants after parachuting to the ground.
This single event marked the beginning of a heart-wrenching episode in the life of one airman: T/Sgt. John L. Lenburg. On his thirty-sixth mission, he was one of the unlucky ones shot down over enemy lines and to become a prisoner of war (or "Kriegsgenfangenen #6410", the code name the Germans gave him), never to know if he would see his homeland again.
Kriegsgenfangenen #6410: Prisoner of War is Lenburg's remarkable story of his imprisonment and walk to freedom nearly a year after his capture.
Recalling the horrific conditions of his encampment, the missions and memories of his crew members and the reunions of those few who survived fifty years later, this illustrated biography demonstrates why Lenburg and his crew were "the greatest generation" of their time.
About the Author
John L. Lenburg is author of two books, including a multi-volume Lenburg ancestry based on more than a decade of genealogy research. Lenburg retired to northwest Indiana after working 30 years as a manager with Sears Roebuck & Co. and frequently lectured about his days as a prisoner of war.
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