In the series on hour zero we shed light on stories from the last year of war in 1945. This time it is about Germeringer Elisabeth Riedl and her encounter with the American soldiers.
Germering -Flak positions in the west, a huge tank farm in the south: In the last days of the war, the Germeringen were right to worry that their village would be erased from the map. But then the Americans marched in without a big fight. Elisabeth Riedl was ten years old at the time - and still knows exactly how the foreign soldiers suddenly stood in the room.
The US soldiers did not find the pig in the basement of Elisabeth Riedl's family.
Photos instead of dumplings
"Photo, photo": The Americans know exactly what they want. They are targeting cameras made in Germany. But the model of the Guth family - Elisabeth Riedl's maiden name - does not seem to them to be valuable enough. "It was just a glump, they put it back straight away," says Elisabeth Riedl 75 years later. The Americans also have no use for the strange yellow balls that bob around in the boiling water on the stove. "They didn't want the dumplings either," says the 85-year-old today.
Farm is on fire
The only thing they take with them are two German soldiers who were quartered with the family. Then they are gone. And the war is over for the family. Overall, Germering and the then independent municipality of Unterpfaffenhofen got off lightly. The residents feared the worst of the invasion. Located west of Munich, there were plenty of anti-aircraft positions by the Wehrmacht around the town. In the south was the large Nazi tank farm - both worthwhile targets for air strikes.
There were also. Around July 19, 1944, when over 100 explosive devices were dropped. Most of them went down over the nearby fields, the pastor of the Unterpfaffenhofen congregation noted in his war and invasion report. In early January 1945, another air raid hit the communities. "The Kiermaier farm started to burn brightly, but the source of the fire could be restricted," says the pastor's report.
Deadly hearing loss
When the Americans invade, major hostilities remain the exception. However, the fate of farmer Josef Huber is tragic. The hearing impaired wants to check on the night of April 30 whether the occupiers are already there. It is you. Apparently, the then 65-year-old did not respond to the calls of the Americans due to his poor hearing. Two bullets shred his leg. The farmer dies two days later.
Crashed pilot
Elisabeth Riedl is also not spared from death and terror. She still has the image of the dead English pilot in front of him in his plane that crashed on the summer road. The loss of the beloved family dog Rolfi is particularly bad. He wasn't killed in an attack. "We had to hand it over to the Wehrmacht. He told us he had to go to the front. ”The last walk with Rolfi leads to Großhadern, where the family has to say goodbye with a heavy heart in a Wehrmacht facility.
Dog Rolfi, whom the 85-year-old loved so much as a girl, had still been demanded by the Nazis.
Little luxury
The other animals in the family cannot help over the loss - a few rabbits and chickens. And a pig. That lives in the basement. With the utmost confidentiality. "We fed the sow black," says Elisabeth Riedl. The father keeps telling the children that no one should know about them. "Otherwise the SS would have picked you up." The pig remains secret. At some point a father's special comes: the butcher slaughters the pig and processes it - a luxury in times of deprivation.
A previous episode dealt with the inferno of Hattenhofen.