Vanished!

by Arthur D. Jacobs, Major, USAF Retired

In this year, the year of the Patriot Act, Presidential Power, and the nomination of a Supreme Court Justice where “equal justice under the law” seem to be the focal point, it is quite appropriate to tell my story.

This is a story about a twelve year-old boy who with his family vanished from his neighborhood and birthplace, Brooklyn, New York. This story also has roots and branches in Missouri.

I was that twelve year-old boy. I grew up in Brooklyn. My parents were German immigrants. My mother and father came to this country in 1928; they met and married in Brooklyn. My father had applied for his first citizenship papers in 1938. This application was pending at the outbreak of World War II.

A couple of months after the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor and the U.S. entry into the war, both of my parents were required to register as “Alien Enemies.” Can you imagine being branded as “Alien Enemy” only because you are of the ethnicity of the enemy? They, like almost one million permanent resident aliens, were fingerprinted, photographed, and provided with an “Alien Enemy” identification card which they were required to carry at all times.

As alien enemies my parents were not allowed to fly; their travel was restricted to their neighborhood; they were not allowed to possess a camera, short-wave radio, or firearms of any type; and if they changed their place of residence or employment they were required to report the change to the Department of Justice. This is when and how our lives began to change. (The photograph below shows our family in 1939, at the time my father's application for U.S. citizenship was pending. My brother Lambert stands in front of Pop.)

In June of 1943, an FBI agent and a detective of the New York Police department banged on our door, then searched and ransacked our home. The FBI report concluded, “no contraband was located.” This was the first of three searches and ransacks of our home. The FBI did not find any contraband or propaganda in our home during any of their searches—the FBI made their last two searches based upon false information furnished by one or more informants whose identity or information the FBI would not disclose to me fifty years after the fact, when I wrote a book about this experience.

On November 8, 1943 the FBI discovered that my father’s name, not his signature, appeared on a list of applicants for membership in the N.S.D.A.P. [the Nazi party]. The next day, the FBI again searched our home for contraband or propaganda—again they found nothing. After this search my father voluntarily accompanied the FBI to their New York Field Division office, where he was grilled regarding his affiliation with the Nazi party. The FBI report says, “[Jacobs] continuously denies membership in the N.S.D.A.P. [Nazi party] at any time or any place.”

On February 18, 1944, the FBI and the U.S. Attorney questioned my father regarding his membership in the Nazi party and regarding his allegiance to the United States. Again, my father stated that he was not a member of the Nazi party. My father also told the FBI he wanted the United States to win the war; that he liked the United States government; that he did not care for the regime in Germany.

On St. Patrick’s Day, March 17, 1944 the Alien Enemy Hearing Board of Brooklyn summoned my father to a hearing. At this type of hearing, the subject, in this instance my father, was not entitled to have an attorney present; the subject could only have three witnesses. After extensive questioning by the board of my father, and his three witnesses (my mother, my US-born aunt by marriage, and an American Jew of Russian heritage who was a close friend of my father and our family), the three member hearing board, plus the U.S. Attorney, unanimously decided that my father should not be interned.

Even before this hearing, my father thought that after the hearing the entire matter would be put to rest. By this time my mother was not the same Mom I knew before these events. Each time there was a knock on the door, Mom would become frightened; her fear was that the FBI agents would again appear at her door and she thought that they would either arrest her husband and/or ransack her home. The FBI had turned my mother into a nervous wreck. My father put the matter behind him. The Hearing Board’s recommendation to the Department of Justice, he thought, settled the matter. However, my father was not aware of Edward J. Ennis, the director of the Alien Enemy Control unit in the Department of Justice—Ennis was determined to have my father arrested and interned.

On Friday, November 3, 1944, armed FBI agents raided my father’s place of work [General Diaper Service at Elmhurst, Long Island], handcuffed my father, and dragged him out of his workplace. Later my father told me that the FBI treated him as if he were a criminal. My father had not committed any crimes, nor had anyone accused him of such. This was the America of the 1940s. This same day the FBI placed my father into the custody of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) at Ellis Island, NY.

By late February 1945, my mother could no longer tolerate being home with two growing sons without their father. Mom packed up our suitcases and gave away our furniture and other personal possessions. On February 27, 1945 my mother, my brother, and I left our home on 411 Himrod Street in Brooklyn and went to Ellis Island. On that day the three of us became prisoners, like my father, on the island. I had turned twelve in February.

Our education was disrupted; there was none for my brother and me on the island. My brother and I were separated from our mother, who resided in the Great Hall, while we were quartered in the baggage room with hundreds of adult males—including our father. There was no privacy here, toilets were public, wash basins public, shower facilities public, and sleeping area was public. If we were not being watched by guards, we were being eyed by the male internees.

In the latter part of April 1945 we were transferred as a family to a family internment camp in Crystal City, Texas, approximately 120 miles southwest of San Antonio. We traveled to Texas on the train and were accompanied by two INS guards—one female and one male. In St. Louis, Missouri we had a few-hours' layover. By this time our guards knew that we would not try to escape, so they let my mother, brother and me go outside of the station. The first thing that came to my mind was the movie, Meet me in St. Louis, which starred Judy Garland—and I said, “So this is St. Louis!”

Crystal City was an INS family internment camp. Our living quarters were austere—two bedrooms, no kitchen, no bathroom, no toilet, and wall framing was bare. We were required to use a public shower and public toilet facility about one-half block from our home. We were fed in a dining hall. Nevertheless, we were happy that we were together as a family again. At Crystal City our education continued, but we attended the German language school. (I wasn’t fluent in German.) We remained in Crystal City for seven months, until December 1, when we were transported back to Ellis Island. We waited there until January 17, 1946 for transport to Germany. While on the island the education of my brother and me ceased—there was none provided.

In July 1945, President Harry Truman issued an order directing that all German American internees were to be deported. This prompted my father to become a “voluntary” repatriate. [At the time this was taking place I had no idea why my father would volunteer to return to a war-ravaged and starving Germany. It was not until I obtained the records of his arrest and internment that I understood his reasoning. He did not want to be a deportee—with it comes a stigma.] My mother volunteered to go with him, and of course, my brother and I had no choice in the matter. On a cold wintry day, January 17, 1946, we were taken from the island to the merchant ship, the SS Aiken Victory, destination, Bremerhaven, Germany. That's the ship in the photo below.

The voyage was pleasant, we were treated agreeably. In particular, Seaman John Kincaid treated my brother and me with great respect and treated us like royalty. On January 26, 1946 we docked in Bremerhaven. Our royal treatment ended abruptly—the reception was, like the weather, icy cold. On the gang plank were heavily armed U.S. military guards—they were shouting at us in fractured German, ordering us to hurry up. Why they tried speaking to us in German I have no idea; most of us could better understand English than German.

Once we were off of the gang plank we were ordered into the back of U.S. Army transport trucks. Children were ordered to sit at the very back of the truck—this is where I sat. Directly across from me was a soldier armed with a carbine. There was no flap covering the back end, and it was frigid. As we left, all I could see from the back of the truck was a city lined with rubble, bombed out buildings. Old women were picking up bricks from the rubble and stacking them.

About an hour of this and we stopped at Bremen, Germany, where we lined up outside of the trucks and then marched over to box cars—constantly the American soldiers were barking commands at us, “hurry up, get in!” It was not easy to boost up into the boxcar. Once loaded, the soldiers slammed the door shut and you could hear the latch being locked. It was pitch black, frigid, no heat, and before the trip was over it was stench-filled—there were no toilet facilities in the boxcar, only a bucket. This was our toilet.

I was frightened and freezing; I curled up into a fetal position trying to keep warm. From time to time we would stop and the soldiers would order us out of the box car—then they told the women, “you squat here to relieve yourself,” and the men were ordered to the other side of the train. This was most degrading. Then, in a few minutes the soldiers would begin ordering us back into the box car, again barking commands at us in broken German. This went on for three days. Our destination was Ludwigsburg, Germany.

Upon arrival in Ludwigsburg, my mother was taken to US Army Internment Camp 77; my father, brother and I were taken to US Army Internment Camp 76, also known as Hohenasperg, Germany.

Hohenasperg is a place that has had many names and has had a presence for centuries. Some have called it a hill, a hump, a mountain. It is known locally as Tränenberg—the mountain of tears, or Höllenberg—the mountain of hell. It rises almost 1200 feet. It is a place that was used to imprison poets, economists, other political prisoners, soldiers, and persons with tuberculosis. The Nazis murdered Jews there. Terrorists have been imprisoned there. It was surrounded by an abysmal and wide moat followed by towering walls. It was a place that was not clean or well-lit.

It is said of this place that those who go up the hill do not come back. I was held in this place. When I arrived there the soldier told me to behave myself, and if I did not I would be hung from the hangman’s tree—the gallows.

This is the view from inside the prison. It looks like a park out there, doesn't it? In the midst of those trees is a large chess board with oversize pieces. It occupies the position of the gallows when I was a prisoner there. The massive doors in the prison were opened with huge iron keys like the one pictured below.

Every time I left my cell, I was required to walk with my hands upon my head. I was never seated for my meals, but had to eat standing up and in silence. Each time I would try to tell the soldier that I was an American, he would shout, “Shut up!”

My book, The Prison Called Hohenasperg: An American boy betrayed his Government during World War II, Universal publishers, 1999, tells the rest of my story.

After spending almost 22 months in Germany, my brother and I returned to the United States, to a ranch owned by Art and Mildred Dreyer in southwest Kansas. The Dreyers were friends of Ed and Mary Simmons.  Ed was an agent of the U.S. Army Counter Intelligence Corps for whom I worked for a while in Germany, and Mary knew that the Dreyers had the heart for a large family.  Our parents remained in Germany when Lambert and I went to Kansas to become virtual brothers to four adopted children and another displaced lad like us. There I finished my eighth grade schooling. My brother didn't take to farm life as I did, and it happened that during a winter stay in Florida, where the Dreyers had a winter place, my brother contracted a severe infection and was taken in by the doctor's family, who were friends of the Dreyers.  

I enjoyed farm life and thrived there, keeping in touch with my brother and my parents through the mail.  But the ranch was almost 26 miles from the nearest high school, and the seven miles of dirt road that led to and from the house were often impassable during the winter months. Thus, the Dreyers formed a plan to send me to a church-affiliated school, the School of the Ozarks at Point Lookout, Missouri. I graduated within three years, in 1951. Today this school is known as the College of the Ozarks. My wife, Viva, graduated with me in 1951; we were married in March of 1952 after I joined the U.S. Air Force in October of 1951. Here is our graduation picture at the School of the Ozarks:

Many thought it peculiar that I would join the Air Force, but because we were at war with North Korea I had a strong desire to serve my country. So strong was my need to serve, that I made a life of service to my country for 22 years. My family and I settled in Tempe, Arizona, where I taught in the College of Business at Arizona State University for almost 20 years.

For the last ten years I have maintained a web site entitled Freedom of Information Times (http://www.foitimes.com/internment/) for the purpose of informing Americans of the United States’ World War II internment program and its effect upon German Americans.

My brother finished his schooling in Florida, played football for the University of Florida, served in the Army during the Korean War, and now resides in Florida. He made arrangements for Mom and Pop to return to the United States in 1953, but things unraveled. Mom later told me, “Pop and I went to the American consulate to pick up our passports, and after the gent at the desk (a German Foreign National working for the US Government) said to your father, ‘So, Mr. Jacobs, when you return to the United States will you do things differently?’ your father replied, ‘Keep your *%$@) passport!’ and the threw the passports back at the clerk.”

I didn’t see Mom and Pop again until 1958, eleven years after I was sent to live with the Dreyers in Kansas. Fortunately, Mom and Pop were able to spend precious moments with my four children while my wife and I were stationed in Germany during the early 1970s. My parents visited the U.S. a few times after that and died in their 70s, my mother in Germany and my father during a visit to Canada. Both are laid to rest together in Germany.

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