1945

Articles from 1945

Wool of the 1940s (Click Magazine, 1945)

The attached 1945 article was intended to serve as a suit-buying-guide for all those young men who were in the throes of trading in their military uniforms for civilian attire.


The one kind of wool that is not discussed in this article is worsted: this was the wool that was specifically reserved for the uniforms of the U.S. military (enough to outfit 12 million souls) and there wasn’t a single thread of it that could be purchased on the civilian market.

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Inadequacies in Combat Training (Yank Magazine, 1945)

Training for combat, according to veterans in Italy, should be a hell of a lot more realistic and a hell of a lot more thorough.

‘They oughta learn them guys’ is that favorite beef you hear from combat veterans when they talk about replacements who have just joined their outfits…the average replacement doesn’t know enough about the weapons an infantryman uses. ‘He usually knows enough about one or two weapons…but he should know them all. He may know how to use and take care of the M1 or carbine, but if you need a BARman or machine-gunner quick, you’re up a creek.’


Statistical data concerning the U.S. Army casualties in June and July of 1944 can be read in this article.

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P.O.W. Camp for the S.S. Women (Yank Magazine, 1945)

Among the many dubious legacies of the Second World War is a growing cult of males who have tended to feel that the German women of the SS are worthy of their attention (Kate Winslet’s appearance in the 2008 movie, The Reader didn’t help). This article (and the accompanying photographs) make it quite clear that no one would have found these men more pathetic than the G.I. guards of Prisoner of War Enclosure 334, who were charged with the task of lording over these Teutonic gorgons and who, to the man, found these women to be wildly unattractive.

The girls who served in Adolf’s army are a sorry, slovenly looking lot. In a P.O.W. camp near Florence they spill their gripes to G.I guards.

Click here to read about a member of Hitler’s SS in captivity.

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VJ-Day in Washington, D.C. (Yank Magazine, 1945)

When World War Two finally reached it’s end, the small, quiet and usually well-behaved city of Washington, D.C. gave a big sigh of relief, forgot about Robert’s Rules of Order for the day and shrieked with joy:


One officer, standing in the middle of Pennsylvania Avenue outside the White House, waved a fifth of Rye at arms length, repeatedly inviting passers-by to have a drink on the European Theater of Operations.


Click here if you would like to read an article about 1940s fabric rationing and the home front fashions.

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The Surrender of a Gestapo General (Yank Magazine, 1945)

Within the moldy, dank confines an abandoned brewery located within the walls of Metz, a troupe of exhausted GIs stumbled upon a German general who was earnestly hoping to avoid capture.

He turned out to be Major General Anton Dunckern, police president of Metz and Gestapo commander for Alsace-Lorraine. He’s the first big Gestapo man we’ve taken; he ranks close to Himmler and is one of the prize catches of the war.

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The Surrender of a Gestapo General (Yank Magazine, 1945)

Within the moldy, dank confines an abandoned brewery located within the walls of Metz, a troupe of exhausted GIs stumbled upon a German general who was earnestly hoping to avoid capture.

He turned out to be Major General Anton Dunckern, police president of Metz and Gestapo commander for Alsace-Lorraine. He’s the first big Gestapo man we’ve taken; he ranks close to Himmler and is one of the prize catches of the war.

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Home Front Culture and Men Without Uniforms (Yank Magazine, 1945)

…you think it’s easy for a guy my age not to be in the Army? You think I’m having a good time? Every place I go people spit on me…


So spake one of the 4-F men interviewed for this magazine article when asked what it was like to be a twenty-year-old excused from military service during World War Two. This article makes clear the resentment experienced at the deepest levels by all other manner of men forced to soldier-on in uniform; and so Yank had one of their writers stand on a street corner to ask the slackers what it was like to wear civies during wartime.


Read about the 4-F guy who creamed three obnoxious GIs.
Click here to read an article about a World War Two draft board.

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The Price of Victory

The first two paragraphs from General Marshall’s Biennial Reportstyle=border:none concentrate on the number of casualties counted from December 7, 1941 up to June 30, 1945 (keep in mind that this immediate estimate would have to be adjusted as time advanced and more men would continue to die of the wounds inflicted during earlier periods of the war).


The last two paragraphs in the report concern the remarkably low amount of non-battle deaths suffered by the U.S. military during the course of the war. General Marshall attributed this fact to the broad immunization program that was enacted on all fronts by the army medical corps.


Click here to read a news report on the American military casualties that were amassed from 1941 up to November, 1944.

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