This WWII story should piss everyone off.

[torchthebitch]

If only because it involves Brits, Yanks, Canucks, Germans and the Irish in a relatively cood light.

Spitfire plucked from peat bog reveals astonishing story of World War II prison camp where Germans AND Allied PoWs mixed
•Recovered Spitfire 'one of the first ever made'
•U.S. pilot lost American citizenship to fight for Britain
•Roland Wolfe later fought for U.S. in Vietnam war

•Allied troops and German opponents mixed together at 'relaxed' World War Two prison camp
By Rob Cooper

Last updated at 4:33 PM on 29th June 2011

When American pilot Roland Wolfe crashed his British Spitfire into a peat bog in Ireland during World War Two, few thought it would ever be seen again.
The pilot who bailed out immediately wanted to climb into the cockpit of another military aircraft and continue fighting for the allies.
Knowing that his fighter was doomed, the young RAF Officer had radioed: 'I'm going over the side' before parachuting to safety moments before impact.

But instead of fighting again the serviceman was interned in a camp - where captured UK and U.S. troops mixed freely with the German enemy.
Despite managing to escape Ireland, neutral during the war, and make his way back to Britain, the 23-year-old was sent back to the camp.
Fearing a diplomatic row, the British Government returned Wolfe to the most relaxed of 'prison' camps in Ireland where he was kept for a further two years.
The pilot from Nebraska had been stripped of his U.S. citizenship after agreeing to fight for the British because the Americans had not yet joined the war.

Now almost 70 years after the pilot from the 133 'Eagle' Squadron crash-landed in the north of Ireland in November 1941, his crashed plane has been recovered.
The Spitfire was the first of 20 made with a donation from a Canadian millionaire called Willard Garfield Weston who wanted to support the Allies in the Battle of Britain with a £100,000 donation.
Remarkably large parts of the plane have been recovered from the bog.
Six machine guns and about 1,000 rounds of ammunition were also discovered by archaeologists searching the Inishowen Peninsula in Co Donegal.

American pilot lost his U.S. citizenship in 1941 when he signed up to fight for the RAF. His Spitfire, like the one pictured, was one of the first ever made

The excavation was carried out as part of a BBC Northern Ireland programme.
Historian Dan Snow said: 'The plane itself is obviously kind of wreckage and the big pieces survived. We're expecting to find things like the engine and there still may be personal effects in the cockpit.

'It's just incredible because it's just so wet here that the ground just sucked it up and the plane was able to burrow into it and it's been preserved.
'It's in amazing condition,' he told RTE radio.

Historian Dan Snow led the project to dig the Spitfire out of the peat bog almost 70 years after the pilot bailed out of the doomed plane
Mr Snow said Mr Wolf was forced to abandon his Spitfire over the Republic when its engine overheated about 13 miles from his base at RAF Eglinton, now Derry International Airport, in Northern Ireland.
Aviation archeologist Simon Parry told the Irish Independent that it was highly significant that the doomed plane had been recovered.
'The pilot was lucky to survive that day because if his engine had failed a few minutes earlier he would have ended up in the sea,' he said.


Landing on neutral soil, the 23-year-old pilot was interned at Curragh detention camp in Co Kildare for two years.
With fishing trips, fox hunts and football matches it sounded almost like a holiday camp - and seemingly the ideal place to be holed up as war raged across the rest of Europe.
The guards were only issued with blank rounds, visitors were permitted and there were frequent excursions to nearby pubs.

Around 40 RAF pilots who crashed in Ireland were held in the corrugated iron huts alongside the German enemy.
The crew of destroyed U-boats and Luftwaffe planes also ended up at the camp.

The warring nations even played football matches against each other - with the Germans defeating the largely English team 8-3, in a precursor to their repeated post-war footballing triumphs over their North Atlantic enemy.

But although servicemen were free to come and go from the camp Wolfe, who died in 1994, was determined to fight on.
In December 1941, just two weeks after his crash, the serviceman made his way into Dublin before hopping onto a train to Belfast which was British territory.
As his doomed plane came down he parachuted out before watching it plunge into the ground half a mile away.

Although he made his way back to RAF Eglinton, he was returned to the Irish camp where he spent a further two years before it was closed.
Belatedly he got his wish, and in 1943 he was allowed to return to frontline action as the tide of the war turned in the Allies direction.
It is only because of the unusually soft ground that the crashed Spitfire could be recovered in the 70th year after the crash.

The Irish Defence Forces said the six Browning .303 machine guns and approximately 1,000 rounds of ammunition were discovered by a team of archaeologists from Queens University buried up to 30 feet in the bog.
'The six machine guns and ammunition have been removed by the bomb disposal team to a secure military location where they will be decommissioned and cleaned before being handed over to the Derry Museum,' a spokesman added.
The plane will now be preserved and go on display at the Tower Museum in Derry.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-70-years-crashing-Ireland.html#ixzz1QhsbgAgX

 

[pointless]

that doesn't really piss me off at all.

 

[about_average]

that doesn't really piss me off at all.

Yeah, I was trying to figure out why it should piss everyone off. I've no idea.
Seems pretty much SOP for neutral countries, well, except the trips to the pub.
But it was Ireland. LOL

 

[torchthebitch]

that doesn't really piss me off at all.

Yeah, I was trying to figure out why it should piss everyone off. I've no idea.
Seems pretty much SOP for neutral countries, well, except the trips to the pub.
But it was Ireland. LOL

BUT! It made you look.

Anyway, we all know those who insist that the Americans, or British, were not involved in the European unpleasantness.

 

[torchthebitch]

Seems pretty much SOP for neutral countries, well, except the trips to the pub.
But it was Ireland. LOL

But how often did any PoWs get to ride to hounds? And Irish hunts remain some of the best.

 

[unregistered]

 

[torchthebitch]

The law is the law.

Actually, as the article says, he was returned to avoid a diplomatic incident. Officers are expected to attempt escape. Ireland allowed Britain overflight of Irish airspace in Donegal, particularly from the seaplane base on Lough Erne. It was a PBY Catalina from RAF Lough Erne that spotted her after she evaded pursuit. Britain was keen to retain this accommodation as it allowed air cover to reach the convoys and be maintained at greater range.

 

[HB1965]

Why did he lose his US citizenship and where did he live after the war?

 

[pointless]

Why did he lose his US citizenship and where did he live after the war?

he lost his citizenship because he joined the army of a foreign nation.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Plenty of Americans joined the RAF and RCAF plus the Flying Tigers in China.

DEFCON 5 BS ALERT.

 

[pointless]

Plenty of Americans joined the RAF and RCAF plus the Flying Tigers in China.

DEFCON 5 BS ALERT.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Tigers

...recruited under Presidential sanction...

 

[pointless]

but, to be fair, upon reading some more i should have added that it was because he joined before the united states had entered the war and we were still officially nuetral.

 

[Ishmael]

If only because it involves Brits, Yanks, Canucks, Germans and the Irish in a relatively cood light.





Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-70-years-crashing-Ireland.html#ixzz1QhsbgAgX

There's something missing in the story Torch.

My father left the US in late '38 and joined the RCAF. He flew for them until very early '42 when he was given the choice of flying for the USAAF or losing his citizenship. The point being that he was given a choice. He chose to join the USAAF and the RCAF was very accommodating in letting him go without prejudice. He retained his Canadian Veteran status and benefits.

Ishmael

 

[Joeybagadonuts]

There's something missing in the story Torch.

My father left the US in late '38 and joined the RCAF. He flew for them until very early '42 when he was given the choice of flying for the USAAF or losing his citizenship. The point being that he was given a choice. He chose to join the USAAF and the RCAF was very accommodating in letting him go without prejudice. He retained his Canadian Veteran status and benefits.

Ishmael

no one cares.

 

[DevilishTexan]

There's something missing in the story Torch.

My father left the US in late '38 and joined the RCAF. He flew for them until very early '42 when he was given the choice of flying for the USAAF or losing his citizenship. The point being that he was given a choice. He chose to join the USAAF and the RCAF was very accommodating in letting him go without prejudice. He retained his Canadian Veteran status and benefits.

Ishmael

That's awesome Ish. Apparently you're a dash older than I as my grandfather served in the Pacific theater, mainly Saipan & Guam as a Seabee. Could never get him to speak much of it though as it tore him up quite a bit. He was discharged after sustaining shrapnel wounds.

WWll had many secrets and underhanded lopsided bs we'll never hear about.

 

[JustaSCOUNDREL]

That's awesome Ish. Apparently you're a dash older than I as my grandfather served in the Pacific theater, mainly Saipan & Guam as a Seabee. Could never get him to speak much of it though as it tore him up quite a bit. He was discharged after sustaining shrapnel wounds.

WWll had many secrets and underhanded lopsided bs we'll never hear about.

My thanks to the O/P and to Ish. Interesting posts. There are thousands of stories out there and sadly they are dying daily mostly untold. History that should be recorded and now will never will be.

Thanks,

Mike

 

[islandman]

Fascinating historical narrative. Would love to know when that program airs so that I can torrent and watch it.

 

[Lost Cause]

"Brothers in Arms"

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

but, to be fair, upon reading some more i should have added that it was because he joined before the united states had entered the war and we were still officially nuetral.

Roosevelt started Lend Lease and patrolling the North Atlantic while we were neutral. Back in 1937 Roosevelt refused to sell Hitler helium gas for the German airships like HINDENBERG.

Your hero is lying or lost his citizenship for some other reason.

 

[Weird Harold]

Your hero is lying or lost his citizenship for some other reason.

You need to read up on the Citizenship Act of 1907:

(as cited at: http://www.sixthsquadron.com/ww1/citizen2.htm

Note that several clauses in the law, listed as "expatriating acts," and as written in 1907, would have included Americans who joined the Royal Air Forces or the French Air Service. Those Americans who joined the Royal Air Forces were especially effected by this law because not only were they commissioned as officers in the military of a "foreign state," many had to take an oath of loyalty to the Crown in order to receive their commission. Many, not taking the actual words of the oath seriously and wanting, most of all, to fly airplanes and participate in the war, did not realize that they were outside the limitations of the law of their country.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

You need to read up on the Citizenship Act of 1907:

Its been my experience that laws exist to serve as excuses to fuck people the guvmint dont like.

Law or no law the RCAF and RAF were full of American flyers who werent punished by the USA. It makes you wonder why Roosevelt didnt jail any of the Flying Tigers working for China.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eagle_Squadrons

 

[torchthebitch]

There's something missing in the story Torch.

My father left the US in late '38 and joined the RCAF. He flew for them until very early '42 when he was given the choice of flying for the USAAF or losing his citizenship. The point being that he was given a choice. He chose to join the USAAF and the RCAF was very accommodating in letting him go without prejudice. He retained his Canadian Veteran status and benefits.

Ishmael

This is true. The Americans who joined the RAF were known as the Eagle Squadrons. There were two or three of them. I think some of the pilots might actually have volunteered for the French air force and escaped from Dunkirk. Some pretended to be Canadian so they could join up without risking their US citizenship. They served in other squadrons and so the real number of US pilots may not be complete.

When the US formally joined operations the RAF also released them from their engagement to join the USAAF. Being Britain though there were no Veterans benefits. Our Government is thoughtful that way.

 

[torchthebitch]

Roosevelt started Lend Lease and patrolling the North Atlantic while we were neutral. Back in 1937 Roosevelt refused to sell Hitler helium gas for the German airships like HINDENBERG.

Your hero is lying or lost his citizenship for some other reason.

The bit about losing their citizenship is correct. Since the US was legally neutral any American joining a foreign armed service could be stripped of their nationality. He was probaly given it back when the US entered the war as the article quoted said he subsequently served in Vietnam.

I don't think there is any question of the man's bravery or dedication to the concept of liberty.

 

[torchthebitch]

Its been my experience that laws exist to serve as excuses to fuck people the guvmint dont like.

Law or no law the RCAF and RAF were full of American flyers who werent punished by the USA. It makes you wonder why Roosevelt didnt jail any of the Flying Tigers working for China.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eagle_Squadrons

Crashing and being taken prisoner in the territory of another neutral state may have been the cause. Since he was in a camp with German prisoners who had access to the German Embassy in Dublin would have been diplomatically imprudent. Perhaps the US government was doing a little window dressing.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

The bit about losing their citizenship is correct. Since the US was legally neutral any American joining a foreign armed service could be stripped of their nationality. He was probaly given it back when the US entered the war as the article quoted said he subsequently served in Vietnam.

I don't think there is any question of the man's bravery or dedication to the concept of liberty.

The man may be the Queen Mother for all I know. What I contend is: Thousands of Americans served in foreign military forces (even German) during WW2 without problem, yet this guy had his citizenship taken. There has to be more to the tale than whats reported. WHY DID FDR HAVE A BONER FOR THIS GUY AND NO ONE ELSE?