written by Marilyn Walton
WWII Eighth Air Force historian and US POW expert, Marilyn Walton, has written a guide to viewing rare archival footage of Stalag VII-A at Moosburg in Germany at the end of World War II. Marilyn served as an advisor on the Apple TV + series Masters of the Air and shared her expertise with us on Greatest Generation Live.
Stalag VII-A in Moosburg was Nazi Germany’s largest POW camp liberated by American troops in April 1945.
From its opening in September 1939 until its liberation by the U.S. 14th Armored Division on April 29, 1945, the camp, originally meant to hold 10,000 prisoners, held 120,000 to 130,000 Allied prisoners at its peak—among them Americans, British, French, Soviets, and Poles. A total of 72 nationalities. Many had been captured in campaigns across Europe and North Africa, including the Battle of the Bulge and the Warsaw Uprising. Soviet POWs, often treated with particular brutality, suffered heavy casualties from neglect and execution.
Originally built to house Polish prisoners after the 1939 invasion, Stalag VII-A expanded into a sprawling complex of wooden barracks, barbed wire, huge white tents and guard towers across 86 acres. In addition to serving as a detention facility, it became a central processing camp for POWs en route to other sites. Its population swelled in the final months of the war as Allied prisoners were marched westward from evacuated camps ahead of the Soviet advance.
The American assault on Moosburg was brief but fierce. SS units were determined to not surrender the camp. They shot German guards who would not fight with them. With U.S. artillery ordered not to fire to avoid harming prisoners, tanks from Combat Command A of General George Patton’s 14th Armored Division overran German defenses with limited resistance. The camp’s liberation revealed appalling conditions—and a complex postwar legacy. Inmates recalled squalid conditions, vermin, contaminated or limited food, makeshift cooking contraptions, yet camaraderie amid hardship. After liberation, the site became a civilian internment center for suspected Nazis and later refugees. It eventually became a residential district of Moosburg. Two German barracks, and one dilapidated American barracks remain today.
The videos embedded below offer a rare glimpse into this history. You’ll see the American flag raised over the camp, Russian POWs walking free (many of whom would face tragic fates back home), and Tuskegee Airman Alex Jefferson among the liberated. Other clips show the dreaded German sauerkraut barrels, Red Cross donut machines, the bridge on the adjacent Isar River blown during the battle, and the steeples of St. Kastulus church that sat right next to the camp, once occupied by Nazi snipers and later transformed into a haven for civilians.
Watch for:
0:23 – The American flag raised at the front of the camp—a tall flagpole unlike what was shown in Masters of the Air (MOTA).
1:03 – Russian POWs shown in this picture? were German generals and are shown walking around after liberation. They would be sent home only to be shot by Stalin. An interesting note on the Russians–the International Red Cross had offered to feed the Russian POWs, but Stalin declined the offer on the grounds that the Red Cross was primarily an espionage organization.
2:50 – There was a tank crossing this bridge when the Germans blew it up as the battle began. The driver quickly put the tank in reverse and got off the bridge before it collapsed.
4:55 – One of many shots of the contraption POWs made for cooking outside. It was known by two names – the smokeless cooker, or more likely the cookless smoker.
11:43 and 12:10 – POW Alex Jefferson Tuskegee Airman featured in MOTA. He had never seen this before two years ago or so when I sent him the link. He said he regretted seeing himself smoke.
13:39 – Barrels of German sauerkraut that were set out around the camp. Vermin could be found in it, and these open barrels sat out all day. Many men had no plates or implements so dug in with their hands. These men show what that was like.
15:13 – POWs using the donut machine that the Red Cross brought in.
Watch for:
16:05 – The steeples of 8th century St. Kastulus Church that sat next to the camp. The church is till there today – Nazis snipers had occupied the church and shot from the steeples until they were killed. A Sherman tank gun took out one of the steeples where the Nazi flag had hung. After liberation, the church served as a safe haven for terrorized local German women.
20:04 – German barracks at VIIA where much of the final battle took place. The SS killed many German guards from the camp who would not fight with them. SS killed more Germans that day than Americans did.
Watch for:
1:28 – This is not South Compound but North Compound at Stalag Luft 3 with RAF POWs building their theatre. Top of picture, tall man on the left is Peter Butterworth, who later became a famous actor in the UK, getting his start in the POW camp theater.
1:32 Play was not put on by the Germans. It was put on by prisoners.
8:05 – The body of George Niethammer, who separated from escaping Cleven, and bodies of two other men were not found until three years after the war, shot in their heads by SS who still roamed that area. (Depicted differently in MOTA.)
