Occupied Germany clean up 1945-1950
Sagittarius
07-14-2015, 08:07 AM
After the Nazi government surrendered their bombed-out cities in May, 1945, the German public faced a massive clean-up. But there were nowhere near enough German men available.
Some 15 million German military were either dead, maimed or still in captivity as prisoners of war in 1945. But there were plenty of women available. At first, the Allies put Nazi party members and their families to work clearing debris in 1945 -- a kind of informal punishment. But the overwhelming volume of rubble in the major cities needed far more effort.
Unemployed women between the ages of 15 and 50 were ordered to register with the Arbeitsamt (Labor Office) for assignment to a 10-person crew (Trümmerfrauen) in their city. It was hard outdoor labor, in all kinds of weather. Their pay: one free meager meal, off the ration book, supplied by the Americans in the U.S. Occupation Zone. The British, French and Soviet Zones had their own arrangements.
Who issued that work order? Some say it was a mandate from the Four-Powers Allied Control Council, but I could not confirm that in any of the literature. In fact, the "rubble women" aren't even mentioned in the Military Occupation books.
One American postwar film. "The Big Lift" (1949, starring Montgomery Clift and Paul Douglas), shows the "rubble women" at work in Berlin. The film was made on location and dealt with the Berlin Airlift.
German histories, however, pay tribute to those women with statues and plaques honoring their contribution. Many of them died of malnutrition, weakness and age in the early months. And many learned independence, freedom from the Nazi credo that a woman's place was in the home, the kitchen and the nursery.
The Trümmerfrau crews in the Western Zones were coordinated through German construction firms in a program running through 1946. The women kept working for years after that -- but for wages, not just food or ration stamps.
First the streets were cleared (sometimes by GIs with bulldozers, for our own convenience). Then the sidewalks. Finally, the ruined buildings were slowly emptied or demolished. The debris was carefully culled for useful bricks and blocks, which were passed out, hand to hand, and stacked for mortar removal. The useless rubble was passed out in bucket brigades and dumped into trolley carts riding on temporary rails leading to a nearby collecting point. Huge mountains of rubble were gradually built up in various sectors of each city and remain today.
Berlin alone reportedly had some 60,000 Trümmerfrauen working on countless sites. We'll never know how many of them had been raped during the Soviet takeover in April, 1945. One Berlin woman, who was 19 in 1945, commented: "We were totally disillusioned, because as girls we had gone through the Hitler Youth. The whole system you had been brought up in simply didn't exist anymore. People just couldn't grasp it. But you had to do something. First and foremost because at the back of the mind you had that thought, 'When my brother or my husband comes home [from POW camps] it can't be like this.' And who else would do it? So the women did it together."
Some 15 million German military were either dead, maimed or still in captivity as prisoners of war in 1945. But there were plenty of women available. At first, the Allies put Nazi party members and their families to work clearing debris in 1945 -- a kind of informal punishment. But the overwhelming volume of rubble in the major cities needed far more effort.
Unemployed women between the ages of 15 and 50 were ordered to register with the Arbeitsamt (Labor Office) for assignment to a 10-person crew (Trümmerfrauen) in their city. It was hard outdoor labor, in all kinds of weather. Their pay: one free meager meal, off the ration book, supplied by the Americans in the U.S. Occupation Zone. The British, French and Soviet Zones had their own arrangements.
Who issued that work order? Some say it was a mandate from the Four-Powers Allied Control Council, but I could not confirm that in any of the literature. In fact, the "rubble women" aren't even mentioned in the Military Occupation books.
One American postwar film. "The Big Lift" (1949, starring Montgomery Clift and Paul Douglas), shows the "rubble women" at work in Berlin. The film was made on location and dealt with the Berlin Airlift.
German histories, however, pay tribute to those women with statues and plaques honoring their contribution. Many of them died of malnutrition, weakness and age in the early months. And many learned independence, freedom from the Nazi credo that a woman's place was in the home, the kitchen and the nursery.
The Trümmerfrau crews in the Western Zones were coordinated through German construction firms in a program running through 1946. The women kept working for years after that -- but for wages, not just food or ration stamps.
First the streets were cleared (sometimes by GIs with bulldozers, for our own convenience). Then the sidewalks. Finally, the ruined buildings were slowly emptied or demolished. The debris was carefully culled for useful bricks and blocks, which were passed out, hand to hand, and stacked for mortar removal. The useless rubble was passed out in bucket brigades and dumped into trolley carts riding on temporary rails leading to a nearby collecting point. Huge mountains of rubble were gradually built up in various sectors of each city and remain today.
Berlin alone reportedly had some 60,000 Trümmerfrauen working on countless sites. We'll never know how many of them had been raped during the Soviet takeover in April, 1945. One Berlin woman, who was 19 in 1945, commented: "We were totally disillusioned, because as girls we had gone through the Hitler Youth. The whole system you had been brought up in simply didn't exist anymore. People just couldn't grasp it. But you had to do something. First and foremost because at the back of the mind you had that thought, 'When my brother or my husband comes home [from POW camps] it can't be like this.' And who else would do it? So the women did it together."
"You can be young without money but you can't be old without money"
Maggie the Cat from "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof." by Tennessee Williams
Maggie the Cat from "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof." by Tennessee Williams
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