American tank commander George Gross encountered “an outburst of pure, almost hysterical relief” from an abandoned trainload of Jewish prisoners found near Farsleben, Germany, at the end of the war

American tank commander George Gross encountered “an outburst of pure, almost hysterical relief” from an abandoned trainload of Jewish prisoners found near Farsleben, Germany, at the end of the war.

#OnThisDay in 1945, two US Army units came across a train carrying 2,500 Jewish prisoners from the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. Nazi officers guarding the train fled when they saw American vehicles, leaving the passengers locked inside the train.

As American soldiers opened the doors, Gross remembered the prisoners looked like “skeletons.” They had been starved in Bergen-Belsen for months and spent days in the train with inadequate food, water, and sanitation. SS officers were transporting the prisoners from Bergen-Belsen to the Theresienstadt ghetto in occupied Czechoslovakia to prevent the prisoners from being liberated. The officers had orders to blow up the train if it could not reach its destination.

Upon encountering the train, one of George’s fellow soldiers called out to the survivors in Yiddish: “I am also a Jew!” After showing them his Star of David necklace, many prisoners ran to embrace him with tears in their eyes.

Photo: National Archives

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