Eric Schwarzkopf (born 1922) is a World War II soldier who was born to Jewish parents, Simon and Thekla, and grew up in Waldshut, Germany with 4 older siblings.
Jewish extermination and persecution had already begun in the mid-1930s and by 1937 the family escaped the Nazis (thanks to Thekla's dual Swiss citizenship) and fled to the United States.
In 1942 Eric volunteered for the US army along with his brothers Hans and Bernard (Hans would be captured and held in Africa until the war’s end). Eric was placed in Military Field Intelligence with the airborne troops. In the 18th corps., he fought with the 101st, the 82nd and 17th divisions.
He parachuted as a pathfinder at Normandy on the night of June 5, 1944 and participated in the Battle of the Bulge, as well as other conflicts.
Toward the end of the war, his battalion took Essen. As the senior officer of the MIS team he was put in charge of the industrial city until he was called to serve near Oberursel. There, with his brother Bernard, he monitored captured SS officers’ conversations and translated them for evidence to be used at the Nuremberg Trials.
He returned to the US the day before Christmas Eve, 1945.
Famous quotes containing the word eric:
“...there was the annual Fourth of July picketing at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. ...I thought it was ridiculous to have to go there in a skirt. But I did it anyway because it was something that might possibly have an effect. I remember walking around in my little white blouse and skirt and tourists standing there eating their ice cream cones and watching us like the zoo had opened.”
—Martha Shelley, U.S. author and social activist. As quoted in Making History, part 3, by Eric Marcus (1992)