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Classifieds

Publication Date: Wednesday, November 21, 2001

Veteran was prisoner of war in Germany

By David Boyce

Almanac Staff Writer

Second of two parts

After fighting his way across France from the hedgerows of Normandy in 1944, Michael Salome, at age 20, was captured by the Germans on the Belgian border and sent to a prison camp in northern Germany.

Inside the barracks at Stalag 2A, prisoners' bunks were stacked three-high, each fitted with a straw-filled mattress. What warmth there was during the winter came from a pot-belly stove in each barracks, and each man received one thin blanket.

Mr. Salome said his feet became frostbitten during that winter, and he still experiences cramps in his toes that he attributes to having to wear wooden shoes for nine months.

Breakfast for prisoners was a cup of ersatz coffee (coffee made from chicory). For lunch, each man usually got three boiled potatoes, but those unlucky enough to be at the end of the chow line got only potato skins, he said. Dinner was a loaf of moldy bread shared among 15 to 20 men.

Sickness was common, he said. Diphtheria, a contagious disease of the throat or skin that can be fatal, was a threat, as was diarrhea and its more serious form, dysentery.

"Your system can't take what they were feeding us," he said. "But I survived it. I thank the Lord. Everyday, I thank the Lord."

The camp had a doctor, but Mr. Salome described the medical care as "not that great."

Contrary to the rules of the Geneva Convention for treatment of prisoners of war, they received no mail, and no relief parcels from the Red Cross. "The Germans were eating them," he said. "They were starving."

Prisoners worked seven days a week, unloading coal from railroad cars, he said. The German guards were old men in their 70s. At one point, he said, the guards discovered that five of the prisoners were Jewish. They segregated them and eventually took them out of the compound.

"We told the guards 'We know who you are. When the war's over, we'll get your ass,'" he said. After two weeks, the prisoners returned unharmed.

Mr. Salome spoke a little German and struck up a relationship with one of the guards who spoke a little English. As the war was winding down, this guard informed Mr. Salome that the Russians and the allies were advancing north on either side of the River Elbe in western Germany.

The prison camp was on the Russian side of the river but the guard did not want to surrender to the Russians, Mr. Salome said. He suggested that they desert the camp and walk more than 100 miles west to cross the river before the Russians got there.

Mr. Salome said he wouldn't leave without permission from the senior American officer in the camp. That officer gave the OK to those prisoners who felt they could make the march, and eight men, Mr. Salome included, left the camp for good.

"We walked fast and lived off the fat of the land," he said, referring to the potatoes and rutabagas they found along the way.

He was rehabilitated in Nice, France, and returned to the United States in the summer of 1945. Mr. Salome said the Army gave him a week's leave at Lake Placid, New York, which he described as "heaven" after what he had been through.

At the end of that week, he reported back and remembers an Army representative saying to him and his fellow veterans of the European theater of operations: "You're seasoned troops. Now you can go to Japan [to fight]."

To which, he said he replied: "Kiss my grits! I spent nine months in prison camp. You send somebody else there."

The war ended before he had to deal with the issue further. On VJ Day, September 2, 1945, Mr. Salome said he and some buddies drove up and down the streets of Rochester, dragging a big German flag, a big Japanese flag and some tin cans.

He said his future wife, Lee, was on the sidewalk that day watching them and waving. They met for the first time later after their mothers arranged a get-together at a celebration party.

After the war, Mr. Salome said he worked for a while digging ditches, but soon enrolled in real estate school and decided to make it a career, receiving licenses to practice in New York and California.

Over the past 19 years, Mr. Salome has donated more than 29,500 hours of volunteer service at the Veterans Affairs hospitals in Menlo Park and Palo Alto.

Frank Schleifer, the assistant chief of voluntary services at the Menlo Park hospital, said Mr. Salome is a "friendly visitor" in wards populated mostly with poor and indigent veterans. He brings the veterans high-quality clothing and shoes donated by Mr. Salome's many contacts in the community.

Many of the hospitalized veterans are homeless or suffer from post-traumatic stress syndrome or have problems related to drugs and alcohol. Mr. Schleifer called Mr. Salome "a vital link" in the volunteer efforts at the hospital. "I couldn't say enough nice things about him," he said, adding that his picture is in a prominent place on the wall next to an elevator.

Mr. Salome is active in the national effort to discover the fates of prisoners of war and those who go missing in action in all the recent wars of in which the United States was involved. He also talks with students in local colleges and high schools on the subject.

Mr. Salome married Lee 54 years ago. They have a son and a daughter and four grandchildren. They came out to California in 1968 to care for his mother-in-law and stayed for the nice weather. Mr. Salome sold real estate in Menlo Park, Palo Alto, Mountain View and other towns farther down the Peninsula.
Correction

Part 1 of this story, which appeared in the November 7 issue of the Almanac, mistakenly said Mr. Salome's unit in the U.S. Army 5th Division landed at Utah Beach on July 10, 1944. His unit actually landed at Omaha Beach on June 9, 1944, three days after D-Day.