| “Original caption: “German Prisoners of War – Fearful Youth” In a still frame from a motion picture film, this Hitler Youth, his hair neatly combed back with pomade styling gel, surrenders to the United States Army. On July 18, 1944, The United States 29th Infantry Division, covered by M10 Tank Destroyers and M4 Sherman tanks including “Civilizer” and the dozer tank “Cookie’s Boy,” entered Saint Lo. Supported by Republic P-47 Thunderbolt fighter bombers, the 29th Infantry Division evacuated casualties under fire. “Nazis Run Gauntlet of Gunfire from Own Officers to Surrender Escape in Dead of Night to Give U; Some Killed on Way to American Lines – The Pittsburgh Press – July 16, 1944” by Ira Wolfert [(November 1, 1908 – November 24, 1997)] — “With The United States Infantry Outside St. Lô. July 13. (Delayed Wireless).” “Finally about one o’clock this morning an end we all had been hoping for came. There was no moon at the time but there was a kind of pearly quality to the darkness, and when something stood up in the open field you could make out the shape. Anyway, you could tell whether it was a man or tank.” “There had been an air raid mile or so back: then the Germans had laid down some shells to keep us awake, and our boys talked back for quite a while to show them we were awake. But now there is the quiet you get in a field at night when, no matter how soft you try to make your breathing, you can still hear vour breath making tickling little noise as it crawls in and out of your nose.” “Surrender Cry” “A Nebraska boy on outpost duty lay in a hole under a hedge chewing cigarette tobacco to give himself the feeling of having a smoke. There was an open field in front of him, boxed in all around by hedges. Suddenly the voice he wanted to hear and had been waiting for through the long, long dangerous day spoke up from the hedge beyond and to the right. “‘amerad!’ it said. ‘Nicht schiessen!’” T”here was a rapid. excited panting for breath. “Halt!” our boy cried, and the cigarette tobacco sprayed out of his mouth in the excitement and clung like hair to his lips. ‘Halt! you — !’ he cried. ‘Kamerad! Kamerad! Bitte nicht schiessen (Friend! Friend! [Actually ‘comrade’] Please don’t shoot).’ The voice repeated.” “Listens to Plea” “The cornhusker’s finger was on the trigger of his rifle but he couldn’t see anything to shoot at except the hedges, and he thought a long time about what to say next. listening, as he thought, to the German tale coming in a rapid, begging, panting, breathless voice and trying pick out a word that would make sense to him. ‘Hands up!’ he said finally. ‘Get out in the open with your hands up!’” “The German passed the word to his companions. He was the interpreter. ‘Hands up.’ He said excitedly. ‘Die hands hoch.’ [‘Your hands high.’] He came out from the hedge and stood in the open field, a black, baggy shape in the pearl-colored darkness, trembling and crouched over a little, trying to plead with hands clasped behind his head.” “Men Appear” “Then another shape came out from the hedge behind him, and a third and a fourth, and still more, all baggy and black-looking and all crouched over pleadingly.” “‘He’s brought the whole damn Hitler Army with him,’ the Nebraskan shouted, and for a moment in that dim field it really looked that way. It really looked to his excited eyes like the beaten-up pulp of a gutted army, but it turned out to be only seven boys led by a nineteen-year-old German Corporal from Carlsbad, serving his Führer as a rifleman.” “Radio Propaganda” “The Corporal had sampled some of our psychological warfare put out by a mobile radio broadcasting company, a combined British and American unit which had won medals for itself by talking some twenty=two hundred Germans into coming out of their tunnels and forts in Cherbourg. The situation here is quite different from Cherbourg and much more indicative of the breakdown in morale, at least in that part of the German Army now fighting on the Cherbourg peninsula. At Cherbourg the Nazis were surrounded and had no hope of being rescued to fight again for their Führer. Here the rear was open for a retreat if the German command would permit it. In this case our psychological warfare, aided by our crushing weight of firepower, talked the Germans into defying the orders of their Nazi masters and into running away from the bullets shot at them by their officers and into the American bullets in order to surrender.” “In all, eighteen men gave themselves up in the early hours of this morning. Some of them are Poles, but most are Germans. How many more were killed trying to do so is not yet known, but there must have been many, for each of these eighteen was shot at by his own officers on his way to us. How many more Germans want to surrender but are afraid to walk the dangerous path to our lines also is not yet known, but the prisoners I spoke to as they came in all said that whole companies would surrender if they could find a way to do so. That seems to be the problem to work out a path along which the Germans may surrender. And until this is worked out the fighting here will continue to be the hard, slow work of hopping from hedge to hedge. The Nazis’ best chance for life is to fight off our assault, and Nazi supermen that we are fighting here want to keep on living. Oh, yes, that is very much on their minds-to keep on living.” The 165th Signal Photo Company, under the direction of Captain Earl W. Witscher (November 1, 1916 – April 16, 2006), accompanied the United States 29th Infantry Division into Saint Lo. They photographed the liberation of the town, including the film from which this still was taken. Earl Walter Witscher joined the Army as enlisted before completing officer candidate school October 16, 1942. Stationed at Fort Sam Houston, Texas, he frequently traveled elsewhere to document various goings on in photographs and film. In January 1944, Witscher went to Canada with the I Canadian Corps on temporary duty to produce a training film. A short time after that he traveled to Europe. After training with the 82nd Airborne in England, Witscher and his photo company airdropped onto Normandy. Several members of their company were injured or lost their lives that day, including their commanding officer, who lost his leg on the beach. Witscher ended up in a firefight and had to bury all of his equipment before possible capture. Just 3 weeks after D-Day, Witscher received a letter of commendation from the Headquarters of the 82nd Airborne Division and Major General Matthew B. Ridgway (March 3, 1895 – July 26, 1993), stating that he had “tireless energy, cheerful willingness to work at all hours, high professional competence and a genial and charming personality which still further enhanced the value of all his work” and that he “should be delighted to have this officer in my command at any time” Less than a month after that, Witscher’s unit received a commendation from Major General William S. Rumbouch (November 2, 1892 – December 2, 1980) stating that their work “had been excellent, and that the pictures of the initial landing were available to the newspapers and news reels in the United States in record time.” The unit’s D-Day operation was the 1st for the Signal Corps in that conflict, and it was considered an “outstanding success.” Witscher demobilized September 17, 1945, and left active duty December 13, 1945, leaving the Army as a Captain. He went back to Los Angeles, California and his wife, Joyce Witscher (April 27, 1920 – April 2, 2011), where he was a motion picture cameraman. Witscher donated liberally to the arts, both monies, as well as an extensive collection of photography to a nonprofit organization called the Hollywood Photographers Archives. | |
| Image Filename | wwii0415.jpg |
| Image Size | 648.65 KB |
| Image Dimensions | 2960 x 2431 |
| Photographer | Earl W. Witscher |
| Photographer Title | United States Army Signal Corps |
| Caption Author | Written or Adapted by Jason McDonald |
| Date Photographed | July 18, 1944 |
| Location | |
| City | |
| State or Province | |
| Country | France |
| Archive | National Archives and Records Administration |
| Record Number | NLR-PHOCO-A-6654(36) |
| Status | Caption ©2026 MFA Productions LLC Please Do Not Duplicate or Distribute Without Permission; Image in the Public Domain |
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