Original WWII Dog Tags and Photos

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Original WWII Dog Tags and Photos This is my third and final auction of the WWII items belonging to my stepgrandfather. In this final auction, I decided to put up a pair of his WWII dogtags, as I have three pairs of them. Those who have seen my other items in this auction, and in the two previous auctions, have noticed or will notice a group picture of my stepgrandfather with fellow soldiers of his unit, the 20 th Armored. That picture has not been, nor is, for sale, serving, rather, as a sort of template for all his WWII items. This particular listing is different. The two pictures are included with the dog tags . T's an interesting if tragic story behind the pictures. When the war ended, the 20 th Armored found itself stationed in Prien, Germany, and stayed on t for a spell before being disbanded. When the unit first entered Prien, like most military "conquerors" from time immemorial, the officer corps looked around for the best house in town to set up their headquarters and living quarters in. Though Mort was not an officer, being a staff supply seargent he was involved in this. Well, the best house in town was found--with a dead body in the upstairs bedroom. . .The house, before the war, belonged to the Lochmeuller's, and it certainly was a grand, two story mansion. I have another picture of Mort's unit standing in front of this huge house, and on it's wide, stone front steps, posing for a group portrait. Mr. Lochmeuller was a well-respected engineer, and one of Prien's leading citizens. He had a wife and two teenaged daughters. When the war broke out, he was in his late fifties. Unfortunately for him and his family, he was a vocal anti-Nazi. It wasn't long before the war rolled into his area, and, once the Nazi war machine was alerted to his views (most likely by other members of the community), the leading Nazi commandant--who was looking for a place, anyway, to set up his headquarters in, lost no time in confiscating the entire house and grounds. In retailiation for his political views, Mr. Lochmeuller, his wife, and daughters were forced to move out of the house and take up residence in the servant's quarters--apparently little more than a barn--some distance from the house. If his wife and daughters were forced to wait on the officer staff hand and foot--cooking and cleaning, like servants (or slaves), in the very house w they used to be the masters--Mr. Lochmeuller was literally worked to death. The former engineer was forced to dig ditches, haul trash, chop wood, load and unload supply trucks, and do other kinds of exhausting labor from sunup to sundown. Finally, his heart gave out. This was some time previous to the arrival of the 20 th Armored. Once the Americans came to town--just days before the end of the war--and made it known that they , in their turn, wanted the house for their headquarters--once word of this reached this same commandant (and just before the Americans stepped onto the property) he put his lugar pistol inside his mouth and pulled the trigger in "his" upstairs bedroom. The 20 th Armored staff set up their offices in the mansion, and Mort worked out of one of the rooms. The wife and daughters were allowed to come back into their own home and start living t again. Mort became friendly with them, and, so he told me, had quite a crush on the youngest daughter. I don't remember her name--or even if he actually told me her name. At some point, as a token of her gratitude and affection, she gave Mort the photo that you see To me, it looks like a studio portrait--probably taken in better times, before the deprivations of the war. The other photo shows Mort in his uniform, with the 20 th Armored patch on his left shoulder, standing on the grounds of the Lochmeuller estate. Morton T. Iler was born in 1907 in Owensboro, Kentucky. Before the war he worked as a traveling salesman for the Hershey Chocolate Company. After the war, he married my grandmother in Bethesda, Maryland, and they moved to Dallas, TX w he worked for man... read more

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