Killing Patton The Strange Death of World War II's Most Audacious General (46 page)

2
Frederick’s fortunes took a turn for the better when Britain stepped in as an ally, while Sweden and Russia withdrew their attacks, thus marking the end of the Seven Years’ War. Prussia and Frederick the Great emerged from the conflict as a world power. It was his greatest triumph.

Chapter 18

1
This is not unusual. Truman was in the habit of taking a long daily walk. Very often, he slipped out of the White House unnoticed and walked the five miles to the Marine Corps barracks and back. He believed that it was useless to worry about assassination, because if someone wanted to shoot him, they would find a way, regardless of Secret Service protection. This proved inaccurate on November 1, 1950, when two Puerto Rican nationals tried to sneak into a house where Truman was taking a nap. They were shot and killed by bodyguards. Truman was unharmed.

2
Anna Roosevelt Boettiger was thirty-nine years old, and had recently moved back into the White House while her husband served in the military. The president put her to work, appointing Anna special assistant to the president. In this capacity, she soon learned many of the most well-kept secrets in the White House. It was Anna who had the unfortunate task of informing Eleanor Roosevelt about FDR’s ongoing affair with Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd after the president’s death. It was a number of years before Eleanor forgave Anna for her role in the deception.

3
America would be without a president for two hours and twenty-four minutes. Truman was not sworn in by Chief Justice Harlan Stone until 7:09 that evening. Part of the delay was waiting for Truman’s wife, Bess, and daughter Margaret to travel to the White House. Another was the search for a Bible for the ceremony. Eventually, a cheap Gideon Bible was located in the office of chief usher Howell Crim, who made a point of dusting it before the ceremony.

4
In a ritual that began in 1924 and still continues almost a century later, the BBC emits a series of “pips” at the top of each hour to denote the exact time. This is accomplished through the use of an atomic clock in the basement of the broadcast center. On the surface, this practice might seem to be an inordinate preoccupation with being punctual, but it actually saves lives. The “pips” are important for those sailors at sea who listen in to the BBC to set their watches, because exact time is vital to proper navigation, preventing them from sailing hundreds of miles off course.

5
The majority of the gold had been looted from the various nations conquered by Nazi Germany. Much of this was returned immediately after the war. The remainder was channeled into what was known as the Nazi Persecutee Relief Fund, which aided survivors of the Holocaust. This fund was exhausted in 1998.

6
Eisenhower and Bradley were also deeply disturbed by what they saw. “The smell of death overwhelmed us,” Bradley wrote in his memoirs. “More than 3,200 naked, emaciated bodies had been thrown into shallow graves. Others lay in the street where they had fallen. Lice crawled over the yellowed skin of their sharp, bony frames. A guard showed us how the blood had congealed in coarse black scabs where the prisoners had torn out the entrails of the dead for food.” Ike’s face “whitened into a mask,” at the sight, in Bradley’s description. Bradley then added, “I was too revolted to speak.”

Chapter 19

1
Joseph Stalin was informed by U.S. ambassador W. Averell Harriman, who made a 4:00 a.m. visit to the Kremlin to deliver the news. A visibly shaken Stalin took Harriman’s hand and held it for nearly a minute as he composed himself. The eternally suspicious Stalin then suggested that FDR’s body be autopsied for signs of food poisoning.

2
The seating capacity was 802, which allowed more than enough room for the entire membership. At Churchill’s insistence, the House of Commons was rebuilt in accordance with its original design between 1948 and 1950.

3
Churchill was a close friend of the distiller Sir Alexander Walker. The prime minister favored hard alcohol, with beer being his least favorite beverage. However, he abhorred drunkenness, and was rarely known to drink to excess. Churchill’s most famous drinking incident occurred just after the war, when the British Labour politician Bessie Braddock accosted him late one night as he left the House of Commons. “Winston, you are drunk. What’s more, you are disgustingly drunk,” she told him. To which Churchill replied, “Bessie, my dear, you are ugly. What’s more, you are disgustingly ugly. But tomorrow I shall be sober, and you shall still be disgustingly ugly.” Churchill borrowed the quote from the 1934 W. C. Fields movie
It’s a Gift
. It’s worth noting that despite exercising very little, if at all, and drinking so copiously, Churchill inherited a sturdy constitution. Well past his eightieth birthday, he could still boast of a very healthy blood pressure of 140 over 80.

Chapter 20

1
Quoted in statements to Third Army correspondents on May 8, 1945, at his headquarters in Regensburg, Germany.

2
There was great confusion about what was to be done with so many refugees. They had left their homes and farms. It was thought that they should be turned back, sent where they came from, and left to fend for themselves against the Russians, many of whom had been resettled in these very farms and homes. The refugees had no place to go and were unwelcome everywhere.

3
Quoted by Martin Blumenson, Patton’s staff historian for the Third Army.

4
The K-ration was a boxed meal containing breakfast, lunch, or dinner. A full box typically consisted of tinned food, crackers, cigarettes, matches, and dessert.

5
Later in life, Baum will devote himself to the creation of the Israeli state. The Jewish tank commander will also exchange holiday cards with camp commandant von Goeckel. He will become good friends with John Waters, who went on to become a four-star general. However, at the time, he was furious that Patton had risked so much for just one man.

6
The name of the attacker has never been verified, nor has the nationality of the pilot. Although the plane had Polish markings, there were no Polish Spitfires in that part of Germany on April 20.

Chapter 21

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An estimated eighty thousand Russians died in the Battle of Berlin. Civilian casualties are difficult to place, but it is estimated that between eighty thousand and one hundred thousand citizens of Berlin were killed.

2
Walther Wenck was arrested as a prisoner of war and held by the Americans until 1947. He died in 1982, following an automobile crash. He was eighty-one years old.

3
The liquid form of cyanide. Also known as hydrocyanic acid.

4
A special medallion given to the first one hundred thousand people who joined the Nazi Party. Each was numbered in the order in which the individual became a member. Hitler’s bore the number 1, making his gift to Magda Goebbels a most treasured memento.

5
The Soviets confirmed the identity of the bodies within two weeks but, for years, pretended to know nothing about Hitler’s fate. At the Potsdam Conference in July 1945, Joseph Stalin made a point of pretending that Hitler was alive and on the run. Stalin, a master at creating uncertainty, believed that the ghosts of Nazism would enhance his power.

Chapter 22

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Priority for going home was based on a system of points accrued by months in service, time in combat, number of children under the age of eighteen, and whether the individual had been awarded a medal such as the Bronze Star or Purple Heart. As for the Third’s job in Germany after the war, days were spent making sure that displaced people did not travel into the American occupation zone, patrolling a “frontier” between the American and Russian lines by erecting signs and barricades to prevent the flow of individuals traveling from east to west, and sealing off Germany to prevent intelligence officials and other high-ranking members of the Nazi Party from escaping the country.

2
The fifty-four-year-old Patterson was a native of Glens Falls, New York, who had been awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for bravery during World War I. He later practiced law and served as a U.S. District Court judge before accepting the position of undersecretary of war when FDR offered it to him in 1940. Patterson became a favorite of Harry Truman, who elevated him to secretary of war on September 27, 1945. Patterson served two years before returning to the law. His firm of Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler still exists in New York City. Patterson died on January 22, 1952, when the plane he was flying in from Buffalo to Newark crashed into a house while trying to land. He was rushing to get home and at the last minute had traded in his rail ticket for the plane ticket.

3
Narodny Komissariat Vnutrennikh Del, translated as the “People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs.”

Chapter 23

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At the heart of the dispute was the Morgenthau Plan, a strategy to decimate postwar Germany by destroying its industrial strength and forcing the nation to return to its agrarian roots, soon to produce only beer, grain, and textiles. This would unknowingly have played into Russian hands, because by reducing Germany’s industrial output the nation would not be able to attack Russia again.

2
Oppenheimer is quoting from the
Bhagavad Gita
, a Hindu scripture.

3
There are some who believe that Robert Oppenheimer, who had known Communist leanings and whose wife was once a member of the Communist Party, was among those providing nuclear secrets to the Russians. In fact, the Soviet spy’s name was Klaus Fuchs.

4
Patton admired the discipline of the German military and the German work ethic.

5
Although Patton was received as a hero when he returned to the United States in the summer of 1945, his affair with Jean Gordon caused considerable animosity between him and his wife. “Beatrice gave me hell,” Patton told his friend Gen. Everett Hughes upon his return to Bavaria. “I’m glad to be in Europe.”

6
Bandera will himself be assassinated by the Russians in 1959, as noted in the Central Intelligence Agency journal
Studies in Intelligence
19, no. 3.

7
On May 4, Patton received approval from Dwight Eisenhower to invade Czechoslovakia. At this point in the war, the Third Army comprised eighteen divisions and more than half a million men, making it the largest U.S. force in history. The Third Army swept into western Czechoslovakia, quickly capturing vast regions of the nation and accepting the surrender of thousands of German prisoners who did not want to fall into Russian hands. On May 6, Eisenhower ordered Patton to halt—which he did, albeit very reluctantly. However, elements of the Third Army did not receive the order. In the ancient city of Rokycany, just east of Plze, there was conflict when the American and Russian armies linked up, very nearly starting the new war for which Patton had long argued.

8
The Russians denied the Americans and British access to many of the POW camps they had liberated, and also denied that they held any Allied POWs. Truman, and Roosevelt before him, allegedly knew otherwise, but did not want to create strife with Stalin. Thus it is believed that many American and British soldiers died in Russian captivity because their release was not demanded.

Chapter 24

1
This is a reference to the smooth-talking religious officials whom Jesus of Nazareth condemned for their lies and air of self-importance, noting that their acts and their beliefs differed greatly.

2
The source of this innuendo is Harry Truman, speaking to a biographer in 1974. Marshall’s reasons were as much personal as political. It was widely held that Eisenhower had a great political future after the war, but Americans did not look kindly on candidates who were divorced—particularly one who left his wife for a foreigner several years younger. Marshall, in effect, believed he was saving Eisenhower from making a great mistake.

3
Raymond Daniell of the
Chicago Daily News
would later attempt to apologize to Beatrice Patton for his part in this scheme, and for his anti-Patton bias. She refused to accept his apology.

4
Named for Joseph Stalin. In the Cyrillic alphabet, IS is the close equivalent to his initials.

Chapter 25

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In addition to camouflaging the villa’s exterior, Stalin added several curious security details to it. He ordered that the drapes be short, so that he could see the feet of anyone trying to hide behind them. There were no rugs, so that Stalin could hear any approaching footsteps. Also, the backs of the sofas were bulletproof, and designed to be high enough so that Stalin’s head was not visible when he was seated.