Band of Brothers

At 10:00 PM on May 8, the 2ndBattalion moved south of Berchtesgaden to Zell am See, Austria, for occupation. The 600 dirty, unkempt Armymen presented a stark contrast with the 25,000 sharply-dressed Germans who surrendered to them (277).

Winters set up his headquarters in Kaprun, just outside of Zell am See. The valley where they were stationed was a popular resort area. The 2nd Battalion’s orderswere to “maintain order, to gather in all German soldiers, disarm them, and ship them off the P.O.W. camps,” but because of the efficiency of the Germans in disarming and organizing themselves, the work moved quickly. When Winters’s German staff officer proposeduniting their armies to fight the Russians (one of the Allies), Winters declined, saying he was only interested in getting home (276). The task of releasing prisoners of war to go home was more difficult than it seemed, however, because all Germans had to be screened to make sure they were not Nazis masquerading as enlisted men to escape punishment for war crimes.

Speirs received word from the displaced persons that “a man who had been the head of the slave labor camps in the area and had committed a great many atrocities” was living on a farm outside of Zell am See.