Alfred Dietrick was born in 1921. [Annotator's Note: The tape breaks as Dietrick is giving his birthdate]. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer asks Dietrick what life was like during The Great Depression, a global economic depression that lasted from 1929 through 1945.] He was about six years old when it hit. His family had other problems. His parents broke up. A year later, his mother remarried John Hay [Annotator's Note: phonetic spelling] who was serving in the Army's 2nd Division and was stationed at Fort Sam Houston [Annotator's Note: now part of Joint Base San Antonio or JBSA; known colloquially as "Fort Sam"; San Antonio, Texas]. They survived the Depression very well. As soon as Franklin Roosevelt [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States] took over, he started many programs. People went back to work slowly, and the country was recovering slowly. He went to work while in high school making 50 cents a day. He did ten hour days on Saturday and got a dollar and half. He graduated from high school in 1939 and joined the 36th Division [Annotator's Note: now the 36th Infantry Division]. He and a buddy were looking for work and passed the National Guard Armory [Annotator's Note: Texas National Guard Armory, San Antonio, Texas]. They were drilling. They had both been in ROTC [Annotator's Note: Reserve Officer Training Corps] and were watching them. One came to the fence and said hello and said they should join up. They did. The company went out to Camp Bullis [Annotator's Note: now Camp Bullis Military Training Reservation in Bexar County, Texas] to the rifle range. Dietrick and Ray [Annotator's Note: his friend; no last name given] made expert. About a week later and a week before the division was going to summer camp, Dietrick got a job offer. It was a nice job. He told the First Sergeant he did not want to lose the job. The CO [Annotator's Note: commanding officer] said to discharge him. Dietrick told him he wanted to stay but not go to camp so he could work. He did not really mean it. The CO agreed. On 25 November 1940, many divisions in the National Guard were federalized due the imminent war. Dietrick had already made corporal. He was asked to drill the platoons. His ROTC unit had won a medal for it, so he did well with that. He had had a West Point [Annotator's Note: United States Military Academy, West Point, New York] commandant in high school and that was a plus. He enjoyed being in the military. Before being federalized, he trained on weekends and was introduced to the M1 rifle [Annotator's Note: .30 caliber M1 semi-automatic rifle, also known as the M1 Garand]. In high school he had trained with the O3 [Annotator's Note: .30 caliber Model 1903, or M1903, Springfield bolt action rifle]. He really liked the rifle. He never wanted to replace it with any other weapon. They promised his job would be there when he got back. He did not go back there and there was no other work to be found. He did find an opening at Kelly Air Force Base [Annotator's Note: now Kelly Field, Joint Base San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas] for a draftsman, and he took it. He decided right then that he would put in his 30 years since his five previous years counted. He spent 37 years with the Federal Government.

Alfred Dietrick was federalized [Annotator's Note: from the Texas Army National Guard to the 36th Infantry Division] on 25 November 1940 and then on 2 January [Annotator's Note: 2 January 1941], moved to Camp Bowie, Texas. They were there for about a year. Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941] happened and he knew he was in for the duration of the war. In February 1942, they went to Camp Blanding, Florida [Annotator's Note: in Clay County, Florida]. They stayed there about eight months and then went to Camp Edwards, Massachusetts [Annotator's Note: in Cape Cod, Massachusetts]. They trained at each base to keep in shape. Dietrick wondered what they could do to train them for war. Most of their officers had not experienced war. Dietrick now knows what guys are going through. All of the training was just basic and out of the book. A blizzard set in for three or four days. He was given a pamphlet to study on the campaigns in Africa [Annotator's Note: North Africa Campaign, 10 June 1940 to 13 May 1943] and ordered to make a report on it the next day. The British and Rommel [Annotator's Note: German Army Generalfeldmarschall, or Field Marshal, Johannes Erwin Eugen Rommel] were seesawing back and forth in the desert. There were watering holes that both sides would not abuse because they never knew when they would need them. The British developed a tactic of retreat to keep Rommel going after them. The British knew he would need water if he did so. When Rommel got to the watering holes, the British had piped salt water into them. Everything is fair in war. Rommel had to keep going then, and the British were waiting for him. They pushed him out of Africa. Dietrick had to report that. In what he read, Rommel had the 15th [Annotator's Note: 15th Panzer Division, German Army] and 16th Panzer Divisions [Annotator's Note: 16th Panzer Division, German Army], the 9th Light Armored Division [Annotator's Note: 90th Light Infantry Division, German Army], the Hermann Goering Division [Annotator's Note: 1st Fallschirm-Panzer Division "Hermann Göring"; German Luftwaffe armored division] and more. After the Salerno invasion [Annotator's Note: Operation Avalanche, 9 to 16 September 1943, Salerno, Italy], Dietrick and his men had a critique, and they were informed they had faced the same units.

In the beginning, Alfred Dietrick would go to the movies before going overseas and the Germans looked invincible. The Americans looked terrible in their World War 1 uniforms. When he first faced a German at Salerno [Annotator's Note: Salerno, Italy], they looked at each differently. The German had a negative reaction, but Dietrick beat him to the draw. When Dietrick crippled a Mark IV tank [Annotator's Note: German Panzer IV medium tank], he learned that they were out there to do a job, just like he was. It was about who was going to move the fastest. His opinion changed and he knew they were just human beings. He received orders that they were shipping out. On 2 April [Annotator's Note: 2 April 1943], a troop train rolled into Camp Edwards [Annotator's Note: in Cape Cod, Massachusetts], and they loaded up. They went to Staten Island, New York and went out to sea on the USS Brazil [Annotator's Note: SS Brazil]. After about four days they hit a rough storm. He would look out his porthole and would only see water. It did not bother the sailors. On 13 April [Annotator's Note: 13 April 1943], they arrived in Oran, Algeria, North Africa. He looked at the shoreline and the city and wondered where he would be in a year. They trained hard. The first month was just hiking and then they got orders to go west. He was in 1st Battalion, 141st Infantry [Annotator's Note: Company B, 1st Battalion, 141st Infantry Regiment, 36th Infantry Division]. They went to just outside of Casablanca [Annotator's Note: Casablanca, Morocco] to a prisoner of war camp. They had to guard the camp. They were there about a month and then recalled back to Arzew [Annotator's Note: Arziw or Arzeu, Algeria] for more training in landing movements. They used Landing Craft, Infantry and then would either wade in or go in on rubber rafts. They lost men that day due to the strong currents. They also got used to overhead artillery fire. The regiment was taken to a desolate area facing the ocean. The artillery fired over them, getting closer with each salvo. Dietrick got up on one knee in sagebrush and an unseen force bent that brush down to the ground. A shell landed about 25 yards in front of him. It killed two men and wounded two more. They then trained in village fighting. They had training grenades to use. One guy threw a grenade in, and it went off. Dietrick could see the guy and he was on the ground and not moving. He called off the training and discovered the man was dead. General Walker [Annotator's Note: US Army Major General Fred L. Walker] wrote a book later called "From Texas to Rome" [Annotator's Note: "From Texas to Rome: Fighting World War II and the Italian Campaign with the 36th Infantry Division"] that mentions some of these accidents. This prepared Dietrick for war.

After finishing training [Annotator's Note: with Company B, 1st Battalion, 141st Infantry Regiment, 36th Infantry Division in Algeria], it was time to go on the invasion [Annotator's Note: of Salerno, Italy]. On 5 September 1943, Alfred Dietrick's CO [Annotator's Note: commanding officer] called a formation and told them they were going into combat the next day. They slept on the ground, and they got on trucks to Oran [Annotator's Note: Oran, Algeria] to transports. They boarded the USS Thomas Jefferson [Annotator's Note: USS Thomas Jefferson (APA-30)]. The next day they were out at sea. They got announcement that the Italian government had surrendered [Annotator's Note: announced 8 September 1943] and there would be no opposition from the Italian Army. The Germans would be fighting. They got 120 rounds ammunition and he knew this was not going to be good. They had a photo of the beach and where they would land. There was only one building in the entire picture. That last night the Navy fed them a fine meal. He thought they were feeding them for the kill. Some men just sat on deck playing cards or shooting dice. They were ordered to their cabins. They got their reporting station number and got in the landing craft. They formed into each wave. The scouts were up front. Dietrick was second in command. They got right up on the beach. They moved in right away with no obstacles. They quickly surveyed the platoon and moved in. It was pitch dark and they moved slowly. He saw the building from the photograph and thanked the Navy for landing them in the right place. They got to the building and there were walls on each side and that was actually an irrigation canal. They moved in and dawn began to break. Then the sound of tanks appeared, and they were told to dig in. They started digging and the ground was as hard as concrete. There was an explosion to his left. Frank Miller [Annotator's Note: phonetic spelling] from New York was to his left. He looked over and Miller was slumped over. Dietrick ran over to him and saw he was bleeding. He thought he was dead, he looked up and a German came out of the brush. Dietrick dropped Miller and fired. The German started moving and fell. Dietrick threw two grenades and realized he was halfway through his ammunition. He took the M1 [Annotator's Note: .30 caliber M1 semi-automatic rifle, also known as the M1 Garand], ammunition belt, and ammunition and started backing up. He came across a sergeant in the company. He asked him for his grenades and then returned to the area and threw them where the Germans had been. Someone called his name and told him to get his rocket launcher for the tanks. He did so and Sergeant Whitaker [Annotator's Note: Army Sergeant James Whitaker] was firing at a Mark IV tank [Annotator's Note: German Panzer IV medium tank]. Dietrick had not seen his ammo loader, Maslow [Annotator's Note: unable to verify identity], since he landed. He put the gun to his shoulder and hollered "load!" He felt it being loaded and a tap saying it was ready. The tank was no more than 100 feet in front of him and he hit it in the rear bogies [Annotator's Note: wheel or systems of wheels and springs that support a track or belt]. He hollered "Reload!" three times and nothing happened. He turned a Maslow was gone. He had been killed. Dietrick had no more ammunition for the bazooka [Annotator's Note: man-portable recoilless anti-tank weapon] and Sergeant Whitaker had run out of ammunition for his Tommy gun [Annotator's Note: .45 caliber Thompson submachine gun]. Whitaker took off and Dietrick was alone. He picked up his M1 and took off. The tank gunner opened up on them. The fire from a German machine gun is terrifying. Dietrick thought he was going to go down and saw Whitaker hit the ground. Dietrick kept going and got back to the wall at the canal. The company had retreated and was there. The only protection they had against tanks then was the bazooka. Nothing else had come ashore yet.

After making it to relative safety [Annotator's Note: during the fighting around Salerno, Italy], Alfred Dietrick looked back at the tank he had disabled. He saw a German soldier standing there and used his M1 [Annotator's Note: .30 caliber M1 semi-automatic rifle, also known as the M1 Garand] to shoot him. A Naval crew had communications and called fire in on the tanks. That first salvo came close, and the tanks left. The crew came out of the disabled tanks and were taken prisoner. Lieutenant Koy Bass [Annotator's Note: Army Lieutenant Koy M. Bass] on the scene and took the prisoners. They got orders to hold their positions. They fired at targets they could see in the fields. The next morning they moved out towards the hills. They received artillery fire so they spread out. They got up into the hills and as night began to fall, the lieutenant had them dig in. Dietrick was too tired to dig. He got in a shallow hole. He laid down and looked up at the sky and stars. They had a password and a counter sign to use at night. He put his P38 [Annotator's Note: Walther P38, German 9mm semi-automatic pistol] on his chest. He heard footsteps coming closer so he lifted his P38. He saw a silhouette. He started to holler the password and he realized it was a horse. He laughed to himself and went to sleep. They moved out the next morning and went into the hills. In a small village they came across a CIA [Annotator's Note: Central Intelligence Agency] man who had been there for 15 days. He was of Italian descent. On the fourth day, they got word to move out in a forced march back to the beach. They were expecting an attack by the Germans. The amphibious ducks [Annotator's Note: DUKW, six wheel drive amphibious truck] were lined up and they got on. They were strafed by Messerschmitts [Annotator's Note: German fighter aircraft] and everyone jumped out. One man jumped out and cut his hand. That was the best thing that happened for that man. He had terrible vision. Captain Harmanson [Annotator's Note: Army Captain S.R. Harmanson], his CO [Annotator's Note: commanding officer], had a crippled leg and walked with a bad limp. Dietrick did not understand how either were in the infantry. They plugged up a hole in the line and then his outfit sent patrols out. They filled in but the German attack never came. The 82nd Airborne [Annotator's Note: 82nd Airborne Division] had landed in Altavilla [Annotator's Note: Altavilla Silentina, Italy] and taken it with the 142nd Infantry [Annotator's Note: 142nd Infantry Regiment, 36th Infantry Division]. The Germans had second thoughts and began to withdraw. He sent out a patrol and found a German they took prisoner. A few days later they were called out of the lines to rest. They stayed out about a month. They had not encountered any opposition filling the line. He felt the Germans were withdrawing to better positions. In an invasion, there is a lot of confusion as units get separated. They got off the lines on 20 September [Annotator's Note: 20 September 1943] and went back around 6 November [Annotator's Note: 6 November 1943].

During Alfred Dietrick's month off the front lines, something happened he has never spoken of. After they went back into training, the First Sergeant called him and said he was sending him to a special battle school during the day. A G.I. [Annotator's Note: government issue; also, a slang term for an American soldier] came to him and said he would like to join his platoon because he had good friends who were in it. His name was Foley [Annotator's Note: Army Private Earl W. Foley]. Dietrick went to the school the next morning. Foley got approval for the change. Dietrick came in at noon and saw men talking. Foley was dead. The second platoon and third platoon were having a skirmish [Annotator's Note: training skirmish] in the brush and Foley was in defense with the other platoon attacking. A guy had come off duty and forgotten to unload his rifle. He drew a bead on Foley and hit him. Foley bled to death. All of that happened because Foley asked to join his outfit [Annotator's Note: Company B, 1st Battalion, 141st Infantry Regiment, 36th Infantry Division]. [Annotator's Note: There is an odd tape break that cuts off part of the sentence.] Things happened like that. They just trained daily after that. Dietrick became platoon sergeant. He made Schweppe [Annotator's Note: Army Staff Sergeant Francis O. Schweppe] his bazooka [Annotator's Note: man-portable recoilless anti-tank weapon] man. He got to see him last year [Annotator's Note: from the time of this interview] when he came to the museum at Camp Mabry [Annotator's Note: Brigadier General John C.L. Scribner Texas Military Forces Museum, also called the Texas Military Forces Museum, Camp Mabry, Austin, Texas]. Schweppe died not long after that. They had talked about knocking out an armored car and getting artillery from the Germans. His bazooka had 38 holes in it after that. It showed how important a foxhole could be.

Alfred Dietrick [Annotator's Note: with Company B, 1st Battalion, 141st Infantry Regiment, 36th Infantry Division] went into the lines in November [Annotator's Note: 6 November 1943] at dusk. They went to five miles from the front line at Verrazzano [Annotator's Note: Verrazzano, Italy] on Highway 6, which goes to Cassino [Annotator's Note: Cassino, Italy]. They formed a line on each side of the highway, and it started raining. They kept going and artillery started coming in. They were ordered to keep going. The artillery was landing off to one side where railroad tracks were. They arrived at the front and replaced the 3rd Division [Annotator's Note: 3rd Infantry Division]. By then the moon was out and it was bright. The hills were bare rock. A guide took his platoon, and they went to be a forward outpost. They had observation of Highway 6 about four miles from Cassino. The platoon there was in a small area asleep. That was a "no-no" to Dietrick. He told them to dig the next day in the daylight. One morning at dawn, a German left his lines and came to the highway. He stood up and gave up. He sent Cathcart [Annotator's Note: Army Private Charles L. Cathcart] to take him back to the company. After about four hours, Cathcart did not return. He got a call from headquarters saying that Cathcart was dead. They had sent him back to battalion with the prisoner. While there, he was killed in an artillery barrage. That is war. On another occasion, the communications sergeant had a telephone line strung to Dietrick's platoon. The line was being cut by wire cutters. He set a three man hole with a line to look out. About two in the morning, they called and said heavy footsteps were approaching. Dietrick went out and they heard firing. One of the men on the patrol got hit. The wire was never hit again. One man was assigned to the platoon as punishment for getting drunk. He was a cook and brought a bag of flour with him. He made them something like tortillas. He was delivering them around and a sniper got him. The same thing nearly happened to Dietrick and a sergeant. They were leaning against a bluff and talking when a bullet hit between them. That is how men get killed unnecessarily. The second day in the area, Dietrick and the lieutenant were going back to headquarters when a German Messerschmitt [Annotator's Note: German fighter aircraft] was coming down the valley. The Messerschmitt was attacking an observation plane. About ten years ago, [Annotator's Note: from the time of this interview] when they were opening the museum [Annotator's Note: Brigadier General John C.L. Scribner Texas Military Forces Museum, also called the Texas Military Forces Museum, Camp Mabry, Austin, Texas] a guy came up to him and thanked him for putting his picture up on the wall. He was the pilot of the observation plane. He said the German had hit him.

On 5 December [Annotator's Note: 5 December 1943], Alfred Dietrick and his outfit [Annotator's Note: Company B, 1st Battalion, 141st Infantry Regiment, 36th Infantry Division] got word that they were being relieved by Italian troops who were now fighting against their former Axis partners. They patiently waited for them. They got word to just pull out to a reserve area. They got word that the Germans had beaten the Italians back. A friend of Dietrick's wrote a book about the German Army in Italy. Dietrick flipped through it to see what they said about that. The German officer said that he got a report from a patrol that there was a lot of movement. At dawn, there was an outbreak of fire. The Italians were attacking the face of Mount Lungo [Annotator's Note: Battle of Monte Lungo or Mount Lungo, 8 December to 16 December 1943, Monte Lungo, Italy] and overran two lines of defense. The last line had a German there named Ewald Scherling [Annotator's Note: German Army Obergefreiter, or Corporal, Ewald Scherling, 9th Kompanie, Grenadier Regiment 15, 29th Panzer-Grenadier Division] who ran down the mountain with a machine gun spraying them. He got hit and it knocked him to the ground. He got up and got two other machine gunners to go with him. The Italians retreated due to one man. Scherling's sergeant gave him his personal Iron Cross [Annotator's Note: Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes or Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross; highest awards in the military and paramilitary forces of Nazi Germany]. Both Scherling and his platoon sergeant were later killed at Cassino [Annotator's Note: Cassino, Italy on 22 January 1944]. That is the behavior that Medal of Honor [Annotator's Note: the Medal of Honor is the highest award a United States service member can receive who have distinguished themselves by acts of valor] winners have.

Alfred Dietrick and his outfit [Annotator's Note: Company B, 1st Battalion, 141st Infantry Regiment, 36th Infantry Division] were supposed to be relieved by Italian troops, so they went back on reserve [Annotator's Note: on 6 November 1943]. It was a nice Fall day and Dietrick was sitting against an olive tree. He looked up to see a German and an American fighter going at it. Suddenly, there was an explosion near his hip. The ground was smoldering from a projectile that had come down from the dogfight. Around 21 December [Annotator's Note: 21 December 1943], the CO [Annotator's Note: commanding officer] told them that they were going to move out with no ammunition or guns. They were carrying rations to the 504th paratroopers [Annotator's Note: 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division]. They moved out to Sammucro [Annotator's Note: Monte Sambucaro or Sammucro, Italy]. About a third of the way up, they came to a ledge where they picked up the supplies to take up. The dead and wounded were also carried down to this ledge. The moon was bright and Dietrick saw four G.I. [Annotator's Note: government issue; also, a slang term for an American soldier] paratroopers who had been killed. It was gruesome. They delivered their goods and came back down around dawn. They got up for lunch and were told they were going back up with guns and ammunition to relieve the 504th. They got up there and around the break of dawn they moved forward to contact the Germans. The ridge is like the back of a dinosaur. Their two platoons were on opposite sides. A corporal nudged him to show him a dead German slumped over his machine gun. The corporal reached down for him to get a camera that was around his neck. They had been taught not bother dead soldiers. Dietrick found the guy's wallet and there was a picture of a girl in it that he took from it. They moved on and, in another hour, they got rifle fire from the Germans who were well hidden. The runner told him that Marcum [Annotator's Note: Army Private Roscoe Marcum] had been killed. Marcum had been hounding Dietrick for his P38 [Annotator's Note: Walther P38, German 9mm semi-automatic pistol] he took off a tank officer. Dietrick sold it to him, and he wondered if he had it. Dietrick found Marcum but he did not have the pistol. Then Dietrick felt stupid for going where he had been shot. He got out of there as quickly as he could.

Night began to fall [Annotator's Note: on Monte Sambucaro or Sammucro, Italy; December 1943], and a runner came to get the platoon sergeants and leaders for a meeting. Alfred Dietrick was a platoon sergeant [Annotator's Note: of a platoon of Company B, 1st Battalion, 141st Infantry Regiment, 36th Infantry Division] but had no platoon leader. The captain said that Company B was to attack after a four o'clock artillery barrage lifted. They were to attack with fixed bayonets and not fire a shot. That did not sit well with Dietrick. He told his squad leaders, but he told them to fire at their own discretion. He moved his men forward. The runner returned with a lieutenant to take over the platoon. When the barrage lifted, they began to move in. He knew the Germans could hear them because of the loose rock on the slope. A machine gun opened up on them. Dietrick called for a rifle grenade to be fired up there. [Annotator's Note: There is a lot of background traffic noise at this point in the clip.] Dietrick took the rifle from him and hit it dead center. [Annotator's Note: Someone starts talking in the background.] The gun quit firing and the Germans set off flares. They all sat still waiting for them to burn out. The lieutenant decided to withdraw as they would just get slaughtered. They withdrew. They had found out where the firepower was. Previously, when the machine gun had stopped firing, one man got nervous and jumped hollering to get them and ran forward. A machine gun on the flank raked his heels but did not hit him. He crawled back low to his position. They did not accomplish what they went to do.

The next night, the 1st Special Forces [Annotator's Note: 1st Special Service Force, 5th Army; often referred to as "the Force"] came up there. Alfred Dietrick had about 28 men and the other platoon had about the same. They [Annotator's Note: the 1st Special Service Force] came up with about 150. The records show the Germans had 250 people up there. The NCOs [Annotator's Note: non-commissioned officers] and officers of the Force got information. At dawn, they went up the summit. He saw four or five Force guys get cut down. That fight did not last ten minutes. The Force picked up their wounded and disappeared. Dietrick and his men moved forward into defensive positions. That was the last of the Germans on the mountain. The Force had American paratrooper uniforms, British submachine guns, and other British weapons. Their shoulder patch was a long red arrow with "USA" at the top, and "Canada" vertically. They were quite an outfit. Dietrick met one of them who had taken a slug in his thigh. He told Dietrick that a lot of his outfit were life sentence prisoners who could earn their freedom by fighting. They had about 1,250 men when they started out and when they got to this fight, they were down to about 350. The movie, "The Devil's Brigade" [Annotator's Note: 1968 American film based on the book "The Devil's Brigade" by Robert H. Adleman and Colonel George Walton] is about them. In Italy, a lot of casualties were due to the weather. There was a lot of trench foot [Annotator's Note: immersion foot syndrome]. They went out of the lines again. The next time they went up [Annotator's Note: to the front lines], they were headed to the Rapido River [Annotator's Note: Rapido River, Italy]. He took a patrol down a railroad track near Mount Trocchio [Annotator's Note: Monte Trocchio, Italy]. They received an artillery barrage and took cover. He tore a ligament in his knee [Annotator's Note: on 19 January 1944]. Otherwise, he would have been in the Rapido fracas [Annotator's Note: Battle of the Rapido River, 20 to 22 January 1944; Frosinone Province, Italy]. While at the hospital, the casualties started coming in. Two of his platoon members were in there and told him he was lucky he was not there. The platoon leader survived and told Dietrick that out of the platoon there were four or five men who survived. It was almost a direct barrage. The boats trying to cross were being punctured and they were being swept downstream. The river's current in the dark makes it worse. The engineers had cleared areas, but it was all blown up. The doctor told Dietrick he could not go back in the infantry. He was given limited service and was assigned to the 229th Ordnance Transport Company [Annotator's Note: unable to verify unit]. They provided armor for the armored divisions. It was a rare and strange organization. They took casualties too. One was trying to fix some flats and the truck rolled on him and crushed his head. Others rolled over on icy roads. War can be dangerous.

Alfred Dietrick went from Anzio [Annotator's Note: Anzio, Italy] to Rome [Annotator's Note: Rome, Italy] with his outfit [Annotator's Note: Dietrick stated that he served in the 229th Ordnance Transport Company but this unit cannot be verified]. He was in Augsburg, Germany when the war ended. The Division [Annotator's Note: 36th Infantry Division] captured some bigwigs like Hermann Göring [Annotator's Note: German Reichsmarschall Hermann Wilhelm Göring, or Goering, commanded the German Air Force and was second only to Adolf Hitler in the Nazi chain of command] and Von Rundstedt [Annotator's Note: German Army Generalfeldmarschall Karl Rudolf Gerd von Rundstedt]. They captured one man named Max Amann [Annotator's Note: German politician and businessman; head of Eher Publishing] who had been a buck sergeant [Annotator's Note: the lowest rank of sergeant in the military; E5] in World War 1. When Hitler [Annotator's Note: German dictator Adolf Hitler] joined the Army, Ammon was Hitler's basic training sergeant. Max became the leading publisher in Germany and published "Mein Kampf" [Annotator's Note: "Mein Kampf" or "My Struggle", 1925 autobiographical manifesto by German dictator Adolf Hitler]. Max received a trophy from the Nazis, and it is at the museum [Annotator's Note: Brigadier General John C.L. Scribner Texas Military Forces Museum, also called the Texas Military Forces Museum, Camp Mabry, Austin, Texas]. Dietrick spent days polishing it. Max was not arrested but was questioned. A Lieutenant Albert Burke [Annotator's Note: phonetic spelling; unable to identify] had been drafted and was a college graduate. He had been a shoe salesman. He joined the 36th Division [Annotator's Note: 36th Infantry Division] in the 141st Infantry [Annotator's Note: 141st Infantry Regiment] and they found out he could speak German well. He became an interpreter. When they got word that Von Rundstedt wanted to surrender, the mission was assigned to Burke. When Burke went to where he was supposed to be, there were Germans soldiers who came to attention. Von Rundstedt's son came out and said to follow him. He took him to his father who was old and sick now [Annotator's Note: 1 May 1945]. Von Rundstedt told Burke he spoke German very well.

In the 229th Ordnance Transport Company [Annotator's Note: Dietrick stated that he had served in this unit; unable to verify unit], Alfred Dietrick replaced their First Sergeant. The company commander made him First Sergeant after 90 days. He was an old type of officer. Dietrick only saw one General his whole time in the service, and that was Eisenhower [Annotator's Note: General of the Army Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower, Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force; 34th President of the United States]. Before they went on the invasion of Italy, they lined up the division [Annotator's Note: 36th Infantry Division] along a highway near the coastline of North Africa. Eisenhower passed by standing in a jeep. Dietrick rarely saw anybody above the rank of captain. There was a time when a General would not talk to a private. He has good friends as Generals now. One was General Scribner who formed the Texas Military Museum at Camp Mabry [Annotator's Note: Brigadier General John C.L. Scribner Texas Military Forces Museum, also called the Texas Military Forces Museum, Camp Mabry, Austin, Texas]. General Wilson [Annotator's Note: unable to verify identity] keeps in close contact. Towards the end of the war, Dietrick was always about ten to 15 miles from the front. They would pick up supplies and armor to take up. They also picked up knocked out armor from the battlefields and took it back.

In training at Camp Edwards, Massachusetts [Annotator's Note: in Cape Cod, Massachusetts with the 141st Infantry Regiment, 36th Infantry Division, 1942], Alfred Dietrick had to make a presentation on North Africa [Annotator's Note: North Africa Campaign, 10 June 1940 to 13 May 1943] to his men during a blizzard. On another day, a sergeant was taking his men through calisthenics. They put a box on the floor and the men were to roll over the box. One guy broke his neck and died. That exercise was not in any manual. Dietrick ended up in Germany at the end of the war. Around 1 August [Annotator's Note: 1 August 1945], they were being channeled into camps to be processed to return to the United States. They [Annotator's Note: the transit camps] were named after cigarettes; Camp Lucky Strike, Camp Chesterfield, and Old Gold. They were treated like animals and sprayed with disinfectant. If they had souvenirs, they would lose them to the guys running the camps. Dietrick broke a Mauser [Annotator's Note: a Mauser firearm] down. A German made a box for him to pack it in. He sent a German helmet and other items home in the mail. He returned to San Antonio [Annotator's Note: San Antonio, Texas] in September 1945 after being at Fort Sam Houston [Annotator's Note: now part of Joint Base San Antonio or JBSA in San Antonio, Texas] and getting a 30 day leave [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time]. He then reported to Camp Fannin in Tyler, Texas for discharge. He got a check for bus fare but he lost it. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer asks if Dietrick knows of anyone who suffered from shellshock or post traumatic stress.] He thinks that most of them have some sort of effects, but he does not know to what degree. Way back, he had a couple of nightmares where he dreamt that they were going up front and the thought frightened him. His First Sergeant was taken prisoner. He lived to be 94. Dietrick met him. [Annotator's Note: Someone tells Dietrick that he has not offered the interviewer some hot chocolate.] Otto Neuner [Annotator's Note: Army Staff Sergeant Otto J. Neuner, Jr.] was a bully. When they were at Camp Bowie, Texas, Sergeant Milan [Annotator's Note: Army First Sergeant Scott G. Milan] told them if they threw a cigarette butt on the ground, they would have to dig a big hole and bury it. Neuner threw one on the ground and he made them do it. They were both were taken prisoner and Neuner could speak some German. Neuner had been sent to a school in Britain while at Camp Bowie and came back a super solider. He got captured and the guys captured with him said he surrendered. They did not know why he did it. Neuner and Sergeant Milan were in the same POW camp [Annotator's Note: prisoner of war camp]. The Germans respected rank and Milan did not have to do anything. He would volunteer for details. Neuner was in charge of a detail Milan was on. Neuner told him to start digging. [Annotator's Note: Dietrick laughs.]

Alfred Dietrick thinks the Germans had a well disciplined Army. The German soldier had it drilled into his mind that Nazism, the super race, everything Hitler [Annotator's Note: German dictator Adolf Hitler] preached, and being a German soldier was important. He lived up to it. On the battlefield, he was just a human being. At one time Dietrick feared him, but once he was in combat with him, he was just a soldier. Their weapons were terrific. The American machine gun could not duplicate the Germans'. Dietrick thinks the Germans copied the American bazooka [Annotator's Note: man-portable recoilless anti-tank weapon] but theirs [Annotator's Note: Raketenpanzerbüchse 54, also oreferred to as the Panzerschreck; 88mm reusable anti-tank rocket launcher] was better. Their machine gun was light. They had rapid fire, but he thinks that was a waste of bullets. Lieutenant Tulley [Annotator's Note: phonetic spelling; unable to verify identity] was the platoon leader near Mount Rotondo [Annotator's Note: Monte Rotondo or Monti Sibillini, Italy] and Mount Lungo [Annotator's Note: Monte Lungo, Italy]. There was a German machine gunner on the tip of Lungo. He would fire about every half hour or so. One night, Tulley said he was going to get him. After an hour or so, Dietrick heard grenades going off. In another hour or so, he came back and said he could not get close. He had a piece of shrapnel stuck in his skin. He did not go get a Purple Heart [Annotator's Note: the Purple Heart Medal is award bestowed upon a United States service member who has been wounded as a result of combat actions against an armed enemy]. He did get hit in the thigh when they went into Southern France. Dietrick liked him because he would not ask them to do what he would not do. Dietrick did not understand why he left him in charge of the platoon at Salerno [Annotator's Note: Salerno, Italy] though. You can only do the best you can.

Many times when Alfred Dietrick was on the front lines, he said that if he ever got out alive, he would not complain about anything. Many times things happened in his life that if not for the war, he would have taken more seriously. He knew things would blow over. When you have been in combat, you learn that when you are not in combat, everything is rosy. Things can be much, much worse. The war did not influence his career. He did work that was very pleasant for a living. He just sat in a nice architectural place and drew engineering plans. In high school, he had an instructor who had graduated from the Naval Academy [Annotator's Note: United States Naval Academy, Annapolis, Maryland]. Dietrick went to a trade school and took a machinist's course and did the work in half the time. The instructor told him to take an architectural course, but he was almost a senior and wanted to graduate. Dietrick had him again for algebra in his final year. He taught it well. The final had only two or three problems and one was a page and a half long. Dietrick went over his answer twice. The instructor gave him the benefit of the doubt and gave him a 100. Dietrick had hoped that after that long war, there would be a long peace. Within five years there was Korea [Annotator's Note: Korean War, 25 June 1950 to 27 July 1953] and then Vietnam [Annotator's Note: Vietnam War, or Second Indochina War, 1 November 1955 to 30 April 1975]. He never understood those wars and why they were fought. We [Annotator's Note: the United States] keep going along with them and they get more technical. World War 2 has not made the world any safer. The only thing it did was keep two dictators with world domination plans from it. He thinks it helped Germany and Japan more than it helped America. He does not think it changed the world any. The world did realize what America was capable of. America used to be a steel industrial power, but we import it all now. Industry has gone and Dietrick does not understand how Congress allows the commercial world to take over everything. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer asks Dietrick what he thinks the significance of having The National WWII Museum in New Orleans, Louisiana is.] History if not, exhibited in museums, is in books and libraries, but the more convenient it is it can be taken in easier by people. He just hopes a hurricane does not wipe it out.