Thomas Michael Holt was born in July 1919 in Oak Ridge, North Carolina. His father was head of a military school. Most of his childhood activities were related to the school, which had around 300 cadets. He went through the junior college of the military school, then attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill [Annotator's Note: Chapel Hill, North Carolina]. After graduating in 1940, the war was on, and he went to Fort Benning [Annotator's Note: Fort Benning, Georgia] for four months. He was then a 2nd Lieutenant in the infantry and assigned to the 9th Division [Annotator's Note: 9th Infantry Division] at Fort Bragg [Annotator's Note: Fort Bragg, North Carolina], where he participated in the Carolina Maneuvers [Annotator's Note: Army exercises in around South and North Carolina, 1941]. Holt was then transferred to the 34th Division [Annotator's Note: 34th Infantry Division]. He started as a platoon commander as a 2nd Lieutenant with his gold bars [Annotator's Note: referring to the insignia of a Second Lieutenant]. He then participated in maneuvers with the 34th Division. Around Christmas 1941 [Annotator's Note: December 1941], Holt shipped out to Northern Ireland for more training. In 1942, a call came out from Colonel Darby [Annotator's Note: Colonel, later US Army Brigadier General, William Orlando Darby], commander of the Rangers [Annotator's Note: US Army Rangers]. Holt volunteered for the Rangers [Annotator's Note: 1st Ranger Battalion] and passed the required test. After a ceremony, they went to Northern Scotland for training, which was very arduous. They trained not only on land, but also on the surrounding islands. Darby did not let them rest for a moment; training was 24 hours a day.

Thomas Michael Holt [Annotator's Note: with the 1st Ranger Battalion] was appointed by Darby [Annotator's Note: Colonel, later US Army Brigadier General, William Orlando Darby] to head a special unit in the North African campaign. He trained the unit and on 1 December 1942 they spearheaded the landing in North Africa. They were in Algiers [Annotator's Note: Algiers, Algeria] for a while, then moved eastward along the coast, staying a week in each place. The Germans had been chased out by the British but were trying to retake territory. Holt's unit's job was to run off any remaining German forces. They went to Tunis [Annotator's Note: Tunis, Tunisia] to take and secure the aerodrome. His unit of about 75 men got caught, with four units behind them, as a German division moved in. The Americans were moved to Naples [Annotator's Note: Naples, Italy], then moved by a group of Italians to the eastern side of the country from 1942 through part of 1943. Later in that year, the Italians left, and the Germans took over again, moving Holt and his men to another camp for a short period, and then to Munich, Germany. The prisoners there were divided into British and American camps. Holt was then sent to Poland where he remained for a year and a half. The first Americans there had been captured at Kasserine Pass [Annotator's Note: Battle of Kasserine Pass in Kasserine, Tunisia, 19 to 24 February 1943]. The prisoners of war remained there until 1945.

Thomas Michael Holt was in a prison camp [Annotator's Note: Oflag 64 in Szubin, Poland] that the Germans decided to move. In January 1945, Holt was with about 145 American prisoners. The Russians soon arrived. The Russians, Germans, and Poles did not get along. The prisoners were to be moved back to Germany, when one of Holt's friends suggested they attempt an escape. The Soviets were on their way to Berlin [Annotator's Note: Berlin, Germany] to capture Hitler [Annotator's Note: German dictator Adolf Hitler]. Holt and his friends saw a chance to escape and managed to do so. They walked to Warsaw, Poland. They continued to walk between 800 and 850 miles from Warsaw to Odessa [Annotator's Note: Odessa, Ukraine] on the Black Sea. An American transport happened to in the port at that time. From there, they were taken to the Middle East with nothing but the shirts on their backs. Holt and his fellow escapees were questioned for two or three days. They took a ship to Naples [Annotator's Note: Naples, Italy], then on to Boston [Annotator's Note: Boston, Massachusetts] where they took a troop train to Miami, Florida which at this point was taken over by the Army. All the hotels etc. were the Army's. Holt had lost 100 pounds over three years. He went to an Army hospital to relearn to eat. The first morning in the camp, Holt and his friends had been taken to breakfast, but they could not eat anything. After a year and a half, in 1948-1949, the Army gave them time to catch their breath and to gain weight. For a long time, they were eating pablum, basically baby food, a type of oatmeal, because it was the only thing they could get down. Holt had been caught early and been a POW [Annotator's Note: prisoner of war] for about three years. They survived on a maximum of 300 calories a day.

Thomas Michael Holt was a POW [Annotator's Note: prisoner of war] in the same camp [Annotator's Note: Oflag XIII-B near Hammelburg, Germany] as General Patton's [Annotator's Note: US Army Lieutenant General George S. Patton, Jr.] son-in-law [Annotator's Note: US Army General John K. Waters], who was the senior officer there. When the Germans left, the prisoners were on their own. Holt took a ship [Annotator's Note: Holt and a few friends managed to escape imprisonment by the Germans around January 1945, as described in Segment 03- "Escape and Return to US" of this interview series], then a train from Boston [Annotator's Note: Boston, Massachusetts] to Miami Beach [Annotator's Note: Miami Beach, Florida]. Holt was in the hospital for more than a year. Once he had gained back his strength, he went to Fort Benning [Annotator's Note: Fort Benning, Georgia] to brush up on training, and was then sent to the Far East. He was in Japan for a while. Holt had been promoted to Lieutenant Colonel where he worked with a small group of Rangers [Annotator's Note: US Army Rangers]. He had a desk job within the intelligence operation there. When the war was over, he went home to Carolina [Annotator's Note: North Carolina] and got married. They had decided to wait until everything was over to get married. He and his wife moved to New York City [Annotator's Note: New York, New York] where he received a degree in French and Spanish studies, and also made progress in German. In 1954-1955, he had completed two years and retired. He taught at two colleges in North Carolina, then moved to teach at Millsaps [Annotator's Note: Millsaps College in Jackson, Mississippi]. He taught languages in Pelahatchie [Annotator's Note: in Mississippi]. In 1970-1971, he retired from teaching. At the time of the interview, his wife had passed 10 years prior.

Thomas Michael Holt [Annotator's Note: a Second Lieutenant with the 1st Ranger Battalion] and his men were put on a German plane almost immediately [Annotator's Note: after being captured in Tunis, Tunisia], and flown to Sicily [Annotator's Note: Sicily, Italy] for a few days. In mainland Italy, the Italians took over and moved them to a camp where other Americans were already imprisoned after being captured in southern Tunisia. The leader of that group was General Patton's son-in-law [Annotator's Note: US Army General John K. Waters]. At the aerodrome in Tunis, German planes were constantly coming and going in, transporting troops, in preparation to defend that area across from Sicily. The British had chased the Germans to that spot. The American entrance into North Africa was just beginning. Holt's unit was taken by a unit of German paratroopers, some of whom had fought nearly to Cairo [Annotator's Note: Cairo, Egypt] and were not going to take any "hullabaloo" from the prisoners. Their treatment of the American prisoners was good. The Italians and Germans were not friends. The Italians were carefree. When Holt and his men arrived at the camp, they were a group of about 100 men. There were several large buildings in the camp where they were put for the next 10 months. They were a small group, but there were many British there, some of whom who had fought all the way from Tobruk [Annotator's Note: Tobruk, Libya]. America, on the other hand, was just getting into the war. In the Italian camp, the prisoners were given very watery soup for breakfast, and maybe a piece of very hard, black bread. In the summertime, when the weather was good, they had some vegetables and fruit, but not much. The total sum of what they were given in Italy, for their year and a half imprisonment there, was no more than 400 calories a day at the most. Their stamina was gone. By 1945, more prisoners were coming in and there were about 150 Americans then. When they went to Germany, the Germans divided infantry and artillery. Then they were taken to Poland where it was cold.

Thomas Michael Holt [Annotator's Note: a Second Lieutenant in the 1st Ranger Battalion who was taken prisoner by the Germans in Tunis in late 1942 or early 1943 after the invasion of North Africa] and his men were put into a prisoner of war camp in Italy, at a camp called Chieti [Annotator's Note: P.G. 21, or Prigione di Guerra (Prison of War) 21 in Chieti, Italy]. There were many British prisoners there. In Poland, Holt was imprisoned by the Germans in Oflag 64 [Annotator's Note: Oflag 64 in Szubin, Poland], oflag being short for Offizierslager [Annotator's Note: Holt speaks in German: "Offizierslager vierundsechzig"]. Holt escaped from that camp [Annotator's Note: in 1945]. The Italians let the prisoners be. With the Germans, if you stepped out of line, you would be dealt with severely. The Italians were happy-go-lucky but would stiffen as soon as a German appeared. The weather was pretty good that far down in Italy, and even during the winter it did not get very cold. Holt and his fellow American prisoners made friends with the British prisoners. There must have been 300 or more British and Americans at this time. They were watching to see what the Italian guards were doing but spoke to the British about how they got caught, and were always thinking about ways to escape, which was not that easy. The American Red Cross supplied uniforms, clothing, and books. In that good climate, even in the small confines of the camp, the prisoners would exercise to try to keep as healthy as they could. They also read and held conferences and lectures. In Germany, the Germans checked on the prisoners all the time and would call them outside even in freezing weather to count them. Sometimes they would have to stand two or three hours in zero-degree temperatures. An hour would be added if the Germans thought someone was missing. One of the German officers had been educated in London, England. Holt could see the difference between what he did – the count completed in just 10 minutes – compared to the hardened Germans who would make them stand for hours. At the end, the Germans came in and took everything that was not tied down, even a piece of clothing. They were hard to deal with, whereas the Italians were less so. There were some escape attempts, but they were caught and did not get very far. If caught attempting to escape, they would be locked in solitary confinement for up to a week.

For Thomas Michael Holt, the worst part about being a prisoner of war was not having food. One American officer was a doctor who knew the content of the food they were eating and said it could not be past 350 [Annotator's Note: calories]. Two American Red Cross men arrived at the camp to check on the prisoners and brought them clothing and some food. The prisoners began to receive parcels which were shared among the prisoners. When they went out in 1945, they found a warehouse stacked to the ceiling with parcels. The Germans had been stealing them. In the Red Cross parcels came bully beef [Annotator's Note: meat made from finely minced corned beef in a small amount of gelatin], some crackers, three to five vegetables including carrots. If they did not eat it all, it was saved for about five days. Some prisoners were so hungry they would eat the entire thing in one go. Holt shared a parcel with the man he bunked with. It was the kind of food that did last. The parcels were very much appreciated by the prisoners. It was the only staple food they had. It would have helped to have received the parcels the Germans had taken. By that time, the Germans did not have much either. Holt never had any animosity towards the Germans, during or after the war. There were four to five German guards all around the fence morning, noon, and night. You would be put into solitary confinement if you talked back to a German guard. The prisoners were glad to get out of camp and thinking about gaining weight. When Holt was training with the Rangers [Annotator's Note: 1st Ranger Battalion] without rest, he weighed about 220 [Annotator's Note: 220 pounds] and it was all muscle. The prisoners tried to keep up in camp. Many of them would rest in bed because that was all the energy they had. After his imprisonment, Holt weight about 150-160 pounds. In Northern Scotland [Annotator's Note: during training with the Rangers], sometimes they had a British ration, but most of the time they had American rations which were between 1,400 and 2,000 calories a day, because they were all being spent.

Thomas Michael Holt [Annotator's Note: a prisoner of war] had access to a hidden radio. With the new POWs [Annotator's Note: prisoners of war] coming in, they would be asked where they had been and where the lines were [Annotator's Note: the front lines of battles]. Sometimes they did not want to hear it, but the British were making slow progress. Some of the battles in Italy were rough going because they were facing the Arika Korps [Annotator's Note: also called German Africa Corps, German expeditionary force in Africa]. Gaining the weight back after imprisonment was the hardest part. In the Italian camp, the prisoners felt freer. All the Italians wanted to do was count them, then they would take off and let them be. The Germans were watching them all the time. It was good being with the British. Sometimes there were differences in work situations, but a lot of similarity. After the Korean War [Annotator's Note: Holt also served in the Korean War from 1951-1954] Holt spoke about his wartime experiences with his students [Annotator's Note: Holt became a professor of languages at several universities after the war]. It was difficult to return to normal life in America after the war. He understands what our men are going through [Annotator's Note: referring to current US troops serving overseas]. Holt had nightmares and difficult times after his prisoner of war experience. He has spoken about this with fellow prisoners, but they each see the experience differently as they were treated differently by guards, for example, even if held in the same place. He has bad dreams on occasion, not often, every three or four years. Something will hit him in the middle of the night, which is rough. From midnight or four o'clock in the morning, he cannot go back to sleep. He does not think anything about his story is important for the current generation to learn. In the camps, they were restricted to a small area with other captured Americans with all manner of experiences: college professors, farmers, etc. They had one, two, three-hour lectures by prisoners who talked about what they did. Holt does think it is important for museums about the war to exist, because too many Americans just do not know what went on. The son of Holt's cousin just finished a master's degree but does not know much about the World War 2 era. His students would ask him about his experience during the war. He is 91 years old at the time of the interview. Things have changed, life changes, your interests, what you do, changes. 200,000 Americans were out of jobs [Annotator's Note: at the time of the interview]. The German guards were always watching them. In their camp in Poland [Annotator's Note: Oflag 64 in Szubin, Poland], they ended up with about 300 prisoners and it was good to learn about your fellow man.

Thomas Michael Holt's Ranger training was arduous [Annotator's Note: the 1st Ranger Battalion]. Darby [Annotator's Note: Colonel, later US Army Brigadier General, William Orlando Darby] was preparing them in Northern Scotland. Darby had taken a group of Rangers into France to test the strength of German forces. Holt was not a part of this. It was after this that Darby appointed Holt as leader of a group of 70 men to work their way east and clear the Germans out of the area. They landed in Algiers [Annotator's Note: Algiers, Algeria] and the landing was rough. His unit was given collapsible bicycles strapped to the LCI [Annotator's Note: Landing Craft Infantry]. They made their landing on 1 December 1942. Holt's landing craft overturned enough to throw everyone from the boat, along with their rifles. It took a while, but they finally oriented themselves and entered the town where they met up with another group and began working their way east. They did not encounter much opposition from the Germans, although German planes were overhead day and night. Once they had made their way eastward and inland, they were nearing the airfield in Tunis [Annotator's Note: Tunis, Tunisia]. A German unit guarding the air terminal spotted Holt and his men. They were overrun and taken prisoner.