textemeryraymondedward1940.html

North High School Wall of Honor
Raymond Edward Emery
Class of January, 1940

Research done by Claradell Shedd, Class of 1953.

Raymond Edward Emery

Ray was a member of North High's class of January, 1940. His next of kin were listed as Mr. Floyd Emery, 1621 Second Avenue, Des Moines, IA. Ray's service number was 37039972.

Raymond Edward Emery

Year		Rank		Status

January, 1940		Graduated		Graduated from North High, Des Moines, IA
1940-1941	x	Employed	x	Warehouse for Cownie Furs in Des Moines, IA
February 8, 1941	x	Drafted into US Army/PVT	x	Drafted in Fort Des Moines, IA
1941-1942	x	US Army	x	Basic Training at Fort Snelling, MN, Fort Benning, GA, Fort Polk, LA, Fort Knox, KY (radio operators school) 33rd Armored Regiment.
1942	x	US Army	x	Mohave Desert; Colorado River, CO
August, 1943	x	US Army	x	Indiantown Gap, PA
Sept, 5, 1943- Sept.15, 1943	x	US Army	x	Troop transport from New York City, NY to England.
September 15, 1943	x	US Army	x	Arrived England.
September, 1943	x	US Army	x	Warminster (Western Wiltshire), England
September, 1943	x	US Army	x	Service at Omaha Beach, France; Belgium, Germany
September, 1944	x	US Army	x	*Siegfried Line; Roten, Germany
April, 1945	x	US Army	x	Orth River, Germany
April 12, 1945	x	US Army	x	**Nordhausen Concentration Camp Liberation, Germany
Sept.7, 1945- Sept.16,1945	x	US Army	x	From Europe to United States.
September 23, 1945	x	US Army/ Sergeant T4	x	Discharged Fort Sheridan, IL
1946-1949	x		x	Drake University. Degree in Education.
March 25, 1947	x	US Navy Reserve	x	Enlisted in US Navy Reserve.
November 24, 1948	x	US Navy Reserve	x	Discharged from US Navy Reserve.
1949	x	Family	x	Married Florence Enenbach from Hartley, IA.
1949-1977	x	Employment	x	For 28 years, taught physical education in Des Moines schools including Brody Jr. High.
1952-2005	x	Employment	x	Farming in Norwalk, IA
2005	x	Retired	x	Retired from farming in Norwalk, IA
October 18, 2020		Deceased		Antioch, IL

*Siedfried Line
Tank traps were also built for miles along the Siegfried Line and were known as "dragon's teeth" or "pimples" (in German Höcker, "humps") because of their shape. These blocks of reinforced concrete stand in several rows on a single foundation. There are two typical sorts of barrier: Type 1938 with four teeth getting higher toward the back, and Type 1939 with five such teeth. Many other irregular lines of teeth were also built. Another design of tank obstacle was made by welding together several bars of steel in such a way that any tank rolling over it would be penetrated in its weak bottom armor. If the lie of the land allowed it, water-filled ditches were dug instead of tank traps. An example of this kind of defence are those north of Aachen near Geilenkirchen.

**Nordhausen Concentration Camp Liberation
Nordhausen was a sub-camp of the concentration camp Dora-Mittelbau. This camp was created by the SS for prisoners too weak or too ill to work in the tunnels of Dora on the fabrication of the German V1 and V2 rockets. Following the Nazi terminology, Nordhausen was a "Vernichtungslager", an extermination camp for ill prisoners. The extermination methods used by the SS were not the same as the ones used in the great extermination camps: there was no gas chamber but, in Nordhausen, the prisoners died by starvation and total lack of medical care. The conditions of life in Nordhausen were so terrible that the few survivors often said that "If Dora was the hell of Buchenwald, Nordhausen was the hell of Dora"...

The camp of Nordhausen was a huge complex of installations and hangers made of concrete. There were absolutly no sanitary installations and the inmates had to stay in the hangars nights and days, without any food until they died. Even for a man in healthy condition, this could lead very fast to extreme weakness. For prisoners who were already exhausted and ill, these cruel conditions of life meant quick although miserable death.

On April 3th, 1945, Nordhausen was bombed by the US Air Force. Since the camp was installed in concrete buildings and hangars, the US Air Force thought that it was a munitions depot of the German Army. This effective bombing killed a great many of helpless inmates because the SS forced them to stay in the hangars which were set ablaze by the bombs.

Nordhausen was liberated by the 104th US Infantry Division on April 12th, 1945. When the first American GI's arrived in the camp, they discovered a gruesome scene. More than 3,000 corpses were scattered, helter-skelter on the grounds. In several hangars there were no survivors and in others they found only 2 or 3 living inmates lying amongst dozen of corpses. The situation was so calamitous that the medic unit of the 104th Infantry Division had to request urgent medical reinforcments and supplies. More that 400 German civilians living in the direct vicinity of the camp were forced by the GI's to evacuate the corpses. The medic units of the 104th Division did the best they could to save as many prisoners as possible but even with the excellent care they received, numerous inmates died in the hours and days following the liberation of the camps.


Fort Snelling, MN; Fort Benning, GA, Fort Polk, LA; Fort Sheridan, IL


Ray Emery, Martin Reinerth, Laddie X, Harry Dougherty, Sidney Freedus	Nov.1943: Ray Emery, Martin Reinerth, Sidney Freedus
1943: Photos taken in Warminster (Western Wiltshire), England All photos personally taken with Ray Emery's camera.


Nov.1943: Ray/England	June 1944: Unloading at Omaha Beach	1945: Germany


*Sept. 1944: Siegfried Line; Rotgen, Germany	**April 12, 1945: Liberation of Nordhausen Concentration Camp

	Raymond Edward Emery Sergeant/T4 33rd Armored Regiment US Army
WWII Victory; Good Conduct; American Theater; European-African Middle Eastern Theater w/battle star (Rhineland) In following campaigns: Normandy; Northern France; Ardennes; Rhineland; Central Europe

References

(1) The World War II Army Enlistment Records contain information on more than nine million indivdual enlistments. These records can be found online at http://www.archives.gov/.

(2) The comprehensive list of names from North High's 1893-2020 graduation classes are from Claradell Shedd's North Des Moines High School website. The names of North High School graduates can be found online at: http://www.ndmhs.com/. Raymond Edward Emery's 1940 class page is: http://www.ndmhs.com/pages/yearclass1940(1990.50).html.

11/26/11. Living in IA. 10/18/20: Died in Antioch, IL.

Music: "Wind Beneath My Wings"