WW2: From POW camps to Hometown USA…via SWL’s and hams
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Although ham radio transmission was suspended in the US during World War II, there were no rules regarding reception.
Throughout the war, hams and shortwave listeners alike used their capabilities and equipment to perform a valuable and heartwarming service to a great many family members who had a loved one reported as “Missing in action” in Germany.
This almost always involved a member of a bomber crew.
In order to get Americans to listen to their propaganda, the Nazis realized there had to be something of value injected into their program for the intended audience.
Calling Back Home was a nightly 30-minute broadcast on the 31 and 49 meter shortwave bands from German stations DXP and DXB in Berlin.
Ten names of American prisoners would be mentioned in each broadcast along with pertinent info that would allow their family to be contacted by those receiving the broadcasts.
Hams and SWLs throughout the US dutifully tuned in and logged what they heard – often in the prisoner’s own voices – and then they wrote letters.
Quite often, a family would receive multiple letters since the broadcasts were heard by a large number of listeners (mostly on the US east coast).
Those writing the letters received letters of thanks in return. Some of these – and a first-hand account of what it was like to be such a listener – can be read on the website of Morton Bardfield W1UQ (scroll down to “Berlin Radio”) who recently became a Silent Key.
From a write-up by Morton:
For my 13th birthday in 1943 my parents bought me a Philco console radio with a shortwave band. I began shortwave listening almost every night, especially the broadcast from Nazi Germany. I sold newspapers after school and had the money to buy plenty of penny postcards needed to relay the radio messages to the POW’s next of kin.
A ham who is still active, Flavius Jankauskas K3JA, was 16 years old when he wrote a letter concerning the grandfather of Lisa Spahr. Lisa recently found this letter in an old trunk along with those from almost 70 other ham/SWLs who’d heard her grandfather’s name mentioned in one of the Berlin broadcasts.
She has compiled these and letters to other families into a book, WW2 Radio Heroes. Lisa also maintains a blog – POW Letters – where she documents her quest in gathering other old letters of the same type from an age that is quickly receding from living memory.
Here is a description in her own words at what it was like to learn of the great service performed by many radio listeners in the 1940′s:
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The second half of this video is particularly interesting:
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Themocracy
Lisa and her family have attended the past few Winter SWL Fests in Plymouth Meeting, PA. She is an inspiring kind soul and I found the letters in her book very moving. What a wonderful piece of radio history.
Cheers,
Thomas
K4SWL
I see from her site she travels around quite a bit, giving talks.
Hello Thomas K4SWL. Thank you. I hope you made the SWL fest this year, we didn’t- but hope to next year. We’ve relocated to St. Louis so it involves a little more on our part to get there. My best to everyone.
To: author@powletters.com
Madame,
My wife tells the story of her mother’s eternal gratitude for a “ham” operator who told her that her missing husband (from invasion of Sicily) was a POW (mid- 1943) and I must assume that is part of the same story you have so dedicated yourself to in the retelling.
Is there a list of names of POW’s who were identified in the German broadcasts?….her dad was Miguel Colorado of El Paso, TX.
Thanks,
Jerry Brown N4EO, ex-YI9EO
Maria Brown KH6EO, ex-YI9AB
Hello John, AE5X,
Thank you for this lovely write up. With your permission I’d like to include some of it in the 2nd Edition, which I’m finalizing now. I am very appreciative of your thoughful review and sharing this with fellow hams and swls. My hat is off to all of you. I hope to meet you at a hamfest soon.
Lisa
Nice to hear from you, Lisa – please feel free to use whatever you’d like. I hope to meet you as well and if I hear of you attending a hamfest within my too-absurd-to-admit-to-triple-digit driving range, I’ll make it a point to be there.
Thanks again & best wishes,
John
Great story. Thanks to Lisa for putting all that together and to you John for blogging the story.
Tom, ak2b
She managed to get a lot of old letters published that would have otherwise been largely forgotten.
Hello John,
My wife and fellow historian Ann Pfau are researching the POW broadcasts and the listeners who wrote to the families. We’d appreciate any other leads you might have. T
Thanks and 73,
Dave Hochfelder, N2HTA
Dave, everything I know on this topic is contained within this post. Best wishes in your research & 73,
John
Hello Dave and Ann (and all), the Second Edition of World War II Radio Heroes: Letters of Compassion will be released next month (via ARRL and Amazon to name a few). It’s 3 x the size of the first edition and almost everything I know about this topic. :) All the best to you in your research.
Lisa
That’s great, Lisa! The first edition is a great read and has been enormously useful. We’d love to talk to you directly. Please consider contacting me at dhochfelder@albany.edu. I think we could be of mutual assistance. Thanks, Dave.