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A fact from Anthony Acevedo appeared on Wikipedia's
Main Page in the Did you know column on 29 March 2018 (
check views). The text of the entry was as follows:
Did you know... that Mexican-American
Holocaust survivor Anthony Acevedo mixed snow and urine with the ink of his pen to ensure he could maintain his concentration-camp diary?
"Instead, he was re-assigned to Company B of the
70th Infantry Division which was also at Camp Adair. This division was deployed to Marseilles in December 1944, crossing the ocean on the
USS West Point, arriving January 18, 1945. ...
"... Acevedo was captured during the
Battle of the Bulge on January 6, 1945."
Obviously, he couldn't have been captured before his division arrived in France. I assume the error is in the division's arrival date (it should have taken no more than a week for their transport to cross the Atlantic), but I can't check the cited source.
@
Colin Douglas Howell: great catch! Indeed, the sources give those conflicting dates. I have removed the "arrival date", because the capture date comes from his diary, while the apparently erroneous "arrival" date comes from an interview conducted much later. I appreciate your further input.
78.26(
spin me /
revolutions) 13:49, 29 March 2018 (UTC)reply
"The three infantry regiments of the 70th Infantry Division, the 274th, 275th and 276th, landed at
Marseille, France, 10–15 December 1944, and were formed into Task Force Herren under command of deputy division commander,
Thomas W. Herren, before the arrival of the remainder of the division on 18 January 1945. Task Force Herren took over defensive positions along the west bank of the Rhine, 28 December 1944, in the vicinity of
Bischwiller, south of
Haguenau Forest. Elements took part in the fight to stop the German
Operation Nordwind, and struck at the enemy at
Philippsbourg and at
Wingen between
Bitche and Hagenau."
So the date of 18 January 1945 was for the arrival of the rest of the division. However, it turns out Acevedo was with the division's 275th Infantry Regiment, so he would have arrived on 15 December 1944 and been part of Task Force Herren when it moved to the Rhine's west bank on 28 December 1944.
Here's my source for Anthony Acevedo being in the 275th Infantry Regiment. The 70th Infantry Division has a members' association whose website includes
an account by Anthony Acevedo which states:
"I was a Medic for the 275th Infantry Regiment of the 70th Infantry Division and assigned to Company B. My story begins with the events leading to interment in a Nazi German prison camp, January 6, 1945."
You can find a lot more details of the history and activities of the regiment (and other 70th Infantry Division forces) on the association's website to fill in further details, if you like. Look around, there's lots of stuff there.
Oh, one more point. When you identify which military unit Acevedo was with, "Company B of the 70th Infantry Division" is ambiguous. A
division is a very large unit, while a
company is a small one. In this case, the company's letter label "B" only distinguishes it within the specific
regiment it belongs to. To be unambiguous, you need to include the regiment, so "Company B of the 275th Infantry Regiment, 70th Infantry Division". --
Colin Douglas Howell (
talk) 17:30, 30 March 2018 (UTC)reply
More sources?
Are there more sources available that aren't obituaries? Obits tend to be less reliable, given the circumstances of their writing. --
Piledhigheranddeeper (
talk) 17:07, 29 March 2018 (UTC)reply