He's old now, but age doesn't diminish some of the memories: of hiding in an abandoned school while bombers shattered the earth around him; of a sniper's bullet whizzing past his ear; and of Buchenwald — God, Buchenwald.
Irving Feinberg, 94, has to pause when he talks about that. “You couldn’t imagine how horrible that was.”
His photographs capture the horror. Feinberg was one of the U.S. Army's official photographers working in Europe during World War II. Over a three-year period, the Johns Creek resident was on hand for some of history's pivotal moments: the liberation of Paris, the signing of the peace treaty officially ending the war in Europe, the Allies' march through Paris that proved the conflagration had ended.
And Buchenwald, when —
Still, it’s hard to relate.
Wednesday is Veterans Day, when America pauses to salute the men and women who served in the military. An estimated 22 million people have worn a uniform in service to this nation — 753,000 of them Georgians.
A dwindling number remain from World War II. Of the 16.1 million Americans who served during the 1941-45 war, fewer than 1 million are alive today. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs last year estimated that about 400 die daily.
Those statistics aren’t lost on Feinberg, but he doesn’t dwell on that. He’d rather think of what those warriors from seven decades ago accomplished. Saving the world is no small feat.
He’s from Philadelphia. Young Irving got interested in photography in high school. When he graduated, he hustled to make a living with his camera, shooting photos of newborns for proud parents and snapping more lurid images from crime scenes that he hawked to the local newspapers. He was doing OK, too — he had a used car, a girlfriend to put in it, some cash in his pocket.
Then he got his draft notice. Feinberg, 20 at the time, was to report for induction into the Army. After an IQ test — "They said I scored 150, but I don't know what that means" — the Army assigned him to the Signal Corps. Thus did Cpl. Feinberg join thousands of others as they marched onto a troop ship for the trip to England. It was a restless, wave-tossed trip across the North Atlantic.
Landing in England, a city boy discovered country living: He and others were bivouacked on a sheep farm.
In the Signal Corps, he was put to work mapping out safe routes for soldiers and vehicles. He convinced his superiors that he could do better with a camera. It was a fortuitous suggestion: He got the camera, and a new posting. When the Army Photographic Service learned about Feinberg, “they snatched me up.”
When a handful of photographers flew to mainland Europe following the D-Day landing, Feinberg was among them. Landing at Le Havre, France, he and other soldiers joined the Army's hundred-mile push toward Paris. Much of it took place at night, with German forces all around.
“They knew we were there, but they couldn’t see us,” he said. “We traveled without lights.”
With no guarantees they’d reach the French capital, either. Nearing Paris, Feinberg and others took cover in an abandoned school — just in time. German bombers passed overhead, emptying their pay loads. The building, and its occupants, survived.
Feinberg also discovered something about himself. “When they’re shooting at you,” he said, “you shoot back.”
The Allies took Paris. Feinberg recalls walking along a street with a pal. Rounding a corner, they saw a bar with a sign guaranteed to stop any soldier: Welcome Americans. They did what any serviceman would do. "We went inside," he said, "and had a drink." Leaning against the bar, the Americans saw what the owner had scribbled on the sign's other side: Willkommen Germans — "Welcome Germans." Even now, it makes Feinberg smirk.
His closest brush with death — a bullet, from a sniper’s rifle — also took place in Paris. The bullet whizzed by his ear and struck the wall behind him. Stunned, Feinberg sought out the military police. “They looked,” he said, “and never found anybody.”
As the Army advanced across Europe, so did Feinberg. He was in Belgium when the Battle of the Bulge broke out. On several occasions, he photographed Dwight D. Eisenhower, the supreme commander of the Allied Forces.
“Occasionally, I see some of those photos,” he said.
Little-known fact: Eisenhower smoked Chesterfield cigarettes. In one Feinberg photo, the supreme commander is sitting at his desk. At the corner of the desk is an inexplicable white spot — a clumsy attempt to white out the cigarettes.
Feinberg was among the first photographers to visit Konzentrationslager Buchenwald. Built in 1937, Buchenwald held nearly a quarter-million people — Jews, political dissidents, Poles, Slavs, criminals, gays and others the Third Reich deemed undesirable. According to some estimates, 56,000 people died at the camp between 1938 and 1945.
Feinberg smelled the bodies before he saw them. “They were everywhere,” he said. “We found nothing but horror.”
He recalls his photo of the body of a man, lying beside a train track leading into the camp. A prisoner, he’d run for freedom as German guards abandoned their posts as the Americans neared. The guards shot him as they fled. “He almost made it.”
Another memory lingers. American officers ordered civilians living near Buchenwald to tour the camp, to show them what their nation had done. One woman, he said, leaned over a body. She extracted a souvenir. Feinberg lifted his camera, a bulky Speed Graphic. Click. The photo bothers him still.
Feinberg is Jewish but says that didn’t make much of a difference in how Buchenwald affected him. Everyone there suffered, he said.
For Feinberg, the visit to Buchenwald was a signal that his war was nearing an end. He went to Reims, France, to document the signing of the peace treaty ending the war in Europe. He remained overseas until nearly the end of 1945, then caught another ship home.
Feinberg, awarded two Bronze Stars, got back to Philadelphia on Jan. 6, 1946. He found a pay phone and called his sweetie, Fredda Gershman. He’d carried her photo from the coast of France into the heart of Germany (He has it still.).
When she heard his voice on the other end of the line, Fredda didn’t mess around.
“Do you love me?”
“Of course I do,” the soldier replied.
“Do you love me enough to get married on the 26th?”
Twenty days later, Fredda and Irving Feinberg embarked on a life together. It lasted until Fredda’s death in 2004.
They had two daughters. He established a photo-processing and commercial photography business. Feinberg ran it for about five decades, retiring in 1996. He and his wife moved to West Palm Beach because Fredda’s bridge-playing friends had already moved there. He stayed in Florida until earlier this year, when his daughters convinced him to move to a senior-care home in Johns Creek. His walls feature pictures of his family, which has grown exponentially since Feinberg said yes to that long-ago marriage proposal.
“I’ve had a good life,” said Feinberg. “I have.”
Cpl. Feinberg, Wednesday is your day.
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