American Valor Quarterly Issue 5 - Winter 2008/09 | Page 22

P.O. Box 1142 Top-Secret Intelligence Gathering in World War II Just outside the limits of the nation’s capital, a top-secret military intelligence facility was created in 1942 with the task of interrogating high-value German prisoners of war. Code-named P.O. Box 1142, the facility was located at Fort Hunt, Virginia, on lands that had previously been owned by George Washington. Many of Germany’s foremost scientific minds passed through P.O. Box 1142, including Wehrnher von Braun and Heinz Schlicke, the inventor of infrared detection. Not only did the camp aid in the Allied effort during World War II, the information obtained from men like von Braun had direct effects on the subsequent Cold War. stationed. In those days many of the men in the 1st Cavalry, were refugees from the “Dust Bowl” in Texas and Oklahoma, who were excellent horsemen whereas I was strictly a neophyte. I did manage to ride a horse military style. Because of my academic background (I was fairly literate in those days) I was assigned as the personnel clerk. But I felt that my proficiencies were not properly exploited because I was a speaker of both English and German. So I tried to get into military intelligence, but I wasn’t a citizen. I became a citizen only in 1943. Brandon Bies: Dr. Mandel, could you similarly tell us when and where you were born and how you came to this country and a little bit about your early life in the United States? Despite its importance, P.O. Box 1142 remained a secret for decades following the war due to the sensitive nature of its operations. For 60 years, veterans who served there kept silent, sharing their George Mandel: Actually my early experiences with no one. Recently, the history is in many ways similar to what surviving veterans were reunited at Fort you just heard. I was born in 1924 in Hunt, and a memorial was dedicated in Berlin. My father was a decorated World their honor. And, for the first time, the War I officer, but he fought on the U.S. Army and U.S. Navy officially wrong side because he was fighting for recognized them for their work. At the the Kaiser. We thought that living in th 11 Annual Conference, two of these Berlin was perfectly fine except that we A photo of the POW interrogation center at Fort Hunt veterans – George Frenkel and Dr. had some American relatives who said, - known as P.O. Box 1142 - taken in 1942. George Mandel – shared their “You have to get out of this place.” experiences at P.O. Box 1142. Moderating the panel was Brandon They said this because of our Jewish background, so we emigrated Bies of the National Park Service, who has led the effort to to the United States in 1937. I went to high school outside of New York City in Scarsdale, New York. record these veterans’ stories. Then I went onto college. I decided to major in chemistry, largely because I had a high school teacher who was teaching chemistry, and I thought that was very exciting. I was in college just about three months when Pearl Harbor was bombed. At the time America had tried to stay out of the war until this happened. The question was: What do you do next? I was told that the development of science was extremely important in the national interest, and I should by all means finish my college education in I spent four years in New York doing menial jobs because I was chemistry, which I did. I got a bachelor’s degree at Yale. a high school graduate. Then I was drafted and was assigned – as a city boy from New York who had only seen horses off and on As soon as I finished that, I was drafted and served in the infantry – to the horse cavalry. This was incidentally the division that made for basic training. When the Army discovered that because I had George Custer famous. Some of my friends have jokingly said lived in Germany for some twelve to thirteen years and that I that I was probably the last survivor of “Custer’s Last Stand,” spoke German, they thought that might be of interest to the American war effort. Also they thought the fact that I could use but that was a little bit before my time! a typewriter was very significant. I received my basic training in Kansas and was subsequently transferred to El Paso, Texas, where the 1st Cavalry Division was National Archives photo George Frenkel: I was born in Berlin, Germany in 1919 and spent a very happy childhood in both Switzerland and Germany, mostly in Germany. In 1933, as I am sure you all know, Adolf Hitler came to power and a very trying period ensued for members of the Jewish faith. Eventually, because we were lucky enough to have family in the United States, we managed to emigrate, and I arrived in New York. AMERICAN VALOR QUARTERLY - Winter 2008/09 - 22