American WWII soldier and concentration camp survivor have heartfelt reunion

By Stephanie Small

UW Newslab

Two older men sit side by side in a Bellevue living room.

With soft smiles and a look of learned wisdom on their faces, Bill Kratzke and Stanley Goleniewski have one commonality that has brought them together after all these years: the end of World War II.

On Sunday, April 29, 1945, Kratzke, an American soldier in the 14th Armor Division of the American military, liberated Goleniewski, among many others, from the concentration camp known as Dachau, located east of Munich, Germany.

Though they didn’t meet face to face then, what brought them to do so after all these years was the Sunset Hills Cemetery. Goleniewski, a Sammamish resident, was receiving help with funeral arrangements for his wife. Kratzke and his wife, Ruth, were working on pre-death arrangements.

Jeff Jones, a funeral home employee, noticed the similarities between the histories of the two and suggested they meet.

“That we were fortunate enough to run into each other was remarkable,” Kratzke said.

Goleniewski agrees, adding that without Jeff, he would never have met the Kratzkes.

If it weren’t for Kratzke and the 14th Armor Division known as “The Liberators,” Goleniewski would not be alive today.

His liberation occurred just hours before Hitler’s orders to kill all concentration camp prisoners were to be carried out.

“The order was that when American troops were sighted, the killing of us all was to occur. All the concentration camps were marked for death,” Goleniewski said. “The Americans arrived earlier than expected, which is why we all survived.”

Goleniewski was born in 1924 in Poland. In 1942, at the age of 18, a priest, an organist, Goleniewski and a fellow altar boy were arrested by the Gestapo, on suspicions that they were hiding people in the church who were trying to escape being captured by the Nazis. Although Goleniewski is not Jewish, being Polish and Catholic was another excuse to be sent to the concentration camps.

“The Gestapo interrogated me for three months before I was sent to Auschwitz for two years,” he said. “After Auschwitz, I was sent to Dachau for six months before I was liberated.”

Goleniewski has since visited Auschwitz, and is reminded of his time there by his memories and his I.D. number, 124300, tattooed on his arm by the SS officers.

“Sometimes, because so much time has passed, I think that maybe it didn’t happen. But then I look down at my arm, and see the number there,” he said. “I didn’t put it there, so I really was there and it really did happen.”

His time in Dachau was marked by the intense severe winter, and several brushes with death. Goleniewski suffered from typhoid while imprisoned, and was almost put to death with others who were near death.

“I was considered dead at that point. I could barely open my eyes and was barely breathing,” he said.

Thankfully, though, he was found to still be alive, and was spared the torturous death he’d seen many others go through. He avoided a second brush with death thanks to Kratzke.

“I remember seeing the American planes overhead — there must have been at least 200 of them. I knew right then it was the end of the Germans,” Goleniewski said.

He recalls seeing the SS officers being brought down at gunpoint by the American soldiers.

Kratzke said he remembers a lot of confusion.

“When we came onto the camp, it was horrible,” he said. “American soldiers were shooting the SS officers because they were so angered by what they saw.”

Kratzke and the rest of the 14th Armored Division were famous for also liberating many other concentration camps, including those that had American and British soldiers imprisoned as well. Goleniewski is the third person he’s met that was liberated by American troops.

“The liberation incident itself was very short, but what happened before and after is amazing,” Kratzke said.

Although Goleniewski endured more than can be imagined, he came out on top. He met and married his wife in England, where they were both in Displaced Person, or DP, camps after the war. They shared similar life stories as far as what they had experienced since the beginning of the war.

Goleniewski also attained a master’s degree in civil engineering, and, upon coming to the United States, obtained a job at Boeing. He now wants to share his story with the world, and is working on a book entitled “Out of Auschwitz - The Untold Story.” In it, he plans to document and share his personal experiences, something that he feels will help others know what it was really like.

Ultimately though, Goleniewski said he is glad and thankful for the life-saving help that Kratzke gave so many years ago.

“I feel very happy to have found someone from the other side of the fence [at the concentration camp]. The whole situation changed in a matter of minutes, and it truly was a miracle.”

Stephanie Small is a student in the University of Washington Department of Communication News Laboratory.

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