When Georg Weber was born about 1506, in Mollis, Glarus, Switzerland, his father, Franz Weber, was 33 and his mother, Weber, was 33. Under torture, he told them about Mayer, so they broke down the latters door on 20 April 1945. Mayer was motivated by a powerful combination of hate and lovehate toward the Nazis and love for America. Franz Weber (1826-1887) - Find a Grave Memorial They were joined byFranz Weber, an ex-Wehrmacht officer turned freedom fighter comparable to the Basterds' Hugo Stiglitz. Nazis! Those who survived the initial onslaught and did not manage to flee, had to eke out a living on a battleground ravaged by incessant bombardment and street fighting. The Life of Fridolin. Undeterred by the units previous record, Mayer and his friends approached the units commander, Lt. Alfred Ulmer, and begged to sign up. Wijnberg and Weber had to flee, whilst Mayer was tortured by the Gestapo. It was the scariest part of the entire mission.. . In 1997, he won the Legends Downhill Championship in Vail, Colorado and placed first overall in the Masters Division of the MCI World Downhill Championships. Mayers incredible story provided the basis for my book They Dared Return: The True Story of Jewish Spies Behind the Lines in Nazi Germany. In an interview, Mr. Mayer stated that he had a good combination of hatred and love: a hatred of the Nazis and a love for America. His father fought valiantly in World War I, and Mayer had seen his family forced from their homeland by an evil regime that later murdered 6 million European Jews in the Holocaust. However, he was never caught and lived a relatively peaceful life until his death in 1964. "Inglourious Basterds" made its world premiere at the 2009 Cannes FilmFestival, but the version of the film that screened there wasn't quite the same as the version which ultimately make it to theaters later that summer. A blooper reel included on the "Inglourious Basterds" DVD and Blu-ray releases showcases one of the ways Tarantino and his actors made sure to keep their hard-working editor in high spirits: whenever they knew a shot had to be cut, someone would interrupt it to say "Hello, Sally!" He Led Hitler's Secret Police in Austria. Then He Spied for the West. They therefore had to walk in deep snowto Oberperfuss, Webers home village. Read Next: OSS Finally Recognized More Than 70 Years Later By Congress. 8001 Zrich. I was really training for it.". Wijnberg died shortly afterwards. He can see the reality of Hitlers plans, which, as Weber puts it, aims to transform the continent into Concentration Camp Europe. Weber deserts to the Allies, makes contact with the OSS, and agrees to join the team. But at the radio station, Mayer persuaded the Nazi to declare Innsbruck an open city, and place himself under his arrest, effectively surrendering the city and his forces to Mayer. Mr. Mayer died at his home in Charles Town, West Virginia, on April 15 this year. . Mayer eventually headed back into Nazi-occupied territory in Europe serving as U.S. spy. But after several weeks behind enemy lines that provided reams of actionable intelligence, a knock on the door of Mayers safe house changed his life. German Order of Battle: 1st-290th Infantry divisions in World War II They jumped in on February 26, 1945. The scene was filmed on a controlled "fire stage" set, but the flames ended up burning far hotter than anyone anticipated. A real world spy story fit for the silver screen. The third soldier was the Austrian Franz Weber, a Nazi officer who had deserted the army. Edit your search or learn more. Operation Greenup brought the Allies real material benefits, transmitting dozens of radio messages with detailed accounts of Brenner traffic to the OSS listening station in the city of Bari in the heel of Italy. Finally, Ulmer asked the Jewish-Americans matter-of-factly, Do you appreciate what can happen to you if youre caught?, Mayer responded, staring directly into Omers eyes, This is more our war than yours.. 1" in 2003, there were seven long years without a single new Quentin Tarantino film. Inside was the officer responsible for his interrogation., Do what you want with me, the man pleaded. Like many other Germans by the end of the war, Hofer was looking for a safeguard with the Allies to secure his own freedom. Historical records matching Franz Weber Franz Weber in GenealogieOnline Family Tree Index view all Immediate Family. Last week we posted a story on the OSS (Office of Strategic Services) and how after 73 years they were finally recognized as a group and were honored with a Congressional Gold Medal. A Nazi SS general responsible for deporting tens of thousands of Jews to death camps worked for West German intelligence after World War . He has written eight books, including his most recent (insrt embedded link to Amazon) Dog Company: The Boys of Pointe du Hoc: Rangers Who Accomplished D-Days Toughest Mission and Led the Way Across Europe. When youre a World War II hero, you can do whatever the hell you want. 1526 1526. The 'Good War' Myth of World War Two - Institute for Historical Review Diane Kruger was not the only "Inglourious Basterds" cast member to face potentially dangerous scenarios during the film shoot. Service on a half-dozen fronts, including the bloody struggle against Marshal Tito's partisans in occupied Yugoslavia, has opened Weber's eyes. After tramping through chest-deep snow, the men literally sledded down the side of the glacier in a Santa Claus-like sleigh. According to The Washington Post, Tarantino thought Christoph Waltz couldn't perform the scene convincingly enough and choked actress Diane Kruger himself. He dominated the sport of speed skiing from 1980 to 1985, winning over eighty percent of the races he entered. Service on a half-dozen fronts, including the bloody struggle against Marshal Titos partisans in occupied Yugoslavia, has opened Webers eyes. Learn More. According to Roth, "[The flames] were spreading so exponentially. The three were to be dropped by parachuted near Innsbruck in February 1945. Hans Landa chokes Bridget Von Hammersmark to death. Out jumped a bruised and battered Mayer, who offered the formal surrender of the entire regions German Army. Speaking German, he admitted to being an American but said he was working alone. There was also the issue of competition: other great directors were also doing World War II epics in the late '90s, notably Steven Spielberg with "Saving Private Ryan" and Terrence Malick with "The Thin Red Line." You think they're gonna be one way and then they're not at all.". There were some contributions from historians, mainly to set things in context, and some re-enactments in the absence of archival footage, but the story was told largely in Mayer and Wijnbergs own words. The trio had supplies packages dropped with them, but unfortunately were unable to locate the packet containing their skis. They Dared Return: The True Story of Jewish Spies Behind the Lines in Nazi Germany, Dog Company: The Boys of Pointe du Hoc: Rangers Who Accomplished D-Days Toughest Mission and Led the Way Across Europe. His captors, including Franz Hofer, the governor of the Alpine Redoubt and an immensely powerful man within Hitlers inner Circle, faced war crimes prosecution. An overwhelming majority of them were women and children. He says Waltz was also instructed to not show up to rehearsals with any of his co-stars, with the one exception ofDenis Mnochet (who played the dairy farmer Perrier LaPadite and shares the film's suspenseful opening scene with Waltz). He was born in Germany and forced to flee as the Holocaust was beginning. 129.303 mph/208.092 kph which he set in 1983 in Silverton, Colorado. Fridolin Weber. The team found a German POW named Franz Weber. After arriving in New York, Mayer changed his name to Frederick. Operation Greif was a special false flag operation commanded by Waffen SS commando, SS Obersturmbannfhrer, Otto Skorzeny during the Battle of the Bulge, Skorzeny died age 67, on 05-07-1975, The . In February, 1945, an odd trio parachuted onto a vast Austrian glacier and kicked-off one of the most spectacular clandestine missions of World War II. Though they managed to retrieve most of their supplies, their skis were another matter entirely, forcing them to climb down in waist-deep snow. 3, No. In an 2015 interview with HuffPost Live, Eli Roth claimed that he and other actors nearly burned to death during the movie's climax, in which a theater filled with Nazis burns to the ground. He found and recruited deserter-volunteer, Franz Weber. By then it was April of 1945 and the Germans knew they were done. Theres no doubt that Operation Greenup saved many thousands of lives, Austrian and American, civilian and military. So how did the title of Tarantino's WWII revenge flick go from "Inglorious Bastards" to "Inglourious Basterds"? Tarantino will never tell us the full logic behind misspelling the title, though in various interviews he's offered partial explanations. Allies suspected the Germans were plotting to make their final stand in the war there. An irreverent alternate history following two intersecting plots of Jews taking violent revenge against the Nazis (one by an orphaned French theater owner named Shosanna, the other by an American GI squad known as the Basterds), Tarantino's sixth film became the director's biggest hit up to that point in the summer of 2009. Frederick Mayer, Jew Who Spied on Nazis After Fleeing Germany, Dies at This is a horrible place where the Nazis tortured and killed members of the Belgium resistance. Patrick K. ODonnell is a bestselling author and combat historian who has conducted over 5,000 oral history interviews with heroes like Frederick Mayer. *Lighting a path to truth* Former Navy JAG Worldwide U.S. Military Defense. WW2 Info - World History is the interaction between people of different The governor was about to go on the radio to tell his troops to fight to the last man. Operation Greenup: a story better than Inglourious Basterds - and true Both men joined the US Army, and were then approached to join the OSS, the US intelligence service,because of their language skills. Feigning the role of a captured German POW, Fred entered a camp and networked within its gates. Weber, Franz (Jger-Regiment 28) - TracesOfWar.com He was a German Jew whose family emigrated from their home on the Western edge of the Black Forest in 1938 to make a new life in the United States. Show Location on Map. Franz Ferdinand - Assassination, WW1 & Death - Biography Mayer was assigned to the German Operational Group before heading out. Shes Not Madeleine: Scotland Yard Refutes Julias Allegations of Being Madeleine McCann. Mayer was allowed to send a message to the OSS. Though it turned out to be a myth created by fanatical Nazis, the Allies couldnt have known that at the time. They traveled by ship to North Africa. Historian K. ODonnell published a volume called They Dared Return: The True Story of Jewish Spies Behind the Lines in Nazi Germany.