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Charles Dawes

Elderly Charles Dawes wearing a tan button-up shirt, a bolo tie, and a red and white veterans baseball cap

WWII Veteran Charles G. Dawes, 2007

Charles G. Dawes, 2007

  • Branch of Service: U.S. Army, Infantry
  • Highest Rank: Private 1st Class
  • Military Service: Drafted, March 29, 1944 - November 29, 1945

Listen to the following sections by scrolling forward to the timecode.

0:00 - Drafted from college at Springfield
2:40 - How parents felt about both sons fighting in the war
3:40 - Arrival in France, a replacement, captured by Germans, P.O.W., life in a prison camp, Red Cross parcels, liberated by General Patton
23:10 - Poems he wrote during the war
26:36 - How the war changed him

Charles G. Dawes Obituary 

This story was recorded at an SDPB event in Wagner, SD. 

Images Provided by Charles G. Dawes
Four Postcards of neighborhood streets and houses

Postcard of buildings that were converted into a German prison camp during WWII. Charles G. Dawes was a prisoner for five months at this German prison camp. Mr. Dawes commented, "I still recognize the buildings in the upper right photo and the lower left photo on this postcard."

Newspaper page

POWs Ex-prisoners Unlock Memories (Argus Leader article provided by Dawes)

Typed poem

It's Just a Piece of Cloth (Poem provided by Charles G. Dawes)

Typed poem

My Days in Munchen Prison Camp (Poem written by Charles G. Dawes)

Charles Dawes sitting in front of a microphone

Charles G. Dawes, 2007

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