Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Argentina - Did Germans really go there after the war?

You bet some did. For all the talk of evil Nazi's hiding out in Argentina (some did), a good number of Germans and Italians went there to start a new life and escape war ravaged Europe. Remember, the Soviets gobbled up 40% of Germany into their own sphere, and that was reason enough to flee.

I found a quaint village just south of Cordoba that has a unique and interesting story - Villa General Belgrano. This town was founded in the 1930s by a handful of German and Austrians, but was really established by 130 surviving crew of the Pocket Battleship Admiral Graf Spee.

The Graf Spee, for those unfamiliar, was a 16,000 ton cruiser sized ship with big guns and great speed built as a commerce raider. Same class as the Bismarck. In 1940, they got into a shoot out with the Brits in the Atlantic, sustained some damage, and took refuge in the port of Montevideo, Uruguay for repairs. Sufficient repairs could not be completed within the 72 hours allowed by international law in a neutral port, so the Captain took her out of port and scuttled her in the Plate River Estuary. The crew were interred in Uruguay, and 130 of them moved to Belgrano after the war.

When I visited Belgrano last week, I found a town in the hills by a lake that could have been in Bavaria. Maybe it's a bit touristy with the shops, but the architecture, the food, the beer all excellent and all German.



Best restaurant in town is called Veijo Munich - Old Munich and they brew their own beer.







It is a bit odd to see German influenced homes and buildings with Spanish signs in front of them. Many of the older generation still speaks German there, although it is fading rapidly. Still, they have the world's 3rd largest Ocktoberfest in this little village of maybe 10,000.

Argentina is a beautiful and fascinating country. Bird hunter's paradise along with Red Stag hunting and trout fishing make it one of my favorite places these days. If they only had a government that worked, that place would boom. Maybe I'll post more on that later.

yeah a whole lot forget that, just like a whole lot seem to forget it was BOTH Germany and Russia that invaded Poland and divided it up.....

W.E.B. Griffin does a nice historical fiction series on the Argentina angle of WWII, including the Graf Spee and the attempted repairs and the O.S.S. interfering. I'm not sure how precisely accurate it is, but it is definitely based on broad historical story.

I've often wondered what Central and South America were like during WW2.

You don't hear much about their participation in the hostilities.

There's a pile of them in Chile as well.

Uruguay and Argentina were neutral, as was most if not all of Latin America. They had no dog in the fight. Argentina certainly was a bit more sympathetic to the Axis, what with the large numbers of Italian immigrants, but they stayed out things for the most part.

That's why I hate all three. Makes things easier.



Travis

Yes

A minor correction. Graf Spee was a "Pocket Battleship" and about 1/3 the tonnage of the Bismarck. Ostensibly she carried sixX11" guns in two triple turrets with a top speed of around 25kts. Bismarck was close to 50K tons, 8X15" guns and a speed of 30 kts.

I didn't know there would be math reading questions in this thread

...and has a great song.

W.E.B Griffin wouldn't be American can any chance?

It was actually the British Secret Service who managed to convince the Graf Spays Captain that the Royal Navy had a number of battleships waiting for him should he leave. In reality, the battleships were still enroute and a number of days away and the Graf Spay would have only faced a number of smaller ships had she left after 72 hours..

Yes, we won WWII all by ourselves, despite the near-constant interference of our allies.

lol...caught me off guard with that one.

Interesting thread.

I had a high school friend whose family came here from Germany via Argentina. His parents were German born Argentinians. Fred was born in Argentina. I think he learned English here. He was raised with German and Spanish but came here so young he mostly lost it. German was his main language. When he joined LAPD he got Spanish back pretty good from some basic classes and working with Spanish speakers and working east and south LA.

My bad. Thought for a moment the Bismark was Deutchland Class, but obviously it was bigger and caused the Brits much concern. I was thinking of the Admiral Scheer. Thanks for the correction.

Pursuit of the Graf Spee (1956) movie
A true WW2 story: the British Navy must find and destroy a powerful German warship.
Stars: John Gregson, Anthony Quayle, Ian Hunter
"The Battle of the River Plate" (original title)

Pete,

A good friend of mine had an aunt who worked at the Brit Embassy at the time.

She was part of the plot.

She went out every day and took pics and notes about the repairs.

Then the info was "sent" to the "battle group.

I have 2 of the pics one of the day before and one of the day she was scuttled

both show radar

The guy's last name was Pepper

Snake

No radar on the Graf Spee. Sorry. There is much historical data and literature on the Battle Of The River Plate as this was known at the time (and as mentioned also a movie) about this being one of the last naval engagements where no radar was used. First use of radar at sea was about six months later during the hunt for the Battleship Bismarck, where two British Cruisers, Norfolk and Suffolk where equipped with some of the first radar sets. Pete's post is correct. There were only three cruisers (two light Ajax & Achilles) and one heavy (Cumberland sent fromt eh Falklands to replaced the damaged Exeter)to guard the entire River Plate estuary which is very wide, and without radar, impossible to cover, although they did have aircraft on board the cruisers.

Both Pics are framed...

I will try to get them scanned

but

They show a square radar Antenna

T