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

Jorge

Pocket BB

This is very simular to the pic I have

Look at the square Antenna atop the main superstructure...

T

There are many books on the subject, one of them by the same name, goes into great detail about how the Graf Spee was able to detect the British cruisers first due to her very high foretops and the book goes into great lengths about no radar involved. Still, pictures don't lie. I just telling you what I've read.

Jorge

I can be mistaken

this is a better pic (which I do not have)

http://www.deutschland-class.dk/admiral_graf_spee/gallery/gallgrafspeemontevideo.html


What is the Rectangular antenna I have so long thought to be radar�

I could be something else


T

I believe that Graf Spee did have a "radar antenna" of sorts, possibly for gun laying, as the British intellegence took pictures of it. Whether this installation was none-operational, or whether it was actually for something else, I don't know..

Quite a thing to be able to tell the grandkids!Ordinary people caught up in extraordinary events..

Is this what you are looking at?



In February 2004, a salvage team began work raising the wreck of Admiral Graf Spee. The operation is in part being funded by the government of Uruguay, in part by the private sector, as the wreck is now a hazard to navigation. The first major section�a 27 metric tons (27 long tons; 30 short tons) gunnery range-finding telemeter�was raised on 25 February.

You talking about this on the front?:


Jeff beat me to it. definitively not radar. That is the Gun Director. If you look at both ends of the horizontal arms, there are holes there. Those are the then state of the art Carl Zeiss optical rangefinders. The square thing in front does look like a radar, but director assembly simply can't turn that fast. Still, I could be wrong.

hatari

Go here



http://www.deutschland-class.dk/admiral_graf_spee/gallery/gallgrafspeemontevideo.html

You can see it in several pics but is very clear 1/2 down the page

T

the rectangle in the middle of the structure

Sorry i did not read all of your post...

Still

Thanks

T

A quick search using Google suggests that the Graf Spee had the Seetakt radar system installed for ranging..

Thanks Pete



T

There you are, so that rectangle must be it. When I get some time, I'll look in my library for that book and the section about no radar, but given what Pete posted, maybe they meant is as radar for fire control?

that's a pretty formidable looking boat.

I always that it was a pity the Captain took his own life. Even though he was the "enemy" he was highly respected by the British for his conduct, and a number of Officers from Royal Navy even attended his funeral.

In the film, it was played by an American battleship , but at least two of the British ships played themselves so to speak..

Actually Pete, it was played by an American Heavy Cruiser the Newport News. They were great ships that went into mothballs. EVen as late as the mid-80s they were perfectly preserved at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard. I once got a tour and it was like traveling back in time. Even the Capenter's shop below had all the nice tools, perfectly stowed and ready to go. They've been all scrapped now. In the film, the two veteran of the fight were HMS Ajax that had been transferred to the Indian Navy and remained operational well into the 70s. There was a move in England at the time to bring her back as a museum ship, but that fell through. The other was the Cumberland that had been turned into a minelayer and in the film one can see where the 8" turrets were removed

Great pics!

Mr Pepper told me the story about his aunt.

then he went to China and then back to our UK office in Isleworth

Not long after he sent me the pics.

They have been framed since then... one of my prize possessions

Saddly I never heard from him after that.

Very nice guy

Snake

Check out the middle of this page under Firecontrol and Radar and see if you can decipher:

http://www.deutschland-class.dk/technicallayout/generaldetails.html

Most definitively radar.

ugggggh

anger building......

I hate to hear that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seetakt_radar

It is all Lies! Vee dit not moof here!

Well yeah, after the war. But if you read the history of Argentina, you'll see that even way back before that they were getting tons of European immigration - folks finding (relatively...) good opportunities for personal/economic freedom.

Peron fixed all that, though.

Both of those points are spot on. The European underclass immigrated to Argentina just as they did to the US in big numbers before and after WW1. Many Italians came, and in the '30s they brought Mussolini's brand of Fascist Socialism with them. Peron adopted it and used rhetoric and give aways to hoodwink the lower class into keeping him in power. The template stands today.

Peron fixed it....oh, yass he did. And Evita. Sheesh, what a waste of a great country.

Out of service yes..But not all scrapped. If you want to see a Des Moines class crusier, Salem is a Museum up in Boston. In my mind the DesMoines were the finest heavy cruisers ever built.

Fine ships, but they take such huge crews they were doomed.

I'm glad they saved at least one of them. Beautiful, well balanced ships and very big (18,000 tons) for a cruiser.

regarding Argentina, they are almost a mirror-image of the US when it comes to immigration and history with Spanish being the most obvious and key difference of course. That said, LOTS of Italian and German immigrants, rich in natural resources and like the US, they exterminated the native indian populations. They are also of course a lot smaller country and also unlike the US, the Protestant Work Ethic and Anglo-Saxon mores and values were not adopted, instead they went with the slower, Latin culture and it shows of course.

Dat's all good and well, but how did you get G V Black to take your pics?


;-{>8

My great grandfather and family imigrated there from northern Italy well before the war.My paternal grandpa was born there and came to this country as a baby.His oldest son fought in Germany and Italy during WW2.I hope visit Argentina someday,I've always heard it's a beautiful country.

i dated german girl name tina. she had big hands and smelled like cabbage.