Joseph Beyrle, 81, Fought for U.S., Russia in WWII

Joseph Beyrle, who died Sunday at age 81, was a World War II Army paratrooper and demolition expert who was reputedly the only man ever to fight for both the American and Russian armies. He died of heart failure while visiting the site of Camp Toccoa, where he had trained as a member of the 101st Airborne Division, known as the Screaming Eagles.Beyrle was dropped behind enemy lines in France at least three times. He was captured, held as a POW in German stalags, escaped, was recaptured and tortured, escaped again, and ended up driving a tank in a Russian armored division commanded by a female warrior who alternately whipped her men into a fury and cradled them on her shoulder after battle.Hailed as a hero in both nations, Beyrle was given awards by Presidents Clinton and Yeltsin at the 50th anniversary of D-Day, in 1994.His story was told in “Behind Hitler’s Lines,” republished last summer to coincide with the 60th anniversary of D-Day.Beyrle grew up in Muskegon, Mich., in a large family that tottered near the edge of poverty during the Depression. He graduated from high school in 1942; there were 12 in his graduating class and Beyrle was named “Class Shark,” meaning he was opportunistic. Seeing few opportunities at home, where reliance on government handouts “hit me like a blacksmith’s hammer,” Beyrle went off to Kalamazoo and enlisted in the Army. Despite color blindness that would prevent him from recognizing the distinctive green for “go,” he was accepted as a paratrooper.With specialties as a radio operator and demolition expert, Beyrle made an ideal candidate for clandestine drops behind enemy lines. Twice he parachuted into France to deliver gold to the resistance and made his way back unscathed.On the night before D-Day, June 6, 1944,his 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment’s mission was to secure crossings of the Douve River. Immediately after he landed, some three miles from the Douve, Beyrle was pinned down by fire. After three nights, he scaled a hedgerow and blundered directly into a German machine-gun emplacement. Captured, he was transported to a POW camp. One of the soldiers who captured him stole Beyrle’s dog tags.Starved but determined, Beyrle was transferred among camps in Germany and attempted escape several times. In late 1944, after hearing gunfire from nearby Russian troops, Beyrle and two others bribed guards to let them hop an eastbound freight train. The train ended up in Berlin, where Beyrle was arrested and brutally tortured by the Gestapo.Returned to the stalag he’d fled, Beyrle attempted escape in January 1945, this time hidden in a barrel. When the barrel fell off a truck just outside the gates, Beyrle eluded dogs and gunfire and found safety in a hayloft; two friends who made the break with him were killed.He was found by a column of Russian armor – actually, American Sherman tanks courtesy of Lend-Lease – a few days later. “I knew two words: ‘Amerikansky tovarishch’ – American comrade,” Beyrle told the Associated Press.The Russians could be brutal with prisoners. A German couple from a nearby farmhouse were shot, hacked to pieces, and fed to hogs. But the Russians seemed to trust Beyrle, and offered him pork soup. Later, Beyrle earned their trust by rigging explosives to clear a road that fleeing German troops had blocked with tree trunks. After that, the battalion’s female commander decided to let him join.“We drank toasts to Stalin, Roosevelt, Churchill, and the Studebaker Truck,” Beyrle recalled. “I taught them to sing the Notre Dame victory song.”Beyrle rolled west with the Soviets, liberating prison camps including Stalag III-C, where he had been interned. Suspected collaborators “piled up like cordwood.”After several weeks’ fighting, Beyrle was wounded when German Stuka dive bombers attacked the column. Beyrle took shrapnel in the groin and ended up in a Soviet hospital.He was found there by Soviet Marshall Georgy Zhukov, who arranged to get Beyrle to Moscow. In Moscow, Beyrle made his way to the American Embassy but was shocked to learn that he had been listed among the dead. Apparently his dog tags had been found on the body of the soldier who had stolen them from Beyrle. After a few days during which he was suspected of being an imposter, the embassy was able to verify his fingerprints, and Beyrle was on his way back to America. When he arrived home, he found his parents had held a memorial service for him. The government had paid them a death benefit of $861.Back in Muskegon, Beyrle married and took a job in the shipping department at Brunswick Corp., the manufacturer of bowling and billiards equipment. He remained active with local veterans groups, although he never talked much about his wartime adventures. When his autobiography appeared in 2002, his daughter told the Muskegon Chronicle, “I hadn’t heard most of this.”Last May, Beyrle was invited to Moscow for the annual celebration of what Russians call the Great Patriotic War. There he stood with his son, John Beyrle, deputy chief of mission of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, as he was presented with an AK-47 by none other than Lieutenant General Mikhail Kalashnikov.

Joseph Beyrle, 81, Fought for U.S., Russia in WWII

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