Museum friend and battlefield guide, Roland Gaul of Luxembourg, recounts Thanksgiving 1944 and how it is remembered today.

The courtroom of the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg hosted nearly 400 visitors each day, including 250 members of the international press. The Museum’s collection contains items from some of these visitors, American service members who wanted to sit in on one of the most significant trials in history.

Justice Robert H. Jackson’s opening statement at the Nuremberg Trials remains one of the most famous and influential oratories in the canon of international law and criminal jurisprudence.
 

The first international war crimes tribunal in history revealed the true extent of German atrocities and held some of the most prominent Nazis accountable for their crimes.

Seeing the cemetery for the German war dead at Futa Pass was a stark reminder of the human cost of defeating fascism.

Even while held as POWs by the Germans in the POW camp Stalag Luft IV, American servicemen exercised their civic duty and made their voices heard, at least to each other, when they held a straw vote for the 1944 presidential election.

Despite their small, fluffy nature and their propensity to do as they please, even cats had a place in the military.

The end of World War II brought unexpected challenges for American servicemembers in both Europe and the Pacific. Fighting forces turned into forces of occupation, working to maintain a fragile peace while living amongst former enemies.

There is insufficient attention paid to the long history of the Roma within European culture.

Private First Class Ferris LeBlanc served his country honorably during World War II. But the credit due to him was denied thanks to the tragic circumstances of his death in the Up Stairs Lounge fire in 1973.

International Translation Day is an opportunity to pay tribute to the work of language professionals and their role in bringing about peace. Roughly 6,000 Japanese Americans served as translators and interpreters with the Military Intelligence Service (MIS) in the Pacific, using the language of their parents and grandparents to shorten the war and save lives.

In late September 1940, the German-Jewish intellectual, Walter Benjamin, embarked on a dangerous and ultimately ill-fated journey across the Pyrenees to escape the Nazis.