A Son’S Odyssey

© 2011 Lewis Allen Lambert. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

First published by AuthorHouse 9/22/2011

ISBN: 978-1-4634-4599-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4634-4598-0 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4634-4597-3 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011914013

Printed in the United States of America

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

Preface

1. DISBELIEF

2. THE SEARCH BEGINS

3. SLIGHT DETOUR

4. LEVI

5. JERUSALEM

6. RACHEL

7. GIDEON

8. SUCCESS ON ALL FRONTS

9. DANIELLE

10. DUELING WITH MOSSAD

11. FRIENDS TO THE RESCUE

12. BREAKTHROUGH

13. THERAPY

14. TEARFUL REUNIONS

15. TURN OF EVENTS

16. THE LETTER

17. A UNION OF LOVE

18. UNFINISHED BUSINESS

19. THE FINAL CHAPTER

Other Books by the Author

Michael’s Messengers

Uncommon Warrior

This book is dedicated to all the men and women who served their

countries in wars and never returned to their loved ones.

Preface

A Son’s Odyssey is the third and final book on the life of Air Commodore Jack Meadows, the youngest flag officer in the Royal Air Force during World War II. The first two books, Michael’s Messengers and Uncommon Warrior chronicled Jack’s life from his early years in Poland until the day he disappeared near Munich, Germany on May 5th, 1945.

Though Jack’s remains were never found, his family and friends reluctantly accepted the fact he had perished. Only one person, Jack’s best friend and confidant wasn’t so certain of his death. That friend, who was my father, was a lawyer serving with the United States Army in England during the war. He spent more than 20 years after the war searching for the man he considered a younger brother.

It might be difficult to understand how a Polish boy, who immigrated to the United States in 1932 and eventually became an American citizen, became a close friend to an American army officer, 20 years his senior, in London during the war. Jack’s 25 years of life are celebrated in the first two books of this trilogy.

A Son’s Odyssey reflects the deep devotion of one man for another in an effort to satisfy a belief that Jack Meadows was alive somewhere in the world.

A Son’s Odyssey is a love story about two fathers and their sons, and the love of a mother for the father of her child. My father became the driving force that brought everyone in Jack’s life together nearly 30 years after he disappeared.

To understand where A Son’s Odyssey begins, a synopsis of Michael’s Messengers and Uncommon Warrior are provided below.

*****

Jacob Grunfeld was more aware of the world around him than any other 11-year old in his small village on the outskirts of Krakow, Poland. In fact, he may have accumulated as much knowledge as anyone twice his age.

Jacob’s Polish mother, Hannah was a university-educated secondary school teacher and his German father, Herschel was a well respected thoracic surgeon and educator. Jacob’s wisdom was attributed to his mother who taught him things far beyond his school studies. His worldliness came indirectly from his father, who traveled throughout Europe lecturing and teaching. His father was rarely home, but he wrote long descriptive letters to his wife about what he saw and experienced in Europe after World War I, the bloody war to end all wars ended.

Jacob’s doting mother would read her husband’s letters aloud to him while he fantasized about all the places he’d likely never see. Jacob’s relationship with his father was practically non-existent; at times he couldn’t remember his face, his touch or his smell. He knew his mother was unhappy that her husband put his career ahead of his family. Young Jacob wondered why his father couldn’t have accepted a prestigious position in Krakow, or even in Warsaw. But as a German who served his country in defeat, Jacob’s father felt he had to represent his vanquished nation at the highest pinnacles of his profession.

Yet Jacob gained some benefits from his absentee father. He lived well, he had his letters, and he spoke and read German as well as his native Polish language. But not having a father around gave some local villagers pause to suspect the worst of Jacob’s mother. Jacob heard many taunts from his young friends that he was a bastard. But those taunts were not as cruel as the ones that made reference to his being a Jew; a Christ killer.

Jacob’s little village had few Jewish families but the ones that lived there were quite well off which only exacerbated the acrimony between the Catholics and the Jews.

A week after his 11th birthday, Jacob learned his mother was pregnant, a situation that caught everyone by surprise and gave his classmates even more reason to taunt him. Shortly after she told him, Jacob’s mother began to have severe health problems and was ordered by her doctor to stay home for the remainder of her pregnancy. The good son Jacob stayed home to care for his mother. While he ministered to her needs, he learned far more from his mother’s teachings than what he would have learned in school.

In September 1931, about a month before her delivery, Jacob’s mother, now confined to bed, began to hemorrhage. If only his father were home, he thought. Jacob resented his father for not being there for his mother. Jacob panicked and ran to find the local doctor. By the time they arrived back at his house, Jacob’s mother was passing through the last throes of her solitary life. The doctor, with Jacob’s help, put her in his carriage and sped off to the hospital in Krakow. By the time they arrived, it was too late to save her. She lost too much blood. Jacob was stunned. He lost his mother, his teacher and his friend. He was alone, abandoned first by his father and now his mother. Those two tragic events would trouble Jacob throughout his life.

One of the physicians at the local hospital, who knew Jacob’s father, dispatched a cable to him with the sad news. Three days later, Herschel Grunfeld arrived home to bury his wife. He was ashen-faced, silent and grief-stricken. Jacob never saw his father so emotional. His father wept, but Jacob didn’t feel sorry for him. When Jacob cried, it was for his mother.

After the funeral, Jacob’s father returned to Germany for a few days to take care of his affairs and then returned to Poland to look after Jacob. He never asked his father why he gave up his position in Germany to return to his village. He never asked him why he didn’t take him to Germany to live with him. It wasn’t the right time to ask such questions.

Herschel took a position in Krakow but he wasn’t happy. It wasn’t only the loss of his wife or the relinquishment of his prestigious position that troubled him; it was something far worse. In late November 1931, Herschel told his son what was troubling him. The rise of fascism and anti-Semitism in Germany was not widely known yet. Germans who were educated and politically astute knew of the situation but didn’t believe it would amount to much. But Jacob’s father had influential friends in Germany who were very frightened and were thankful that Herschel decided to move to Poland. Even a well-known surgeon and teacher of his repute would not be safe in Germany because he was a Jew.

Herschel was a strapping handsome man at six feet in height, with blond hair, and blue eyes. He looked like a poster boy for the Aryan race. But he was a Jew and appearance and position were unimportant to the rabble that ran the streets in many German cities.

Unbeknownst to Jacob, his father had written to colleagues in America who worked in various teaching hospitals. He expressed a desire to come to America to practice his profession and to provide a good life for his son. In late December, Herschel told Jacob they were leaving for America. Herschel explained what was occurring in Germany would eventually come to Poland.

Herschel accepted a position at Johns Hopkins University Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland where he could earn a living as a medical researcher while obtaining certification to practice medicine, and to learn English. They left the only home Jacob knew, they left his mother’s resting place to begin a new life that for Jacob would be lonelier than the one he had led in Poland. But he would be safe, and he would thrive. Not only thrive, but he would become one of the most admired men of his time.

To ensure that he and his son would not be discriminated against because they were Jews, or because he was German, Herschel anglicized their names. Herschel and Jacob Grunfeld became Harold and Jack Meadows.

Jack matured well beyond his age to become a man of courage, a man of action, and a war hero—yet a man who had demons that he tried to overcome, but they persisted and grew.

Michael’s Messengers is a story of a young Polish-American who comes of age during the world’s darkest days. He fights for his adopted country and becomes a highly decorated national hero. Oddly, that country wasn’t America, it was Great Britain.

Uncommon Warrior begins in 1943, when young Jack assumes an important role in the RAF. He rises rapidly in rank and gains the attention and admiration of many of Britain’s wartime leaders.

As the end of the war in Europe was in sight, Jack’s premonition that he wouldn’t live to see the end of the war was not far from the truth.

*****

1. DISBELIEF

My father gathered all his drafts and Jack’s notes he had compiled about a young man who officially ceased to exist as of May 13th, 1945. Three years before his disappearance, Jack gave my father permission to write his life-story but he wouldn’t let him publish it until the war was over or he had died. How ironic that both conditions occurred at the same time. Now my father was ready to finish the book. He never knew why Jack left Paris on May 5th, or where he was headed. It was one of those adventures Jack embarked upon with such enthusiasm. Since he was a passenger on the flight to Germany, he left his favorite well-worn Polish flying boots behind. My father eventually took them home to Jack’s father.

The disappearance of Jack Meadows on a flight over Germany on May 5th was more than a tragedy. After six years of war during which time Jack flew more than 500 combat sorties, my father couldn’t accept the fact that he lost his life just three days before Germany surrendered. When my father considered the fact that Jack survived numerous crash landings, returned to England after bailing out over enemy territory twice, and went on several clandestine missions posing as a German officer, the thought of his death during the last days of the war was very difficult to fathom.

Jack’s loss left a hole in the heart of everyone who knew him. After paying his respects to Jack’s father, and to the woman he was to marry five days after he disappeared, my father spent the next few months buried in his work. Every once in a while the thought of Jack’s disappearance went off in his head like an alarm clock. For him there was no closure.

As a lawyer, his logical mind told him the circumstances of Jack’s accident didn’t make sense. On top of that, there was little public notice of his loss. His records were sealed. The people Jack worked with in the RAF and SAS refused to discuss him. It was as though he had never existed.

My father had a feeling that Jack would be with him forever, if not in the flesh, certainly in spirit for the rest of his life. My father was consumed with finding the truth about a young man who seemed to vanish without a trace.

In the fall of 1945, my father was discharged from the Army and returned to New York to resume his career as an attorney. He also had to find time to finish the book. The loss of Jack at such an early age haunted him. The loss of a young man who had contributed so much to the countries he loved was unfair. He had just been promoted to the rank of air commodore. Though his official records listed his age as 27, and he was hailed as the youngest flag officer in modern British military history, we all know now Jack was only 25 years old. If the truth about his age were known, he would probably never have risen to the lofty pinnacle he so richly deserved. He fought his youth at every turn but lost the biggest battle in the end.

My father began writing Jack’s story as he told it to him in the first person because he practically dictated it word for word. Jack gave him notes about conversations he had with various people that he never had the opportunity to discuss with my father. He included them in the book. As 1945 turned 1946, my father began to feel in his heart that Jack wasn’t dead. His remains were never positively identified.

In late January 1946, my father returned to Europe to visit some old friends who were assigned to Allied Command Headquarters in Germany. He began to research the circumstances of Jack’s tragic death. He obtained copies of the search team’s report, and the medical and pathology reports. Only five of the seven people on board the aircraft were positively identified through their remains. Jack wasn’t one of them.

My father took a side trip to London to visit General Douglas, the father of Jack’s true love. The general wept when they talked about Jack. He asked the general if he could obtain a copy of Jack’s military records from RAF headquarters. The general promised to make inquiries for him. Two days later, the general called to say Jack’s records had been sealed on May 13th, 1945. They were placed in a classified storage area somewhere in the bowels of the War Ministry with the inscription ‘top secret, not to be opened until 1970.’

My father thought that was strange and asked the general about it. He said there were certain sensitive documents that were being withheld from the public for 25 years but he didn’t know what criteria determined that length of time. My father said it sounded as though it might have something to do with national security but certainly Jack wasn’t involved in anything like that by the end of the war. The general could only say Jack’s life was as mysterious as his death.

My father decided to go to Munich where he could take advantage of the wonderful skiing at that time of year. While skiing down those beautiful Bavarian mountains, he asked himself what if Jack survived the crash. Where could he have gone? He rushed back to his hotel and asked the hotel proprietor where he could find a detailed map of southeastern Germany. The proprietor told him he could find one at the University of Munich library. Since my father didn’t speak German, he asked if he would write down what he was looking for so he could show it to the librarian. The proprietor was kind enough to do it for him. The proprietor asked my father if he was looking for something in particular. He said he wasn’t sure but it had to be an area within 50 miles around Munich.

What my father found out from his friends at Allied Command Headquarters, but not reported in May 1945, was that Jack’s plane landed in Frankfurt, Germany to pick up a passenger. Then it headed southeast over parts of Germany that were under both Nazi and American control. The last reported contact with the aircraft was when it was about 40 miles southeast of Heidenheim at 6:25 p.m. on May 5th. Its final destination was unknown. My father took the information, obtained directions to the library and left with immense anticipation.

The library was badly damaged and was in the process of being restored. He approached the clerk at the information desk and asked in German if he spoke English. When he said no, my father handed him the piece of paper with what he was looking for. The clerk looked at him above his spectacles and studied his face for a second or two. He pointed his index finger up and said ein moment bitte. He disappeared behind the huge shelves of books and when he returned he was carrying two large volumes of maps. Fortunately for my father the clerk marked the pages that encompassed the area he was looking for. He thanked the clerk and took the maps to a secluded table to begin his research.

My father took out his wallet and retrieved a piece of paper with the coordinates of the crash site written on it. His army friends were kind enough to dig them up for him. He checked the coordinates and found them on the page that included the city of Augsberg. Jack’s aircraft apparently passed over that city and if it remained on course it would have either landed at, or passed over Munich. But the plane crashed in a wooded area between Augsberg and Munich.

Based on his research, by May 5, both German and American troops were operating in that area. The Germans were trying to flee south toward the Austrian Alps so they probably wouldn’t have bothered to check on an aircraft crash site even to help anyone who might still be alive. If the Americans found Jack alive he would have become a statistic recorded in the army’s files and some evidence of this should have been found.

My father knew who was in the area and who wasn’t, as far as military forces were concerned. If German civilians found Jack they might have ignored him, or perhaps helped him. In either case his body, dead or alive would have been discovered and subsequently reported.

If Jack survived the crash and was badly hurt, unable to walk, or perhaps unconscious, did someone find him? How far could he have crawled from the crash site? What else was going on in the area during the last week of the war?

According to my father’s research it was chaos. While the Americans were occupying towns and villages and moving through very hostile Bavarian cities, the Germans were trying to move concentration camp survivors by foot, truck and rail away from the Americans toward the Austrian border. The Allies were bombing the fleeing Germans and in the process many concentration camp survivors were unfortunately killed.

My father turned to a map of Munich to see what he could find. Yes, there it was. The infamous Dachau concentration camp was merely a few miles northwest of Munich. He took his notes out of his briefcase. Dachau was liberated on April 29, 1945, but later it was reported that nearly 7,000 survivors were taken out of Dachau by the Germans two days earlier. Suppose Jack ran into this long line of starving survivors who were staggering to keep up with the Germans and dying by the hundreds. Or he came upon a few groups that broke off and hid in the forest after the trains they were packed into were destroyed. Depending on how badly he was hurt, could he have approached them, or if they spotted him, would they have tried to help him?

My father had to assume somehow they found each other and Jack survived. What my father had to do was to determine what happened to the survivors of Dachau, and in particular to the survivors whom the Germans were transporting during the last days in April and early May. Did the Allies find any of them before they died? Where were the survivors taken? Where were the dead buried? Was Jack among the dead? Obviously the library was of no further use to him at this time. My father had to find out where the records were being compiled on holocaust survivors.

A few days later my father returned to New York to make further inquiries. He couldn’t find all the answers to his questions. Records of the concentration camps, including Dachau, were in the hands of various Allied military groups, primarily the Americans and Russians. Stories of the dozen horrible years of torture suffered by holocaust victims were coming out piecemeal. There were a few Jewish-led organizations trying to organize the whole aftermath including locating and reuniting family members, returning people to their homelands if they wanted to return, and taking care of people who had nowhere to go.

The survivors stayed in refugee camps for a while but many were free to leave. There was a lot of confusion about the status of the survivors who came from more than 15 countries and spoke perhaps 100 different dialects of dozens of languages. French, Dutch, Danish, Norwegian, Belgian and Italian survivors were quickly processed and returned to their homelands. German, Austrian, Czech, Hungarian, Polish and Romanian Jews, and others, had little to go back to. They lost their homes and possessions. Baltic, Russian and Ukrainian Jews were in the hands of the Soviet Army. Since the Americans liberated Dachau, my father began his inquiry with the United States Army Refugee Center in Germany and made additional inquiries at the United Nations.

There were no records of any survivor by the name of Jack Meadows or Jacob Grunfeld. That was a good sign. He was fearful of finding evidence to confirm his demise. If Jack was unable to speak or didn’t know his name for whatever reason, then he could have been given medical assistance and placed in one of the refugee camps. What about his clothing? Was he wearing his uniform, was he carrying any identification? Surely someone would have noticed if he had.

If he survived the crash impact, he could have also escaped the ensuing fire. If he were burned, his clothing was probably burned as well. Oh my God, he must have been an awful mess if got out of that inferno alive, my father thought. So Jack may have been a badly burned, incoherent man, crawling or staggering half-naked in the woods. He might have joined the survivors of Dachau who were hiding or running away in sheer panic from German and American soldiers.

As American soldiers took control of the situation on the ground, they began to gather the survivors and returned them to Dachau or to other collection centers for medical treatment. Was Jack among them? If so, he may have been mistaken for a holocaust survivor. In reality he was an early survivor who escaped eight years before he would have been sent to a concentration camp, or worse.

My father began to suspect Jack was likely included as one of the Dachau survivors. If he died after he was found by the Allies, there would have been a record of his death even if he wasn’t identified. But according to all my father’s sources, every survivor who died after the Allies liberated the camps was accounted for. In addition, all those poor concentration camp survivors who were killed during the last week of the war, either by Germans or mistakenly by American aircraft, were also accounted for.

If my father’s theory that Jack survived the crash was correct, then