Postwar GI Tourism of Dachau


On April 29, 1945 a few hundred soldiers of the three co-liberating divisions participated in the liberation of Dachau

The other 42,000 soldiers from those divisions had the opportunity to visit Dachau as GI tourists after the May 8 end of the war in Europe.

To visit they were required to obtain a visitors pass
Click on image for larger format
Dachau Visitor Pass
June 29, 1945 three hour visitors pass for PFC Willard S. Jones, Company M, 180th Infantry Regiment, 45th Infantry Division, and PFC Forbis.

Image courtesy of
Heather Weir, granddaughter of the late PFC Jones.

GI tourist took photos of themselves at Dachau such as this:
522nd at Dachau
GI tourist Melvyn Hamamoto, 522nd Field Artillery Battalion, arriving at Dachau sometime after May 18, 1945

Fair use of photo from the Nisei Veterans Legacy Center

Misidentification of GI Tourism as Participation in Liberation

GI tourist visits have been misidentified as as participation in the liberation of Dachau.

Some of that is good faith misunderstanding by families of their relatives' oral history.

Some of that is the result of the good faith retelling by
WWII division and unit associations of veterans' liberation stories immediately after the war and continuing to this day.

Associations are not professional historians.

They may not have been aware that the veterans stories of postwar tourist visits to Dachau were being misidentified as accounts of participation in the wartime liberation of Dachau.

That has been brought to the attention of some associations.

Unfortunately, some associations have not made corrections after having that brought to their attention.

Seventy-five years after the end of the war, the time is long past for those associations to reconcile veterans' reports with official Army documents and scholarly histories and cease circulating postwar tourist visits to Dachau as being  accounts of participation in the wartime liberation of Dachau.

How Our WWII 45th Infantry Division Group Assists in Identifying if a Soldier Visited Dachau as a GI Tourist

A list of the units of the three co-liberating divisions that have been identified in U.S. Army Center of Military History documents and histories as having participated in the liberation of Dachau on April 29, 1945 is available at:

Units of the Co-Liberating Divisions at the Main Dachau Concentration Camp, April 29, 1945

Except for some soldiers of the
45th Infantry Division who while on occupation duty entered Dachau to provide security or to assist in the care of the liberated inmates soldiers of the three co-liberating divisions not listed on that page who report being at Dachau were probably postwar GI tourists:

To assist the families of the 522nd Field Artillery Battalion we have a website which documents the 522nd's location on April 29, 1945.

That is how we were able to identify the above photo as a Dachau GI tourism photo and estimate its date.


Families needing assistance may contact us through our Facebook Group.
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The 45th Infantry Division in World War II: An Unofficial Guide to Resources

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