The author, Eddie Willner’s daughter Nina, explains that they were raised hearing how ordinary Americans had saved their father and his best friend, Mike Swaab. For nearly 50 years, Eddie and his wife, Hanna, searched for the soldiers using only nicknames but found nothing. In the late 1990s, after writing to numerous veterans’ organizations, Hanna received a letter from the 3rd Armored Division Veterans Association with Lieutenant Hovland’s phone number. Eddie immediately knew it was him.

Eighty-year-old Elmer, recently widowed after Harriet’s death, answered his phone. The caller identified herself as Hanna Willner, wife of Eddie—one of the Jewish boys he saved. Stunned, Elmer listened as Hanna recounted Eddie’s story.

After leaving D Company in 1945, Eddie searched Brussels and his hometown of Mönchengladbach for his parents and anyone from the list of 26 names his father had made him memorize. He learned the Leeks, the Jewish family who had cared for him in Brussels, had also perished. A Belgian underground group tried to recruit him for revenge operations, but he declined. He found no trace of his family; Nazi records later confirmed all had died. His Catholic neighbor Fritz returned the family heirlooms.

Eddie reconnected with Mike, who was also his family’s sole survivor. Inspired by D Company, both teenagers applied to emigrate to America. In 1947, they arrived in New York Harbor and enlisted, Eddie in the Army, Mike in the Air Force. Eddie became a military police investigator and interrogator, working with French and Belgian authorities. Inspired by Elmer, he completed Officer Candidate School in 1952, becoming Lieutenant Willner, an intelligence officer. He eventually served as the first American liaison to Germany’s new intelligence agency, sometimes working alongside former SS officers.

While posted in Heidelberg, Eddie met Hanna, a secretary who had escaped East Germany. They married and had six children. Mike also married and had three children, remaining like a brother to Eddie. Both served for over 20 years in uniform. They gave Holocaust testimony to various organizations. In the mid-1980s, Eddie returned to Mönchengladbach for a presentation titled “We Were Your Neighbors” (269). Mike died of cancer in 1985.

After Hanna’s call, Elmer phoned Pepsi and Fred. The news spread among the surviving D Company members. Over the following days, they had long conversations with Eddie, who told them he wanted to see them again.

In September 2002, nearly 60 years after they last met, Eddie hosted the D Company reunion at his Falls Church, Virginia, home. The event drew an unusually large attendance, with many aging veterans bringing their families. The Washington Post covered the story on its front page. The veterans, most in their early-80s, arrived using canes and supporting one another. A banner welcomed the soldiers of D Company. Pepsi greeted Eddie first with a bear hug. Eddie thanked him for saving his life, but Pepsi insisted Eddie made them all better people and introduced his wife, Blue Eyes. Fred Headrick and James Vance also greeted Eddie warmly.

Inside, patriotic decorations filled the house, with a cake bearing the Spearhead insignia. The company guidon stood beneath portraits of Eddie’s parents, Siegfried and Auguste. The veterans examined photographs and certificates documenting Eddie’s successful military career and family life. When Elmer arrived, the room stood in respect. He made his way to Eddie, took his hand, and told him how proud he was. During the gathering, a grandson asked Eddie about his Auschwitz tattoo, while Eddie’s children thanked the soldiers for saving their father.

The room was called to order to read the names of the 34 D Company men killed in action. One veteran gave a speech expressing how long they had been thinking about Eddie. Eddie rose to toast them as the best men he had ever known, thanking Elmer specifically for taking him and Mike in and giving them back their lives. Elmer stood to speak, saying that they did good work together, got the job done, and took care of each other and the two boys. Turning to Eddie, he added that, by God’s grace, they were together again and that they had never forgotten him.

The reunion brought deep fulfillment and peace to both Eddie and the soldiers, finally completing their story. In a later interview, Elmer said being personally thanked by Eddie brought tears to his eyes and was something he could not put into words.

Eddie’s children and grandchildren visited Holocaust sites connected to his story, including Auschwitz-Birkenau, Blechhammer, the Project Malachit tunnels at Langenstein, and the riverbank where Eddie and Mike escaped. Though Eddie returned to some camps, he visited Langenstein only once. In 2019, his children had Stolpersteine memorial plaques installed in the Mönchengladbach sidewalk where the family once lived.

After the reunion, Eddie and Elmer exchanged many letters. Elmer, Pepsi, and Fred maintained regular phone contact and occasionally visited, attending family gatherings, including the promotion ceremony for Eddie’s son Albert Willner, who became a US Army colonel. The Willner family adopted the aging veterans, particularly Elmer and Pepsi. Having lost all relatives in the Holocaust, they embraced Pepsi as a beloved surrogate uncle, and he treated them as family.

The book concludes that the soldiers’ compassion after Eddie and Mike endured humanity’s worst cruelty restored their faith in humankind, presenting a story of faith, unity, unbreakable friendship, and moral resilience.

After Elmer, Fred, Vance, and Eddie passed away, Pepsi was the last survivor. In 2016, at 97 years old, he spent his days tending his prized red buffalo tomatoes and caring for Blue Eyes after nearly 70 years of marriage.

Eddie’s grandson Michael, an MIT student named for Eddie’s wartime friend Mike, made regular monthly visits. Pepsi cooked his signature Italian spaghetti and meatballs using tomatoes from his garden, chattering in his Boston accent while offering advice and prying into Michael’s life. They spent hours laughing together, with the gun oil pancake story growing funnier with each retelling. As Pepsi tired, he leaned forward and spoke in a whisper, recounting how during the war he fed Michael’s grandfather. Shaking his head, Pepsi said they had simply had to take care of him.

Pepsi died 28 days later.

The epilogue provides historical context for the narrative. World War II was history’s most violent military conflict. The Nazis murdered approximately 6 million Jews, two-thirds of Europe’s Jewish population, plus an estimated 250,000 to 500,000 Roma/Sinti and thousands of others deemed “undesirable” by the Nazis. Between 1933 and 1945, Nazi Germany established over 44,000 camps and incarceration sites.

American war losses totaled over 400,000 killed and nearly 700,000 wounded from the approximately 16 million who served. Britain lost nearly 400,000 in uniform and 70,000 civilians. Germany lost roughly 5 million military personnel and 2 million civilians. D-Day involved 156,000 Allied troops in the largest amphibious assault in history, with 9,000 casualties on the first day alone. The Battle of the Bulge was America’s largest and bloodiest battle, costing 20,000 American lives. The US Air Force lost 79,265 personnel over Europe, with the 15th Air Force alone losing 21,671.

The 3rd Armored Division destroyed more tanks and captured more prisoners than any other US armored division, but suffered over 2,500 killed and lost 640 tanks with a replacement rate of 580%. D Company lost 34 soldiers killed in action; its total casualty rate was near 100%, with only a handful of men making it all the way from D-Day to the linkup with Eddie and Mike.

Eddie and Mike survived extraordinary odds. Of 638 Jews deported from Mönchengladbach, only 27 survived. Of the 1,000 on Eddie’s transport from Drancy, only 13 survived. Of 76,000 deported from Drancy, approximately 2,000 survived. Of 4,000 prisoners on the Blechhammer death march, around 1,320 survived. Life expectancy at Langenstein was six weeks; Eddie and Mike survived eight. Of 3,000 on the Langenstein death march, only 500 survived. Of over 56,500 Dutch Jews sent to Auschwitz, slightly over 1,000 survived.

The epilogue provides contact information for visiting memorial sites at Langenstein, Blechhammer, and the Manhay History Museum. It mentions French resistance fighter Louis Bertrand, whose son Jean-Louis Bertrand honored his father’s wish to have his ashes buried at Langenstein in 2013 to honor those who died there.

Mike Swaab is buried in the Netherlands. Elmer Hovland rests in Luverne, Minnesota; Pepsi DeCola in Waltham, Massachusetts; Fred Headrick in Chattanooga, Tennessee; and James Vance in Canton, Georgia. Eddie Willner is buried in Arlington National Cemetery, his grave the only one inscribed “Auschwitz Survivor,” representing not only himself but the 26 family members murdered in the Holocaust. His headstone is featured on Arlington’s Walk of Honor Tour, educating visitors about his journey and the American soldiers who saved him.