Exhibit Captures Courage, Pain of Jews in Military

MIAMI (March 23) -- Fred Schrager says he was always careful not to reveal his Jewish heritage after he was captured by Germans during World War II. The American soldier knew the Nazis were exterminating Jews by the millions in concentration camps.

Finally, freed in the spring of 1945, Schrager was en route to France when he witnessed the Holocaust firsthand at the concentration camp known as Buchenwald. There, he remembers the sight of a "pile of bodies with arms and legs sticking out."

"In all the time I was in the Army and a prisoner of war, no matter how bad the situation was, I never cried," the 87-year-old veteran told AOL News. "But I looked at the faces in that pile of bodies. Some of their eyes were open. I thought maybe some of them were alive. But they weren't. That's when I started to cry."

Schrager's story of service is just one of hundreds being celebrated at the "Florida Jews in the Military" exhibit at the Jewish Museum of Florida in Miami Beach.

The nearly yearlong exhibit ranges from the 1800s during the Seminole Wars up to the current conflicts in Iraq -- where five Florida Jews have been killed -- and Afghanistan.

Chief Curator Marcia Jo Zerivitz, who founded the museum, said the exhibit illustrates Jews' dedication to country and dispels notions that Jews in the United States are not particularly patriotic.

"This exhibit shows just how courageous and bold they were," Zerivitz said.

Among the artifacts on display are the spoon and knife Schrager used during his months-long imprisonment. There is also a letter he wrote to his wife, Norma, after he was freed.

Though Jews from Florida and elsewhere served in every major U.S. conflict, including both sides of the Civil War, their presence on the battlefield wasn't always appreciated by their fellow soldiers.

"There was quite a bit of discrimination in my outfit," Schrager said. "As a matter of fact, they used to call me 'Jew boy.'

"But I could read and write and some of them couldn't read and write. When they got letters I would read some of their letters to them. And when they wanted to write letters to their girlfriends and wives, I would write it for them.

"That's when they stopped calling me 'Jew boy' -- when I was 'their Jew boy,' " he recalled.

Other Jewish soldiers made contributions that are celebrated not just in the exhibit, but in the annals of military history.

Among them is U.S. Navy Capt. Ellis Zacharias. The Jacksonville, Fla., native commanded a naval cruiser in the South Pacific during World War II. Fluent in Japanese, he broadcast U.S. war propaganda to Japan, addressing the country's leaders directly in an effort to break Japanese morale.

After the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Zacharias relayed translated messages between President Harry S. Truman and Japan's prime minister ahead of Japan's unconditional surrender in August 1945.

So far, thousands of visitors from more than 30 countries have come to the museum to view the exhibit that Zerivitz said was 25 years in the making.

"Theirs is a story that wasn't just collected from the history books. We had to do a lot of research ourselves," she said, referring to countless firsthand interviews with Florida's Jewish war veterans, many of whom have contributed to the exhibit since its opening in February. "It's very meaningful for these people to finally have their story told."