What is Erwin Metz notorious for?”
Metz was one of the Nazi commanders who headed a slave labor camp known as Berga an der Elster, where 350 U.S. soldiers — 80 of whom had been targeted for being Jewish — were beaten, starved and forced to work in tunnels at a secret V-2 rocket factory. They worked 10 to 12 hour days with only 400 calories of food, mostly bread made from sawdust. More than 100 soldiers died at the camp or on a forced death march of more than 200 miles. Other Berga survivors had described Metz: “A real bastard.” “Butcher of the Earth.” They said he talked with a high-pitched lisp. Behind his back, the soldiers called him Donald Duck.
