Holocause Testimony #1- Elana Carson

Interview with William McKinney

William McKinney was born in Union Town, PA but grew up in Pittsburg, PA. His family had a total of 10 kids and lived in a fairly large house with 8 bedrooms. He was drafted into the U.S. army at age 18 and guarded the command post. He was first stationed in Reardon, Belgium right outside of Auckland, Germany. At one point in the interview, he talked about the size of the Nazi’s guns; he said that some of them got up to 205 Millimeters and shot 23 miles. In the interview William was asked what he saw in the concentration camps. Through tears, William talked about the horrible conditions, the starving children, the Jews dressed in bluish/grayish pajamas as well as the prisoners of war from other countries. He stated that he saw pickled hearts and brains in the laboratory as well as lampshades made from human skin. Finally he was transferred to camp Buchenwald to watch over the ammunition of the U.S. army; while he was there he tried to talk to some of the Germans about what was going on in the camps. He said that most of them turned a deaf ear and didn’t want to know what was happening. They were too prideful about their country and didn’t want to believe what was actually going on. William McKinney ended up meeting two young boys at the camp in Buchenwald. The boys were five years old and seven years old and were starving to death, they had told William that they had watched their parents burn alive. He was able to give them his daily portion of food before he ended up getting sent home. He said he never knew what happened to those boys, but he hopes that they would remain alive because he was able to share what he had with them.
Quotes by William McKinney

“Until this day, I believe there is military strategy on the high command of the U.S. army.”- William McKinney

“It is time to lend every effort on ones being in trying to establish peace and harmony throughout communities and the United States of America and throughout the world, without bloodshed. It is time that we come to our senses and eliminate bloodshed because war is hell. War is horrible.”- William McKinney