This is the Russian Tank and memorial which was blown up in the night time. That is Daddy sitting on it.The person who should get the credit for collecting these photos is Ruth Schumi. She is the daughter of Harold Nelson.
She wrote me a couple of times and I made high quality copies of the ones I had plus some documents I still have not shown. She did the best she could to categorize them in various ways such as time or by the person who took them. Or by the location. A very high percentage of the photos are of Berlin as they had much more free time to take pictures after the war ended. She also corrected me on a couple of things I had thought, maybe guessed at.
I thought the 208th was the first American outfit into Berlin but she checked with other living members, my Father had died in the mean time and found out that tho the 208th was there early they were not the first.
I did get one fascinating piece from Daddy when he was in the nursing home. His memory would be bad at times but he would occasionally have lucid moments. I brought in some of his photos including ones of the first Russian Tank to enter Berlin. When daddy looked at it, his mind cleared and he chuckled just a little. He said the Russian memorial was blown up during the night, and he even suggested that it might have been the 208th which destroyed it. Apparently they never did find out for sure.
Out of curiosity I checked to see what Russian tanks are now displayed in Tiergarten Park. Sure enough, that JSII Stalin tank is no longer there. They instead have two T-34s.
This is the Russian Tank and memorial which was blown up in the night time. That is Daddy sitting on it.