My grandad was one of the soldiers that first encountered Belsen concentration camp.
He was an MP attached to the 11th armoured division which discoved the horrific place, and was one of the first to go through the gates.
He rarely spoke of his experience there, and when he did, he would cry his heart out at the memories of the place, even over 40 years later when he first told me.
It may go some way to explaining why he was a cantankerous old git who had little love for anything german... quite odd considering my nan was half german herself :p
( MrSanity has maybe kicked the WoW habit forever, Mon 6 Jun 2011, 22:30, 3 replies)

My grandad was also one of the first to go into Belsen
He only ever spoke about it once to my dad. Turns out he was pushing lots of dead bodies into a mass grave with a bulldozer :( Not surprising he didn't want to talk about it.
(John_Bonham's_snare gave you tinnitus on, Tue 7 Jun 2011, 2:05, closed)

war is a secret only soldiers can share
( enoughblueskyforsailorstrousers, Wed 8 Jun 2011, 11:09, closed)

our grandfathers probably knew each other then
Sadly my grandad is no longer with us to confirm that though :(

He described it to me simply as "worse than you can possibly imagine hell to be"
( MrSanity has maybe kicked the WoW habit forever, Wed 8 Jun 2011, 20:44, closed)