'We are all Jews here': Pastor reflects on father's heroism in WWII

The Rev. Chris Edmonds' father was always his hero.

But Edmonds did not know others felt the same way.

On Tuesday the Jewish Foundation for the Righteous (JFR), in partnership with the Jewish Community Center (JCC) of Middlesex County and the Jewish Federation in the Heart of New Jersey, will host Edmonds at an event honoring Jewish war veterans at the JCC.

Edmonds will share not only the story of his father’s heroism but his dad's life after the war and his own discovery of the truth years after the elder Edmonds' death in 1985.

Master Sgt. Roderick "Roddie" Edmonds was a good man who saw right and wrong in black and white, Edmonds said. Born after his father's military service in both WWII and the Korean War, Edmonds grew up with the knowledge that Roddie Edmonds served as a member of the 106th Infantry Division and was a POW after the Battle of the Bulge.

And that was all.

When asked about his experience, Roddie Edmonds would say it was "something he'd rather not talk about." This was respected, though in hindsight, Edmonds wishes he pushed his father to open up.

"We just knew the broad strokes − that he had been in WWII and fought the Battle of the Bulge, and then was captured and came home," Edmonds said. "He was a great dad and very involved in everything we did. Dads can either be heroes or zeros − and Dad, he was always a hero. And we loved him.”

Something 'surreal'

Born in 1919, Roddie Edmonds hailed from South Knoxville, Tennessee. A member in his high school's Junior ROTC program, he enlisted in the military in 1941. After WWII, he joined the National Guard, served in the Korean War and was discharged after nine years of military service.

Roddie Edmonds was as a soft-spoken man − a coach of his sons' baseball teams and a Cub Scout leader. Described by his son as "laidback," Roddie Edmonds was an "older father" known to be "cool as a cucumber and just one who loved on people − he worked hard and lived good."

But nearly three decades after his father's death, Edmonds experienced something "surreal."

His daughters' school history project allowed the family to delve deeper into who Roddie Edmonds was and his WWII service. There were journals that were read and re-read and later three pages of handwritten notes were remembered and unearthed.

Also see:'I was frightened to death': WWII veteran's war tales grip students

In 2013, Edmonds typed his father's name into a search engine on the internet − and it delivered a New York Times article from 2008.

One sentence stood out.

In the article, Roddie Edmonds' fellow POW, Sgt. Lester Tanner (Tannenbaum) spoke about the bravery of his Master Sgt. He said Roddie Edmonds saved Tanner's life and the life of 200 other Jewish soldiers when he defied the Germans at the POW camp.

That one sentence became a thread that when pulled, unraveled a story of courage and bravery − and a "righteous man."

During the Battle of the Bulge, Roddie Edmonds was captured by the German Army on Dec. 19, 1944. With thousands of fellow soldiers, Edmonds endured a grueling march to Gerolstein, Germany and an almost week-long train ride in box cars − 60 to 70 men per car with no food or water − to Bad Orb, Germany.

After several weeks in Bad Orb, a group of more than 1,000 NCOs (non-commissioned officers) − 200 Jews among them − were taken to Stalag IXA POW camp in Ziegenhain. As the highest-ranking American soldier, Edmonds was responsible for the camp's American POWs.

Soon after their arrival, the camp’s commandant, Maj. Siegmann, ordered Roddie Edmonds to identify the Jewish soldiers − to separate them from the other prisoners.

Roddie Edmonds refused.

Roddie Edmonds ordered the more than 1,000 POWs to stand in formation outside their barracks. Roddie Edmonds stood with his men, with Jewish soldiers Tanner and Paul Stern on either side of him.

When Seigmann saw all the men standing in formation, he said "They cannot all be Jews!"

Roddie Edmonds said, "We are all Jews here."

The commandant then placed his pistol against Edmonds' head and demanded he identify the Jewish soldiers.

Edmonds told the commandant the Germans would soon lose the war.

"If you shoot me, you will have to shoot all of us. And we know who you are and after the war, you will be tried for war crimes," he said.

Siegmann turned around and left.

Roddie Edmonds had saved the lives of the 200 Jewish soldiers.

'There's a right way to treat people and a wrong way'

Roddie Edmonds was a man who lived by "right is right and wrong is wrong − and you should know the difference," said his son.

"We were a family that lived by 'there's a right way to treat people and a wrong way. And we're not a family that does it the wrong way'," he said. "He was real good with people in general. It's almost like he had a gift to be able to know people's hearts − where they were at, what was going on. And obviously, I think that helped him tremendously when he was confronted with the situation in the POW camp, particularly with the Nazi Major."'

Roddie Edmonds later helped lead a revolt at the camp. He instructed his men to refuse to leave with the retreating Germans. They were liberated shortly after − on the second day of Passover, March 30, 1945, by fellow American soldiers.

In his diary, Roddie Edmonds wrote of the new friends he made, the hope "his boys" would survive and that the experience "all seemed like a bad dream."

"He comes back and never spoke a word about it − kind of aggravated about that," said Edmonds with a laugh. "Oh well. But, you know, people that we understand and truly revere as heroes − they don't. They don't brag about it. And if you asked dad − he would say, 'I'm nobody − the heroes are the ones who are buried over there.'"

It was Tanner, who became an attorney, who told Edmonds the story of his father's bravery, calling it the "defining experience of my life," at the Harvard Club in New York in March 2013 − 68 years later.

"As he was telling me, I was transported to where they were," said Edmonds, who now calls these men in their 90s − his father's "boys" − his friends. "It just felt like I was in a dream. It was just incredibly moving. I was mesmerized by his story, and he's so into it − because it's his life that was on the line. And he's so grateful. There were lots of tears − it was like I went back over there with him − and he helped me see and feel all the things that they were experiencing that first time that I heard the story."

Edmonds also acknowledges all the men in that POW camp. Anyone of them could have broken ranks and given up another soldier as a Jew.

"When it came to matters of life and death, they stood together and I think that's a credit to their humanity," Edmonds said. "And I think that's the one of the main reasons that they survived not only that particular experience, but really the entire time they were prisoners − because they were together, they were in unity."

And what gets to Roddie Edmonds' son the most, are the thousands − about 13,000 − of descendants of those 200 Jewish soldiers who are alive today because of his father's bravery.

"Our lives multiply," Tanner said in the film. "You can see how important that decision has been."

"That's the biggest joy for me," Edmonds said. "To see the real people − the lives − that have been touched and changed."

Roddie Edmonds is the only U.S. serviceman and fifth American who’s been recognized by Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Center. In 2016, he was conferred posthumously with the designation of "Righteous Among the Nations" in a ceremony for his heroism in saving the lives of 200 American Jewish POWs.

Roddie Edmonds also received the JFR's Yehi Or (Let There Be Light) Award in 2018 and a historical marker placed in Knoxville in 2020 donated by the Jewish American Society for Historic Preservation, with support from the Knoxville Jewish Alliance.

His acts of heroism have been marked with a book, "No Surrender," by Edmonds as well as a short JFR documentary "Following the Footsteps of My Father" in 2016 and the award-winning longer version "Footsteps of My Father" in 2018. The shorter version will show Tuesday at the event, which begins at 7 p.m. on the JCC campus at 1775 Oak Tree Road in Edison.

The father of three daughters and grandfather of 10, Edmonds lives with his wife, Regina, in his home state of Tennessee and works to foster the legacy of his father. The former senior pastor of Piney Grove Baptist Church in Maryville, Tennessee, Edmonds is CEO of Roddie’s CODE, created to promote the motto of "choose love, oppose hate, choose goodness, and do the right thing." e works − the kind we'd like to see go from dreams to reality," Edmonds said.

The event is free and open to the community. Advance registration is requested at www.jccmc.org/veterans or call the JCC at 732-494-3232.

email: cmakin@gannettnj.com

Cheryl Makin is an award-winning features and education reporter for MyCentralJersey.com, part of the USA Today Network. Contact: Cmakin@gannettnj.com or @CherylMakin. To get unlimited access, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

This article originally appeared on MyCentralJersey.com: 'We are all Jews here': Pastor reflects on father's heroism in WWII