In 2000, 83-year-old Robert Allen returned to Dresden, Germany. The first time he was there, he'd been a young man and a prisoner of war who shared some of the most horrific experiences of World War II with author Kurt Vonnegut and about 150 American GIs.
The second time, he went with his son, Jerry Allen, now 61, of Long Lake, and they rediscovered the elder Allen's war experiences and the inspiration for Vonnegut's most famous novel, "Slaughterhouse-Five."
Robert Allen, of Maple Plain, died Friday at the age of 91. He was one of the remaining few who shared war experiences with Vonnegut, said Jerry Allen. Vonnegut, who attended many reunions with Allen and other survivors, died in April at the age of 84.
"He experienced some of the most significant events of World War II," Jerry Allen said of his father.
Robert Allen enlisted in the Army at age 28. He was captured by Germans in the Battle of the Bulge and crammed into a boxcar with other soldiers and transported 400 miles across Europe. About 150 prisoners were then taken to Dresden, where they lived in a slaughterhouse with the number five over the door. One of them was Vonnegut.
On Feb. 13 and 14, 1945, the Allies firebombed Dresden, leveling the city. The death toll is unknown and a matter of much debate. In "Slaughterhouse-Five," Vonnegut said 135,000 civilians were killed. Other estimates put the total at 30,000 to 100,000. During the war, the Nazis claimed as many as 200,000 died there.
The prisoners of war hid in the underground slaughterhouse. When they emerged, they were forced to remove corpses from the rubble.
"What these men did to survive," Jerry Allen said. "These dead bodies they would carry out, the corpses after weeks of decaying." His father told him that one of his fellow soldiers found a bottle of liquor and drank it until he passed out.
"He would have been shot on the spot," Jerry Allen said. "But my father found a wheelbarrow and took him past the guards, convinced them he was sick. That was in the book."
As the Russian Army approached Dresden near the end of the war, the German guards let the prisoners go. Allen was among those who found their way over the Czechoslovakian border and back to the American forces. A big man who had weighed nearly 200 pounds, Allen had been starved to 160.
After returning to the United States, Allen worked as a truck driver and freight manager in Des Moines, where he raised his family. He moved to Minnesota about three years ago. Jerry Allen said that like most men of his father's generation, he didn't talk much about his war experiences.
"You never knew it. He had this great sense of humor," Jerry Allen said. "But I would hear him wake up in the middle of the night with nightmares."
In addition to his son, Allen is survived by his daughter, Madeline Allen of Des Moines; his granddaughter, Kate Allen; a brother Richard, and a sister, Nell.
A memorial service will be held at 10:45 a.m. Wednesday at Mount Olivet Lutheran Church in Minneapolis, 5025 Knox Av. S.
Josephine Marcotty • 612-673-7394
