| Notes |
- This was written by his son, Arne Validmar Brogger, on 5/12/2020:
Seventy seven years ago today, my father landed in Oslo, Norway. It was two days after the German capitulation that marked the end of WWII in the European theater. He was greeted by 450K fully armed German troops, 1K Norwegian National troops and a couple dozen Brits. He was charged with establishing the US Army HQ, which he shortly housed in a “liberated” mansion near the palace of the soon to return King Haakon 7th. The Resistance members began to materialize soon after his arrival (the “boys in the mountains” that I heard so much about as a kid) with offers of liberated material (e.g. a black Mercedes with a white star they had painted on the door), etc. One of the first items he requisitioned from London was a case of Chesterfield cigarettes, which were considered a precious currency. I heard many stories from that time, and later met and stayed with one of the “boys in the mountains” and his family, when I was in Oslo in ‘66. His name was Arne Knutzon and he stayed with us briefly in ‘47 or ‘48. He was christened by my mother as The Other Arne, to differentiate him from my father (also Arne). During my ‘66 visit, he told stories of how he and compatriots, sighted in machine guns in Nordmyka, the forest above Oslo. “The Germans stayed away” he told me. “We knew the forest, they didn’t.” He went on, “It was heady stuff, walking around Oslo as a 19 year old with a .45 under your arm. A lot of the daring-do was done by us youngsters, we were bulletproof.” And 1945 Oslo. What a time that must have been.
- He is buried in Plot H, 0, 659 at Ft. Snelling National Cemtery.
- He served as a major in the U.S. Army during World War II. Was one of the lawyers who prosecuted Nazi war criminals at the Nuremberg War Crime Trials after the war.
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1909 - 1965 (56 years)
