Kaufering: Where Easy Company Saw the Unimaginable

The Side of the War No One Enjoys Seeing

I never enjoy visiting concentration camps. They’re sad, heavy places—filled with silence, sorrow, and the weight of everything that happened there. And yet, I think it’s important to go. There’s more to the story of World War II than beaches and battlefields.

What Easy Company Found Near Buchloe

In late April 1945, Easy Company stopped for the night near Buchloe, in the foothills of the Bavarian Alps. They had no idea what lay nearby.

Just outside town was Kaufering, one of the Dachau subcamps. Though it wasn’t an extermination camp, what they found was unimaginable: starved prisoners in striped uniforms, dazed and weak. Corpses lay in piles. The smell clung to everything.

Winters discovered a cellar full of cheese and ordered it given to the inmates. But a regimental medic soon arrived and stopped the distribution—warning that the sudden calories could kill those too weak to handle them.

The Importance of Bearing Witness

When I visited the same site, it rained all day. No sun, no joy. Only memorial stones, a small cemetery, and a deep, echoing silence. It’s not a site you visit for photos or stories. You go to bear witness—just like the men of Easy Company did.

The next morning, by order of General Taylor, the townspeople of nearby Landsberg were marched to the camp carrying rakes and shovels. Not just to clean up—but to see it with their own eyes. To understand what had happened just outside their little German town.

Visiting Buchloe and Kaufering Today

• There is no museum at Kaufering—just a handful of memorials. It’s a site for reflection, not explanation.
• For a fuller experience, visit the Dachau Memorial outside Munich. The preserved structures and museum offer context, history, and space to reflect.
• Take your time. Don’t rush this stop. You’re not there to sightsee—you’re there to remember.

Walk Their Path, Remember the Weight

This isn’t an easy visit—but it’s an essential one. Easy Company didn’t expect to find a concentration camp, but they did. And it stayed with them forever.

👉 You’ll find full directions and context in the Band of Brothers Travel Guide – available now on Amazon.

📷 Thank you to James Skeffington, the U.S. Army Signal Corps, and the many talented artists at Unsplash for helping us remember.