by Richard W. Sonnenfeldt

In this gripping memoir by the chief American interpreter at the Nuremberg trials, Richard Sonnenfeldt recounts a remarkable life. By the time he was 18, Sonnenfeldt had grown up in Germany, escaped to England, been deported to Australia as a 'German enemy alien', arrived in the U.S., and joined the U.S. army. By age 22 he had fought in the Battle of the Bulge and helped liberate the Dachau concentration camp, when he was appointed chief interpreter for the American prosecution of Nazi war criminals at the Nuremberg trials. During his service, he spent pretrial time with Hermann Goering as well as other top Nazi leaders like von Ribbentrop, Rudolph Hoess, and Julius Streicher, the infamous editor of the anti-Semitic Der Sturmer. An engineer in later life, he was a principal developer of color TV and computer technology and a key player in NASA's preparation of the first moon shot.