Shadow and Subterfuge Series
The Crying Boy of WWII: Finding Hans-Georg Henke
“The Crying Boy of World War II”
by Gary Kidney
On a trip to Poland, I was shown this picture by a tour guide who was telling me of the brutality of the Nazi invasion. Supposedly, he was crying at the rape of his sister before his eyes. Vaguely, I recalled seeing the image before. Nothing about the image felt Polish.
Upon returning to the US, the photo turned up in a Google search.
A Facebook group called “War Stories” had the image, claiming it was a girl, “Mika” Kazimiera, who had just witnessed her
sister’s killing. It gave credit to the photographer, American Julien Bryan. Warsaw had just hosted an exhibition of his photos, so I found the press release and sent an email. The curator responded with a copy of Bryan’s snapshot of the real Mika. Although blond and crying, her longer-than-shoulder hair and knit cardigan made no match.
I tried my original hunch. It’s a guy, most likely German, and the artist most likely American. From there it was easy — National Archives. Meet Hans-Georg Henke, 15 and a Luftwaffe Flakhelfer (anti-aircraft helper). The shot was taken by American John Florea.
The strangeness doesn’t end there. Henke claimed the shot was taken when the Soviets captured Stettin. He told the Russians he was crying because “everything I’ve been told about my life is a lie.”
Florea told a different story. He said the picture came from Rechtenbach not far from Frankfurt, and that Henke was crying from combat shock after the American takeover.
Moral of this tale? If a picture is worth 1,000 words, how do we know which paragraph is accurate? Any story can be seen from different points of view, even when told about the same event. The word “history” comes from the Greek and means “knowledge acquired by investigation.” But research doesn’t always provide clear answers.
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