Gottfried Gaag

Gottfried Gaag was born on June 3, 1916, in Germany. Public records that list those buried in the German prisoner-of-war section at Fort Douglas identify him by name and give his birth date, placing him among the small group of men who were held as prisoners in the United States during the Second World War.

Like many European men of his generation, Gottfried’s life was profoundly shaped by the upheavals of the 1930s and 1940s. The archival notices and cemetery listings that preserve his name show that he served in the German armed forces and ultimately became one of the prisoners interned at the Salina, Utah, branch camp. While the surviving documents do not provide detailed personal anecdotes about his everyday life, they record essential facts: his full name, his date of birth, and that he died from gunshot wounds on July 8, 1945, while at the Salina camp.

After his death, Gottfried Gaag was buried with other prisoners in the Fort Douglas Military Cemetery near Salt Lake City. His grave marker and official burial lists are part of the post cemetery’s record of foreign military dead interred there. These records stand as a quiet testament to his existence — a human life remembered by name, date, and place of rest.

The public record about Gottfried is limited, and in such cases it is important to acknowledge what is known without filling the gaps with conjecture. Though personal details such as family members, occupation before the war, or personal interests are not available in the reliable sources located, the documentation that survives confirms that Gottfried was a real person whose life and death are part of a larger, difficult history. The headstone in Fort Douglas preserves his name and dates so that visitors and descendants may find a place to reflect.

Today, Gottfried Gaag’s memory endures through those records and the cemetery where he rests. He is one of the men whose names invite reflection on the individual human lives affected by global conflict. This remembrance honors him as more than an entry in a record: as a person born in 1916 whose life reached others and who is commemorated by a marked grave and by careful remembrance in historical accounts and cemetery registers.