My uncle told me a story that my grandmother had told him about her time as child in Germany during WWII. It's significant because she normally refused to talk about it and her sister denies that WWII even happened. The story goes that her father was persuaded to join the Nazi party in order to keep his job as a postal worker. Towards the end of the war there were allied soldiers trying to distinguish actual Nazi's from ones like her father. Two soldiers who did not speak German showed up at their door and took her father out back after awhile they heard a gunshot and assumed the worst because they had been brainwashed into believing that the Allied soldiers were the enemy. Instead, the allied soldiers came back with the father and a deer they had shot in the woods behind the house for food.
The reason I ask is because I want to turn it into a script for my screenwriting class, but if there's no way this could have happened then I don't want to bother with it. My grandmother did have alzheimer's, if this story is plausible then is there anything I should know to make the story more historically accurate?
well, one thing is for sure, if he worked for the Reichpost, he definitely did not need to be a Nazi Party member. BUT, by 1939, it was compulsory for all Civil Service OFFICIALS to become party members. So I guess it is possible that he joined if his friends/coworkers were doing so. Or if it meant that he could rise in his position more easily.
the average German soldier in the Wehrmacht/etc was not a party member. But we will never know if your Grandpa was a Party member or not, unless you have documents/etc to prove otherwise, or if you do some research on his name, possibly.
However, it is true that the Allies did try to distinguish who was a Party member in some situations, but ive heard of it done mainly in POW camps. A German vet I speak to said that when he was captured by the Americans, they asked if he was a Party member, which he declined truthfully. And the GI interrogator or Camp commander said "So out of 32,000 captured German soldiers, not one of you is a Nazi!?". And most likely, this is the truth too, as it was not that common for soldiers/etc to be party members. It is possible that they were trying to find out info about the Reichspost Official in his town, and wanted to talk to him, though. So the story could very well be true. Or they could have simply wanted a place to hunt or cook the deer! lol
Given the number of Allied soldiers in Germany, the number of civilians, and the number of resulting interactions between a soldier and a civilian, I would say just about any interaction is plausible.
Maybe that's not as helpful as I intended...