Abstract
This article examines the experience of the small rural community of Wildflecken in the Bavarian district of Lower Franconia after the second world war. This area became an important center for those uprooted by the war, including Polish displaced persons, evacuees from German cities, and Germans who fled or were expelled from Eastern Europe. Because of its strategic location, it also attracted the interest of the US Army. The multi-faceted refugee crisis strongly influenced the development and implementation of occupation policy, while the presence of American and non-German outsiders helped to integrate ethnic German refugees into rural communities.
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