A World War II veteran will shine a light on the horrors of the Nazi regime by telling his story on the MTSU campus.

“An American Soldier at Ohrdruf, 1945” is scheduled for 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 15, in Room 106 of the Paul W. Martin Sr. Honors Building.

Murfreesboro resident T. Guy Fortney, a retired physician, was a member of the U.S. Army’s 4th Armored Division when his unit entered Ohrdruf, a subcamp of the Buchenwald concentration camp, in April 1945. The 4th Armored and the 89th Infantry Division teamed up to liberate Ohrdruf, the first such camp freed by the U.S. Army.

Mourners prepare to honor and bury some of the victims of the Buchenwald concentration camp in this April 1945 photo by World War II veteran and photographer T. Guy Fortney, a member of the U.S. Army’s Fourth Armored Division. An exhibit of Fortney’s photos, taken when when the unit entered Ohrdruf, a Buchenwald sub-camp, to liberate the Nazi facility, will be presented Thursday, Nov. 15, at MTSU. (Photo courtesy of Dr. T. Guy Fortney)

Fortney was born and grew up in Harlan, Ky. After earning his medical degree from the University of Louisville in 1951, he moved to Oak Ridge, Tenn., and practiced family medicine.

In 1972, Fortney was hired as Union Carbide’s corporate medical director and moved to Danbury, Conn. After retiring in 1989, he moved back to Oak Ridge. Last year, he returned to Murfreesboro to live.

This event, which is free and open to the public, is co-sponsored by MTSU’s Jewish and Holocaust Studies Program and the Virginia Peck Trust Fund. Please be advised that the photographs that will be shown are graphic and explicit in nature.

For more information, contact Dr. Elyce Helford, director of the program and MTSU English professor, at 615-898-5961 or Elyce.helford@mtsu.edu.

— Gina K. Logue (Gina.Logue@mtsu.edu)