After spending 14 years at his country home in New York, Jason Hurdle believed he was familiar with every corner of the property.
That confidence was shaken in July when the 74-year-old uncovered a concealed crawlspace while tidying up the garage in Waterloo.
Inside the dusty recess, Hurdle found a collection of files stamped “secret”—a discovery that made the hidden space even more intriguing.
The roughly 300-page collection appeared to hold firsthand testimony from American prisoners of war captured during World War II.
Hurdle brought the papers to a nearby library, whose staff contacted the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). Officials later traveled to retrieve the documents.
The records were eventually authenticated, confirming that they were genuine accounts and had once been classified.
“I’m in podunk little Waterloo, New York, and this went all the way to the National Archives. We’re kind of in shock here,” Hurdle told the Washington Post.
The house has belonged to his wife’s family for several generations, but Hurdle said he has no clear explanation for how the classified files came to be hidden there.
Jason Hurdle discovered a box of classified files in his garage that turned out to contain 300 pages of firsthand accounts from American prisoners of war during World War II
The historic records were found inside a crawlspace in the garage of Hurdle’s home, which has been owned by his wife’s family for generations
He noted that a former neighbor had owned memorabilia connected to an ancestor, though he remains uncertain whether that could be linked to the unexpected discovery.
The documents offer disturbing, detailed descriptions of what the prisoners endured during their captivity.
The POWs were told to write down their experiences to gather intelligence when they arrived at Camp Lucky Strike in Normandy.
Many documents from this camp were then used as evidence of war crimes in military tribunals.
Historians had no knowledge of the lost accounts. The National Archives told the Post that they did not have the files on a list of missing documents.
‘The discovery of these government records is important and meaningful to ensure preservation and public access to our country’s history,’ NARA spokeswoman Grace McCaffrey told the publication.
One account was from a man named Julian Candelaria, who was held captive in a work camp for months, recalling that he witnessed ’60 men in boxcars,’ with ‘no food no water, no sanitary facilities, crowded, exposed to bombing. Walked 3 days + nights with little food, no medical.’
The Washington Post found Candelaria’s obituary, which read: ‘After returning home he refused to discuss the events that occurred during his imprisonment at [the] hands of his captors, the Germans.’
Another POW named Henry Daly wrote that the conditions were ‘a very sad example of what the US soldier was like.’
Hurdle told the Washington Post that he was ‘in shock’ that he discovered the precious documents
POWs were told to write down their experiences to gather intelligence when they arrived at Camp Lucky Strike in Normandy
‘We ran for cover, but two of my companions [whose] names I do not [recall] were killed by the bombs,’ he added.
His great-grandson, Michael Yanes, told the Post that Daly did not talk about his time in the war with his family, but he often slept in a park because he struggled to stay in his house.
‘Seeing these words written is quite heavy. This is all new to us. The emotions. I can’t even describe,’ Yanes said.
The documents have been placed with similar accounts in the National Archives and will be digitized.
NARA also confirmed over the summer that they discovered 145 US Navy records from an engineer who participated in several Apollo missions, including blueprints and sound recordings.
A pardon signed by President Franklin Pierce and a Congressional Tally Sheet of a secret House of Representatives vote were also recovered at auction houses.
A letter to then-Secretary of War Jefferson Davis from Army 1st Lt JEB Stuart has been recovered as well and will be digitized.
Our News Outlet reached out to NARA for comment.
