Georg Ratzinger military branch Wehrmacht
Early life and military service
Ratzinger was born in Pleiskirchen, Bavaria, to Joseph Ratzinger, Sr. (1877–1959), a police officer, and Maria Ratzinger, née Peintner (1884–1963). His younger brother is Joseph Ratzinger (1927–2022), who later reigned as Pope Benedict XVI from 2005 to 2013, and they had an elder sister, Maria (1921–1991). Early in his life he showed musical talent, playing the church organ already at the age of 11. In 1935 he entered the minor seminary in Traunstein and had professional musical instruction there. In 1941 he encountered for the first time the choir of the Regensburger Domspatzen, which he would later direct, when they performed in Salzburg on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of Mozart's death.During World War II, in the summer of 1942, Ratzinger was drafted to the Reichsarbeitsdienst and the same autumn to the Wehrmacht. On 12 June 1944, he was shot through the arm during a fight in Bolsena, Italy. At the end of the war, he was a prisoner of war of the U.S. Army in the vicinity of Naples, but was soon released and arrived home in July 1945.
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