MADISON —Kurt G. Pechmann was captured twice during World War II.

First, as a German soldier who had already served on the Russian front, he was captured on the rainy night of Nov. 6, 1943, east of Casino, Italy, by British troops.

Next, as a German prisoner of war in Wisconsin for nearly three years, the people of the state captured his heart. After he returned in 1952 with his bride, Emilie, he spent the rest of his life quietly reconciling the many kindnesses he never tired of describing, always with a hint of marvel in his voice.

Pechmann, 87, founder of Pechmann monuments, and benefactor of uncounted groups and causes, died Sunday.

Pechmann, a stonecutter trained in the quarries of what is now Poland (Silesia), was drafted into the German army. Following capture in 1943, he became one of more than 20,000 prisoners held in camps in Wisconsin. His time here was spent in places such as Lodi, Columbus and Juneau, working as a farm hand with fellow POWs picking peas and corn.

"We were . . .shipped out to different towns, just like migrant workers. When the corn harvest was done, we went down to red beets, from red beets to the onions and carrots, and so on, see, so . . . we went to a next town, to the next camp," said Pechmann in an interview with Wisconsin World War II Stories.

"Almost every town we went to, we worked in canning companies."

As "POW No. 816-225-487" he worked in the hemp mills in Juneau, and he remembered being met with kindness, and, often, landsmen.

"We knew that there were a lot of Germans here, but we didn't know there were that many. Because no matter where you talked to, or any farmer, 'I talk German. Ich sprechen Deutsch.' "

Not long after Armistice, he was sent — 40 pounds heavier and carrying 39 pairs of socks — back to Europe and a French prisoner of war camp. But by that time, he had fallen in love with America and Wisconsin. He returned with a bride, Emilie, in 1952. He was sponsored by a Lodi farmer as a laborer, but he quickly returned to using his stonecutting skills.

He helped build, often at or below cost, war memorials around Wisconsin. In 1986, when the Veterans Memorial Monument at Forest Hill Cemetery was vandalized, he volunteered his services.

"He was low-key about everything like that," said Gerhard Pechmann, a son, Tuesday.

In 2007, when officials decided to memorialize an Air Force pilot who in 1958 sacrificed his life by crashing his disabled jet into Lake Monona to avoid hitting a neighborhood, the task naturally fell to Pechmann.

"Dad still likes giving back to veterans," said Gerhard Pechmann, who now runs the family monument business. "It was, and still is, his way of saying thanks for what they did so we can have the freedom to do what we want."