INTRODUCTION

The following story was provided by Mrs Olive Brown of Strelley in Nottinghamshire for the purpose of keeping her late husband's memory alive and ensuring in the process that the privations endured by our young soldiers as Prisoners of War were not forgotten.

Private John Victor BROWN (Jack) of the 8th Battalion Sherwood Foresters dictated his memories to Olive while recuperating from an illness.  No apologies are made for misspelling of place names or titles as Olive took this story down in longhand over a long period of time before her son in law Nick Richardson typed it out.

It is an interesting and sometimes amusing story that should be told for the benefit of future generations, so please read on and remember.





MY GAFFANGANENSHAFFE
(MARCH TO FREEDOM)

Chapter I


From the late fifties onwards I have had the urge to write of my lost five years as a prisoner of war (POW) in Poland. In my opinion a country of honest, friendly and hard working people, but rather backward in development.

I shall not dwell upon the times that I was prodded, provoked and pushed by the Germans in Norway, with both ends of a rifle or the shits that did it.

I know many men had worse and its all been said before. Nor will I comment upon the squabbles and sometimes fights we had as POW's in the first few months.

The squalor and the primitive way of life and equipment on the farms will be evident as you read on. The schooling here was not the three R's but the three M's, muck, muscle and manual work, for here there were no work saving devices.

In the spring of 1939 I joined the Territorials. I was on the staff of the Coal Board at the Bulwell Pit and was a shot firer, my wage being £4.15 a week, which was very good at that time.

A Territorial unit was being formed by a part owner of the colliery. He was, I believe, an officer in the First World War. We were to be a feed unit of the 8th Sherwood Foresters. Staff from the colliery were made NCOs (Non Commissioned Officers) and the workers who joined were infantry, I started as a full Corporal.

We were taken on a fortnights training holiday to Wales under canvas with Army instructors and introduced to Army life.

In September 1939 war was declared. We were at war with Germany and we Sherwood Foresters were the first to be called up.

It wasn't long before the authorities realised that the pits couldn't work without shot firers and miners.

I had been detailed to go on a physical training course of 6 weeks duration. All the others from Bulwell Pit had been recalled when I returned. They were all my mates; they had gone back to the pit. I, as a trained PT instructor was refused unless I paid £250 for my release. I didn't have that kind of money, which was a big sum in those days.

The first few weeks of the war I was in charge of ACK ACK duties around Hucknall aerodrome. Our quarters were a Bell tent. On and off duties we slept on the airfield and some nights we were allowed home. We also did some work for the local farmer in the nature of potato picking. Some nights we slept under the hangers at the aerodrome. This was all right when the weather was fine and dry, but when it rained the water ran through the hanger and all the palliasses would get wet. So the solution was all but those on duty on ACK ACK were sent home. Bestwood lodge was being prepared for us to take up billets there and we would travel to the aerodrome in lorries from Bestwood Lodge when on ACK ACK duties at Hucknall airfield. We had an RSM (Regimental Sergeant Major) from the regular army visit us and everything was done by order with him even to riding bikes.
After duties at Bestwood Lodge he would command us to mount our bicycles. The orders were "prepare to mount" which meant put your left foot in the pedal, and on the word mount you pushed three times with your right foot, cocked your leg and got on the saddle. However, some men weren't very good at this and when they fell all those at the back of them finished up on top of them. This was one operation they didn't repeat. By now Bestwood lodge was finished and we were regularly billeted there.

All my friends had got back to the pit and the unit was now made up of men from Retford and the surrounding area. It was after this that we were sent to Shildon County Durham. I had forfeited my corporal stripes in my endeavour to get back to the pit. I was told that while I was an NCO I couldn't hope to get back, especially with my PT training. So when I went to Shildon I went as Private 4977616 and after 6 weeks full training I passed as an infantry soldier. At Shildon we were in an old railway station house and the people there had been warned about soldiers and that they would wreck the town. Nobody had a word for us. We were there many weeks before they realised we were just ordinary people.

After a while we were accepted and we began to socialise, cups of tea and pieces of cake, and this made things much better for us because the billets here were very cold and draughty.

Our weekly pay was 7s-6d married men and 15s-0d single men. Out of the 7s-6d I had 1s-6d stopped for Barrack damages. Every man had to pay this 1s-6d whether he had damaged anything or not.

There was plenty of snow here and we would slide down the hills which made perfect toboggan runs. We also did a lot of PT and running through the snow in the early morning, when it was very cold. We were all of the opinion that we were being prepared for the cold conditions that we would experience in Finland, where we were expecting to go. The huge thick fur coats that we tried on, left us in no doubt that we would not get sun burnt on this trip. All this fizzled out however in early December 1939 when Finland surrendered to the Russians. The Arctic clothing was withdrawn and we were in the right place when Hitler decided to take Norway. Whilst we were here we were taken out six men at a time to learn to drive. This was very frightening. A driver and a learner would sit in the front of a truck and four men would sit in the back hanging on for dear life whilst the man in the front was taught to drive. The truck would be going very slowly one second then pick up to a terrific speed the next. Those in the back of the truck would find themselves on their backs in the road if they did not cling on tightly. It certainly was a hair-raising event. Double de-clutching was the way of being taught to drive. This de-clutching would make the truck jump into the air when we learners were in the driving seat.

A spare driver was needed in the team and this was my introduction to Mortars, though I much preferred to stay in the infantry, as I knew nobody in the mortar team. My wife told me that she had read in the local newspaper that these lads (meaning us) were being sent to Finland and many of them hardly knew how to fire a rifle; in most cases this was near the truth. At the time we embarked for Norway, I had the pleasure of seeing six rounds fired from this mortar and one of those was a bloody dud that had to be detonated by the bomb squad. I had six weeks Infantry training; was passed out and then sent to the mortars a few weeks before we embarked for Norway.

It was a very miserable existence here; we were not allowed home leave and my spending money had dropped from £2 a week to 6s-Os a week; that was enough for 5 cigs a day and a cup of tea now and again. We were at Shildon the whole of the winter.

In April 1940 we were sent to Rosyth in Scotland standing by because of the German invasion of Norway. Whilst at Rosyth I applied for compassionate leave to see my daughter Kathleen, our first born, but I was refused.

All leave was refused because of embarkation and so we went on board a luxury ocean going boat ready to sail to Norway.

The decks of the luxury boat were filled with Bofor ACK ACK guns and the swimming pool was full of ammunition. This luxury boat had a sumptuous lay out, the long dining table glittered with silver and for a few days we lived like Lords. We had luxurious bunk beds and excellent food and from the porthole we could see the Firth of Forth Bridge in the distance.

We were here for two or three days and then we were transferred mid stream to the Arathusa HMS light cruiser. Looking back this was hilarious, as we had to transfer from flat bottom boats to the destroyer in midstream with a six to eight foot swell. The narrow bridge between the two boats would tilt from horizontal to 60 or 70 degrees as the swell lifted the flat-bottomed boat. This was bad enough, but after circling around for two or three hours many of the soldiers were seasick and this spew was circling around too, being blown by the wind whilst the men waited to transfer from one boat to the other. This had to be done one man at a time, as the bridge between the two boats became level. The sailor on the boat pushed a soldier across the bridge and the sailor on the Arethusa would grab him to safety and so on.

Once aboard we had to keep out of the way of the sailors as they had to run the ship and we had to bed down anywhere out of the way.

The kit bags were thrown over too, some of them not making it.

Food on the ship was plentiful. Uppermost in my memory were the piles of hard-boiled eggs down the centre of the dining tables, there seemed to be hundreds of them.

After a day or so on this ship mid river in the Firth of Forth, we sailed for Norway.

I recollect how fast we must have moved for the water was breaking over the bows of the accompanying destroyers and I remember saying to a mate "Cor look at that!" meaning the huge waves.

We were not long seemingly before we were passing the magnificent fjords and approaching harbour.

The Germans had bombed the harbour and were expected back.

We were bundled off the ship very quickly. She took off immediately or else she would have been a sitting target.

People stood cheering us as we rode through the town. It was easier than we had expected. We were made to believe we would have to fight our way off the ship.

Our goal was Lillehammer. We had many sightings of the Luftwaffe as we sped along but they were evidently on their way back to base.

We were detailed by a Norwegian Officer to relieve a Mortar on what he said was a hill; to me the hill looked like a mountain. With Mortar and bombs in our truck we reached the bottom of the hill.

It took 1 to 2 hours to reach the place where the Norwegian Officer took us. Then the Norwegians withdrew with their Mortar and we were left to set ours in its place. Theirs was a four-inch Mortar and ours was only three-inch; the ground they were covering with their Mortar we couldn't hope to cover with ours. We could not reach target.

My part was to carry the base plate (about 50 lb weight) slung from my shoulder, this with rifle and pack was hard going to say the least, especially as the mountain was covered in thick snow. Four of us had to retrace our steps and bring up the bombs, which were three bombs in a case, a case in each hand.

As we made our way up with the bombs, going up two yards and slipping back three, a Norwegian Officer observing us shook his head. He could see we were not equipped to get up the hill in these British Army boots; we needed boots with studded soles to get up these hills. He ordered some Norwegian soldiers to take the bombs off us and even carrying the bombs they left us standing, they were used to climbing snowy slopes.

When we returned the Mortar was rigged ready for firing and we laid the bombs in position, forty-two in all. The Range Finder confirmed we could not reach the area that was covered by the Norwegians and so the Mortar was set at maximum.

The Range Finder, the one who looks for the enemy through binoculars, then took up his position. We were well situated; we were only twenty yards from the side of the hill and had a good view of the area to be covered, with the Mortar out of sight.

The hillside and the whole area where we stood were covered in pine trees, so we had a perfect view without being seen. We English were not alone on the hill. A good many Norwegian soldiers were moving away from the action behind us. A few miles away was the noise of battle, and German spotter planes were above us. As the action came closer we noticed more and more people, soldiers and civilians at the back of us all going one way.

The Range Finder shouted that there was movement on the ground we were covering, and the corporal told me to get the bombs ready. When he came back after consulting the Range Finder we prepared to fire. We then fired because the NCO decided that the enemy had reached the position that we could cover and we started putting the ten-pound bombs down the barrel of the Mortar.

One man took the bombs out of the cases; passing them on to the next man nose first; he passed them on to the firer and he put them fin first down the Mortar barrel. Whilst this happened another man moved the barrel of the Mortar slowly to cover the area in front. I should say the full traverse of the Mortar took about twenty bombs. The Range Finder had indicated that we were on target so we reduced the length one hundred yards to finish off the bombs.

Suddenly all hell broke loose! A spotter plane must have noted the position because Mortar bombs and shells were falling all around us. The trees that were so protective were now falling. We immobilised the Mortar and joined the retreat with the civilians and soldiers. The bullets were thudding into the tree trunks as we made our way along the top of the hills.

The Norwegians told us that the Germans were on the low road where our truck was and that meant that we had lost our truck and that we were afoot. We then had a concentrated attack of shells and bombs and I was parted from my mates; I never saw them again.

I joined up with the flow of Norwegian families and soldiers who were streaming away from the action and at intervals I noticed Norwegian troops dug in; presumably to slow the enemy down. We joined in the skirmish with the Norwegian soldiers many of whom looked more like schoolboys. Away from the action we came to a large building where food was being served and I was glad to hear English speaking voices. I sat with a soldier from the Green Howard's and had food and water.

English Officers there told us that after we had rested we must make our way back to England if we could. That meant getting to a foreign country or trying for the coast to be picked up by the navy.

I rested for an hour or so and then took off with the two Green Howard soldiers; we had lingered too long because we were caught up by the Germans who were advancing swiftly.

Mortar bombs and shellfire were exploding on each side of the road; it was obvious the Germans didn't want any craters in the road to slow down their advancement. Everywhere was alive with bouncing bullets, which were so concentrated I took cover behind a big abandoned lorry, which was already smouldering. As my stomach came in contact with the wagon bumper a burst of machine gun fire ricocheted underneath the lorry and slammed into it from the other side. I crouched down until the firing subsided and then I ran like bloody hell.

Out of range once again we kept moving on, and from time to time we stopped along the way getting information from Officers both Norwegian and English. We travelled so for a few days and nights.

I well remember how embarrassed I felt on one of these stops. We were sitting at a long table and being served hot gruel by young Norwegian girls and I sensed their revulsion as they served the 2 Green Howard soldiers and myself. We must have smelt like skunks.

We had been in Norway for over 2 weeks, lying in the snow and mud taking cover from the German fire. We were much slower than the Norwegians in this terrain and we were wet through with sweat just keeping up with them. We never seemed to get more than an hours sleep before we were on the move again.

On one occasion my two companions and I were making our way across a field with snow up to our crutch when a German plane shot at us. We must have stood out like a beacon in all that snow. He missed us thankfully, though we did get a sweat on trying to run in over 2 foot of snow. Eventually we came to the bank of a very swift flowing river on which, to our surprise, were gathered hundreds of soldiers and officers. The officers were trying to work out a way to cross the river. They had maps and the idea was that if we crossed to the other side we would by pass the enemy and have a chance to reach the coast. They had already established that the Germans were in charge of a bridge two or three miles upstream. Volunteers had tried to cross the river at different parts.

The river looked formidable and had huge boulders in it. Where the boulders were close together ice had formed between them. The ice was two or three feet thick in places and the water was roaring underneath. I said to my mate the Green Howard "I think I could get across there!". The part that I chose to cross was approximately thirty to forty feet across: the depth I did not know; I could see from where I stood that I could get across three quarters of the way without getting a dowsing. An officer encouraged me to attempt it and I jumped in a seesaw fashion until I got within the last ten to fifteen feet and, standing on a boulder, I knew I couldn't make it.

It was a very strong current there and I was told to return. As I came back I realised that I was in difficulties. At one point that was about six foot wide I jumped onto a smaller boulder and slipped into the water which was so fast I was fifteen to twenty foot down stream before I could stand up, with the water up to my chest.

The Green Howard soldier had taken my rifle. I thought that he was of the opinion that I could get out myself. I was grasping onto a boulder, afraid to let go, or the river would have taken me further down. The soldier came towards me over the rocks and ice and offered me the end of my rifle, which I grasped and he pulled me out. I used the rifle as a rod in my effort to get out of the water, but my hands were so cold that the rifle fell from my grasp into the river. It was now dusk and we all huddled together on the side of the river. The men put ground sheets down and I was in the middle of them and that is how I spent the night.

When dawn came and I awoke, I wondered what was the matter with me, my face was really distorted. I had a cold sore, which covered the whole of my face and my lips and nose. My clothes were still wet through, though strangely enough I wasn't cold.

We were there two more days, then, due to the activity coming towards us, we moved on in parties of twenty men. We made our way down river in the hope of reaching the sea.

Some days later, keeping close to the river, we came to an area where many English and Norwegian soldiers were grouped together, I should say five hundred English and even more Norwegians. By this time the blisters on my face had burst. I had a beard, which had to remain because I could not shave, though by now my clothes had dried out.

We were with that party at least a week. The Norwegians brought food for us daily. The fish balls I'll never forget. They were in a can floating in water. They were revolting, but we had to eat and we got them down.

Then suddenly we were Prisoners Of War. I don't know how it happened. One minute we were eating fish balls and then there were Germans among us and not a shot had been fired.

Chapter II

We were then transferred to Oslo and I finished up in a police cell. The food here looked like dog biscuits with caraway seeds. l couldn't eat them at first but I did eat them, as it was them or nothing.

After a few days in Oslo we were transferred to a ship, about one hundred of us in the fore-hold and more in the rest of the ship. The fore-hold was 40ft by 40ft and 30ft or so deep. On each side of the hold were fastened huge metal troughs 12ft deep 2ft wide and these were our toilets. On the opposite side were troughs of smaller size for us to wash ourselves and on the bottom of the boat were duckboards.

At first sight it looked and was a reasonable place for our journey, though I was to change my mind later on.

The ship moved only at night, moving short distances and picking up other P.O.Ws on the way. The journey took many days before we reached Kristensand, which is situated on the mouth of the Skaggerak. By this time the stink from the hold from the excrements of the men from diarrhoea and seasickness was so bad that we were allowed on deck 20 men at a time for a breath of fresh air. On these occasions we were covered with machine guns.

Suddenly one night the screws on the engine were not running so gently as they had been doing until then, they started throbbing and picked up speed considerably across the Skaggerak to the coast of Denmark. During this run the excrements in the troughs were slopping among us to our distress and now we weren't allowed upon deck. The hatches had been closed and we just had to suffer the putrid smell below deck.

Later on I will tell you the reason for this sudden dash by the ship; according to an English sailor I met in Stalag XXA.

In the shelter of the Danish coast we moved only at night again and we were allowed on deck as before. Twenty men at a time under guard and once again we travelled slowly.

Food was scarce and word went round that our watches and rings would be confiscated when we arrived at Germany and foolishly I parted with my cherished gold ring; I got two loaves of bread for it.

Occasionally water was lowered down into the hold for us to wash but as we neared Germany this pleasure, if that is what it could be called, came to an end.

I can't remember the number of days and nights we endured in this boat before we disembarked at Hamburg, though I am positive that if we had been on this boat much longer there would have been an epidemic and men would have died.

When we reached Hamburg the hatches to the hold were thrown open and we were given plenty of water to wash and clean ourselves. The reason for this was obvious as we alighted from the ship. We were paraded in front of the people of Hamburg who seemed to have been prepared for our coming. We were all photographed and the people back home were informed that we were prisoners of war. We were given a number; mine was P.O.W.no.5101.

We were soon on our way again, this time in cattle trucks 40 men to each truck. Straw was inside the trucks for us to sleep on and we learned that our destination was Danzig, which was quite a few days away. We travelled as usual by night and were shunted onto sidings regularly during the day. Our diet was dry bread and the occasional army soup and water to drink.

When we landed at Danzig many of us had dysentery and diarrhoea and sickness. We were a long while before we got over our trip from Norway to Danzig.

At Danzig our billets were a Polish fortress, which was more like a prison than a billet, and, each took about forty men. The windows were heavily barred, the doors were made of solid wood and bunk beds were situated all round the walls. We were issued with palliasses, which we filled with straw and put on the bunk beds. There was a wooden dining table down the centre of the room and an N.C.O. was in charge of each room. We had roll call each morning on the parade ground.

The cookhouse was operated by British army cooks and we had kartoffel (potato) soup daily perhaps with a small amount of meat, but too small to see.

There was about 400 men, N.C.O's and Officers, and gradually more men came. It took a few weeks for us to get fully organised. When all the billets were full there must have been about 1200 men here.

We had a cookhouse, a small hospital and a place for Officers.

Every day a man would be chosen to help in the cookhouse, peeling the spuds and cleaning pans. This wasn't a chore at this stage because those on spud bashing received tit bits such as chips, or sugar in their tea. Food was so short, there were 5 men to one loaf and a packet of knackerbraut each. Helping with the spuds was better than walking aimlessly around the Fort.

This went on until the instructions were given out that each soldier below the rank of sergeant was detailed to working parties and even sergeants were glad later on to take charge of the working parties to relieve the monotony, for boredom had caused a lot of friction and fights too.

My first working party was in a small wood on the outskirts of Danzig. There must have been at least 4 parties of ten men, 40 men with 4 guards. We were to retrieve the barbed wire from around the wood, where the Polish soldiers had made a stand against the Germans. My job was taking out the staples that held the wire to the post; the wire was then pulled free and wound onto huge spools. This we did for a day or two until we came to a part in the wood that was very swampy and was full of mosquitoes. These creatures attacked us ferociously, they were so bad that the guards left us to it, they refused to go near the swamp. It was very hot but we had to wear clothing to cover every part of our bodies; nevertheless many of us were bit and had huge lumps from the bites, many of which turned septic.

This worked to our advantage, as there were many Poles in the woods collecting mushrooms and wood for the fires: we would get friendly with them and they would give us food and sometimes we could do a trade with them. This would only be on a small scale as we were always searched before we returned to camp. I was glad however when this job finished, it was so uncomfortable wearing clothes in such hot weather.

After this we were transported daily to a seaside place called Zoppot. Here we came under the working orders from an ex Nazi soldier who walked with a slight limp. His job was to restore buildings that had been devastated during the war with Poland.

We filled cellars with boulders, sand and cement and then flooded it with water from the hosepipe. This was to reinforce the buildings, which were to be brought into use when we had finished our work here. There were many German soldiers and sailors about and when these buildings were finished they probably would be used to accommodate them.

We were extremely hungry at this place and would go about looking in the waste bins for bread that the soldiers and sailors had thrown away. There were civilians here as well, both Polish and German, who were working on these buildings too.

In these buildings were the uniforms, cavalry boots and mattress' belonging to the Polish soldiers and we helped ourselves to a good deal of this stuff, using it for trading for food when possible. If we were caught with this loot we most certainly would get roughed up and could expect a spell in solitary.

We were here for some time and would seize the chance to take some of this army equipment, when we had a guard over us who we knew wasn't so particular about searching us. The odd guard would just take it off us, put his fingers to his head and say ''Dumfkoff" (thick head). These were the ones that we would take a chance with. We took the covers off the mattresses making the covers easier to conceal on our person and these would be eagerly received by our mates back at camp. We put our palliasses in the mattress covers, which made the beds look nice and clean.

The boots and tunics etc. that we took from the Docks were taken by other parties who were working inland and traded for bread, sausage or whatever they could get for them, mostly food.

We came to know quite a few Poles through this bartering.

It was now late into the summer and we had our first lot of Potatoes delivered from the Polish farms. They were not dried off properly and had been stored in a damp condition in one of the barrack rooms. The rooms had only one entrance and we were to regret this later on.

We worked on many projects in the harbour and the surrounding areas, stacking bricks on building sites and on some occasions getting close to where the ships were being unloaded and loaded ready for sailing.

We did hear of one soldier getting back home. This, we were told, he did by dirtying his face and uniform with coal and joining in with the loading of coal onto one of the ships. This could have been true because by now the Germans were more lenient towards us because of the work we were doing.

We were having trouble back at camp with lice, which was very disturbing and caused a very unhappy atmosphere. This we suffered for many weeks. This first onslaught of these creatures caused us to develop many sores from scratching, and some men finished up in hospital from septic sores.

At this time of our captivity we had no soap issued and we washed our clothes by boiling them in a 5-gallon oil drum, which we had cleaned out. With our first issue of soap everybody wanted to wash themselves at the same time and everyone wanted a stand up bath. Nevertheless we had to be patient and organised, and room-by-room we cleaned up the best we could considering the circumstances. This was my first wash with soap since I had become a POW 6 months ago. Even so, we couldn't get rid of the lice. The trouble was getting worse and the Germans had to organise a proper delousing for us.

First of all we burnt our palliasses and then we were taken in lorries to a German army depot and there all our clothes were stored. We washed thoroughly with soft soap after shaving off our hair and returned to camp nice and clean, receiving new palliasses on arrival. These we filled with fresh straw and felt great. I was to repeat this operation often during my life as a POW.

We were still working around the Danzig area and the potatoes that had been stored in the barrack room were beginning to rot. So once again men from each room were detailed to help in the cookhouse. The potatoes by now were one stinking horrible mess and it took hours to sort out enough potatoes for the daily meal. Even when the potatoes were cooked the fust could be tasted and those of us who went out with the working party could smell them a mile away if the wind was in that direction.

It took many weeks of hard work and horrible meals before we cleared the room where they were stacked and besides the rotten spuds there was green mould on the loaves of bread; the mould we cut off. Many of us had diarrhoea and stomach pains and this must have been the start of my stomach ulcer, which I have been plagued with until this day.

We went to work at a place called Gdynia, which was hit very hard during the German onslaught in 1939, here we worked on the roads and also inside the German barracks where soldiers were training. We did quite well at this place, these were occupational troops and not front liners, they were older men and were easier to get on with.

After a number of weeks at this place our next working party was Gdansk. This place wasn't so far away from the Fortress as the others had been and we were more in touch with the German Navy. We did in fact see warships around this area and we were more heavily guarded. Here we were helping to build chalets by carrying wood for the German Navy Personnel to erect on site.

We were moved on after a few weeks to the main Stalag XXA. The winter had set in and it was very cold. Our journey to the camp was in cattle trucks and although only a short journey was very uncomfortable. I was amazed at the size of the main camp, the number of soldiers, N.C.Os and Officers there must have been 3,000 men with many Germans on guard.

On my first visit to this camp I was of the impression that we were all being congregated to form different working parties. We were so crowded and pressed for washing space that when detailed for working parties we accepted straight away.

I volunteered to go out with one party to a place called Brounlow, or something like that, and when detailed to this work I found that there was about 400 men already on this working party. We were again loaded into cattle trucks, different ranks and different regiments all together, and we were on our way to yet another billet, one that had been prepared for us in advance. Each hut would house approximately 40 men and each hut had 3 pot bellied wood burning stoves.

I had no regular mate and I found that I was with 3 more English men and the rest were 30 Scotsmen all from one regiment. I am not going to say that I enjoyed their company on this our first acquaintance.

I was told daily there would always be an England whilst it was joined to Scotland. I often wished that I could cut the bugger free and let it drift into the sea up there. We didn't mix very well with these men and we had reason to confide in an English sergeant who took up our complaint and so the situation became more tolerant. We worked with English soldiers during the day and it was after work that we were pressed into arguments, which we knew we couldn't win.

Our first chore in this place was getting wood for the stoves and the cookhouse, this wasn't a big problem as we were actually at the side of a wood and we had cross cut saws and axes.

The Germans told us how to saw the trees down, the branches, which were lopped off, were for burning on the hut stoves and the trunks were taken away in lorries. We found that after a while there were many Poles both men and women working in the wood.

We were issued with gloves, which we needed because of the utter cold. In fact it was so cold that we were warned about grabbing the saw or any metal with bare hands as finger ends could be left on it and we did have casualties this way.

To have a pee was something you prepared for and gave great thought to in this bitter cold. There were no zips and hands had to be warmed before you started or your hands would be too cold to fasten the buttons when finished. We were told to rub our ears with snow in the early days of capture; later we used what wool we could get to cover out ears.

As we chopped down the trees and went further into the woods. The Poles, both men and women, could also be seen working there. We then began to use their toilets, which were under cover they were about 4 foot deep and a twenty foot long trench, with wooden seats with round holes cut to make a toilet seat.

Imagine my amazement when a young Polish girl nipped in and sat on the toilet alongside and began to jabber away, and jabber away to me. I didn't know if she was telling me off or being sociable. I didn't stop to find out. I jumped up quickly, pulled up my trousers and fled. When I saw the guard and told them about it he laughed and said "ganse gall". I think he meant it's all the same. The lads got quite a laugh out of this. Me! I thought I was going to be shot for invading the women's toilets. We were here long enough to find out that both men and women used the same toilets.

We made friends with many of these Poles in the next few weeks that we were there, these were the weeks running up to Christmas. They told us to look at a certain building in the distance where they had a Christmas tree and it was decorated with "number 10 in lights". These Poles were a working party also, but they weren't so restricted as us for they could come and go as they pleased, whilst we as POW were behind barbed wire and there were guards on patrol.

They must have had access to food for we had many a parcel off them. They would indicate from a distance, pointing to the ground and we would saunter to the spot and there would be a parcel with bread and sausages, sometimes fat which would be lying on the ground either wrapped up or just lying there. However, it was very thankfully received, especially the bread, for at the camp we were still on the German army ration of bread with its green mould, and five of us to a loaf and one kartoffol (potato) soup each day.

This was my worst Christmas ever. There were so many men from the evacuation of Dunkirk and none of them had any good news, plus the fact that by now I had developed a very grotty stomach and we had started with lice again.

One of the English lads with us seemed to be suffering more from POW life mentally than any one of us and it showed. He was a loner and very withdrawn. This, and the fact that he would always have tealeaves boiling on the stove, drew everybody's attention to him. How he got these used tealeaves nobody knew, we did know that he kept them in his bed, either under his pillow or under the mattress. He was nicknamed "tealeaf" and he was blamed for everything that went wrong in the room even to the lice. He was once taken out by the Scottish lads and held under the icy water that run from the pipes on a hill close by. This stopped him from hoarding tealeaves in his bed, but it didn't alter him in any other way, he was mentally ill.

Over the Christmas period all the huts were left open and we were allowed to mix with whoever we wanted. This was where the food from the Poles came in handy for anyone who had been lucky enough to get any. We all got together and had a singsong, but it did not ease the unhappiness within us.

One good thing here was that we had ample wood to feed the pot bellied stove and it would give out a terrific heat so we were very warm at this billet. The most outstanding thing that I recall was the chimneybreast in the washhouse where we stripped off our clothes, picked the lice off them and crushed the lice on the chimneybreast, which was coloured red from the blood from the lice. I was glad to leave this place, there were no fond memories here.

When we returned to Stalag XXA towards the end of January we were immediately deloused. It was during this procedure that I lost my boots and I was issued with an inferior pair of rubber shoes, which, unlike my boots, were very thin and cold, and I had to manage with them for the rest of the winter.

Many men had gone from the Stalag on our return. We were organised, paraded and counted each morning and then marched out of the camp to some barracks where German soldiers were being trained. We were cleaning at different buildings and we managed to get the occasional meal from the German field kitchen, which was soup, always soup. This soup had more taste in it though than any of the soup back at Stalag.

We did some work here for a German civilian. He was one of the very few Germans that appeared sociable to us, even when everything at this stage of the war was going their way.

We cleaned the area and bricks began to arrive. These we stacked ready for the builders. When we returned to the Stalag each night we shared a loaf of bread between 5 of us as usual. The only thing left to do at night was to go across to the main building where the NCOs who didn't want to work were billeted. We would watch them play cards and Ludo, this being the warmest place in the Stalag and this was our daily routine.

From time to time different parties of men were arriving, some of whom were sick and had to go to the sick bay. From one of these working party arrivals I was overjoyed to acquire a pair of Polish cavalry boots. I suffered with very cold feet because of having to wear the rubber shoes. I was so pleased to get hold of them although they cost me a full week's supply of Polish cigarettes, this being a week's allowance that I had to queue for at the shop where we spent our POW money.

The word went round that more working parties were going out and I immediately applied and found to my amazement that it was for farm working. Twenty men were selected and one sergeant included. This time we rode in the guard's van on the train and this was a pleasant surprise.

We had a German feldwebel (sergeant) and a private soldier as guard. After a short journey we arrived at a village where there were a number of small farms, the largest of these belonged to the Bergermaster of the village and this is where we were billeted.

Later on the guard brought in the Bergermaster. I don't know if this was by arrangement, but on all these working parties either an English man could speak German or a German could speak English. We always understood what we had to do. They told us that at eight o'clock the next morning someone would come and arrange for us to go to our respective jobs on the farm, and the Bergermaster had already picked out the three strongest looking.

A very large German lady arrived very early the next morning and to our amazement picked the smallest one among us. He was a very sick young man who was with us at Danzig and had been very ill with dysentery. We were to see the woman come to fetch him every day rain or sunshine.

Nobody else bothered to come for any other workers and so all detailing was left to the Bergermaster. We were split into two parties and marched off into opposite directions. The feldwebel took one lot and the private soldier took the other half. As we approached each farm the number of workers they had asked for were allotted to them. I finished up about half a mile from the farm with a mate named Bernard. He was a "Townie," meaning that he came from the same town as me, Nottingham. He was actually in civi life, a farm labourer. When we arrived at the farm where we were to work there were two women, one, Frau Leitka who was the owner of this small farm and a Polish woman who was working for her. The Polish lady was getting on in years. Most of the early farm work had been done by this time. We went into the farmhouse to have breakfast, which was a slice of bread and a bowl of thin soup. It was enough, as the slices were thick and the bread was good.

The one awful thing that stands out in my memory was the amount of flies around the stove and in the kitchen. The stove was in the corner of the room and a large canopy was over the top to take the smoke up the chimney instead of going into the room. There were millions of flies around this canopy both on it and under it and later on we found out how careful we had to be from what we ate.

During the morning a Polish fellow of middle age came to the farm. We understood that he went to two or three of the farms as an advisor. He got on very well with Bernard, who, being a farm worker understood the work.

It was by now the beginning of June and the potatoes were about eight inches high. Our first job was hoeing and covering the potatoes with soil. We had been told to come back at twelve for 'mitt tag' (lunch) and the meal was the usual potato soup with a thick slice of bread. In the meantime the older woman had been and checked what work had been done. She seemed satisfied and we were back again in the afternoon doing the same work hoeing the spuds and at four o clock, another two slices of bread with plums (the plums having been boiled) and a mug of ersatz coffee (burned cereal used throughout Germany as a substitute for coffee and tasting nothing like coffee) was brought to us on the field.

The guard had visited us by now to make sure that we had not run away and he had to borrow a bicycle to visit us later. We finished work here about 6 o clock in the evening, the guard would fetch one of our mates who was working further on to join us; picking up other mates as we went along and so back to the billet for the night.

Later on we were left to return to the billet on our own. There was a lot of talk about this first days work, but it seemed that everybody was satisfied with their lot.

We were still paraded the next morning, though we were away quickly and were soon back at work on the farm. My mate was called Bernhard by the women and I was called Brower. They didn't seem to be able to say Brown. My mates at camp called me Ginge because of my ginger hair.

We soon finished work on the potato crop and Bernard who had worked with horses on a farm in England was soon clearing land and getting ready for other crops: whilst I was being taught to look after 20 sows and a boar: the food for these were boiled in old copper pansions (the fires were wood burning). Another of my jobs was with the cows both feeding and mucking out and giving them fresh straw. I did try my hand at milking the cows, I didn't know if my hands were too cold, but no milk ever came out, so the old Polish woman milked the cows and we soon got into an harmonious way of working.

As soon as breakfast was over in the morning, Bernard would go straight up the fields, mostly with a horse and I would feed the cows and the pigs; mucking them out and putting down straw, fresh bedding for them.

By the time I had barrowed the pig muck and stacked it onto the dung heap it was well into the morning. I was supplied with a saw a pick axe and a spade. The previous winter had split many of the fruit trees and these had to be taken out by the roots, which was more time consuming.

The Pole who was supervising came to me and explained how it was done, I pick axed the soil in between the roots and with a trenching spade (a narrow spade) I exposed as much of the root as possible. I then sawed the root a distance from the tree and when the tree was ready for pulling down, Bernard would bring the horse; we would fasten the rope to the tree and the horse would pull the tree down.

This we could do on the smaller trees but not the larger ones, though I did have a go at trying to dislodge them: the horse wasn't strong enough to pull them down.

The orchard was situated on the side of the road and people passing would shout "Morgan Tommie" and would wave as they passed.

As I pulled the trees down they were towed close to the farmhouse, where I sawed and chopped them up for firewood; this was an in between job for me.

After the midday meal I would accompany Bernard up the fields (the year before the dykes hadn't been cleared out ) and this was our job to clear them out to keep the water flowing. The dykes were full of leaves, twigs and silt; we used long handled shovels and rakes for this job. I would work until 5 o'clock and then I would go back to the farm to feed the pigs and the cows.

When we were very busy, the old Polish woman would see to the animals for their evening feed and I would stay with Bernard.

Back at the billets we were concerned about the state of the war especially after the sinking of the Hood. Nothing seemed to be going right.

The guards by now had settled down; they had each got a Polish girl friend and they realised they were on a good thing. When they visited us now it was on bicycles and they often went to town after they had locked us up for the night.

The Polish woman who worked at the farm had to finish work because of illness; one job she did was to take the milk to the dairy daily in a pony and trap, picking up other milk churns from all the small farms on the way and after consulting the guard I took the job over.

There was no parade now, so we started one hour earlier; we just showed ourselves to the guard and took off for the farm.

A young Polish lad was employed in place of the Polish woman; his name was Johan: Frau Leitka milked the cows for a few days until he arrived. I fed the pigs and the cows, rigged up the pony and trap and set out for the dairy.

On my first journey there, I was trotting along nicely with the pony and trap when I came face to face with a German soldier on a bicycle; he told me I was on the wrong side of the road, which I immediately rectified.

When I arrived at the dairy I was greeted with a good swig of fresh milk and a lot of jabber that I didn't understand. When they realised that I was to deliver daily, I received gifts of cake and Polish cigarettes from the workers. The cake I took back and shared with Bernard on the 4 o'clock break in the field.

When Johan arrived he milked the cows and then joined Bernard in the field.

Johan, although only 16 years old had worked on a farm all his life, so I was the general "dogs body". I wasn't complaining, I had a better deal here. I was able to do some trading at this place especially when the personal parcel, sent to me by my wife arrived, from England.

Chocolates and cigarettes were good bartering items, I didn't forget the people who had given me cigarettes and cakes etc.. They had never tasted anything like Cadbury's chocolate.

Word went round at the billet that I was in contact with the Poles at the dairy. So when the others received their parcels from home I had something to barter with for their chocolates, cigarettes soap and socks.

The Poles working on the surrounding farms alongside of us were very reluctant to have anything that was British in their possession. They seemed to be afraid of what might happen if they were caught with anything English. They would take a smoke and eat chocolate out in the field and that is all they would do: they were afraid because most of them lived on the German occupied farms. The Poles that worked at the dairy went home daily.

Sometimes Frau Leitka would take the pony and trap and take the milk and I would go up the fields to help, which was a never-ending job of work. We were still catching up with the dykeing as well: so we were very busy indeed

A short time after the arrival of Johan we had rissoles for the midday meal and to mine and Bernard's surprise Johan wouldn't touch his: he indicated for us to look at them; there were dead maggots inside them.

Bernard and I had started to eat ours, but when we saw inside we left the meal and went out of the kitchen.

Johan was very wary of the Frau. The day he started to work on the farm she gave him an old couch to sleep on in the stable and during the night he was attacked by some beetles, which made a dreadful mess of his stomach. He flung the bed outside and set fire to it. She made no apology for this to the boy although we should have been ready for anything, because of the state of the kitchen and the hordes of flies. She was not of the best German standard where cleanliness was concerned. However, it was better here than anywhere else that we had stayed during the 15 months so far as POWs.

One day the sergeant was recalled to the Stalag and returned with 6 Red Cross parcels and 6 tins of 50 cigarettes. It was quite a problem sharing these out among 20 men. There was one tin of bacon in each parcel, condensed milk, small pots of jam, biscuits, butter and tea etc,

We all decided the tea would be used in the evening at the billet when we arrived there at the end of the day. For a while about 9 o clock in the evening we had bacon butties and real jam with the farm bread we were given and the lovely stink of the English cigarette smoke.

It came as a great surprise to me one day to find out how much weight that I had lost. Bernard and I were in the process of putting corn into the bags each bag weighing a sentna (1 cwt). I stood on the scales and said to Bernard "We haven't got the weights on properly!" Because I was standing on the scales and they didn't move. "How much do you think you weigh then" asked Bernard. I was flabbergasted! As a shot firer at the pit, when I joined the Territorials, I was over 12 stone, but after 15 months as a POW. I was under 8 stone. I put this down to the fact that I kept being sick to get rid of the pain in my stomach and the privation of being a POW.  Knowing that I had lost so much weight, it affected me for a time and that didn't help in any way.

I had still got the little job of taking the pony and trap to the dairy most days. It was only when I was needed up the fields, when they were behind with the fieldwork that Frau Leitka would do this job instead of me. I would drink milk when I arrived at the dairy and I would take some back to the billet on these occasions when my stomach was off. We were now well into the growing season and the winter fodder for the horses hay had run out: we had plenty of corn chaff, which we had to cut daily. This was time consuming, for this was cut by a machine that needed two men, one to turn the handle and one to feed the straw into the blades.

The cows were grass feeding in the orchard and only came in for milking. To save time we started cutting the green feed, which was long grass, clover and lupins, mixed. This was my first introduction to a scythe: I was not very good with a scythe and I was lucky to finish up with both of my legs intact. Johan finished off my first effort and taught me how to use it.

This fodder was put on a small cart and I would take it down to the stables for the horses to eat during the night. We were now ready for the harvesting and the first cut was the clover and grass for the animal's winter fodder. It was cut and laying on the ground when I returned to the field after two days when I went to market with pigs.

Going to market with the pigs, the driver and I loaded two pigs onto the lorry to add to the pigs that was already in there. We would get a stick, push it under the pig to wedge behind its two front legs, we grabbed the tail and threw it into the truck. The abattoir was very busy. A man with a pair of electric tongues would approach the pig and the electrode, which was like a pad was placed each side of the pig's head and when the man pressed the lever the pig was dead. It was lifted by block and tackle, bled and gutted and then dropped into a vat of boiling water. It was then lowered so that we could scrape the hairs off its body. This was done with a flat piece of metal, which had a very sharp edge. We left the pigs there and returned to the farm; it was the days work finished with. The man called for me the next day, I must have been on hire. We repeated the work of the previous day, then we returned to the farm and I collected my bread ration and returned to the billet.

Before we started work the next day Bernard and I were told to load a huge boar into a small-wheeled pig box to be transferred to some other farm. This pig was very vicious with wicked looking tusks, it was wild and Bernard was very apprehensive, and well he might be. We were told firstly to force it into a carrying cage, something like you see in films for carrying wild animals, we put this cage in the gangway: it was made to fit so that the pig would have to go in when its pen was opened; I called to Bernard to check that the cage door at his end was fastened and then to stand back. I had been feeding this sodding brute for weeks and thought I knew all about it. I got it into the gangway and then the bugger tried to turn round; I gave it a right wallop on the arse with a sweeping brush: it flew along the gangway and went straight through the other end of the carrying cage as if it was made of straw. I could see Bernard wide-eyed on its back riding backwards as it went charging along until he threw himself into one of the pigpens on the side of the gangway. He was not amused. It took four of us all the morning to get the sod into the pig box, "What a performance!".

The following day I was up the field turning the hay (winter fodder) with a wooden rake to dry it out; this hay had to be bone dry before it could be stacked in the loft over the stables; so it was turned regularly.

The Frau was taking the milk now leaving me free to help Bernard and Johan. The corn was being cut. On these farms the corn wasn't bundled with string the same as in England, it was left loose on the ground: with 6 or 7 strands of corn we made our bundles by gathering a small armful and tying up with the strands of corn to form a sheaf. These we stacked in an inverted v-shape, about 12 sheaves at a time to dry out. When dried, they were either stacked in the field or taken to sheds in the farmyard. When all the corn was gathered on the farm that I was on, I was lent out to other farms to help with the threshing. At these times quite a few people are needed to man the machines: there was only one threshing machine in the village, so the corn from each farm had to be taken to the threshing machine and the grain and straw after each threshing had to be returned to each individual farm, it was a case of borrowing and lending where the labour was concerned. When enough corn was threshed to suit individual farms, we then returned to our normal work.

I had by now been a POW for over 15 months, I was under weight, I had a grotty guts, I had been locked behind barbed wire every night from the time of my capture in Norway and to put it mildly I was thoroughly beezed off. So badly was I affected, that one night in the early hours, I woke up, opened the window, jumped out, climbed over the fence and took off.

For a mile or so I felt as free as a bird, although it was raining. Eventually I stopped to take my bearings and lit a cigarette, then I looked around me. I was amazed that as I turned about in every direction everywhere was as black as the hole of Calcutta. I couldn't see a light either close by or in the distance. I was wet and cold and I knew that I had made a right stupid balls up.

Where was I going in a British khaki uniform, hundreds of miles from any neutral country. I knew that Danzig was like Fort Knox; I was gutted, I knew I had to return and the thought of Stalag and all the regimental bull that went with it, was not very welcome to me. I need not have bothered, the only person who seemed to have missed me was the soldier in the bunk above me, Ginger Ralph. He said he would have joined me, had he known my intentions. We never had the chance to plan anything together as we were parted soon after.

Potatoes were the next crop to be harvested. This was done 'by each person having what is known as a potato grabber. I never saw a potato machine in Poland. A potato grabber was like a three-headed pickaxe and it was very affective. This grabber was struck into the soil about 8 ins away from the potatoes and pulled forward bringing the potatoes with it, they were then dried and later put into clamps with about a foot of soil to cover them, 6 to 8 ins of earth was then put on the top of the straw to form a frost free layer.

We followed up after this with Mangels, these we pulled up by hand, topped and tailed and made clamps, which were twice as large as the potato clamps.

Back at the billets more Red Cross parcels had arrived, they were Canadian this time and they contained coffee, powdered milk and huge round biscuits in a tin. These were like babies rusks and I swapped some of my stuff for these; the rusks and powdered milk were helpful when my stomach was playing up. There was also a few letters and photos from home and it was at this time that I received my first picture of Kathleen.

All the crops had by now been gathered, Bernard and Johan were busy ploughing and I was dyke cleaning.

Word was getting round that we would be returning to Stalag and only a few would be staying and to my disappointment I was not one of them. This was October 1941 and out of 20 of us on this first working party half stayed to replace the men who were being called up, the rest of us moved on to Stalag XXA.

Many changes had taken place at Stalag XXA during the time we had been on the working party. On our arrival we were each given a Red Cross parcel and 50 cigarettes. We were then sent to join about 1-10 men who were building a road about 15 miles outside of Stalag. We took our Red Cross parcels with us and we also took the l00 men, whom we were about to join, their Red Cross parcels too and 50 cigarettes each. This working party must have been there for quite some time, because every thing was established, cookhouse and huts for the men's sleeping quarters. The work, was breaking bricks and levelling them out for the foundation of the road. It was a monotonous job and well scrutinised by both German and civilians. We were guarded so keenly, that we had no chance of trading with the locals.

One of the guards here was a very quick tempered and suspicious man, who always had his rifle at the alert and was partial to giving any one of us the butt end in the back for no reason whatever. I was glad when I got over that stretch of road. He was a lanky gangling youth with a ginger moustache. He would twitch his moustache (probably from nerves) and I was told two of our lads had been shot by him. They may have been laughing at him; and I could understand this for he really did look ridiculous. He stood about 6 ft 4 ins and probably weighed about 9 stone, looking like a stick with a helmet stuck on the top, he was truly a figure of derision. I managed to keep clear of this man without any incident and as the work progressed I moved further on to another section and out of his area.

As I moved on I came into contact with a German who had lived in USA for a long time, He was in charge of a lorry that was delivering old bricks, that were to be the foundation of the road we were making and he spoke perfect English.

I had two packets of pure coffee beans, which I had saved from my Canadian Red Cross parcel, this pure coffee was very scarce in Germany. I could get 2 Deutschmarks for just one packet of coffee. I settled for one marc and three white loaves for each packet of coffee beans.

We had plenty of time to discuss the deal with the German lorry driver, as we had to take turns each morning with the starting handle on his lorry, which had a diesel engine. On very cold mornings, it would often take over half an hour to get it started. There was often an outburst of foul language from the person whose turn it was to try to start the engine and his efforts had failed. If the starting handle had not disengaged this often caused a kick back and could give a right good rap to the handle operator.

To get the three loaves that we had acquired in our barter, back to the Stalag, we needed the co-operation of the other members of the working party.

The three loaves had to be cut up long ways and hid to get by the German guards. Each man kept half of what he took through past the guard. Helping each other to do a deal was a recognised thing with most of us. Some would not take the risk.

It was getting near to Christmas, my second Christmas as a POW and to our amazement we heard of the bombing of Pearl Harbour, early in December 1941. Rumour was that most of the American Navy had been attacked and sunk by the Japanese aeroplanes operating from aircraft carriers. This unexpected vicious attack was very bad news for us. Later we were to hear both from the Polish and the English Grape Vine (radio) that the damage was not as extensive as said originally. We didn't know the full facts until just before Christmas and this knowledge (plus the fact that America was now in the War) was the best Christmas present that we could wish for. After work each day now we were eager for news.

Whilst probing around for news I chummed up with an old soldier, who was of Jewish origin. He seemed to have lots of information of how the War was progressing. He could and did at times produce a small amount of fat, sometimes butter for cooking. I was glad of this, because I struck up a companionship with him and I did the cooking. How he obtained these fats and little luxuries, I don't know. Whilst in conversation with a friend of this man, he told me, that as long as he had known him, he had always been able to get little tit bits.

My new companion, who we called Josh, would disappear each day until mealtime. Immediately after breakfast he would go, (he must have had his daily soup somewhere else) and he would always return about 4 o clock for the evening meal, bringing something back with him. On the odd occasion he would bring back spuds and with these cooked and placed on fried bread it would make a filling meal. Stalag beefsteak we called this.

We would sit down for the evening meal and he would relate the news that he had gathered during the day. He would tell us news that was always ahead of the camp news. His friend hinted that he thought that Josh was a freemason and that he might know someone else in authority, managing the camp.

This could be true, because by now there were many senior officers in captivity. Our friendship came to an abrupt end when I had to go into hospital with a burnt hand turned septic.

I was cooking at the stove and I got hold of a tin which burned the heel of my thumb, which was so bad, that the skin came off onto the tin and within two days I had red lines going up my arm and a lump as big as a tennis ball under my armpit. I was hospitalised straight away with septicaemia and this was how I spent my second Christmas as a POW.

At the beginning of my stay in hospital, I couldn't understand why the orderly more or less dictated to me how I should only use my own towels and bowl when I washed. At first I thought that he was telling me this because of my septic hand. Looking around the ward, there didn't seem to be anything wrong with any of the patients and I didn't worry about this at the time, I just lay back contentedly and thought how nice it was and how comfortable and warm I was: I considered myself very lucky.

I was also allowed to see the Stalag Pantomime. This was of course an all male show. Written produced and staged by the POWs of Fort XIII Concert Party in The Little Theatre "First Day of Pantomania" A fantasy in three acts, was on December 26th. The hospital was allowed seats for the show; Germans were there, Officers and guards, we all enjoyed it and clapped enthusiastically.

This was my first and only chance to see these annual events held at the Main Stalag.

I have an album with many photographs of open air boxing exhibitions and programmes of plays that were put on. This album was given to me by a very dear friend Mr Alf Bates, it was a parting gift; we worked together on a farm in Poland.

I soon realised that this ward was something different. I was amazed to find there were VD cases and septic scabies and these sores had to be cleaned each day. I am glad to say that my septic hand responded to treatment and I was soon out of hospital. I was comfortable there to begin with, but I was very relieved to be discharged without my becoming infected.

It was now into January and I was looking forward to working on the farm again. Word came round that a working party was wanted for two or three months duration and I applied for this work and on this party I teamed up with Swanee and Punch.

This work party was to fill in huge holes to level the ground for a project the Germans had in mind. The journey to this site was in cattle trucks and it took over three hours.

There were two non-working sergeants on this party. The billets here were really good, with single beds and proper mattresses. They had been occupied by the people who had worked here previously.

We had a couple of days to get the cookhouse organised. We were told the job was twenty-four hours a day and 8 hour shifts, with twelve men on each shift.

Punch, Swanee and I started our first shift on nights. It was bitter cold and we started work during a raging snowstorm. The work was filling a huge hole with rubble.

This work must have been in progress for many weeks before we started. It wasn't hard work, but very very cold and uncomfortable.

As we approached the site, I could see arc lights over quite a large area; but the most outstanding thing in my mind was the shouting of the German in charge. All we could hear was Ooruk!! Ooruk!!.

Later I was to understand why the shouting was necessary. The men at work were spread out over such a large area and the man in charge had to shout very loud to be heard above the icy howling wind and his voice was very raucous.

We were taken to a cabin and told what the work was to be and we were informed that if we co-operated, meaning work steadily; we would get a voucher for extra white bread each day. This I found very acceptable, because the brown army bread issued to us aggravated my stomach and I was glad to work at a steady pace to get a voucher. It worked out three vouchers for one loaf of bread.

Swanee, Punch and I received a loaf of bread each day for three vouchers.

The place where we were to work had a small gauge railway line with fixed sleepers, which ran parallel with the hole and was kept about 2 foot from the edge; this ensured that all the rubble went into the hole when we tipped the wagon. If the rubble collected on the lip of the hole because of the rail being too far from the edge, the thick steel sleeper rails would be moved closer to the edge with wooden levers.

A small locomotive was being used, this train had 50 tip up trucks filled with rubble which we tipped into the hole.

There were 10 men on the stretch that we were filling in, with one at each end to keep the rails straight for the train as the work went forward.

From time to time a section of rail had to be inserted as the work progressed. When the full trucks arrived each of the ten men would pull a lever and tip the rubble into the hole.

They had 5 trucks each to empty and they also had to keep their individual section of line clear, so that the truck would not become derailed. When the line was clear the loco reversed and pushed the trucks back for another load. Further along the line must have been a junction, because no sooner had an empty train gone by, than another came back full of rubble.

I was placed at one end of the line to keep the track straight and free from rubble. I had a wooden lever and a large wooden jack, this jack had a screw down the centre and a handle to operate it.

As the men filled the hole with the rubble, they had to move the track over and I had to straighten the bends, which were created. It would have been a nice job of work in the summer, but midwinter, in these conditions and on the night shift it was atrocious. We were really exposed to the elements and on the few occasions that we lost our vouchers it was sheer stupidity. On one very cold wintry night, it was snowing and blowing a gale and one of the lads was feeling downhearted, he was known to put a piece of wood against the wheels of the tip up truck and then give the all clear.

When the train driver started the train, at least 10 trucks went into the hole. We were the losers! We had to get the trucks out by hand, well those that were close to the top and then we stood around until the crane came to lift the other trucks out of the hole.

By the time the trucks were back on the rails we had a forced break and we were very cold and our vouchers had been forfeited.

We could not trade here for sausages; fats or anything like we had been able to do on the previous work parties. Here we had only the loco drivers and the German overseer that we came into contact with and they were more interested in getting work finished.

I think this was to be a site for something special.

When the British soldier placed the piece of wood against the truck wheel, it was the only deliberate attempt to derail the trucks and of course everyone was punished and not just the guilty one. Though there were other times when the trucks were derailed accidentally.

The guard gave the soldier a hard time for a while after the deliberate attempt to stop the work progressing smoothly and as the weeks went by and the weather improved, the work seemed to be quite acceptable.

Back at the billet Punch and Swanee and I worked on a rota when we were on afternoon shifts and when we were on nights.

When we returned to camp, two would get into their respective beds. The other would mash and take his mates a cuppa in bed. This was good when we got back to the billet after a cold night.

The holes were filled in and the ground was made level by March. So the work here was finished.

Once again the old enemy lice prevailed among us. There had been a few cases when we arrived at this work party and so they must have been left by the previous workers.

After a delouse and a convict hair crop we were taken to Stalag XXA.


Chapter III

I was never very happy at Stalag. Many of the soldiers there were regulars and some of these had a very dubious sexual background. I had been approached like many another soldier, it seemed that fair hair or curly hair invited suggestions of debauchery, even though the persons involved did not appear that way.

I had decided that I would keep my hair very short while I was a POW until such times that I was sure of the integrity of the people with whom I was associating. This I am sure saved me from many unsavoury approaches.

When we arrived at Stalag XXA, I was amazed to find how empty it was; many working parties had left and I thought that I had missed out.

I told Swanee and Punch that I was going to apply for farm work, but they weren't interested.

I met some of my old mates from Retford at this time, they were at Stalag when we arrived and they seemed well established and satisfied with the camp.

There was no working party available and the word went round that coalminers were needed for working parties in German occupied Russia. I was not interested I wanted farm work. When I heard that a party was needed for a State farm, I offered to go and the fact that I had already worked on a farm went in my favour and I was one of the 10 men selected. After assembly the next day we were called out by name and army number. Imagine my surprise when the first one called out was a 6 ft 2 ins Scotsman with his Tam 'o' Shanter. He was to be our sergeant (non working) in charge. I was glad that the remainder of the men were all English.

We rode in the guards van on the train and we seemed to be travelling for hours. We took plenty of food with us, as we had each received a Red Cross parcel, before we left Stalag XXA and 50 cigarettes each.

Our first guard was Czechoslovakian and while I was talking to him later, I found that he too was a coal miner. He was disgusted to find that I was a shot firer in the mine at the tender age of twenty-four. We had many talks during the next few months about coal mines. I, in pidgin German. He, in pidgin English.

The billet at the farm where we were to work was quite a small place considering the buildings they had. It was to my thinking just like a stable. Many Poles lived in similar buildings, with no upstairs, just a ground floor room housing a family. The ten of us lived in this cramped condition. The only difference was that we were fenced in by barbed wire and there were iron bars at the windows. At one end of the billet was a small barred window and on the front of the building was a large window which was 8 foot by 4 foot, this was also barred and overlooked the barbed wire compound.

At first the ten of us slept side by side on raised boards and later when it was decided that we were to stay, double bunks were made for us by the wheelwright.

More room was created by this transfer and the billet was made more habitable.

In the compound were tub toilets with 4 seats side by side and just outside the compound was the guardroom. At night the compound was locked and so was the door to our billet. Behind this door was placed a 5 gallon steel drum for our use as a toilet during the night; across the top of this drum was a piece of wood to enable the person to squat down if needs be. This drum was emptied first thing in the morning by the man on stag duty and he always needed help with the slop out. The person on stag duty was allowed an hour to sweep the room and fetch water from the well.

To do this he had a shoulder yoke and 2 churns, these he filled at the well which was about 200 yards from the billet.

It took about 20 minutes to wind up the buckets of water from the well and fill the 2 milk churns and this chore he would repeat in the evening when the men returned. The man on stag would fetch water about four times a day and the water would be used for body washing, cooking, drinking and washing clothes. We each had turns at stag duty. On Saturdays and Sundays 2 men were on duty, as such a lot of water was needed at the week end; men would wash clothes and have a stand up bath.

I was really taken aback at the size of this farm. There were about 7 Polish families working here. Fathers, sons and daughters did various jobs; some would feed the animals; pigs, cows, fowls, geese, turkeys, ducks. Everything that was running around on this farm was being attended to by one family or another, everybody had plenty of work.

The teamsters fed their own horses. The wheelwright and blacksmith asked for assistance as they wanted it. Our sergeant spent a good deal of his time with these 2 men.

There must have been forty people working on this farm, you could walk for a mile and still be on farm land.

About a mile away from the billet there were about 300 sheep and these were dipped and sheared and looked after by another family. There were sheep pens and buildings that were needed for the upkeep of the herd of sheep. In the winter months a lot of work and effort was put into the necessity of keeping these sheep alive, because of the very severe weather. I never explored the whole of the farm. I only went this far afield in the winter when the sheep needed feeding and the herdsmen wanted help. We also helped at shearing time.

The Major, the man at the main farmhouse, kept in touch with everybody by riding the whole area on horse back.

When we started work on the farm most of the crops had been set so hoeing was our first job. The guard always accompanied us at first and we were kept together. The sergeant had the choice of remaining in the yard or joining us.

The first few weeks here were very boring and we were kept away from the other workers.

We were hoeing potatoes and hoeing mangels and singling potatoes and sugar beet.

By July our first crop of hay and clover etc. was being harvested for winter feed.

The management must have realised that by keeping us apart from the Poles they were not getting the best from our labour.

Our first job with the Poles was haymaking. This was gathering the hay with hayforks and hurling it onto the wagons. A man with the experience of stacking the hay would be on top of the hay cart to ensure that the hay was stacked evenly so that it would reach its destination without falling off. Then it would be taken back to the farmyard and stacked over the cow sheds and the horse stalls.

The final step to working with both men and women on the farm came when we had to pick the ridge cucumbers. Everyone helped on this but the teamsters.

At first we began picking the cucumbers the same as the girl workers, but at the opposite end of the field.

Cane baskets 4 feet high were filled and then they were loaded onto the lorries that came to collect them. It wasn't long before the picking was left to the girls and we were just carrying and loading the baskets onto the lorries.

We carried and loaded about 60 of these baskets every day before morning break at 10 am, for weeks. We then went hoeing and hay turning.

By now we were talking to both men and women workers and the guard was not so nervy. I think the German Major must have told them to give us more scope.

By August the corn was ready for cutting, and on the evening preceding the cutting a pinging noise could be heard and looking out along the barn like houses attached to our billet, we could see the Polish men, both young and old sharpening scythes on a piece of steel and tapping the edge of the scythe with a light hammer. This was the pinging noise that we could hear. Tapping the edge of the scythe made a rough sharp edge which was honed just like a razor. The next morning the men were up the field each cutting a yard or more swath with every swing of the scythe, keeping 4 foot apart for safety. To see these men swinging the scythe in rhythmic motion was quite a sight.

As the corn was scythed it was tied into sheaves and staked out to dry, ready to be taken to the barn and stacked for future use.

The wagons that the teamsters had been using were now being converted into hay wagons. The sides and the bottoms were taken off these wagons and the wheels were extended longways and 20 to 25 foot by 4 foot sides, that looked like ladders were placed in a vee shape along the bottom. This made a very long wagon to take the corn and when this was fully loaded it was about 25 foot long and 12 to 15 foot from the top of the converted wagon, it looked like a "house made of straw" on wheels. Only the skilled workers were allowed to load these wagons.

Some of the men had prepared the huge barns back at the farmyard to receive the crop. Everybody at the start would go to the field to load the long hay wagons. Two experienced loaders would climb onto each wagon and we would fork the sheaves of corn up to them and they would stack them in a neat professional way.

Two people with 2 tined pitchforks would toss the sheaves to the loader. This gave the loaders time to stack the wagons safely and the pitchers time to fetch the sheaves from the short distance away from the wagon.

When we had cleared a certain area, we moved the wagon to another position further along the row of sheaves, until we had a load of between twelve to fifteen foot high like the afore said "house of straw".

The big strong heavy horses would then take over the load and make their way to the barns in the farmyard.

Four pitchers would be needed with the first load, this load would be taken to just outside the barn in the farmyard and they would then begin to unload. Two pitchers would stay on top of the load and toss a sheaf of corn to a fellow worker, the workers would each catch a sheaf and pass it to the older men who were one each side of the barn. These older men would skilfully pack the barn so that as we filled it we wouldn't get into each other's way. This was very important for as the barn filled, we, in the barn, were above the loads that came in.

By the time the first wagon was emptied, another one or two wagons would be waiting to be unloaded. The teamsters bringing the loads in would hitch up to the empty wagon which had been pushed aside. He would then return to the field for another load and after a while there was a steady flow and the work proceeded smoothly.

We changed jobs from day to day, because the work at the barns were more demanding than the work in the fields. As the barn filled more labour was needed and it was far more difficult to fill the top half than the bottom. At the halfway mark, long one foot square beam supports had to be contended with and worked around. To fill the barn to its full capacity up to the apex and keep a safe footing was really hard and slow sweaty work.

At the apex only 2 men would be in the barn; the others would already have started on another barn.

At a busy time like this we POWs would all be in one place, either in the field or in the barn, this way, our midday meal, mostly soup could be delivered to one place.

Once all the barns were filled we started on stacks in the field. These were a different proposition. They would be stacked working from both sides. The corn didn't have to come as far, therefore two could be started at the same time, though more care was to be taken making the stacks in the open.

The butt end of the sheaf, (the end that has been cut) had to be facing outward and at an angle pointing slightly downward; so that when it rained the water would run off the side of the stack and onto the ground. Any water running into the stack would cause the grain to start growing and the whole stack would be lost. It also had to be straight sided and safe from wind damage. Stacking was always done by the skilled.

Towards the end of the harvest, the time would come to decide if there was enough corn to make another stack, if it was doubtful, the threshing machine would be hauled onto the field close by and we would be threshing for 2 or 3 days to finish the rest of the corn. After the corn was threshed the grain would be taken down to the granary at the farm.

The straw was then restacked in the field and later used for bedding down the cattle and also for covering the root crops in winter to keep out the very severe frosts.

The word came from Stalag XXA that we were to remain at this State Farm for the rest of the winter. I was glad to hear this.

We were then organised to fetch wood from a part of the farm where we had never been before. We were supplied with crosscut saws and axes before we went and to our surprise when we arrived, there were sawing frames and plenty of wood. I think this was a place where the wheelwright had wood stacked for his future use.

We soon gathered and chopped a load of wood. The sergeant was with us and we made a day of it: a sort of celebration. Even the guard joined in, by now he knew he was on a good thing. He could go into town almost as he wanted. He knew we were under the supervision of the three farm inspectors.

The corn harvest was now finished and the hay wagons were soon converted back to deal with the harvesting of the root crops.

The light horses were used for clearing the stubble from the cornfields. Two light horses would be tackled up to a heavy wooden rake with long spikes attached. This rake looked very heavy and very primitive.

One of the lads with us who had been a farm hand in England said he had never seen anything like it. Though it did what it was intended to do. It ripped the roots (stubble) out of the ground. The field could then be manured, deep ploughed and left for the winter frosts to break it down.

We were now on what was called the potato crop. Looking at the massive expanse of potatoes, I wondered how long it would take to harvest these, bearing in mind there was no machines to help with the work. Every potato had to be pulled up separately, with what was known as a potato grabber. This I described earlier at Frau Leidkers farm. All the potato grabbing was carried out by the girls.

There were loads and loads of baskets, all the same size and the girls filled these baskets as they picked the potatoes. Four of these baskets full of potatoes were equal to one centna (100 lbs). The girls would take these baskets as they filled them, to one of the wagons and each girl would get the overseer to register in her name, the number of baskets she had filled. At the end of the harvest for every centna registered in her name, her family was allowed a percentage of potatoes for their own use.

As the baskets were registered with the overseer we POWs would take them from the girls and tip them into a wagon and place the empty baskets into a selected place for the girls to use again. I was amazed at the speed and progress made. Here again the 2 light horses came into use. The big heavy wagons really did sink into the soil when filled with potatoes and it needed the four horses to get the wagons moved to the place where they were to be clamped for the winter. This would be a good distance away.

At the area where they were to be clamped, workers were unloading the potatoes and putting them in pyramid shaped rows. After the potato harvest a layer of straw was covered over them, held down by the occasional shovel full of earth. This was to protect them from freak frosts that could be expected at this time of the year.

Whilst we were finishing the potato crop, securing them and covering them against frost, the women workers were top and tailing the swedes and mangels. The tops (the leaves) were kept separate. These were stacked and used as a supplement winter feed for the cows. This was called silage and the tops of the sugar beet was also used in this way at a later date.

The mangels and swedes, another type of cattle feed, was not so time consuming as the potatoes and these were also put into clamps like the potatoes. These clamps were also pyramid shape, they were wider and higher than the potatoes. They didn't need much straw and soil and could have frost on them and still be used as cattle feed.

At this time the workers excluding the teamsters were sealing the clamps against the frosts that were now expected.

The last crop, sugar beet, was quite a large crop but it was very easy. We only had to contend with the leaves and these were used for silage. The sugar beet roots were taken straight to the railway station en-route to Germany.

As the nights began to draw in we found it very difficult to light our billet either to read or entertain ourselves. There was no gas, electricity or lamps of any kind and candles were very hard to come by.

We tried melting axle grease until it was liquid. When the wick was lit, it gave a flickering light but this was very smoky and smelly, causing us to open the windows, it was either choke to death or freeze to death.

We must have looked very weird and uncouth sitting around these smoking lights in our long polish overcoats.

We eventually found that carbide could be acquired, the Poles probably used this old type lamp and so we began to experiment with this form of gas.

The empty tins from the Red Cross parcels came into use and we attempted to make crude lamps by putting carbine into a tin: one end of the tin completely cut out. A small amount of carbide was put into a saucer, the open end of the tin was placed over the carbide and a pinhole was made in the top of the tin. We put a drop of water into the saucer which filtered underneath the tin and activated the carbide to form gas. We then put a light to the pinhole on top of the tin and got a brilliant light. At this stage we couldn't control the flame. We tried different ways until one of the lads brought a swede to cook. We cut the top and the bottom off this swede, leaving an inch and a half ring of swede: in the centre of the swede we placed the carbide and then the open end of the tin was pressed over the carbide and about half inch into the swede. We got a good result instantly.

The moisture from the cut swede was sufficient to activate the carbide and so give steady light. Better than candle light. As the swede dried we poured water into the saucer, which filtered through the swede and kept the carbide activated.

We were really chuffed and for a while all of us had a light.

There were quite a few mishaps at first; such as the tin jumping out of the saucer, when too much water was put into it and gradually by trial and error we got a light, to our satisfaction.

All the root crops, potatoes, swedes and mangels, now had to have a foot of soil put on top of the straw to keep out the winter frosts and it took quite a while to do this. It brought us up to November before this work was finished. The final job of work was the sealing of the silage, which always gave off a very sour stench.

All the fields would have been ploughed by now. A few days threshing was needed to fill the granary before most of the girls were laid off until the Spring. From now through till Christmas we were mostly going up to the potato and mangel clamps. With the mangels it was simply filling the wagons with the teamster, who would take them back to the farmyard for cattle feed.

The potato crop was different, we had a 6 foot hand made conveyer with open wooden slats that let the small potatoes drop through onto the floor. These small potatoes were for the pigs the larger ones went to the end of the conveyer and were loaded into a wagon. The conveyer was manually operated by turning a two and a half foot diameter wheel which had a handle attached. Fifteen minutes at turning this wheel was very hard work, especially if the conveyer was full of Potatoes; it took a long while to fill a wagon this way. Most of our time was taken up doing this during the winter.

The small potatoes were taken back to the yard each day. 'I'hey were cooked and fed to the pigs. Through the winter months we were either loading potatoes and grain, and then threshing as the granary emptied.

By now Christmas was approaching. It was freezing cold both day and night: it was minus 20 and even lower at times. It was difficult to keep warm in these temperatures and half starved as we were.

Just before Christmas one of our party was suddenly unwell, he had what we called a "welly". This was a letter from some person back home to tell him that his wife was going about with another man. I had experienced seeing other soldiers downhearted because of this. Some even received a letter to say a member of the family had died; when they had not. It is said that blackmail is murder of the soul; well this was akin to blackmail, because of the length of time it took to find out that it was not true. This would be a very soul destroying time for the soldier involved. These mean minded folks calling themselves well wishers, no doubt would have enjoyed their handiwork if they could have seen gaunt, haggard men just shrivelled up and inconsolable.

Our sergeant and the guard took the soldier to Stalag XXA. When the sergeant returned after a few days, he came back with another guard and another mate. He also returned with a Red Cross parcel for each of us and cigarettes. I was sorry to lose the guard, we had many a chat together about our work in civvy street, which was coal mining. He always argued that I was too young at twenty four to be in charge of detonators and said I should not have been allowed to use explosives down the mine at that age.

The friendly way our sergeant handled the situation with the very upset soldier made me think what a very humane person he was.

Our new guard was not what we would call an A1 soldier, he had a gammy leg and he also brought a guitar along with him. His name was Franz and he didn't seem to care about the war, he would go along with anything the overseer suggested, he was very easy to get along with.


Chapter IV

This was to be my third Christmas as a POW and like many others I was looking for the silver lining. There was no good news for us. I was always having problems with my stomach. But with the help of the Red Cross parcels and the white bread we received for the evening meal and breakfast at the farm, I managed to keep going.

I never knew the casualty list of POWs in Germany. I do know that in my party of 10 men, that over a period of just under 3 years, one died and 3 had to be replaced and one of the replacements had to be replaced. I put this down to the very hard winters and the lack of nourishing food. Without the Red Cross, the few that we received, more would have perished.

I have heard of the "Following Winds" and winds like a "wetted knife". At minus 10 and even lower during the day at times: in an open field, it was all of this. It was "wetted" and seemed to "follow" us everywhere. In these conditions one could eat every hour and still feel hungry.

This Christmas was to be my best one to date.

With a Red Cross parcel and 100 cigarettes, food wise we couldn't grumble; mentally however, it was not so good: as we looked through the windows of the billet and saw the Poles and Germans going on their respective way to town.

The compound was only 100 yards from the main road. At first we would wave to those passing, but as days, weeks and months went by we realised how hopelessly empty our existence was, behind a 20 foot all round and 8 foot high, barbed wire fence.

This Christmas 1942/3. We had 2 days rest. The 10 of us amused ourselves by playing cards and on Christmas Day and Boxing Day we enjoyed a steady walk to the main farmhouse which we POWs called the White House. Here we had a turkey dinner on both days. This was not surprising for there were dozens of turkeys running around in the farmyard. Turkeys, geese, bantams, fowls and ducks could all be seen around the pond. We were glad to get Christmas over as there were too many thoughts of home and of past Christmas's when we had happy times. Even though we had more freedom than in the Stalag we were still cold and miserable.

The replacement brought us the news that Monty had retaken El Alamein and that many German soldiers were under attack at Stalingrad. He assumed that we already knew about this, as the battle of El Alamein was fought in October. We had been waiting for good news so long; he was overwhelmed with our enquiries.

By now it was mid winter and we had had some snow. It was frosty both day and night for weeks with no let up and we had to watch each other for frost bites and everybody sported a little diamond on the nose end.

When very bad conditions were prevalent we had an understanding with the overseer Ramonovski that he would accept a certain amount of work for that day. He knew what a reasonable days work was so he would tell us what work had to be done and we would finish it off and take shelter instead of hanging around wet through in what could be atrocious conditions.

The straw and soil had to be removed and the potato clamps had to be opened and the potatoes graded, then the clamps closed again to keep out the frost.

Every day we did the same thing. The grain had to be weighed, sacked and sent on its way.

Suddenly out of the blue we were given the oddest tools imaginable they were cross cut saws with 20 pound weights of iron fastened to one end and eight 6 foot poles with a hook and a spike at one end and pick axes. It was explained to us that we were to fetch the ice, for the freezers in the Majors farmhouse.

We were taken in a wagon along with the tools to a large lake which was frozen over; it was from this lake that the ice was to be cut.

At the far end of the lake we cut 2 holes about 40 foot apart, the ice was about 18 inches thick. Into the holes we put the weighted end of the crosscut saw and we sawed the ice towards each other, making a forty foot cut. We then had a section where we could pull the ice from the water. It was evident what the pole with the spikes and the hooks were for. The spike was for stabbing into the ice to cut it into pieces and the hook was to lift the ice out of the water. The ice was then slid down to the teamster, who loaded the wagon. At midday we had loaded three wagons and were on our way back.

On our return to the farmhouse we took the ice to a small bank on the side of the road which was close to the White House. The bank had a door built into it and 3 or 4 foot inside was another door and to my surprise a room about 15 foot square with frames to stack the ice. Standing back and looking at this room it had soil about 4 foot thick all the way round it was a perfectly good fridge. On the top outside, it had 5 foot of horse manure and every year about 2 foot of fresh horse manure was put on the top of the old. This made a perfect bed for mushrooms, which we gathered in pounds later on in the year. The Poles wouldn't touch them, they said that they were poison. The ice stayed frozen all through the summer months and was used daily in the old type fridges.

This was the only break we had from potatoes, mangels, silage, grain and some threshing, until the spring of 1943.

I had been a prisoner of war now for three years and I felt it was beginning to show. I had been lying awake at night for some weeks with tooth ache and I had observed the restlessness of the men in the night. The sergeant referred me to the guard and along with another man who had jaundice, the 4 of us went by train to Stalag XXA.

I was apprehensive when I arrived at Stalag. I thought that I might have to look round for another working party and have to make fresh acquaintances.

Within three days of leaving the farm the sergeant, Franz the guard, a replacement for the soldier who was ill and I went back again.

I'd had my tooth filled temporarily and I was told to return in 3 months. The treatment I had for my tooth was very primitive. The filling kept coming out and I had to fill the hole with any sort of wool I could find, mostly from my sock.

After we returned from Stalag we were setting spuds and like the previous crop it was huge, it was not so time consuming as I thought it might be. The ploughed field was first raked level and then a machine about 12 foot wide was pulled by 2 horses across the field. This made holes in the soft soil which were about 18 inches apart and in rows 2 foot wide. This machine looked like a long roller made up of rimless wheels.

There was a wagon on each side of the field full of seed potatoes. The 30 girls would then take a basket and put in as many seed potatoes as they could carry. They would then walk along individual rows dropping a seed potato into the hole that the machine had made, scuffing the earth over the top of it as they went along. We POWs carrying sacks of seed potatoes which had been filled at the wagon, followed, and kept the girls baskets full. The whole of the potato crop was set in one day. The plough would then follow and cover the potatoes, the light weight horses were used for this work; each one tackled to a single plough. The horses were very frisky and had to be led. One man led 2 horses, each horse pulling a single plough. The ploughman at the back would make sure that each potato was covered as he guided his plough down the row.

As many horses as possible was used to cover this potato crop. It took days after the girls had finished to complete this huge crop of potatoes. The teamsters were very busy at this time of the year. The fields had to be raked and prepared for the crops to be set and food for the livestock had to be taken to the yard.

It was this time of the year 1943 that we were to be reminded of the stress we were going through, when a young man in his early twenties fell ill. A doctor attended to him upon the request of the guard and the Major. He died the following day. If he had been in England I feel sure his life could have been saved.

His passing was very distressing for all of us. A funeral service was held and a few of the Polish workers, the guard and the Major attended the service.

Photographs were taken of the burial and we were allowed to buy them with camp money.

After the long dreary cold winter we were glad to be out and about again. For a while we were working with a woman who was named Antosha, she was a perfect leader, either sowing or hoeing; she was about 40 years old and had a very rugged countenance: she was never in a hurry, but my goodness!! she didn't half move no matter what the work was. She would look at the working party and ask "How many worked right handed" and "How many worked left handed" when hoeing. Then she would count so many rows down the field and she would then start them working, so many on her right and so many on her left. It worked out that nobody trod on the work that the person in front had done.

This year we tried 2 fresh crops, onion sets and flax, though we had nothing to do with the setting of the flax.

I helped with the setting of the onions and "Oh what a back breaking job that was". The rows were 1 foot wide and the onion sets were 6 inches apart. We had a full wagon of these bloody things. It was the first time either of these crops had been set on this farm. The only good that we POWs got out of this crop was, we took the bigger ones and used them, cut up with the curd cheese. The curd we got from the sour milk and this we had in an abundance at this time of year because the cows were being fed silage with their feed. After it had stood all winter the silage had a distinct sour smell and the milk from the cows was sour as it came from them. Large white sacks of cheese from the sour milk was placed at intervals in the cow shed and this milk was also included in the pigs diet.

By now we had taken on the duties of a trusted farm hand. Quite a few of the Poles were being called up for the army. What their roll was in the war I wouldn't know; they were seen once when they came home in their uniform and after that I never saw any of them again. Though both men and horses were taken away and it soon began to show.

The horses had sores through them being too long in harness on heavy work, and oxen with horns about 4 foot across appeared on the scene. These had thick wooden yokes across their foreheads to pull the load. They looked so bloody ferocious and yet they were as timid as sheep.

I remember very well how frightening these huge animals could be. On one occasion Pluto, another member of our work party, and I were walking down a narrow lane towards the horse stables when suddenly, from behind us, we heard this young Polish lad who was in charge of the oxen. He was shouting and running flat out, his eyes were sticking out of his head like two doughnuts and well they may be for just behind him were nine oxen at full gallop. Leatka, the lad knew that they couldn't stop and he knew there was nowhere to get out of the way. Get out of the way is what we did "Bloody fast". Just down the lane was the gate to the Majors vegetable garden and we just had time to swing it open when Leatka was on top of us. There was a cloud of dust as the tons of oxen and horns went by.

We were just starting to grin about it when I looked over the fence, the oxen had all got their heads up, with horns at the alert and to make things worse they were looking for Leatka on the bloody trot.

Pluto and I disappeared after this and left Leatka to it.

We were asked to pair off for different work to be done and I and our new replacement Alf, volunteered to clear a field full of stones that was causing a lot of trouble to the equipment and causing a good deal of work for the wheelwright as weIl.

To start off we had a wooden box with long handles each end for carrying purposes. We then walked up and down the field putting the stones that could be handled into the box. We then carried them to the side of the field filling in the ruts that the heavy wagons had made. When we had finished taking the stones off the ground that could be carried; we began to move the big ones which were sticking out of the ground.

To get these big ones out, we were supplied with a steel pickaxe, a wooden lever,  a jack made of wood and a 3 foot long steel rod.

We would push the steel rod into the ground to find the outline and how deep the stone was in the ground. We would then dig down below its lowest point, push the jack into the hole that we had dug, wedging the top of the jack under the stone. We jacked it up as high as possible and threw soil underneath the stone. We did this at different sides of the stone until we had it lying on top of the ground. The lever and pickaxe was also used to help to get the stone to the surface. A teamster was then called and he would bring a sling to drag the stone to the side of the field.

It was getting close to the time for me to go back to Stalag XXA once again for my tooth to be filled properly. We were to bring back with us a replacement for the colleague who had died. I think the management at the farm had begun to realise that more of the farm workers were to be called up for the German army. We were away for a few days whilst my tooth was being filled and we got a replacement. When we arrived at Stalag XXA there were quite a few sailors there and one was from Nottingham (a Towny). He explained to me that during that mad dash across the Scaggerak his sub had ideas of sinking us. He even named the boat we were on. We were riding so high in the water and they thought we had no cargo, therefore, his Captain didn't think it was worth the fish (torpedo). I stayed a few days with this sailor, talking mostly about Nottingham. He would like to have applied for the replacement we needed but for some reason the Germans wouldn't allow sailors on working parties.

I never found out what happened to his submarine, all he said was "They let it go for a packet of Woodbines". I didn't press him further he seemed so upset when it was mentioned. As in most cases when meeting a "Towny" we promised to get in touch when it was all over. We never did.

After a couple of days I had my tooth filled properly. The Australian doctor who treated me asked me questions about the farm where we worked. I supposed he asked this because of the death of our mate and because there had been one or two replacements.

I got the feeling that quite a few POWs were having trouble both mentally and physically.

I had to wait two days to see this doctor, as he was very busy. His patients must have been from working parties, for there wasn't many POWs in Stalag XXA.  After seeing the Dentist we were ready to go back, another man joined us and we returned to the farm.

By now Alf and I were mates and we shared everything.

I still had to be careful with the filling in my tooth, I could eat hot and cold food without getting pain in my teeth although the Dentist had said that the filling was not first class.

Private parcels and letters were getting through to us now and at a better rate. I always saved the chocolate from these parcels for when my stomach was upset. I could get through the bad times much better if I had the rusk like biscuits from the Canadian Red Cross parcels. I did many swaps to acquire these biscuits.

It was about this time that I had a letter from a lady from Dorking in Surrey. Mrs Jacomb was her name. She had adopted me as a pen friend and wanted to know what type of book I read. Alf my mate said straight away Peter Cheyney so I asked for this author. My wife corresponded with Mrs Jacomb a good many times during the war years and wrote to thank her for the books and for her interest and kindness shown to me during my captivity I should have made her acquaintance before she joined her son in New Zealand. Though I am very sorry to say we never met.

Once again I was getting wire crazy. The more I watched the people going backwards and forwards to town, the more I thought of home. What a sleazy monotonous existence it was here behind a barbed wire fence. I felt I must get outside of the wire as I did at Frau Leidkers farm. It would be easy to do, just climb the fence and go. For the first half hour it would be like walking on air. Then, after looking around there is nothing. No lights, either in the road or in the houses. All there is are bushes and dykes, which one stumbles into. This is farmland in occupied Poland. All around are countries occupied by Germans or Russians.

Danzig is close by and we know this is like a fortress having worked there during 1940/1 and there was no means of escape from there. It would take more than an hour to work off your paddy and probably twice as long to get back. I do know of many soldiers who climbed over the wire fence and went walk about, it was a way of letting off steam. Once again we had a change of guard. We heard him a long while before we saw him, he was stoned out of his mind. With all the noise he was making I imagined him to be about 6 foot. He was in fact a German Feldwebel (sergeant) about 5 foot 4 inches he was as far across as he was tall and instead of a chip bag hat he wore a helmet. He looked very funny and he also looked and sounded very forbidding. He made our guard stand at attention for quite a while, the guard looking very forlorn.

After the feldwebel had washed he came to see us; he stood beside our sergeant, who was 6 foot the guard looking like a midget at his side. In spite of his small stature, he was a very thick set muscular man and not much fat there.

We had the feeling that he had been on the wrong side of a battle, like some of us. He was to be the best of our guards. He was not the "Heil Hitler" type when he greeted the Major or anyone else. He tried to make life that much easier for us whenever he could.

To start with he took two of us to town and he persuaded a butcher to let us buy meat (wurst) and a few other things from other shops with camp money. He might have received a rollicking for this as it only happened on the one occasion. He was more lenient than any other guard we had ever had. If we were on stag duty with this guard and happened to get talking to one of the Poles at the well, he wouldn't bother, he just took no notice. I think he had sussed the position right from the start as far as escape was concerned. On one side of us was Russia at war and there was Danzig on another side of us. The coast was guarded like Fort Knox. There were hundreds of miles of Poland and occupied countries around it. I did hear him say "Where can they go?". We all of us said this man had been around. He would come in at night and have a fag and a cup of tea with us: he would never speak openly about the war. I had a feeling he had seen quite a lot of it, after all, the war had been on now for 3 1/2 years.

Eventually he came to an agreement with us, instead of locking us up in the billet he would let us have the run of the compound; if we would stay in it whilst he was away. He never bothered about the Poles talking to us through the wires and that made it good for us, as we could stay outside until it was dark.

This was very nice in the summer when it was hot and we went along with it, he hinted that he would only be here for a short time before he was sent back into action and he was making the best of it.

He did like his pint of beer though, he came back from town many times well over the limit, though he was never quarrelsome; he held his drink very well.

News was getting to us from the Poles about Russia and how they were progressing. The Poles seemed very worried and fearful of the Russians.

Everything on the farm seemed to be getting done, the hoeing and the haymaking was one long monotonous slog. lt was work all work.

Another one of the party went back to Stalag, he was one of the replacements. He told me that he could always go back whenever he wanted. He must have had some kind of ailment that the Germans accepted, because he was soon replaced.

Talking to Alf one day I mentioned how long I had been here and how beezed off I was and I was surprised when he said "Let's apply for a job transfer". He seemed to know more about it than I did and I left it to him to arrange. We were to be sorry for this later, we should have gone into the matter more thoroughly, for by now we were getting to be real friends and this made life easier for both of us.

We were harvesting once again and up to the neck in work. Occasionally workers came from different parts of the war zone and so we were getting news, mostly from the Russian area the Ukraine.

Another one of our lads was troubled, he was having very bad toothache. He was taken to the dentist and was told that he needed 2 extractions. No painkilling drug was available, so the teeth had to be extracted without freezing the gum and he had a very traumatic time for a few days.

I was having skin trouble; the very cold winters and hot summers and the spreading of artificial fertilisers by hand had caused my skin to crack and bleed and I developed tiny vesicles under my skin which I thought was very conspicuous and making me very self-conscious.

The new crop that we had set, flax, had been left too long and it was over ripe. We were asked to harvest this crop, starting at 4 am and whilst the dew was on it,  so as to reduce the loss of seed and we were promised time off later because of this early start.

The overseer was pleased with the onion crop, this being the first of its kind on this farm.

The land that had been treated with muck and artificial fertiliser gave first class results.

What struck me as being weird was the lack of song birds, larks, thrushes and the like. I never saw a game bird, pheasant or partridge in my 5 yrs as a POW, I saw just one fox, even when we cut the corn and guns were at the ready I never saw a rabbit. Sparrows, rats, mice and cats were in an abundance. I never heard of a fox attacking the fowls, turkeys etc. in the farmyard. It seemed to me that when Poland capitulated everything seemed to have died; it was such a forlorn desolate empty place.

As Autumn approached we had another sick mate, he had jaundice. The Doctor prescribed for him and he stayed in the billet until he was fit again and he would help by doing all the stag duties whilst he was confined to the billets.

Each year we seemed to get more involved with the working of this farm. This year it was Schnapps, though we had nothing to do with the making of the stuff, we did load the barrels onto lorries and make ready for sending them to the railway. I don't know how our sergeant got some of the Schnapps, as the Germans were all over the place, but get some he did and how he could drink it was another thing; it was so strong you could feel it burning your mouth and throat. A thimble full was my limit and even that small amount upset my stomach.

Most of the lads had a drink , they didn't show any interest for it either. Only the sergeant and he said it was good, I think he got plenty of it down him too. The brenneri mister, whose name was Shultz got his milk churn full of the stuff. Shultz always had Schnapps and plum juice mixed together when he went up the field especially in the winter. He would turn his back to us as he sneaked a drink.

We were now doing all of the jobs leading up to Christmas, clamping potatoes etc. the same as last year. This was the first time Alf had done this kind of work and he was quite intrigued.

The weather was starting to get cold again. I did dread the cold winters, gradually these atrocious winter conditions were wearing us down and the billet, no matter how we tried we couldn't make it look like a place that one could live in. These sheds were never meant for human habitation. In fact they were identical to the pig sties. The only difference was that we had a fireplace added and glass covered the barred windows.

I was now approaching my 4th Christmas and I, like many of the others had England very much on the mind. I pictured a nice long soak in a warm bath and the luxury of warm surroundings. We pitied these people, the life they have here, but "Hell!" our lot was not so flaming hot either. I felt we had gone back 100 years. It was so primitive in every aspect.

Like the previous year we were given 2 days off from farm work at Christmas.

The guard was full of spirits and I mean spirits, the intoxicating kind. He took off to town and came back loaded. We sang carols again this year and Alf liked "The Old Rugged Cross". I don't think he had heard that one before.

Both the door to the billets and the one to the compound was open. We went outside to the Majors house carol singing and we went to a few of the Poles houses singing carols too. The guard told us to have as good a time as possible. Some of our lads were invited into the Poles houses for a drink of Christmas cheer.

Alf and I walked the length of the farm, as far as where the sheep were and with the snow on the ground it was quite light. When we reached the shepherds house the dogs were very excited, they were barking and snarling, then I heard Nina the shepherds daughter quietening them.

We were invited into the house and the shepherd played a tune for us on his fiddle. We stayed for about an hour and was invited to have cold lamb with them. When we left we gave them a few cigs and pipe tobacco. This little outing didn't seem much, but it broke the monotony. During the time we were at the shepherds nobody seemed to have missed us, everybody was in a good mood and chatting together. We must have been awake nearly all of the night, we were singing and even the guard joined in; it was a real pick me up.

It was after Christmas when an unter feldwebel came to the billet with another soldier, the soldier was a Geordie. The transfer that Alf had applied for had been accepted. But Damn!. It just came for him. His name had been forwarded to go to another working party. Not mine. I was to stay. Both of us were gutted.

We quickly exchanged one or two things. He gave me a photo album containing many photos of events, pantomimes, boxing exhibitions and shows which were put on at Stalag XXA. Although this album was rather heavy, I carried it with me on the three months march, in front of the Russian advance as they overrun Poland and Germany in 1945. He also gave me a blue hand knitted pullover which his sister had knitted for him. We were quick to say goodbye and I never saw Alf again until after the war was over and he brought his wife Rita to visit us in Nottingham.


Chapter V

It was after Christmas during January 1944 that I developed boils. I had so many of these that I had to have treatment. The German doctor gave me injections for them. These boils were all over my back, face and chest, I was in a right mess. I had a huge boil on each side of my face and very close to my ear, which gave me constant earache. I had both abscesses lanced by the German doctor and after this minor operation I experienced immediate relief.

For most of the time now I partnered the new replacement. I can't honestly say that I tried very hard to get on with him. In my mind was the memory of my first encounter with soldiers from North of the border, I still had a feeling of apprehension and that an argument was just around the corner. I was wrong though, he turned out to be no different from any other soldier. His name was Jock and it was quite some time before we became friends.

He was full of information from the grapevine. He got the news from Stalag. He brought us news of the Allies and how well they were doing. Up till now all the war news had been from the Russian front. In a way he was like a breath of fresh air to us and he grew on me like Roses Chocolate. We never got to the stage where we shared our cigarettes, we did become good pals.

As the weeks passed by, during the setting of the crops we did notice how apprehensive the Poles were becoming about the Russian advance. Most of them feared the news they were receiving of the Russians progress.

Something else was happening too; the word Partisanty was being floated about, these were undercover Poles fighting the Germans, we called them "Charlies Auntie". It was hinted that if we contacted these people, they could help us to get back to England. If this was true we would have loved to have made their acquaintance. We had had enough of this life we were leading and we had many sessions discussing it. Without a doubt we could easily have made our escape anytime we had wanted and could have made a good start before we were missed. We had heard some time ago that Danzig had been bombed, very heavily, so that way out would be closed; either for Charlies Auntie, or anyone else's auntie. We decided the best way was to stay put and wait.

Some workers came from the Ukraine in June and they hinted that the Russians were fighting well inside the Ukraine.

We also had an unexpected visit from the Red Cross Society and St John, they were enquiring how POWs were faring. I think the death of the soldier in 1943, plus the fact that a number of lads had reported sick and returned to Stalag had prompted their visit.

This was understandable, because in winter we were working in temperatures anything from minus 8 during the day and sometimes minus 20 at night and on inadequate food for these conditions. Our billet was hardly ever warm and by the time we came in from work it would be dark in winter and all we had was just the one fireplace and there was never time for the room to get warm before we went to bed.

We answered the Red Cross Inspectors questions and they departed, we never got any benefit whatsoever from their visit.

At harvest time this year things were so much different. We were seeing the results of the Russian Campaign. Even the man second to the Major was called up for war duties, the horses and the teamsters were going too.

There were whispers from the Poles that we had invaded France and this was confirmed by the guard, though he was so sure the Allies would be pushed back. He admitted later though that we were making progress. We heard of more bombing in Danzig and Poles with rifles were hiding in the woods in this area.

The rumours were so strong we imagined ourselves to be home for Christmas and as the days went by the news was so heartening that we were sure of it.

During the harvesting I had been working with a Ukrainian family, husband and wife and their two children. They would work together in the field every day. They gave us information about the Russian advance and that the Russians were steadily moving forward all the time and this little family were hoping to get back for Christmas.

When I told the lads back at the billet, they too said that they had heard news to this effect. This was great.

More of the crop this year went to the railway for dispatch to Germany. In September we were out in the field and heard a noise like distant thunder. On looking up there was a huge ball of fire in the sky, it seemed to disappear but there was no explosion.

This happened quite a few times in the next few days. We didn't believe the guard when he said it was a secret weapon. It was the V2.

As the weeks went by we realised it was going to be another very cold winter and we hoped we would get a Red Cross parcel to help us to get through it. This was to be our 5th winter and if there was ever a time we needed these parcels it was this time of year. The work was so different this year. Some days I was helping the cowman, I never had to do the milking, I just did the mucking out and walked the bull, though I never understood why this was done.

Mucking out was shifting the soiled straw from around the cows, barrowing it along a plank to the muck heap and after clearing all the soiled straw away I would then walk the bull. To do this I had a long steel rod with a handle at one end and a gadget at the other end to attach to the bulls nose. Then I would walk the bull up and down the dung heap guiding it with the ring in its nose. I don't know if this was to keep the bull fit, or to firm the dung heap. One had to be very careful doing this, for the top of a dung heap is not the best place for walking even without a ton of bull at your side. One slip either from me or the bull, could result in a broken limb.

I preferred the job with the wheelwright. Every Autumn the wheelwright would take one of us with him and walk along one of the fields which had a dyke running down one side.

Down the side of this dyke were willow trees, they had been stopped at sometime and a callous had formed at the top and from this, long tapering shoots about 6 foot long had sprouted out. These formed perfect shafts for the pitchforks that we used at harvest time.

For this work we took with us a small ladder and a saw, which we used to lob off the branches which were selected.

The winter ploughing and the potato clamps did not seem to be so important this year. I had a feeling that the grain and the potatoes were going to be moved very quickly to Germany.

Just before Christmas we had a private parcel delivery and I was pleased to receive cigs, socks and chocolate.

I had tried during the Summer, to get my back and chest clear of the boils, by spells of sunbathing. The Sun had helped for a short time, but I was soon covered with boils again. The skin on my face was very lumpy and to me it looked awful, I was very conscious of it. I was also very ill with my stomach again. The only treatment I had for this was to make myself sick. This was the only thing I could do ease the pain and discomfort. I must have been about 9 stone in weight, this was 2 1/2 stone less than I should be.

That December it was snowing and very cold, it was dark early and the only comfort we had was from the Poles who assured us that the Russians were on the borders of Poland. We calculated this to be 400 miles from where we were. We didn't know whether to believe this or not, as we had not seen any Russian planes. Yet out of the blue something happened that almost confirmed it.

A full cavalry unit of Cossacks who were fighting with the Germans arrived and took over the whole area around the farmyard and the area outside the compound, they had even got their women folk with them; it looked just like a gypsy camp. In fact it was worse, because in one place, there was a horse that had been killed, whether it had been wounded, I don't know: it was being used for food. These people looked as if they had been roughed up by the Russians.

A number of the live stock turkeys, fowls, pigs etc. went missing, even the duck pond had been bombed for the fish in it. The small perch in the pond were all floating dead on top of the water. The Polish girls in the kitchen actually cooked them for our dinner, they probably thought they were doing us a favour. They mixed them with the spuds and didn't even take the heads off, I realised this when I saw a fish eye looking at me from my mashed potato. It looked revolting, I pushed my plate away and so did the other lads at the table with me.

There seemed to be no apparent leaders with these Cossack soldiers. No parades and no discipline either. They slept in tents and makeshift tents and anywhere they could lay their heads. The horses were tied to stakes knocked into the ground and they were fed where they stood.

I do believe the Major had orders to feed these turncoats and their horses, because the pans on the open fires and the field kitchens always seemed full of soup. If I were a German soldier, I wouldn't feel safe with men like these behind me.

At night, from the window of the billet it looked very weird. There was the unfamiliar sound of the horses as they fed and stamped. The sparks and crackling from the various open fires, when fresh wood was thrown onto them and the many heated arguments from our quarrelsome guests. Nobody on the farm went out at night, whilst these people were here. They looked and were a barbarous and unruly lot. They were here for less than a week and then went off again.

They did a bit of a clean up and even so they left plenty of feathers and horse muck

We were glad when they went, apart from the noise and awful suspense they brought with them, we were worried about visiting the well, which was our only supply of water. It was not an ordinary queue with this lot. Anything that could hold water was tied to a rope and thrown into the well. At times it was a frightening place to be the fact that most of their receptacles were covered in horse muck etc. never seemed to worry them at all.

I hoped that we were not liberated by their counterparts on the Russian side. I was beginning to understand why the Poles were so worried when the word Ruskie was mentioned, no one seemed to be in charge and the feeling was, that a blood bath was imminent in their presence.

If these Cossacks were the stock in trade of the Russian army, I was hoping that such an unruly lot was not going to be the ones to liberate us. I didn't think that they would abide by the Geneva Convention.

That Christmas we heard of the Polish uprising in Warsaw and that this had been crushed by the Germans in August and that many Poles had been killed. We were getting news of the German farmers who had gone to Poland in 1940 and who were fleeing back to Germany because of the Russian advance. This Christmas we were on top of the world. Even the guard was feeling the tension over the news we were receiving.

The overseer, who was Polish, feared he may be in trouble with the workforce, both men and women, because of the way he had treated some of them during the occupation.

We POWs had been asked to attend a dance at Christmas and when we first heard of this invite we could hardly believe it.

One of the barns that had been cleared of wheat was to be used. The German Major and his wife provided a few sandwiches and diluted schnapps, the schnapps were diluted with juice from damsons. It wasn't champagne, but it tasted like it to us, we were on cloud 9. We sensed that our lives as POWs was coming to an end. The Poles enjoyed the dance and so did we although the music, the fiddles and accordions were not professional, but we didn't care, for we were walking on air as we knew things were coming to a head.

Out in the fields in January we had seen planes and we knew that they weren't German and by the middle of January we knew that the war was getting close to us. There was fighting in Warsaw that was less than 200 miles away.

We could see German farmers in their wagons covered with tarpaulin going down the main road on the way to Germany. Work had almost come to a stop and we just seemed to be waiting.

After the third week in January we were killing pigs and preparing for we knew not what.

We didn't know if we were to stay and be overrun by the Russians or whether we would have to take to the road and become refugees.

Our sergeant was at his best at this time. I sensed he had done this before in Scotland. I knew from the talks we had during our 3 years together that he had kept pigs in the out of way place where he lived. I understood that he worked for British Rail and his job was to keep a single rail track about 15 miles long under supervision. He was more or less self supporting, he had a smallholding. He told me that he had neither to buy fish nor meat and he could get a salmon whenever he wanted.

His instructions to us were, lift the pig by its back legs and its head will come out almost at right angle. It was just in position then for a blow with the hammer, which the sergeant wanted, be struck one blow with the edge of a short handled 7 pound hammer and the pig was unconscious. It was then bled and gutted and then hoisted into a boiling vat. When the pig was cooked the hairs was scraped off with a metal scraper.

When this was finished we were given half of a pig, which was dropped still steaming into a box and the box was put into a hand cart and then we went back to the billet, taking the pig with us. That was January 23rd 1945.

The next day our working party of ten and the guard had a meal off the pig for our breakfast. The pig was frozen in a block of ice, from being put into the box and left outside whilst it was still steaming. It was lovely! All the ten of us enjoyed it including the guard. Apart from the Christmas meal with turkey on the menu, this was the first meat meal we had had in over 4 1/2 years. All the meat we had had previously had been in soups.

We said our goodbyes to the Poles on the farm as we put our belongings onto the hand cart that we had been provided with and we walked happily along, there was no hurry and our idea was that we would soon be liberated, though it wasn't long before we found out that it wasn't going to be so easy or so enjoyable a journey, travelling in winter on foot and the roads jammed with refugees.

The guard had told us that our first objective was to cross the Vistula. As we approached it we couldn't help but notice the number of refugees making their way towards the same bridge. They came from many different directions and long before we reached the bridge the roads were full with men, women and children, horses and carts and anything that could be moved seemed to be on the move towards the bridge over the river Vistula.

These Germans who had derided the Russians for so long were in full flight and utter disarray, fear could be seen on their faces, they were so out of control that the German Army had to take over to stop them stampeding. With the small handcart that we had it was easy for us to make progress.

We soon reached the other side of the bridge and couldn't help thinking what an awful place it would be if we were attacked from the air. The horses and carts were two and three abreast and it was soon obvious what was causing the delay, for as the carts came off the bridge, there was quite a steep incline and the horses could not get a foot hold, they were slipping all over the place.

A German officer ordered the guard to organise us to help to clear the bridge, by getting us to push at the carts and help the horses over this bad patch. This was to be our first stop.

We stayed there over the remainder of the day and well into the night, before we were allowed to get some sleep.

This night we got food and slept in a school.

We started off again, the guard feeling better now he was away from the officer who had taken us over for a short time.

I soon realised that I was going to have trouble with my boots. They were beginning to crack across the soles, I knew they weren't going to stand up to walking in these conditions of slush, snow and frost for very long.

The food supply that we had brought with us, the pork etc. had all gone. It did not last long with 11 hungry men in midwinter, we discarded the hand cart and carried our own packs, all I had in mine were cigs, soap and socks and the album and pullover that Alf had given to me as a parting gift. I also had a blanket and an old Polish overcoat.

We soon got clear of the crowd that had caused the bottle neck at the bridge and by now we were catching up with hundreds of POWs of many nationalities, but mostly Russian who were being marched in blocks of 200 and they were approximately 200 hundred yards apart.

We came to barns that had been used so often by POWs the excrements could be smelt as one entered and after looking inside we told the guard that we would sooner sleep outside on the straw. A dry clean place could be found in these barns, but you couldn't be sure of getting back to it if you had to get up to the toilet during the night. The whole area had been used sometime or another as a toilet for the thousands of POWs who had passed by with upset stomachs. The order came that we were to walk until we were over the border, the Polish, German border.

In doing so we caught up with and joined, roughly about 100 English and American POWs Russians too and these outnumbered us many times over, they were in there thousands and they were segregated from us. I am sorry to say these Russian soldiers were in a far worse state than we were, they were very downtrodden.

Just before we reached Bukow, the Russian soldiers were stopped and as we marched by I could see this column of Russians about 1,000 men, were pushed into an open field and the guards were throwing swedes for them to eat; the swedes were from a clamp on the edge of the field and the guards had opened the clamp to feed the Russian POWs. Some of the swedes were frozen and as they were thrown among the Russians many of the soldiers were hit and fell to the ground from the weight and force of the frozen swedes. I could imagine what these Russian soldiers will do to these young Hitler Youth Movement boys if they get the chance. If this is the way the Russian soldiers have been treated during their captivity there is a good reason for the Germans to be frightened of the Ruskies.

We passed on to Bukow; another bottle neck was forming here and we stayed there for 2 days: it gave us the chance to get sorted out. We spent the 2 days at a "brenneri" this was a brewery where schnapps was made from potatoes.

February 6th 1945 we were on the move again and I knew that I had to do something about my boots before much longer. Among my belongings I had an old pair of lightweight bootees that was sent to me from England if we had had dry weather I could change into these, though I was not looking forward to doing this, because the bootees were well worn and thin on the soles.

We were marching 6 abreast along the main road and were being asked by the German civilians "How far are the Ruskies behind?". We sensed an underlying fear in their question. We could only tell them that we had heard the guns and the strafing from the aircraft.

Now and again we saw a white sheet on a pole sticking out of a bedroom window; it seemed that quite a few of the German civilians had lost all hope of stopping the Russians. They were all so different from how they were in 1940, when their soldiers were singing songs of victory.

Some of the American lads had plenty of food. A small group of them had Red Cross parcels and an handcart stacked with boxes that were covered at all times. They seemed to be well organised; with a huge cooking pot in which they made a meal every night. As they went along the road members of this small party were looking for things to put into the pot, such as Potatoes swedes etc. and the occasional fowl, which they killed with a stick when the chance came their way. They even scrounged wood to make a fire at the end of the days march. I feared before long, as the food became more scarce they would get some agro from other POWs and the guards. It was getting very hard to get food and the number of Red Cross parcels that were on the handcart would need a good deal of explaining as things got worse.

There were thousands of refugees on the road, just one great shambles, every house along the road must have been asked sometime or other for help. The best chance of this, at this time of the march, was with the refugees and the food from their wagons. From time to time they would get stuck in the snow or mud and need a push to get going again and if they were on the spot at this time you could get a little snack. We knew they had plenty of food in the bottom of these wagons, which they had stacked up before starting on their journey and we had seen them having meals on the roadside.

For the last few days I chummed up with a fellow soldier named Fred and we decided at the first chance we would drop out of the march and go it alone. We knew we had only to follow the road into Germany: there was so many stragglers that we wouldn't be noticed and with just the two of us we would be able to cadge or exchange socks or whatever for bread. It was almost impossible for us to exchange anything because of the vast number of refugees being drawn together as we got further into Germany.

We both of us dropped into a ditch just before we reached a place called Budow. We were lucky, for in the next field was a potato clamp and after scouting around for enough dry wood to make a fire, we enjoyed some half roasted potatoes.

There was evidence of many fires that had been lit on this road in the past week or so. Wagons had been drawn off the road and become stuck, we could tell this had happened by the depth of the ruts that the wheels had made.

There were no live stock on these fields, but one or two outbuildings that had been used by the German soldiers and refugees on more than one occasion; these were open to the elements but they were dry.

We stayed there the following day and during that afternoon we saw two men working in the field at the potato clamp where we had taken the spuds from.

They were Yanks and they told us they were in a working party nearby and every day before going back to their billets they checked the potato clamp and made it frost proof. It seemed that we were not the first to raid this clamp.

They took us back to their billet and gave us a very good meal and we exchanged a lot of information, they had been told to stay put and not to take to the road. We would like to have stayed with them; but the guard would have none of it.

The next day a lorry picked us up and we were driven to a place called Stoly, there we were handed over to a guard who was French and who had a few French POWs with him.

We stayed with this party and marched 20 kilos to Noschau and surprisingly the French guard obtained some food for us.

We marched 25 kilos the next day and reached Nemeitz, where we picked up 7 more English and more Frenchmen, then we went on to Koslin.

The last Frenchmen that we picked up seemed very aggressive towards the guard (a Frenchman in German uniform) the French guard must have sensed the antagonism from these Frenchmen, for when we stopped at Koslin about 25 kilos further on, he drew our rations and took off with them.

One of the English POWs was one of my old mates from the last working party I was on, his name was Charlie. He too had lost contact with the others from the state farm and had been drifting along the same as me.

Further along the road at Zietlow we were all picked up and taken to a camp run by some Canadians, then we were on the road again, another 12 kilos and we came to an English invalid rest camp at Grefenbure, this was a camp where the soldiers were too handicapped to carry on.

We rested here for a day and was given a hot drink and a little food: it was the first hot drink provided for us in 4 weeks.

This wasn't a permanent resting place, if you could walk you had to continue on, there were quite a few who could not make it; but this break gave us the chance to wash and brush up, only to find we had our old enemy lice.

February l9th 1945. We were on our way again from this rest place and were about 200 strong, marching the same as the Russians, about 10 abreast. The guards were older men, they didn't behave like guards, they did have rifles, but there was no attempt to force anything, they lacked food and most of them wanted out the same as us.

It was the 17 and 18 year olds who were different, I could imagine some of these young domineering gits would come to grief at times from the hands of the people whom they were guarding. Many of us realised that all of us were just being herded along and that nobody could do anything about it.

There was no sign of German planes, now and then the road was cleared on one side to let the German armour, artillery and tanks pass through. At such time our hearts were in our mouths for if the Allied planes saw the column passing through, we do believe they would attack and this would be bloody awful to be killed by our own planes. We saw many allied bombers in the distance, the sky seemed full of them at times.

We had marched 40 kilos and we were approaching Swienmunde.

Water for washing was getting hard to come by because the snow was disappearing fast. We had seen a few low lying planes, but they did not bother us in any way. We could hear bombers, but none of the planes were interested in the fires which we had lit and these were burning all night long.

The bombers just came in and dropped their loads on Swienmunde and then flew off again. There was no sign of a German fighter anywhere. They bombed again during the night and again we had no agro from them; this was the first bombing raid that I had experienced on the march and I thought from now on we had to watch out for any low flying planes, after all we were marching in columns like soldiers, therefore we could be targets.

I had heard of columns of POWs marching with banners with POW in large letters written upon them, to warn the British and American pilots.

I had also heard that some columns had been attacked, though I never experienced this though I could quite see how they could be attacked if a German column was passing at the same time.

We were with this party for a few days passing Dangon and Ankalam. The nights were very cold and we were miserable, mostly sleeping in barns; they were filthy!.

The barns had the smell of the excrements from the POWs and there was the sickly smell of death. How many soldiers died on this march is hard to estimate. We could see the tarpaulin that covered the bodies of the less fortunate and observe the awful smell of the place in the barns where they had lay down and died. These bodies could have lain there for days, there was no inspection nor were we counted.

By the time we had reached Denmitze, we had marched another 120 kilos or more it was February 23rd 1945.

After another 35 kilos we were stopped and crowded into a field. A German officer of very high rank took over from our guards. This man was very strict and kept all of the guards on their toes. He was a right snotty git.

The field we were in had been used before, it had been ploughed and most of the ploughed ridges had been covered with branches from the bushes and trees to try to keep clear of the wet ground. We made fires and got water from wherever we could, from pools and dykes.

Even the guards had it rough on this night, when the fire died down it was very cold and we were glad to move.

This particular column seemed to be travelling very fast and we had covered far more miles during the last two days than when we had been rushed over the border. It was the first time as far as I knew that a German officer of rank had led POWs. He was going far too fast in his horse driven landau and we were getting strung out because of the pace. I wouldn't know if he had any reason to hurry, I know that I was cheesed off and so was Charlie.

I suggested to Charlie how much better it was to be on the loose and he was all for it.

We were strung out so much we found it was easy to drop out and just before darkness came we dropped out of the column and let the others go.


Chapter VI

The road signs were pointing the way to Teterow and for the next 17 days I logged nothing down on paper. 25.2.45 to 14.3.45.

I remember visiting quite a few American POW camps and spending the night with them and talking far into the night of how we had fared on the way from Danzig. They were amazed at the round about way that we had been taken. All of these working parties had been told to stay put and wait to be liberated, seemingly to be well aware of the situation, they told us that they expected to be liberated by the Americans.

These billets were far superior to the ones that we had lived in Poland, these had electricity and other mod cons. It was alright for them to stay put, so, "why not us to?". We were keeping dry and we wished to stay put.

The guards thought differently, so, after an overnight stay and a very good meal and some cigs they pushed us on the road again.

We didn't bother as we were told that there was another working party some miles ahead.

On March 14th we were picked up by the German Police and put into the local lock up, where we were given a couple of rounds of bread and butter and a cup of ersatz coffee. Later on the village Bergamaster came and took us back to his home, he gave us a good meal and we slept at his home that night. The next day after a good breakfast he directed us into the main stream of refugees.

During our 2 weeks away from the main drag we had seen many planes all Allied, and fighter planes, they seemed to be scanning the scene below and nobody seemed to be bothered about them.

The roads were choc a bloc with refugees, soldiers and Russians, the Russians were segregated from the rest of us. We were marching in columns of 200 and approximately 100 yards apart.

As we passed through the villages the people asked the same question "How far are the Ruskies away?". They weren't bothered about the Allied planes dominating the skies, "Ruskies?:" they enquired "How far away?".

I was more bothered at what we were walking into, the artillery and tanks that had passed us from time to time, meant that there was a right old ding dong somewhere ahead and we were walking into it. We saw one or two buildings and wagons that had been caught and roughed up in a skirmish and this could only mean by planes.

Charlie and I had been on the road now for about 6 weeks and we were starved, froze, lousy and getting very edgy, we had covered another 22 kilos and arrived at Schemendorf.

We had just past the signpost to Rostock, though it was pointing in the opposite direction to where we were going, it seemed we were going inland.

Once again we were stuck in a barn and we were put into one that had not been used and we considered ourselves to be lucky, as we could rest without the fear of dropping into mess.

We received a small bread allowance, how my stomach stood up to this treatment I shall never know. I did have to make myself sick a number of times, but I was making out alright. I must have been worried so much about the situation that we were in that it took my mind off my stomach.

The next day we pressed on to Groswochern, twenty kilos further on, we stayed here the next day and for once we had one or two large buildings. One of them being a huge Breneri and we were able to wash socks and a shirt, we also got a bread allowance.

It was here at this Breneri that I met an American parachutist. His name was Chris and I was told he was a Golden Glove Champion in America.

He remarked on the polo neck pullover, that Alf had given to me and he showed an interest in the album. He browsed through the album, it had snapshots of American soldiers and snaps of Stalag activities, boxing and plays etc. He was very interested in the pullover and we did a swap.

I liked the rainproof jacket, which he offered me for the exchange, this blouson jacket had a motif of a parachutist across the back and as we had been having drizzles of rain it would keep out the wet and the cold. I traded the pullover for the blouson and I was very satisfied with the deal.

The Polish army long coat that I had used for two or three winters, I threw that away on the night that we all slept in a ploughed field. It was in such a bad state, I couldn't use it any more. I decided to use my boots for a while longer. One of them was very weather worn and was hurting my foot, but I had no idea as to how much longer we had to keep walking.

When we started off again after a days rest I expected to go quite a long way, which we mostly did after a long rest. I felt that the rest days always came when we were catching up with the columns in the front of us. When this happened it was utter chaos with hundreds and hundreds of Russian POWs the English and others from different countries, plus the German refugees. No village or town could cope with this amount of people and at times we would finish on the side of the road where we would sleep for the night, or in an open field, whichever.

At such times as these we slept alongside the Russians. There was not enough room to segregate us and being in the last column in such circumstances, we slept any where we could get.

March 18th 1945 we were on out way again and we had no idea just what we were walking into, we knew we were walking away from Rostock, which was close to the coast, so we knew, we were going inland. When we first started out on this march, it was the Russian army that we were walking away from. Its days and days since we saw a Russian plane.

It is our planes that we are seeing now and we are seeing more as we go further inland.

Another 20 kilos and we were at Awfenhagen and the roads were still full of refugees fleeing just like lemmings. I wondered if we were coming to the end of this damned silly haphazard race towards nowhere.

We were still being pressed into barns and fields with the Russians and these stopping places were getting so bad that they were becoming a hazard as well. Many of the Russians were ill with dysentery and we noticed that there were more deaths at the barns when we were mixed with them. On one stop, the guards, who mostly sleep on the floor of the entrance to the barn, had been shouting Schwine Hund and fired their rifles through the straw above them. (This could account for some of the bodies found in the straw at the barns). It seemed that the straw over the area where the guards were sleeping would no longer hold the excrements from the thousands of POWs who had been using it as a toilet and it had dripped onto them as they slept.

It would be no job for the squeamish or faint hearted, when these places were cleaned out, not to mention the decomposed bodies that could be within. I had seen no covered bodies at this stop though I suspected that they were in the straw, it smelt that way.

The next day we walked only 10 kilos to Altzammit and I felt sure we were coming to a bottle neck or the end of the journey, this was the second day in four that we had rested and this had not happened before. Resting again at Altzammit more or less convinced us that we were at the end of this long trek.

Now the roads were really full and getting food for such a great number of people was impossible. The guards were complaining and they seemed close to revolt.

To make things worse youths of 16 and 17 were taking over from the guards, they were the Hitler Youth and most of them as thick as planks. It was inevitable that there would soon be trouble between them.

We walked for another three days 90 kilos into Germany passing through Menzendorf; we were told we were making for the River Elbe which we had to cross over.

We had also heard that a number of POWs had been killed by our own aircraft. I had hoped that this was just a rumour, although our planes seemed to be the only ones in the sky.

It was now March 23rd 1945 and another rest day. There was a lot of raised voices at this stop, for the word had gone round that POWs had been strafed whilst crossing the Elbe. We didn't know if this was German propaganda, or if it had actually happened and had been seen by our own POWs. The highest ranking officer NCO is sergeant and none of them wanted the responsibility of taking any action. I didn't envy the position that they were in, the guards were getting very lax as we got further into Germany. To relieve them of their rifles would be quite easy, because there was so many of us and the rifles were always slung over their shoulders. From what we knew there was no love lost between the Germans and the Russians, goodness knows what would happen if the Russians did take control and so they could, because they outnumbered us by 10 to 1 or even more; thousands of them were being brought into the area. If trouble did start it would be very bloody and I wanted no part in it and neither did most of the others. One or two might take the chance and I hoped they would take into consideration the number of mechanised German troops that were passing us from time to time.

March 25th 1945 we were on our way again and most of us with the feeling of apprehension and worried over the discussions that we'd had the day previous.

We were split up before we had gone very far, some going towards Hanover and us going towards Domitz. We did 25 kilos and finished at Horkalten and we were worried about the planes above us after hearing of the strafing of the columns as they went over the River Elbe.

March 26th Most of the Russian POWs seemed to have been sent to Hanover, we weren't so packed together when we stopped because of this, though we were still marching in columns of 200.

We were offered bread from time to time as we went through the villages. We still had the daft silly, stupid Hitler Youth Movement around us.

On our way to Domitz the sky seemed to be full of bombers and they seemed to be in layers and at different heights. One of these silly Youths looked up and said "It's only propaganda" and by the look upon his face the silly sod believed it.

We were seeing more and more of these low flying planes and none of them gave us any aggro. About 3 kilos from Domitz we stopped and were fed and given a hot drink.

I had to dump my shoes, they were hurting my feet and I had to revert to my leather zipped bedroom bootees, I was hoping that they wouldn't let me down.

One or two POWs had to drop out for some reason or other. Our feet were taking a hammering and so was our health. I didn't know how long most of us had been on the road, but I had been on the road for over two months and my feet were sore and bleeding, from having to wear wet socks day in and day out and I couldn't see the soles of these bedroom bootees lasting much longer. I would feel reluctant to give in because of the state of my footwear. I had seen other soldiers feet that were much worse than mine carrying on, though I wouldn't be able to continue if the soles of these boots broke.

We passed through Domitz and over the Elbe noticing that even this far inland the white sheets on poles were hanging from the windows.

We were all asking one another "Why are we still walking?" and "Where are we making for?". We passed Pudripp, Ratslinger and Sprachenseul, walking another 80 kilos and we had another rest day.

The barns here were much cleaner than the other barns where we had slept and this we think could be a different route to which POWs who had gone in front of us had taken.

We had been so poorly fed as POWs and most of the food we had whilst on the road we had to beg and bargain for. We bartered with whatever we had left from the Red Cross Parcels and we were getting very weary and frustrated, because we could see no end to this march at all.

We knew that the guards were getting food, there were hundreds of us and we were very lucky if we were in a place where food was being distributed.

April 1st 1945 Fools Day, I was stocktaking I still had 250 cigs, a bar of soap and a couple of pairs of socks and the album that Alf gave me, all the rest had gone. I pondered whether to put a fresh pair of socks on, or to save them to do a deal with.

I had some very bad blisters on my feet and if they burst on their own they would be sore for days, so I used a needle to drain them and washed my feet in cold water, after this they felt much easier. I then washed my socks so that I could wear them again and kept the new ones to exchange for food.

Starting out the next day I was like a cat on hot bricks for a while. As we marched along we were offered cigs and bread by the crowds of Germans that lined the roads. It seemed that they were glad to see us and not the Russians. The roads were lined with people as we passed through the villages and towns. We stopped at Scharnhurst over night and then we were on our way to Celle thirty kilos away.

On the outskirts of Celle three German soldiers approached the column and solicited for volunteers for a work party, the uniform of these soldiers was different from any other that I had seen and for some reason I suspected they were not real soldiers, but members of a political camp, of sorts.

I pointed to my face, which was covered in little lumps from a skin complaint and said "eine sticken" (this I had been told meant contagious in German). I surmised that close by was a Political camp. We had heard of such places, while we were on the march. We had another days rest close by at Celle and once again we had reasonable barns and a small amount of food was found for us, though it was always the same trouble; we must have been one thousand strong and insufficient food to go around and we were always the losers.

I had hinted to Charlie that I was dropping out at the first chance, with all these soldiers around it was a chore even to get a drink of water.

It was my birthday today April 4th. Well at least we were getting a rest day.

I definitely decided that I was going to drop out of this column, even if I had to go it alone. I couldn't see any village, town or even city that could cope with so many extras. We didn't even know how many or how far the columns in front of us were, we were reduced to cadging as we went along the road.

We marched another twenty kilos and stopped at Fahrburg, which, according to my daily logging was approximately twenty six kilos from Hanover.

Another forty kilos to Schweihae and we rested there overnight. The next day we did twenty-five kilos to Dahendorf and I decided that no matter what I would drop out on the next march.

It was quite easy to do with so many dropping out through sheer exhaustion, these, were picked up by lorry; though they had no treatment when they reached the rest place. After resting they would be on the road and marching again.

April 11th and another rest day.

We received a hot drink and some queued for hot water if they could find a container. It was chaos because everybody wanted as much as they could get.

I settled for a hot drink and a small bread ration and then I rested. My feet had settled down after I had drained the blisters.

April 12th When we started off after the break, I told Charlie that I was leaving the column at the back end of this march. I didn't know if he would come, or whether he had decided not to, I know that I had to go as I couldn't see any end to this march.

Sooner or later our luck was going to run out, I didn't like the feeling I had as this armour passed us, with so many planes around it had got to happen and we wouldn't always be lucky.

We had been on the road for quite a while and many planes had passed us. The Yanks said they were Flying Fortress'. I am amazed that they were able to identify them, for they were so high up in the sky. The pace seemed faster, or was it that we were worn out.

Charlie had not hinted that he was going. Then out of the blue a tiny spot appeared in the form of a German fighter plane, we heard short bursts of cannon fire and the wing of the Fortress broke off. We followed the trail of the plane all the way down and were longing to see parachutes coming from it. There were none.

This was the first German plane I had seen to recognise since I left Norway almost five years ago.

The Americans with us were full of rage, they said our SOBs had been buzzing us for days and the first time they were really wanted they were not there. They were livid.

We were moving faster than ever and more and more were dropping out for the agony wagon.

It was getting late in the evening and no signs of a stop, the guards apparently had a certain place in mind that we had to reach. We were so spread out it was possible to drop out for toilet reasons and join a column behind. We were just putting one foot in front of the other automatically and were nearly asleep. 

We had been on the road for fourteen hours and as I worked my way to the very last column I found that Charlie was with me we dropped out at the first hole in the hedgerow. We just walked through a hole in the hedge and kept going until we reached the other end of the field. We had a choice of places to sleep either haystack or outhouse and we chose the outhouse; this was dry and we didn't need any rocking.


Chapter VII

The first thing we noticed the next morning was a wood a short distance away, we knew there was no houses on the road  where we had ditched the column and we were deciding whether to walk through the wood and look for a farmhouse. The decision was taken from us, I was shaving with water I had taken from a sheep trough, when I saw through the mirror that we had company coming.

On each side of the field, half running and half walking alongside of the hedgerow, were three German soldiers coming towards us with automatic weapons and there was no doubt what their intentions were.

I said to Charlie "We have company", and it wasn't long before we heard the words "Achtung". We stood still and let them approach us. They could see we had no weapons and we told them that we were Krieg geffangenun and that we had dropped out of the column that had passed the day before: we also told them that we had been POWs for five years and that we had started the march over two months ago from Danzig in Poland. They were flabbergasted. They allowed us to finish shaving, then they took us to their officer.

The huge parachute motif on my jacket had been seen and they had been detailed to investigate. We went with them and we were told that if we saw any planes we must hide. When we came to the wood we could understand why they wanted us to hide if we saw any aircraft: for just inside the wood were huge self propelled artillery pieces, we could see about six of them and they were very well camouflaged and there was probably more scattered around.

Charlie thought that they looked even bigger than our 105s. They looked menacing and these were more likely the reason for all the air activity that we had experienced earlier.

The officers asked many questions about the Russians. They were astonished at the route we had taken from Danzig. When we mentioned Swinemunde, it was obvious that we had taken a very round about way to get to this area and they wanted to know why! But we couldn't tell them.

They noticed the state of my shoes and one of them actually got a soldier to hand sew a piece of leather right across the sole and heel of both of my bedroom bootees and he made quite a good job of them.

We had our meals with them that day and we were kept under observation and held inside a certain area under cover. We heard strafing a few hundred yards away and we kept our heads down.

The German soldiers suggested that the pilots did this strafing hoping that the Germans would retaliate and so give away their position. If they did return fire, then a much more concentrated attack would follow.

The soldiers wanted to know quite a lot about the Russians, they seemed rather perturbed at their rate of advancement.

I gave the soldier, who had sewed the soles onto my bootees, a packet of twenty cigarettes and I could see by how he accepted them and lit up straight away, that he and his mates had been a long while without and we tipped up another twenty cigs in exchange for German army loaf.

Before light next morning the soldiers were away and before they went they told us to keep on walking into Germany. We took off in the opposite direction as fast as we could, we didn't want to be around if they were spotted by the aircraft: distance is the best cover in any situation.

April 14th we had come to the end of our first day after dropping out of the column. The loaf of bread we had bargained for with the cigarettes would last us another couple of days.

The German armoured unit we had just left was going into action and this proved we were close to the war zone.

Two kilos down the road we stopped at Danstorf, here we came to a stretch of water and we stayed here for the rest of the day; keeping well out of the way.

Continuing on our journey we came to a little village called Gustborn. We didn't see anyone working in the fields or in the lane since we left Danstorf, it seemed as if the whole area was deserted and waiting for something to happen.

We asked for water at a small farm and spoke to the young Frau who lived there. She told us that her husband was in the army and she was having to manage the best way she could without any help. We offered to work for her and she gladly accepted.

There were a few German soldiers in this village and nobody seemed to be in charge of them, it could be that they were billeted here, or, like us they were waiting for the war to end.

There was about twelve houses in this area and every house had a white flag hanging from the bedroom window. It seemed so quiet here, it was not what we had been used to.

Many people had gone from this village, there was no one around and nobody at work in the fields.

Our work for the Frau was hoeing the potatoes and covering them with soil, the field where we were working was a few minutes walk from the house.

The Frau came back later, scrutinised our work and was satisfied and this was great for us. We had a dry clean place in the barn and we could get water to wash or mash whenever we wanted and after ten weeks on the road scrambling for somewhere to sleep and scrounging for something to eat; this place was a haven and we worked steadily in the field, so we could keep it that way. We never saw anyone else working in the fields whilst we were there.

On the second night at the Fraus, as we slept in the barn, we heard the sound of battle in the distance. We went up the ladder to the top part of the barn, opened the shutters and looked out, we could hear the rumble of action and see tracer fire in the sky.

The next two days and nights were uneventful. When we went onto the fields on the third day we met four German soldiers and on the ground near to them was about twenty Red Cross parcels and in a spinney close by was what looked like an anti tank gun. They had a milk churn full of wine and they were smoking English cigarettes.

When we told them that we were English Tommies and that we had been prisoners of war for five years they invited us to have a drink and gave us a smoke.

We were curious about the Red Cross parcels and we asked how they had come by them. They told us they had been taken off a ship that had been sunk in one of one of the ports. And here we were more than two hundred miles inland!!.

But then, we got a drink of wine and a fag out of it. Each morning for the next few days, we walked down the road through the village, round the tree lined corner and over the main road and we would pass the time of day with the German soldiers who had their tank gun in the spinney now and were watching the road through binoculars all of the time

The silence and the waiting was getting at both Charlie and me.

We knew from the conversation of these German soldiers and the sound of battle, that we could be in the middle of a right bloody ding dong and there was not much that we could do about it.

These spinneys could be full of German soldiers with artillery pieces, we were working between the spinney and the road that they were watching.

On this day April 24th Charlie had gone to tell the young Frau that we had nearly finished the potatoes and I went on alone. I had my hoe on my shoulder and my thoughts were miles away and I could hear noise on the main road, although I couldn't see anything because of the trees.

As I rounded the corner, the first thing I saw was a German soldier with his back towards me and his hands in the air. Twenty yards away from him was a jeep with three American soldiers in it. One was the driver and the other was behind a vicious looking automatic gun attached to the jeep, the other soldier, who seemed to be in charge, was shouting orders in German to the soldier with his hands in the air. Behind this jeep the road was full of Jeeps guns and tanks.

I turned and began to run back to inform Charlie, but before I had covered five yards the words "Achtung" stopped me dead in my tracks.

I turned round again putting my hands above my head, still clutching the hoe. I shouted "I am a British Prisoner of War". The Yank shouted back to me "Walk man,  dammit walk you nearly got your damned head shot off!"

Looking down the road I could see what he meant.

Everything seemed to be pointing at me, even the bloody tank guns.

He told me to "Get rid of that damned hoe. Go back to where I had come from in the village and to stay there out in the open."

I went back very slowly, walking towards the farmhouse where we had been sleeping. I told Charlie and the Frau that the Americans were on the main road. She didn't show any surprise, it was what she had expected.

We just sat around in the open listening to the short bursts of fighting coming from the main road.

After a while we were fed up Charlie and I  decided to take a walk down the lane in the direction we had first approached the village.

Less than two hundred yards down the lane we heard voices and the words "Achtung" once again: we were in contact with the American troops on foot. We told them that there were a few German soldiers in the village and they instructed us to keep behind out of the way so that they could deal with them if they had to.

We could understand why we had not heard much of the battle, in this village there was not a lot of action and hardly any resistance. Even so I heard of the death of the young German feldwebel, the one we had met in the field, he was with the soldiers who had the Red Cross Parcels. I saw the rest of them being taken prisoner of war by the Americans.

Later in the afternoon we were questioned by a senior officer in one of the houses and he told us that we would soon be passed down the line.

I was sorry to see one of the American foot soldiers with whom we had been in contact; he came in with a head wound, he was strapped to a stretcher which was fastened onto the front of a jeep. This young soldier had a very grey pallor he looked poorly, he was unconscious and after a quick examination by a medic he was taken away at speed. His friend who was with him was overcome with emotion, they had come through the campaign together and were buddies.

April 25th we were awake early and ready to go and when the jeep arrived we wasted no time. As we clambered aboard we were told it would be a rough ride with no stops and the four wheels of the jeep never seemed to be touching the ground at the same time. In places where we passed wooded areas we were told to keep our heads down.

From time to time the young soldier manning the automatic gun fired bursts of machine gun fire at the trees as we whizzed by. He told us that the woods still had snipers in them. I didn't know whether we were fired at or not, I was too busy hanging on. We sped on for another one hundred kilos and reached our destination Hildesheim and here we had a meal and a powder delouse. The procedure for this being to hold ones clothes tightly around the neck, then with a soldier either side, compressed air and delousing powder is blown up the sleeve of ones coat until you are blown out like a balloon. We were then given a shaver and soap to wash and clean up.

There were soldiers of all nationalities, walking about in this town and all of whom seemed to be intent on some business or other; it reminded me of a busy town in England.

April 25th 1945 this was the first time I had felt free in five years.

The next day Dakotas arrived to take us to Brussels and here we joined more soldiers who had been prisoners of war, having been picked up at different stages of the battle.

We were segregated from the troops who were fighting and even in the NAAFI, where we had our meals, we were kept separate and were not allowed to mix. This might well have been because we were still lousy.

It was here that I rewrote my route from Danzig along the coast to Swienmunde and inland to Celle and beyond. The paper that I had written upon to log my daily route during the three months march was in tatters, so I rewrote it in the NAAFI , on YMCA writing paper.

We had all of us been given different items of army kit, to make us more presentable, our POW numbers were checked and we were ready for England.

The next day we were still sitting around huge fires in a field in Brussels, out of touch with all that was going on, isolated and fed up to the teeth.

For some reason or other there was no flying that day and so another day regrettably away from England. Nothing was mentioned the next day at breakfast, until suddenly without warning, we were loaded into lorries, each one of us being given a brown paper bag and we were on our way to the airfield; here we were put into Lancaster bombers for our flight to England.

I still wonder if the people who plotted our route wanted us to see what force had been needed on the campaign to overcome the German Armed Forces.

In many places on the outskirts of Germany it was devastation for mile upon mile.

The only bricks above ground level were the chimneys of the houses that had been flattened by either bomb or shell and they stood out like giant tombstones. It was an awesome sight.

It was evident that the troops in this area had to fight house by house and street by street. I was thankful that the fighting was not so ferocious at the time we were liberated.

After alighting from the bombers in England, we were taken in lorries to a reception camp and taken in hand by the doctors, dentists and psychologists who were actually a team of ranking officers and we were told that because of our condition, we would not be going home right away as we had expected.

We had yet another delouse and after a shower we were examined thoroughly by a doctor, with an orderly taking down details.

I was as lousy as a hedgehog, because of my being on the road such a long while and after a good clean up we were put into huge dormitories, the only furniture in which were beds, lockers, table and chairs and here we were to stay for a while.

We were allowed to phone to the local police in our hometown, who would inform our relatives that we were back in England and safe. We were given money to spend in the NAAFI and that was the end of our first day in England. As a long time prisoner of war I soon realised that I was one of the last to be allowed to go home.

I was moved to another camp and there I was pleasantly surprised to see some of my own regiment the 8th Sherwood Foresters, who were in the Norwegian Campaign. They had been there a few days I was told and to me they looked bored stiff.

It soon became evident that nobody knew just what was to be done with quite a few soldiers, who had been soldiers for six years, but with only eight months under orders and these eight months was back in 1939. At heart and at the time they were just slacky arsed colliers. We had been five years without army discipline and we wanted to go home. It was established that many of us would no longer be fit enough for HMS and we were soon downgraded so that we could be sent home out of the way: we were given six months leave, which was due to us and then demobbed.

The doctor that examined me decided that I had chronic stomach trouble and that I needed more treatment. After a day or so with a shrink I proved to them that my brain was still working reasonably and that I knew the difference between squares, rings, oblongs and triangles etc. and a few sums that I could do when I was eight years old.

Two dentists examined my teeth, one of whom said that my teeth were reasonable and adequate, whilst the other diagnosed slight pyorrhoea.

I don't know what status they reached in their profession in civvy street after the war; for I lost all of my bloody teeth within five years of being demobbed.

I was downgraded to C2 and I was no further use to HMS.

I will end my story of soldier and POW and as I look at my final settlement for five years as a POW which was £260: I ponder wistfully, that I could have just bought myself out with this; six years ago.
THE END