B
y 8 p.m. we were all asleep, and compared with some of the nights spent in the train last week, we did not sleep so badly. However, there was many a loud grumble, when, about 1 a.m. the steady drone of Joe’s voice could be heard repeating over and over again ‘You must all get up – we are moving immediately.’
There were many who were inclined to say ‘Oh, tickle him what’s the big hurry?’ and turn over and try to get to sleep again, but Joe was reinforced by Claude, and then by our own Wing Commander. Soon, the place was in a confused uproar in the darkness, there being no doubt that we had to go, and in some panic, too. Eventually, they got us out into the yard a count was made, and it was found that we were three short. Nobody seemed inclined to bother about it; I was destined to meet those adventurous three much later on, in Paris, and to learn exactly how they made good their escape.
We moved off, slowly – so very slowly that it was an effort, for those like myself who were not suffering from bad feet, to walk at such an
unnatural speed. It was no faster than a funeral march, and as I feared, it deceived nobody, least of all Claude, who seemed to be the direct mouthpiece for the Major himself, the latter apparently speaking no English. An attempt was made to sort the party into two groups, those with foot trouble being allowed to proceed at their own pace, with a separate lot of guards. Wing Commander Kelly, who was among those who should have retired to the slow party, insisted that he would be alright, and that it was his intention to stay up in the lead, where he belonged.
We moved on but the pace of the fast party was no more rapid than it had been before, and in a few more minutes Claude had called a halt again, and proceeded to address us. It was obvious that he was wild with anger.
It is no use, the Major says that you must move more quickly. You, Wing Commander, I have asked you to go with those who are sick, and you have refused. But you must go faster – I myself will now go up in the front and you must all keep up with me – if you do not do so, it is sabotage, and you will all be dealt with as saboteurs. I do not say that if I were in your position I would not do the same, but it is sabotage, and we cannot allow it.
All this took time, of course, and our purpose, to some extent, was accomplished. However, there did not appear to be a great deal more we could
do, and the pace took on a definite improvement. The number of genuine cases of bad feet, at this stage of the march, was no more than two or three. However, there was one poor red-headed fellow who definitely could not walk at all, and the last I saw of him he was sat on the Company’s bicycle, being wheeled along by two of his comrades. I learnt afterwards that at the next village we came to he was left behind and taken into hospital. I hope it was true, for there were many more who dropped out later on, and whose fate I never did learn. To the crafty, labour-saving mind of the Germans, a quick bullet and no questions asked was always a likely way out of any difficulties such as these.
We made our first stop for water as soon as it was daylight, but we only had a short break, and were soon on the move again. It was difficult to determine the route we followed, for we invariably kept to very minor roads, and seemed to wind about all over the place, nevertheless making good a very rough track in a general north-easterly direction. Eventually, we were led into a spacious farmyard, where we settled down for our first meal of the day.
It was by no means too warm yet, for it would have been no later than 8 a.m. I made myself as comfortable as possible with Guy on a small heap of straw, with our backs to the door of a barn, and with a tin-opener borrowed from one of the guards, we opened a can of salmon for our
breakfast. Some of the men had started the practice, soon to become insidious, of bartering cigarettes for bread from the guards. That morning, however, a small extra supply was obtained from the farmer, and an official issue of one thick slice per prisoner was made. There was no doubt about it, the American Red Cross food was extremely good. With a main dish of salmon, it was possible to follow up, as we did that morning, with prunes, and a little cheese, as well as bread and margarine. We felt that we had had a really good meal. Every parcel contained a tin of coffee and a large tin of powdered milk. With cooking facilities furnished by the farmer’s wife, it was possible for a couple of our boys, who had acted as cooks back at the Dulag, to present a brew of coffee in the way that we liked it, far removed from the horrible black ersatz stuff that the Germans drank. The system too, had the advantage, that it took these willing lads an awful long time to brew coffee for eighty of us. We were therefore assured of a decent extension to our rest period!
And what had happened to the other four boys making up our original party of five? Well, Jack had become very friendly with an Australian Flight Lieutenant called Jarman, of whom we were to see a good deal more later on; Arthur seemed to be knocking around with Jack Evans, now the happy possessor of a stout pair of boots, and no longer troubled by his feet; and Diffy, his
wounds now much better, was friendly with a small group of American officers. There were many others, too, among the crowd, with whom I speedily developed acquaintances. When marching, at any rate, it often became the case of passing the time of day and getting to know a bit about the fellow who happened to be next to me in the ranks.
The stay at the farm lasted about two hours. We found time to wash in the horse trough, and one fellow more proud of his appearance than the rest, was even seen to shave. Guy and I had the idea of cramming the whole of our kit into an old wicker basket that had we found lying around the yard, and then carrying the basket between us on a short length of wood garnered from the fuel pile. It seemed a good idea in theory, but in practice we found it far too heavy and unwieldy. We therefore abandoned the contraption before we had gone a hundred yards along the road. Another scheme three fellows seemed to be using successfully was to carry three lots of kit on a stout bamboo pole slung over the shoulders of two of them, thus giving one man a complete rest every third shift. They were not alone in devising weird and wonderful ideas for lessening the burden of kit carrying; there were hardly any two men shouldering their load in the same fashion – we must have looked a very odd crowd as we plodded along!
We were on our way again – the day passed very much in the manner of the previous one, with the inevitable two or three occasions when it was necessary to dive for the ditch to avoid the attentions of our comrades of the air, usually in Thunderbolts or Lightnings. Rumours were constantly being passed around that somewhere at the end of all this walking – it might be after 10, 20, or even 50 miles, nobody really knew – there would be a train that would whisk us speedily away to our destination. We original five smiled to ourselves at this talk, for we alone had up-to-date experience of the present state of the German railways. We knew that the train, even if it ever did materialise, might take us somewhere, but it certainly would not be speedily, and it was questionable whether it would even be to where we were supposed to be going! Our numbers, too, were steadily declining. In addition to the red-headed man, two others, one of them Wing Commander Kelly, were said to have been left behind in hospital that morning, and there seemed to be a few more familiar faces that were missing from the throng. A count, after one of our halts around noon revealed the present muster as seventy-four, but as had been the case in the early morning, those in charge seemed little inclined to worry. We suspected that a tally of the guards would show that there were no longer as many present as there had been when we started, but that was no business of ours.
It was nearly 2 p.m., and there was little sign of any pause for refreshment that day. Then, Joe in his sleepy monotone announced, ‘We will march four more kilometres, and then we will eat and stop for the night’. This seemed far too good to be true, and the best pace so far was set by those in front, for the call of hunger was getting urgent. We must have walked nearer seven kilometres, for we kept up a cracking pace for over an hour, before we crossed the Frankfurt-Kassel
Autobahn
, and pulled up in the town of Nieder Gemeünden. Once more, the Thunderbolts were busy overhead, and there was a long delay spent under what cover we could get, before our shelter for the night, another schoolroom, was located.
Bread, so necessary to make a decent meal out of our supplies of tinned goods, was now beginning to change hands for as many as twenty cigarettes for half a loaf, but there was little to be had even at that price. Those of us who were unlucky in the market, had to ‘borrow’ a slice from somebody more fortunate who might be willing to incur the risk of a very likely bad debt. Nevertheless, we knew we were very lucky to have the Red Cross parcels, and there was very little tendency to grumble. As in the morning, volunteers supplied tins of milk and coffee, and a good hot drink was prepared.
This schoolroom had deep recess windows, and perhaps mindful of the three who had escaped this morning, Claude announced that
the first man to enter a window recess would be shot without question! There was no straw, but some of us who got there early enough were lucky in being able to find an extra blanket among a pile of old clothing, which looked as though it had been used for a dramatic performance at a recent date. Guy, who seemed remarkably good at rooting things out, organised for our use a bowl, a cup and a large soup ladle, which he broke in half saying that the handle could be used as a margarine spreader, and the bottom portion as an emergency drinking vessel. By arrangement, he took the bowl and I had the cup, which I carried down my battledress blouse, and served for me to drink out of for many a day afterwards. Somebody produced a couple of tubes of ointment for tired feet, and altogether the whole party settled down as cheerfully as possible to make the best of the conditions.
At 5 p.m. Joe entered, and with his characteristic ‘
Heil
Hitler’ gesture announced: ‘You must go to bed now – at midnight we will move on.’
‘Gets earlier every night,’ I remarked caustically to Guy, ‘Come on, let’s get bedded down.’
We made ourselves as comfortable as possible underneath a table, and were soon asleep. We were woken after just three hours (for it was no later than 8 p.m. and barely dark) by Joe once more: ‘You must all get up at once – we are marching immediately.’ I wish it were possible to
describe the exact sound of that fellow’s voice – it just had to be heard to be believed. Every time he spoke it made one want to laugh, no matter how bad the news. Just a flat monotone was all he used, with no attempt at an accent on any word, however badly the English sense needed it.
So started what was to prove the most uncomfortable night we passed during the whole time we were over there – speaking, of course, for those of our original party. I have no doubt that many of the others who had been POWs a long time could tell many a grim tale. We seemed to be more or less going around in circles, for there were several long stretches of road, when from the position of the moon it was apparent that we were proceeding north-east and south in turn. There was a time when we must have walked for nearly two hours down a narrow valley, and the whole of the time we could hear shellfire so close on our right-hand side, that we estimated that the shells must be almost passing over our heads.
It was obvious from the excitement and chattering among the guards, that the war was getting too close for their liking. A powerful rumour spread among us that when we reached the main road, which was supposed to run along the end of the valley, we should find Americans already in possession, and our retreat cut off. It certainly needed some such inspiration to keep us going, for we were all getting to a state of great weariness. Odd disappearances were getting
more rife – the horseless cart of kit seemed to have gone, and with it any number of guards. We seemed to be down to a mere handful, mostly old men, who probably thought that their best end was to get taken prisoner – and as quickly as possible. Claude, also, was no longer present, and the full brunt of the interpretation of the Major’s wishes had fallen on Joe. Of our ranks, the number was down to a bare sixty-five, making a loss of seventeen since we started. What happened to most of them I just do not know, although if they had avoided getting shot, there is little doubt that sooner or later they would have made their way back to their own lines.
To add to the excitement were the additional rumours that the guards wanted to leave us all to our own devices and make good their escape, or alternatively that they wanted us all shot out of hand. This was a suggestion that the Major was reported to have refused point blank to countenance. It was all very mystifying and disturbing. We all wondered what the end of that road would bring, and whether the hour of our deliverance was at hand. But it was as yet only the small hours of Thursday morning, and this part of the story does not end until late on Friday afternoon….
T
he end of that valley brought us along to a bleak main road, along which we saw trundling in an easterly direction a solitary tank. For a moment it raised our hopes to the Heavens, only to sling them down again to rock bottom, as we realised that it was a Jerry. We flopped wearily on to the grass at the side of the road. It was about 2 a.m. and apart from the break of about four hours in the last schoolroom, we had been on the tramp for over a day. We could hardly remember when we had last eaten. We were done, and the reaction after having our hopes dashed was just sufficient to put us in the mood for mutiny
It wasn’t true, of course; we were nothing like at the end of our resources yet, and in a few minutes we were being forced to march on and taking it as calmly as we could in the circumstances. We fought our way slowly up a long gradual incline – every step was an effort, not only because of the pain in our tired feet, but also because of the difficulty of maintaining a straight
course when one’s every inclination was to close one’s eyes and go to sleep. It seems a rather impossible, but a fairly credible tale was put out to account for the disappearance of one young lad, a paratroop hero from the ill-fated Arnhem expedition. Apparently, he had dropped off to sleep whilst on the march, had fallen in his tracks, and nobody had taken the trouble to pick him up.
Still we went on. We paused for occasional rests by the side of the road, but the night was cold. A great many of the men agreed with me that the effort of getting started again when cold and stiff after a halt of ten minutes, was far more trouble than the amount of rest to be obtained was worth. I think what kept me going was the pleasure of being able to take frequent nibbles at a slab of the very excellent chocolate included in the Red Cross parcel. I had quite a good supply, because being a non-smoker, I had traded some of my cigarettes for additional chocolate. I remember rationing myself to a bite from the bar every kilometre (nearly all the roads were plentifully supplied with ‘kilometrestones’). This not only kept me supplied with energy, but also gave me something to anticipate, as we trudged along for kilometre after kilometre with no sign of a long rest being ordered. As for my feet, they were sore, but by no means as bad as most. My secret was plenty of soap well rubbed into the soles, and two pairs of socks worn at the same time, which was possible in my case, as my shoes were a little on the large
size. I had real sympathy for the poor fellows who complained that the shoes issued to them in the Dulag were too small, because nothing more detrimental to comfort on a long march could be imagined.
Dawn was just breaking ahead on our right when at last we drew over on to the same
Autobahn
that we had crossed the night before at Nieder Gemeünden. After walking along the magnificent highway for a couple of miles, we were taken to a kind of roadside canteen run by the German Red Cross. There were some who were too tired even to eat, and they just flopped on the floor with every appearance of being fast asleep as soon as their bodies touched the boards. Joe, meanwhile, was busy in the kitchen. To give him his due, he did all that was possible for us. ‘You will get hot coffee,’ came his dirge-like tones. Then, ‘You will get hot soup – you will rest here two hours.’
‘They could do with making it two weeks,’ I muttered to Guy, sitting at a table beside me. ‘What are we going to have for breakfast?’
We made that meal a good one, for the way these chaps wanted to force us along there was no telling when we might stop again. The fact that we had it all the wrong way round, with a meat course first, followed by coffee, and soup last, was not of the smallest consequence. As soon as we had finished, we settled ourselves with our heads on the table to try and secure a little sleep. It was
only a bare forty winks, because the soup and coffee had taken some time to prepare, and Joe had us up and outside again well within the two hours he had allotted. The rumour was rife again that there would soon be a train. This time there seemed some foundation for it, because we had noticed two railways running into the fairly large town of Alsfeld, which was over on our left, and we had even spotted the smoke from a distant engine. What this party lacked was somebody like Adolf to make persistent enquiries as to the location and condition of the
bahnhofs
, and the possibility of transport!
Any real hopes we might have entertained were soon dashed, when we resumed our march and found that Alsfeld and the
Autobahn
were slipping away to our left, and we were off once more down the quietest of country lanes. Joe assured us that we would march ‘only three more kilometres’ and then we would find shelter. But we knew his kilometres of old, and were not at all surprised to find that it was 10 a.m., and the sun was riding high, before we at last pulled up in the village of Udenhausen, where provision was being made for us to rest in a barn at the side of the road.
‘You will get more straw,’ said Joe, bustling about as usual, trying to make sure that everybody was comfortable. Sure enough, somebody was detailed to go up into the loft and heave down great armfuls of extra straw to those waiting below. It was not a very big barn, and
there was an abominable draught coming through various chinks in the door and walls, but in due course everybody had found a comfortable berth and was fast asleep. Fatigue such as we knew, could have but scant regard for such minor inconveniences as draughts and the cold stone floor.
It was probably due to these factors, and also because the sun shining through the cracks made the inside of the barn very light, that nobody seemed much inclined to sleep after about 2 p.m. By this time, most people had drifted outside, where it was considerably warmer than it had been indoors. The trade in bread for cigarettes was brisker than ever, as more and more of the guards realised our position, and I suppose, quite naturally, decided that they might as well make what they could out of it. Our Commanding Officer was now the other Wing Commander (Whose name I never knew). As the American Major was among those who had fallen by the wayside in the night, it appeared that Diffy was second in command, and presumably liable to be called upon to take over at any moment.
The Wing Commander addressed us on two points:
In the first place, I would advise everybody who can possibly keep going at all, to stay with the main body. Once you fall out, it’s just a toss-up what they will do to you. You may get slung into
some deep dungeon, and even if we do get overtaken, it may be weeks before anyone is able to find you. Secondly, we must make an effort to ‘peg’ the price of bread; if we don’t these Jerries are going to force it up and up as our need grows, and in a very little while none of us will have either bread or cigarettes. Some of you are giving as many as forty cigarettes for a loaf of bread, and I tell you that it is far too many, and that twenty is plenty.
The first part of his advice was good, and I had no quarrel with it. The second part to me, provided a very interesting little study in economics. It is all very well to try and introduce a price control, but when there is no ready means of enforcing it, and the only law in operation is that of necessity, or supply and demand, it is hard to see how it can be expected to work. I, along with several others, did not smoke, and we (Guy and I) probably had anything up to a couple of hundred cigarettes apiece (the people at Dulag had been very generous just before we left). The only value those cigarettes had to us was what they would buy in terms of goods that we could use, which at the moment took the form of bread.
Had bread been plentiful, it would have been alright, and the Germans could have been offered five cigarettes, which was about the intrinsic value of a loaf, and if he refused, told to keep it; but bread was scarce, and the guards were cunning
enough to hawk their odd bits around until they found the highest bidder. Was it any wonder that if a man with no bread had plenty of (to him) useless cigarettes, he was going to offer them pretty freely to the first Jerry he found with bread for disposal? To my mind, the Wing Commander went the wrong way about solving this problem. What should have been done was for the available cigarettes to have been pooled, and used to buy the bread on offer at a fair price, then an issue made to each man on a ration basis. As it was, we had the highly unsportsmanlike, and un-British, sight of many men being entirely without bread whilst others, more fortunate, had a plentiful supply, which they had picked up at varying prices.
At 3 p.m. we moved on. However, a count at this time numbered fifty-nine men – twenty-three had gone missing in just over two days. It was impossible to say exactly what were the losses among the guards, but at a very round estimate I should think that we started with well over 200, and that now there could not be more than about thirty at the most – such was discipline in the
Luftwaffe
! All the panic seemed to have gone out of the expedition and we sensed that if there had been any danger the night before, of being overrun by the advancing armies, it was considered, by now, to have passed. Joe announced, ‘You will march only five kilometres, and then you will stop and have a complete
night’s rest’. So little faith had we in the amiable Joe’s promises that there was a burst of derisive laughter at this remark. Nevertheless, we completed an uneventful 3 miles. Then, after hanging around in the village of Grebenau for an hour or so, we were taken, at 5 p.m., into another barn.
It was a slightly bigger barn, and boasted a small electric light, which to our surprise worked. Joe was as indefatigable as ever with his offers of ‘more straw’, and the promise of coffee now and soup in the morning. As had been the case at Undenhausen, we had strict orders that there was to be no smoking in the barn, but he need not have worried too much about that order being disobeyed. With the price of bread as it was, nobody felt he had any right to waste a cigarette by merely smoking it!
Guy and I found a billet underneath a plough, which offered us rather more room than most, because the various odd bits of the plough sticking out made it impossible for anybody else to get very near! It was whilst resting thus, that I made acquaintance with the brother of a very old friend of mine, whom I had met in the RAF, on the very first day I joined. It made it seem a very small world, meeting this fellow right out there in the wilds of the Third Reich. It was only the accident of his overhearing a chance remark to Guy about a training camp that we had both been at, that caused us to get into conversation.
Needless to say, we had a good deal to talk about, especially when I learnt that his fiancée lived in my own home town, and that they were hoping to get married as soon as we got clear of this country
Sleep came better that night, and it really was a surprise to find, on waking, that it was daylight outside. Moreover, unlike the experience in the two schoolrooms, there was no immediate signs of our guards wanting to hurry us on. We had a leisurely breakfast, washed down by our own excellent brew of coffee. Then Joe made his first speech of the day: ‘We are staying here until 2 p.m.’ he said, to our intense stupefaction. ‘At 11 a.m. you will get soup.’
‘And you can walk round the yard for exercise,’ added one wag.
‘The war must be over,’ said another, more optimistic than most.
‘The point probably is,’ I said to Guy, ‘that the ruddy guards are a jolly sight more tired than we are, and the old Major knows, that the way he is going on he’ll have no guards left at all in a couple of days. They’re all old men and thoroughly fed up.’
Anyway, we were all very glad of the extra rest, for now that our bodies had stiffened up, it was astonishing how tired we really felt. Guy’s feet, too, were giving him a lot of trouble, and although I recommended trying an extra pair of socks, he said that his boots were not big enough to allow
it. We fell to taking stock of our remaining food, and decided that with great care we should have enough to make ample meals for another four days. It seemed a reasonable provision at the time, and one at any rate that did not warrant any stringent rationing. However, reading since, of bodies of prisoners who were marched around Germany for six or more weeks, I have often wondered what would have happened if things had not turned out as they did. We exchanged sixty cigarettes for a box of prunes surplus to one man’s requirements. Immediately afterwards, we were offered another one by a man who had lost his false teeth and couldn’t eat them. After a consultation, we suggested forty cigarettes only, as the market had slumped, and with many a loud grumble he handed them over! It struck me at the time as being awfully mean, but the laws of supply and demand in a world that knows only barter, are inexorable. Where this poor chap made his mistake was in offering a box of prunes to men that had just bought one. He should have looked around to try to find somebody whose need for prunes was greater than ours!
After we had finished stocktaking, I went outside to try and secure a wash. Eventually finding my way into a stable where there was a tap, I enjoyed pleasant ablutions while also enjoying the nice friendly aroma of horse. I even managed to borrow kit from a guard, and indulged in my fourth shave in fifteen days. I was
surprised that I could muster sufficient spirits to chuckle at the thought of all the shaves that I had ‘done’ the RAF out of since I left my base a fortnight yesterday morning! It was about 10.30 a.m., and I was back in the barn instructing Guy where he could get a wash, when Joe came in and told us that there had been a charge in the plans. ‘You must all get packed up at once,’ he said. ‘You will get your soup at 11 a.m., but we are marching again at a quarter to twelve, and you must all be ready to go.’
‘The war’s on again,’ I remarked. ‘Never mind, as long as they keep pushing us along, it’s a fair indication that they’re afraid of something.’ We set about the task of getting our belongings together.
We had seen them making the soup out of potatoes and peas, and we were eagerly looking forward to the dish, which had just been placed outside the barn in a huge vessel that looked like a dustbin, when Joe dropped his second bombshell that morning. ‘You must all get outside at once, we are marching immediately.’