The Final Curtsey

by Margaret Rhodes

  On the night of 12–13 April, at 11.30 pm, we were roused from our beds in the room in which we were locked up every night and told that we and the Polish officers were to be ready to leave in two hours. Armed guards in the passages and courtyards made any reasonable scheme for getting away to a ‘hide’ impossible, and in due course, at 1.30 am, we were marched out into the waiting buses. The American troops were at this time only some 20 miles away, and reached the camp area 24 hours later. In the morning, we arrived at the fortress of Konigstein on the Elbe, where we were lodged in the German quarters of the camp and allowed no contact with the other prisoners of war in the fortress.

  Two members of the party were ill and, after some difficulty, it was agreed by the German Kommandant, after telephoning to Berlin, that these two officers, with one British orderly, should remain there until well. Since we could hear from the fortress the guns on the Front, we all thought it likely that, within a very short time this camp, too, would be liberated — an event which unfortunately took very much longer to materialise than we expected.

  Next morning, the rest of the party were motored down through Czechoslovakia, seeing frantic efforts being made on all roads to make road-blocks, antitank ditches and weapon-pits. We spent the night at Klattau, and at dawn moved on into Bavaria, and finally stopped outside an internee camp at Laufen, 12 miles north of Salzburg. Our great anxiety was the possibility of being taken out of Wehrmacht (army) hands and as this now seemed probable, a fierce battle of words took place. As senior of the British/American party, I refused to leave the bus or to enter the camp and told the German colonel conducting us that I held him personally responsible for seeing that we were taken to an officers’ camp run under army regulations. After some delay, it was agreed that temporarily we could go to the camp of Dutch officer-prisoners ten miles away.

  After several days spent with the Dutch officers, who received us with the greatest possible kindness, and gave us every help, we were informed that we were to be removed back to Laufen.

  We decided that more extreme measures than protests must be taken, and, accordingly, with the help of two Dutch officers in particular, a hurried scheme was arranged whereby one member of the party and one Dutch officer should escape by a rope (more than two being unlikely to get out unobserved owing to various difficulties) and the rest of us should be bricked up in a cleverly constructed ‘hide’ in the wall of the room, previously prepared by the Dutch officers. The Polish officers were unable to join us, and were removed the next day to the internee camp at Laufen. All went well the first night; two civilian members of our party and one Dutch officer succeeded in making a ‘get-away’ while we remained in the ‘hide’ hoping that the Germans would presume us all to have escaped when they found the rope left hanging down the outer wall.

  We were told later that the German authorities were panic-stricken as they had been informed that they would forfeit their lives if we escaped. 3,000 Germans scoured the countryside and a very thorough search was made inside the camp itself — without any success. On the fourth day, however, presumably suspecting that some of us were still hidden in the camp, they made an even more drastic search — walls, floors and ceilings all being torn up — and eventually the plastered-up entrance to the ‘hide’ was knocked down and we were pulled out. Under very heavy escort, we were taken to the internee camp at Laufen. Here the German general commanding the Munich area visited the camp, and in the course of an interview, finally gave me his word of honour that we should remain there until the end of the War — a promise repeated in the presence of the Swiss Minister by the German Kommandant the next day. The latter, however, could, or would, give no reason for our detention, apart from all other officer-prisoners, except that it was ordered by Himmler.

  All remained quiet until the fall of Munich, and then, with the Americans once more rapidly approaching, the orders were given that we were to move at once — in spite of promises given — into the mountains of the Austrian Tyrol. Two officers, an SS colonel and a Luftwaffe major, were sent by Obergruppenfuhrer and General of SS Berger to conduct us. At 6.30 am we entered the transport, with the colonel fingering his revolver, watching us with a somewhat sinister-looking blonde woman who accompanied him in his car. This was possibly the most trying of all the moves, as the whole scene had a gangster-like atmosphere. We drove through Salzburg, past Berchtesgaden and finally stopped at a Stalag in a remote valley in the Tyrol. We were allowed no contact with the prisoners, who included representatives of most of the allied nations, but were isolated in the German part of the camp.

  The representatives of the Swiss Legation (Protecting Power) with admirable and with very reassuring promptitude, followed us and visited the Kommandant within a very few hours of our arrival. Later the Swiss Minister and his staff started on the series of interviews and discussions with the leading German government figures who were in the neighbourhood. This work, which they carried out with wonderful patience and success, was of the utmost difficulty, as the leaders were scattered in remote mountain hamlets, and all roads were choked with army vehicles and personnel.

  Finally SS Obergruppenfuhrer Berger, chief, amongst other things, of all prisoner-of-war affairs, agreed to hand us over to the Swiss, and allow them to conduct us through the lines. He did this on his own responsibility and warned the Swiss that other elements of the government would, if they knew, resist his orders and lay hands on us. He therefore sent to the camp a special guard under an SS colonel, armed with every type of weapon, to guard us against the ‘other German elements’ during the final night of our captivity.

  Berger himself came to visit us and in a long and theatrically declaimed speech reiterated, probably for the last time, many of the well-worn phrases of German propaganda together with several revelations of the complete break-up of the German government and people. He then informed us that, owing to this break-up, he felt he was no longer in a position to safeguard us properly and had agreed to hand us over to Swiss protection. On leaving, he turned, theatrical to the end, to the German officers in charge of us and, having given his final commands, said: ‘Gentlemen, these are probably the last orders I shall give as a high official of the German Third Reich.’ We were due to leave at 11 am the next morning. The Swiss Legation attaché, who was to accompany us in his car, arrived early, but for more than three rather tantalizing hours, there was no sign of the German trucks which were to take the party, a fact which caused some anxiety in view of Berger’s warnings. At length, however, two other trucks were secured locally, thanks once again to the perseverance of the Swiss attaché, and finally at about 5 pm we set off, each vehicle draped with the Swiss flag, along the densely packed roads. Accompanying us was an SS medical office as personal representative of General Berger.

  A STRANGE INTERLUDE

  At about 11.30 pm, this officer stopped the convoy in a small village in the mountains, saying that he had orders from General Berger to see that we had food and drink in his headquarters here. We entered a house filled with SS troops, many of them intoxicated, and were shown into an upstairs room where some food and much drink was laid out. In the middle of the meal, the Obergruppenfuhrer once more made a theatrical entry, played the expansive if somewhat nerve-strained host, and again poured out a flood of propaganda and explanation. After some time he gave an order to an SS adjutant, who handed him a scarlet leather case. After yet another speech, he turned to me as senior of the British/American party, and handed me the case as ‘a proof of his good feelings’. Inside was an elaborately ornamented pistol of ivory, brass and enamel, with his own signature engraved on the butt.

  After this strange interlude, we set off once more. At dawn we passed successfully through the last German post and shortly afterwards were halted, to our joy and relief, by a spearhead force of six American tanks. A few hours later we were most kindly and hospitably welcomed by an American divisional headquarters at Innsbruck. It would be difficult indeed for our party adequately to express our gratitude to th
e Swiss minister and his staff for all that they did to make the release possible.

  Sometime after the war, more information became available about this particular episode. Apparently orders were given to the German Army authorities that all the prisoners were to be shot. My brother John, who was the senior officer of the Prominente, managed to convince the German officer in command that Germany had lost the war and that, if he obeyed these orders, he would be signing his own death warrant.

  His convincing arguments saved the lives of all those prisoners and ensured that negotiations with the Swiss authorities were continued successfully.

  * * *

  After Queen Elizabeth’s death, I was given the task of sorting through her correspondence, and found a letter to my brother John, complete in its envelope, addressed to ‘British Prisoner of War N.1186’ at OFLAG VII B, which was, inexplicably, never posted. I still have it. It is a wonderful, charming letter, in which she listed all the things John might be able to enjoy once he was free, including inviting a few guns from among his prisoner friends to a shoot in the Highlands and stay at Gannochy. She told him that the very grand butler there, known as ‘Lord’ Bingley, had, ‘wise man’, married the cook, and assured John that ‘Lady’ Bingley would cook for him and his friends ‘exquisitely’. Perhaps Queen Elizabeth, being a sensitive soul, hesitated to send it because she thought a description of pleasures he might never be able to enjoy would make him even more homesick.

  My younger brother, Andrew, was in the Cameron Highlanders. A lot of his men came from the Outer Isles and spoke Gaelic, so he went off to live for a short while on the island of Benbecula to learn the language — a notoriously difficult one to master — and I remember him reciting the Lord’s Prayer in Gaelic. Andrew, to his chagrin, was found to be medically unfit for active service, due to a heart condition, and was posted to India as ADC to the Viceroy Lord Linlithgow. This was an unbelievable chance for a twenty-one-year-old, but ‘Hopey’ Linlithgow, as he was known to his friends, resigned in 1943, in the wake of the spreading resistance to British rule, and Andrew came home to be recruited to MI5, through my intervention, sharing rooms with me in Buckingham Palace, when I was working for MI6, as described in the next chapter. He was an accomplished pianist, and, in my view, good enough for the concert circuit, but after the war, he felt impelled towards the Anglican priesthood. He was in a dilemma; was his future to be the piano or the pulpit? Divine providence, however, intervened. One day, sawing wood with a circular electric saw he inadvertently cut off the first finger of his right hand. The decision was therefore made for him and he became a clergyman.

  I still managed to escape to Glenmazeran, where we had a keeper called Duncan who taught me a lot about shooting and fishing. He also had other talents which proved useful in a time of shortages, becoming a prominent figure in the local Black Market. I suppose this was very reprehensible, but there were some things one couldn’t do without. Duncan could produce an illicit petrol coupon or two and he had a good line in knickers, the old-fashioned, elastic round the legs kind, and other little comforts. I don’t know whether he was ever rumbled. I hope not, because as far as I was concerned he was performing a public service, although I sometimes wondered whether I was an accessory after the fact. Towards the end of 1941, when I was sixteen, I was sent to a finishing school in Oxford to have my rough edges smoothed. We were supposed to talk French all the time and were allowed to attend lectures being given in the university. With French, a smattering of Italian, and a touch of philosophy, I was considered ‘finished’, although it has always amazed me that I acquired an education at all. Luckily, I have always devoured books and so perhaps I am largely self-educated.

  My siblings Jean, John, Elizabeth, holding me as a baby, and Andrew

  I was enamoured of a young man called Bill Birch Reynardson who was up at Christ Church. He escorted me to a dance at Windsor Castle, but geography put an end to this potential romance when he left Oxford. I then went off to prepare to earn my living by learning shorthand and typing at the Queen’s Secretarial College, which had been evacuated from London to Surrey. I stayed at Windsor Castle, with the Princesses, and caught the bus to Egham every day.

  The castle had returned to its original role as a fortress and there was a plan for my cousins to disappear in the event of an invasion. It was, I believe, called the Coats Mission because it was commanded by a high ranking officer called Coats. A hand-picked body of officers and men from the Brigade of Guards and the Household Cavalry, equipped with armoured cars, was on twenty-four-hour call to take the King and Queen and their daughters to a safe house in the country should the German threat of invasion materialise. I don’t think there was much reason to worry about that after 1940, but it was a comforting thought that they were around, until I learned that although the operation probably included the corgis, it did not include me.

  Windsor Castle was a bit bleak in those days. Heavy black-out curtains made the rooms look gloomy and the furniture was naturally shrouded in dust covers. It seemed to be perpetual twilight. The King and Queen, who came down from London at weekends, observed the food rationing regulations although the rations were supplemented by game birds and venison. The pudding every day was stewed bottled plums, picked from the garden.

  In order to save on vital supplies, we were only allowed three inches of water in the bath and the King commanded that a black line be painted as a sort of ablutionary Plimsoll line. It was, of course, impossible actually to regulate this and I’m sure there were many who totally ignored His Majesty’s attempt to impose water rationing. Often there were air raids, and the Page would come in, bow, and announce: ‘Purple warning, Your Majesty’, the signal that the Luftwaffe was zooming in. I remember one particularly heavy attack when we all had to go to the shelter. We were roused in the middle of the night and first taken to the King and Queen’s bedroom where I think I saw the King take a revolver from the drawer of his bedside table. It was a defensive precaution, bearing in mind the possibility of an enemy parachute drop aimed at his capture. I know too that Queen Elizabeth practised revolver shooting in the garden of Buckingham Palace, particularly after the Palace was bombed, which meant huge numbers of rats ran free, so she was able to practise on moving targets.

  We then walked what seemed like miles and miles, down into the bowels of the castle. On the trek Queen Elizabeth absolutely refused to be hurried, despite the efforts of courtiers to persuade her to move faster. Hitler had described her as the most dangerous woman in Europe, after he saw a newsreel clip of her laying a single poppy on a memorial to the Commonwealth dead in the First World War during the state visit to France in 1938, a time when, despite the Munich Agreement, many people believed that war was inevitable. It was a symbolic gesture, as were her dragging feet, typifying her attitude to Nazi aggression. The Fuhrer was not going to force her pace. This did not mean that the raids did not disturb her. At the end of December 1940 she wrote to my sister, Elizabeth, saying: ‘I am still just as frightened of bombs and guns going off as I was at the beginning. I turn bright red, and my heart hammers. In fact I’m a beastly coward, but I do believe that a lot of people are, so I don’t mind . . . Down with the Nazis.’

  But outside the family she knew that she could not give an inkling that she might be scared. One such occasion was when she had a meeting with Lady Reading, the head of the WVS at Buckingham Palace during a particularly bad raid. The palace had already been bombed and as they talked the explosions got closer and closer. Lady Reading was renowned as a most formidable woman and was obviously not the least concerned.

  They were ensconced by the big windows overlooking the garden and Queen Elizabeth rather wanted to suggest that it would be sensible to move a little further away from the possible danger of shattered glass. Lady Reading, however, just went on talking and talking. Afterwards my aunt said that she had to strongly remind herself that she was the Queen of England and couldn’t possibly show any fear.

  I have many memories of
my sojourn at Windsor, and the comings and goings of important figures in the war effort. For instance I met the South African Prime Minister, Jan Christiaan Smuts, and I like to think that decades later when I was introduced to Nelson Mandela that I had rounded the circle as far as South African politics were concerned. But for frivolous reasons I particularly remember one summer afternoon when we were having tea on a small terrace overlooking the castle rose garden. A long white tablecloth swept to the ground, and the table was set with a silver kettle, teapot and all the usual paraphernalia. The party comprised the King, the Queen, the Princesses, myself, and my friend Liz Lambart, who, like me, was a bridesmaid to Princess Elizabeth. Liz, a daughter of the Earl of Cavan, was sharing my shorthand and typing labours.

  Suddenly we heard male voices engaged in transatlantic chatter. The King exclaimed: ‘Oh Lord. General Eisenhower and his group are being shown round the castle. I quite forgot. We will all be in full view when they turn the next corner.’ It was embarrassing because the little terrace was half way up the castle wall and they would have been clearly seen, but unable to descend or to communicate in any way with the visitors. Thus without another word, and acting as one, the Royal Family dived under the tablecloth. Liz and I, our mouths gaping open, followed fast. We stayed there until we thought it safe to reappear. Eisenhower must have been over here planning the D-Day landings at that time. If he and his party had looked up towards the terrace they would have seen a table shaking from the effect of the concerted and uncontrollable giggles of those sheltering beneath it. Years later, on a State Visit to America, the present Queen confessed to the then President Eisenhower about it and he thought it very funny.