They Spread Their Wings
Page 26
Arthur also noted:
Discipline is not as strict as I expected it to be. Our day starts at 06.30 with a roll-call, from then until 20.00 when the second and last roll-call is made, the day is ours. Occasionally we have inspections but they are too rare to be classed as discipline. Most of the Camp work is done by other nationalities and the British are, outwardly at least, the most favoured and I came to realise there were far worse places to be.
Time was always the other enemy but prisoners had much scope to create ways of occupying themselves. There was no lack of space for sport in the Stalag. This suited Arthur and he recalled there was some form of sport, competitive or otherwise, played pretty well every day, with football, rugby and volleyball being the most popular. The British and French constructed theatres and during the winter several concert parties toured the huts and were considered good entertainment. British POWs could occupy themselves with a wide choice of lectures on all manner of educational subjects, too – ranging from big game hunting to the cost of dry cleaning and everything in between. Lectures would keep a hut quiet for an hour or so and as an alternative, there was imitation horse racing and indoor and outdoor concerts by the several good bands that were formed.
Arthur’s favourite card game was bridge and he and his playing partner, another Stirling rear gunner named Frank Elliot (twenty-eight ops with No 214 Squadron), won lots of cigarettes that way. His hut also ran a bridge league. Occasionally there were parcels from home and even some from No 15 Squadron which had formed a POW Fund and sent such things as a book and an LP record (Arthur could not recall what the title of the record was), but cigarettes remained popular gifts that could also be turned into a form of currency.
Sometimes a new contingent of prisoners would shuffle through the main gate and a crowd would always gather, eagerly searching for faces from the past. Arthur remembered one of those days:
In late 1944 a party of new arrivals turned up and I was among those peering at their faces. I spotted Taff Davies, a bomb aimer from ‘Pop’ Regus’s crew in 15 Squadron. He looked real downcast. I shouted to him: ‘cheer up, Taff’ and as he looked over at me his face lit up. I told him Maxie and I had been here for fifteen months. When he settled in we met and mulled over the old days and he brought us up to date on what had happened in England since May’ 43.
Things were enlivened a little by attempts to escape. In Stalag IVB the recreation hut was located in the RAF compound and it fulfilled many uses: the barber shop, sports store and table tennis were all housed in the building. At one point the Germans closed it down when a tunnel was discovered running from the hut to about 6ft outside the wire. It only needed the escapers to break the surface and the way would be clear, but it was discovered before that could happen. The guards filled the tunnel with human refuse then reopened the hut. Not a particularly hygienic way to discourage tunnel diggers – but very effective. Arthur recalled another attempt:
One very cold night in the winter of 1944 my ‘mucker’ Les Ellingham informed me he was going through the wire with several others. I said I hoped he would make it. They went out at about seven o’clock at night. About nine o’clock he staggered back into the barracks saying it was so bloody cold that they would not survive out there. A brave attempt.
In December 1944 Arthur received a letter notifying him that he had been promoted to flight sergeant, backdated for several months. By March 1945 the biggest issue was that everyone in the camp was so very, very hungry. One of its effects was to make a person liable to black out if they rose off their bed too quickly and other movements had to be made slowly otherwise you might fall down.
Nevertheless, towards the end of March 1945 there were many signs that the war was almost over. Arthur recalled hearing bombers go over the camp and seeing the night sky lit up in the direction of Dresden. There were lots of aircraft about during daylight, too. On 21 March three P–51 Mustangs machine-gunned the camp, putting several holes through huts 47A, 47B and 49B and knocking the searchlights off one of the German guard towers. From the beginning of April, American fighters came over the camp daily, machine-gunning anything that moved outside the wire and one day they hit a woodcutting party, killing and wounding eleven Russians, British and Germans. Six American P–47 Thunderbolts pounced on an ammunition train about three-quarters of a mile from the camp and left it blazing merrily until it disappeared in a string of thirty to forty violent explosions. USAAF P–38 Lightnings with long-range tanks strafed enemy positions and formations of B–17 Flying Fortresses attacked nearby rail centres. The end seemed to be close.
Each POW nationality in Stalag IVB – and there were believed to be soldiers and airmen of thirty-three different nationalities in the camp – had its own head person, known as the ‘man of confidence’:
On Sunday 22 April 1945, these men were called to a meeting with the German Commandant. He asked if any of them wished to take their contingent over to the west side of the River Elbe via the bridge at Mühlburg. Only the Poles went.
The Germans also left the camp that same night. Most of the camp just turned in and went to bed, although not many slept as heavy guns seemed to be firing all round us. At 07.00 next morning we paraded for roll-call and while the count was taking place, to our great delight we saw hundreds of Russian Cossacks on the south side of the camp. We were free at last!
An estimated 30,000 prisoners were in the camp by this time, of which 7,250 were British. Orders were given that prisoners must remain in camp and there was to be no looting, but within two hours hunger got the better of everyone and most of the camp inmates – Arthur and his mates among them – were wandering outside searching for food. Potatoes, onions, wheat, pigs, cows, bullocks – almost everything edible was brought into the camp. Arthur and two pals returned with a huge hulk of beef that the Russians had given them:
What a feed we had, but having been starved for over three months, the rich food gave many of the POWs diarrhoea and some became quite ill. Next day we went into the local village, which was almost deserted, and discovered such luxuries as porridge, tinned and powdered milk, bottled fruit, white flour, sugar, all of which were liberated in a frenzy of eating.
This spree continued until 30 April when the Russians moved all the British prisoners to the town of Riesa but our liberators were clearly in no hurry to repatriate the British and Americans to their homelands. We crossed the Elbe and were herded into large brick houses that had been occupied by the German army. Life seemed much brighter now particularly when other luxuries such as wireless sets, sheets, pillows and so on, began arriving having been commandeered from deserted German homes.
We listened to the VE-day broadcasts on the radio. How much longer must we wait to go home? A few more days passed and we became restless, so five of us went for a look around for food. We found some pigs and since I had worked on a farm it fell to me to lead the process of turning the pig into food! One of them was man-handled to a deserted house; a fire lit under the washing copper, water brought to the boil and we did what was necessary to make the beast edible. That pig was killed, cooked and eaten within five hours!
Nothing seemed to be happening in Riesa so three of us decided to try to reach the American lines. Percy Brett, a Stirling pilot from RAF Witchford; Eric Weare, a navigator on Lancasters with No 156 Squadron at Warboys; and myself gave the Russians the slip one morning about 07.30. We waited until the guards couldn’t see us and made a bolt for it, heading west towards Leipzig, which was about 60 km from Riesa. Nightfall found us tired out and wondering where to sleep. An elderly German approached us and took us to his home where we spent the night in real beds. Next morning he asked us to write our names down on a piece of paper and each to sign it. This enabled him to obtain for us bread, butter and meat from the village burgermeister [mayor]. General Eisenhower had made a radio broadcast in which he promised that any German citizen who helped POWs would be rewarded for their efforts, so the ‘chitty’ was very valuable to this particular German, too.
Setting out after a hearty meal, by midday we reached the town of Wurzen. More Russian soldiers were guarding the bridge over the smallest of two rivers that ran near the town but we told them we were Americans, so they let us pass. Crossing the main river, the Mulde, was far more difficult as the bridge was completely down. The railway bridge, however, was only half collapsed and on nearing it we spotted several American soldiers. They helped us climb on to the bridge then we inched our way over very slowly until we reached the other side – which was American-held territory.
Now in high spirits, walking the next seven kilometres didn’t seem quite so bad. Then an American lorry pulled up. It was full of soldiers and equipment and the driver said he was sorry but there was no room for us, but not to miss out on this chance to relieve our weary legs, my two pals squeezed in and I rode outside on the front wing, holding on to the small side light for all I was worth. The driver by-passed Leipzig and took us on a marvellous autobahn to Halle. At a prisoner reception centre in Halle the Americans took down our particulars, gave us cigarettes, chocolate and a good meal and we were given a bed for the night. Next morning we found we were not alone and several hundred ex-POWs were taken to Halle airfield to await transport – HOME. Two hours passed then the wondrous sight of thirty-three C–47s [Skytrain] landed, we embarked and were flown to Belgium.
Landing at Nivelles airfield, south of Brussels, we were met by RAF trucks and plied with cigarettes and sandwiches before being driven to Brussels for the night. Next day, I and many others were interrogated and even paid and that afternoon I boarded an RAF Dakota which flew to RAF Ford in dear old England. Stepping down from that aeroplane on to the tarmac, we must have looked a pretty sorry sight. A row of huge marquees was set up on the airfield to process us and it was straight into de-lousing, a thorough wash, and my tattered uniform and other rags of clothing were taken away and burned. In another marquee I was issued with a new uniform and other new items of clothing and in yet another tent one of an army of WAAFs sewed on my rank badges – at which point I learned I had been promoted to the exalted rank of Warrant Officer. I was then issued with a rail warrant to RAF Cosford.
Arthur Edgley’s POW record card, which he ‘liberated’ from Stalag Luft IVB in 1945. (Arthur Edgley)
On my way through London lots of people flocked to the train and I was asked if I wanted any telephone messages sending to relatives. There was not much time to spare so I asked one of these ladies if she would phone my family and tell them I was back in England and I gave her some money to make the call. I wondered if this was all just a ‘con’ but it turned out to be absolutely genuine – my mother received a phone call that same day to say I was safe, well and back in England.
Arriving at Cosford, I was issued with more equipment, yet more back pay, a rail warrant and – the best bit of all – nine whole weeks’ leave. I left Cosford at 4pm and arrived at long last at my fiancée’s home in Sutton Bridge on Sunday 19 May 1945. What a home-coming that was! It was not long before I ‘popped the question’ and having asked her father’s permission, Joan and I married on 15 June 1945 in Sutton Bridge. I returned to RAF Cosford at the end of my leave and was posted to RAF Wittering but I had lots more leave thereafter – I was at home more than with the RAF – and was finally ‘de-mobbed’ in March 1946.
After the war Arthur returned to farming and, under a government scheme, was able to take up a smallholding consisting of 40 acres of arable land and a house where he has been content to remain ever since.
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Air Link, Magazine of Lincolnshire Aviation Society
Flight (magazine) digital archive
Lincolnshire Free Press and Spalding Guardian
The London Gazette
The Times digital archive
A selection of records in The National Archives has been consulted:
RAF Form 540s for the following: AIR 26 Wings; AIR 27 Squadrons; AIR 50 Squadron Combat Reports
AIR 76 First World War Personnel Records
Extracts from IS9 post-war debrief interview documents dated 29/8/1945
Crown copyright material appears by permission of the Controller of HMSO and the Queen’s Printer for Scotland.
Internet sources consulted:
www.tactical-airpower.tripod.com – No 2 TAF and the Normandy Campaign by Paul Johnson
www.tangmerepilots.co.uk – on the Normandy Campaign
www.pprune.org – for facilitating contact with Peter Brett
www.luftwaffe.cz – for information on aces of the Luftwaffe
www.cwgc.org – for information about airmen casualties
home.clara.net.clinchy/neeball.htm (www.belgiumww2.info) – for information from Escape and Evasion in Wartime Belgium (© John Clinch, 2004)
PREVIOUS BOOKS BY ALASTAIR GOODRUM PUBLISHED BY
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Copyright
Cover illustrations. Front, clockwise from top left: Flying Officer Jack Cheney, pilot with No 25 Squadron, Church Fenton, 1943 (J. Cheney Collection); Howard Clark tries out a Bf 109 for size, Tunisia, 1943 (Clark Collection); No 6 Squadron Hurricane IIDs, Tunisia, 6 April 1943 (Via Martyn Chorlton).
First published in 2013
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