I remember getting captured by Germans sometime during 1942. My plane had slowly crashed into the ground in one of the ambushes, but I had survived the crash. I was captive for a year or two when my allies captured the prison camp. The camp was named Stalag Luft, short for Stammlager Luftwaffe. This camp was specified for airforce prisoners, like me. They also had a prison camp for naval servicemen and they were called Marlags. I hoped my friend Matthew wasn't captured on his Merchant ship. Luckily, he didn't! The conditions here were horrible. When I was captured, I first had to pass through a Dulag or a transit camp. This camp was for interrogation and background details of prisoners. We would then be transported to a war camp using a train. I had no food for several hours on top of the train being hot and stuffy. When I arrived, I stayed at a one-storey wooden barrack with bunk beds and a charcoal burning stove in the middle of the room. We were given 2 meals a day of thin soup, and black stale bread. I had to work long hours for at least once a day for a roll-call. German soldiers were all around us so we had no chance of escape, and it we did, we would get shot on the spot. By the end of the day, I was so weak and tired. Those days in the prison camp were the slowest days of my life. My fellow veterans, have you ever been captured by the Germans? If not, have you had a friend that got captured? Do you know what happened to them?
Luckily for me, I have never been captured by the Nazis. Hearing from your experiences, Glendon, I would find it difficult to bear living anymore! However, to answer your second question, I have known several friends captured by the Germans. One, a Corporal from the Royal Regiment of Canada by the name of William Burnaby, was captured during the failed raid on Dieppe when his tank was hit by a German Panzer III and burst into flames. We had been friends since school in Edmonton and though I’d returned back to Athabaska and him to Toronto since then, we still kept in constant contact through letters. I was terrified to hear that he suffered terrible burns but was captured by the Germans. While he was still in the prison camp, William still sent letters to me, but they were highly censored by his German captors and after a while, he completely stopped writing to me. I suspect that the Germans forced Williams to work as a slave labourer on the Atlantic Wall, as I have heard was common. I sure hope he somehow survived the war, but I have never heard a word from him since …
ReplyDeleteIt is always painful to remember the harsh treatment that my friend, Leon who fought in Hong Kong had to endure under the cruel Japanese soldiers. The worst part, however, was that I had no idea that he was captured, let alone completely tortured. Years after the war, when I had met Leon again, he was a father, but his thin figure and his rough-looking face had a grueling story to tell. He told me about his capture after failing to defend Hong Kong in 1941. Leon told me about being deprived of food, living in a pigsty with other soldiers who began contracting diseases, and being treated like animals by the Japanese. It certainly did not have to be said to his face, because he already knew, himself...the chances of him surviving that chapter of his life was next to nothing. He, as well as the rest of the prisoners of war would have been killed if anyone invaded Japan. You can imagine that I was definitely glad that he remained obedient, and that no one had a chance to invade Japan.
ReplyDeleteYes, Air Commodore Glendon, I was not captured. Thank you for filling in the rest of the world on what happened to you. In response to your questions, you were one of the only friends that I had that survived these prison camps for more than a month after entering, let alone surviving to tell the tale afterward! But no, I was not captured by the Germans, but I had a close call. If it wasn't for that naval brigade that saved me, I might have been in the same trouble as you were. I am sorry that you had the misfortune of going through that but at the same time I am glad you survived!
ReplyDelete(Major Rey Hypolito T.)
ReplyDeleteI was one of the lucky ones, I was neither captured by the Nazis or the Japanese. I feel for what you have gone through though I will most likely never know exactly how you felt during those times. All I know of those times were of what was passed by the word of mouth. But I would have never thought that it could have been that bad. But I did have this friend that was captured by the Japanese. He was my very best friend, because he was my brother. It killed me to know that he was being treated as something worse than an animal. Even animals had it better than he did. At least they were feed properly. I found out later that my brother had died of dry berry while calling my name as he closed his eyes for the last time. FOR GOD”S SAKE could they not have a heart?! All they fed them was RICE! I would not mind giving those stupid old Japs what they have coming for them! We should do what they did to our men and see how they like it!