- Article |
- Discussion |
- Edit |
- History
Hundreds of PoWs fell in death march across Poland
RAF flight engineer David Scott, from Derby, was taken prisoner after being shot down over Nazi Germany in 1944. Somehow he survived a tortuous march from Bankau in Poland to Luckenwalde, Germany, which left hundreds of PoWs dead along the way – as this extract from his wartime diaries reveal.
That day we marched to Winterfeld where we arrived at 6pm. A hundred of us were crowded into a small barn. Although worn out with the 23km march, none of us could sleep, it was so crowded.
On the way, we had jettisoned everything possible. The weather was terrible; some dragged makeshift sledges through the snow; carrying suitcases was impossible. Most of us only kept blankets and spare socks etc.
At 4.30am, we were roused out into the dark, arriving eventually at a brickworks at Karlsruhe at 11am. After a short stay, we were on our way again at 8pm. Many people tried to evade the guards by hiding in piles of bricks etc but dogs were sent in and the random shots fired persuaded most to assemble, with the warning that we must cross the Oder that night.
We marched 41km, arriving at another large barn at Wauberty at about 11am. Next morning, we were away once more at 4.30am, arriving at Grosse Jankwitz, another barn at 3pm.
By now, we were all in a bad way. Even the fittest were struggling. The weather was appalling – continuous snow -storms and freezing winds. Many had frostbitten feet and all were so apathetic they hardly noticed their friends falling by the wayside.
I have little record of the following days, just nightmare memories. Food was almost non-existent. Stops were as bad as the march – generally we were herded into farmyards to find what shelter we could. More than once my friend, Denny, and I sheltered under farm carts or lean-to sheds.
An added hazard was keeping one’s boots from getting frozen; they were best in bed with you.
Our route was roughly through Wansom, Heidersdorf, Pfeffendorf, Stansdsorf, Prausnitz and then a last march to Goldsberg, where, on February 5 at 11am, we were stuffed into cattle cars. We remained locked in until February 8, at 11.30am, with 65 men in each boxcar.
We finally arrived at Stalag IIIA at about 3pm. IIIA was situated just outside Luckenwalde. When the sliding door was eventually opened after three days, many had to be lifted off. They could not even fall out of the door. You can imagine the conditions. We had insufficient room for all to sit and many stood to enable those who were ill to sit.
Luckenwalde Camp was vast, like a town, with a central spine of a cobbled street. The different compounds each held a different category – US soldiers, US airmen, Poles, Russians, Scandinavians – you name it.
Each compound had its own gate and guard with space between the compounds to discourage fraternising. Some of the compounds were not guarded, being compounds from which daily parties went off to work on street cleansing, farm labour etc. The French were the largest in this respect and even had a camp cinema. All this we learned when we got familiar with the system.
One section of the camp was occupied by Irish soldiers, many captured at Dunkirk. They had been separated out from camps all over Germany to hopefully form the nucleus of a Free British Army.
However, the authorities found they had a tough nut to crack and, even though they were left stranded for weeks in the open air without shelter, none would sign up for their propaganda army.
They were very hospitable to us, finding us food from their meagre supplies. We were all billeted in a large wooden hut without beds, bedding or palliasses, yet it was great to have shelter and a settled, if spartan, existence.
The weather was improving as we went into spring. We subsisted on soup, bread and a small bowl of potatoes daily. The soup wasn’t sustaining. It was generally what we named “whispering grass”, which was hot water with a few barley grains and fronds of a grass-like substance floating in it.
On about two occasions, we had a Red Cross parcel each. This was a real red-letter day. We also had the added misfortune of all being lousy. The lice we picked up on arrival in our hut. It had been occupied by a bunch of French refugees and they had left us the lice for a present.
They were a really bad experience. On a fine day, we would send all our outer clothing to the ovens for delousing, wash all our underwear and dry it in the sunshine. Back would come our clothing.
We would dress and, within minutes, we were scratching again.
Previous extracts from the diary can be found at:
Prisoner of war tells his story through diary which helped him stay alive
I felt hot flames around my ears and saw burning petrol
I was not welcome to sit on a train with the “super race”
Americans were badly burned but glad to be alive
FEEDBACK
Did you enjoy this article? If so, why not comment on it? Perhaps you disagree with something in it, or you know something the writer doesn't and can add some extra facts. You may want to ask a question about this article. Making a contribution is easy - either click 'edit' to insert more information or 'discussion' and then 'add comment.' This is your site. Please feel free to use it to the full and share your memories, thoughts and knowledge about Derbyshire with others.
If there is no 'edit' link showing it means the article has either previously been published in the Derby Evening Telegraph, or it has been protected by the site administrator and cannot be edited.'
|
Other tags that are relevant to Hundreds of PoWs fell in death march across Poland Help us to improve You&Yesterday by adding more tags to this article. Simply edit this page, find this area and add the words in a list separated by commas next to the *. To find out more about tagging please click here. |
County: Derbyshire
Return to You_and_Yesterday
Share this page: del.icio.us 
| digg 
| Fark 
| Furl 
| BlogMarks 