Description
Object description
Memoir (32pp ts, written in 1980) of his experiences whilst serving in 208th Field Company, Royal Engineers, during the Second World War, joining up at Eastbourne shortly before the outbreak of war in 1939 and proceeding to northern France in October of that year, constructing defences and army accommodation, his capture by German troops at Saint-Venant in the Pas-de-Calais in late May 1940, his life as a prisoner of war in Stalag XXA (Thorn / Torun) in occupied Poland, being sent to nearby work camps to dismantle redundant Polish military defence structures, help with road-building, and carry out agricultural labour at a 'Germanised' farm near Kulm (Chelm) where most of his captivity was spent, giving a good account of his experiences on the farm and his increasingly friendly relations with the German family working it, the approach of the Soviet forces in late 1944 / 1945 and the forced march of the POWs westwards in harsh winter conditions, his ordeal ending with liberation at Uelzen in northern Germany in early May 1945; together with an account (10pp ts, with numerous photographs) of a return trip to Poland in 1987 to revisit some of the places associated with his wartime captivity.
Content description
Memoir (32pp ts, written in 1980) of his experiences whilst serving in 208th Field Company, Royal Engineers, during the Second World War, joining up at Eastbourne shortly before the outbreak of war in 1939 and proceeding to northern France in October of that year, constructing defences and army accommodation, his capture by German troops at Saint-Venant in the Pas-de-Calais in late May 1940, his life as a prisoner of war in Stalag XXA (Thorn / Torun) in occupied Poland, being sent to nearby work camps to dismantle redundant Polish military defence structures, help with road-building, and carry out agricultural labour at a 'Germanised' farm near Kulm (Chelm) where most of his captivity was spent, giving a good account of his experiences on the farm and his increasingly friendly relations with the German family working it, the approach of the Soviet forces in late 1944 / 1945 and the forced march of the POWs westwards in harsh winter conditions, his ordeal ending with liberation at Uelzen in northern Germany in early May 1945; together with an account (10pp ts, with numerous photographs) of a return trip to Poland in 1987 to revisit some of the places associated with his wartime captivity.
History note
Cataloguer SWW