Description
Object description
British private served as nurse with 189th Field Ambulance Coy, Royal Army Medical Corps on Crete, Greece, 1941; prisoner of war in Dulag 183, Salonika, Greece and Stalag VIII-B, Lamsdorf, Germany, 6/1941-1/1945
Content description
REEL 1 Aspects of period as nurse with 189th Field Ambulance Coy, Royal Army Medical Corps on Crete, Greece, 1941: call up for military service, 1939; landing on Crete, 1941; pattern of movements on Crete; capture by Germans, 6/1941. Aspects of period as prisoner of war in Dulag 183, Salonika, Greece, 1941: transfer from Crete to Greek mainland; conditions in camp; nature of Regimental Sergeant-Major Storer's collaboration; treatment received from German; work parties; prisoner of war morale; Greek-prisoner of war and Greek-German relations. Aspects of train journey from Greece to Germany, 1941: journey in cattle trucks; escape attempts; friction between prisoners of war; question of unfair recriminations against Royal Air Force; faith of prisoner of war in ultimate British victory.
REEL 2 Continues: Recollections of period as prisoner of war in Stalag VIII-B, Lamsdorf, Germany, 11/1941-1/1945: arrival in camp, 11/1941; description of camp; prisoner of war nationalities in camp; reasons for separation of Indian prisoners of war; attempt of Germans to play Irish prisoners of war off against British; attitude of Poles towards Germans; treatment of Soviet prisoners of war by Germans and aid given to them by British prisoners of war; outbreak of typhus; rations; prisoner of war health and accidents; comradeship between prisoners of war; struggle for moral ascendancy between prisoners of war and Germans; bribing and blackmail of German guards; German searches; contrast between prisoners of war taken at Dunkirk and those captured later; German attempts to recruit British to fight Soviets and lack of response; his clandestine activities.
REEL 3 Continues: work forging passes; blackmailing of German civilians; two instances of affairs between prisoners of war and German women; duties on working party; story of German discovery of prisoners of war attempt to disguise missing prisoner of war; prisoner of war use of cellar to get out of camp; maintenance of prisoner of war discipline; story of discovery of corpse in camp pond, 1944.
REEL 4 Continues: baiting German guards; how prisoner of war disclosure of news of Stalingrad led to trouble; German searches; German treatment of Canadian prisoners of war after Operation Jubilee the raid on Dieppe, France, 19/8/1942; march away from camp, 1/1945; how he heard of German surrender, 5/1945; impressions of Soviet Army troops; his use of 'safe conduct' pass; methods he used to get to American lines; return to GB; effects of imprisonment.
REEL 5 Continues: story of miniature handcuffs prisoners of war made for German guards at time of Dieppe Raid reprisals.