Dunkirk: The Men They Left Behind (12 page)

How long Les Allan lay in the ruins, he would never know. Eventually he came to, as two German medics grabbed his inert body and dragged him upstairs into the street. Nursing a head wound, he sat in the street wondering what had happened. All he knew was that somehow he had survived. As the ceiling had collapsed he had just been leaving the cellar. The arched stone entranceway had taken the brunt of the collapse and remained standing – with him beneath it.

As he slowly regained consciousness, none of his comrades were to be seen. It seemed no one else had been pulled from the rubble that had buried the wounded men he had been caring for earlier. Nor were there any of his fellow bearers, or any of the infantrymen to be seen. He was alone. Dumped on to a lorry, he was driven to a French field hospital. As he struggled to make sense of what had happened, he realized someone had bandaged his head – when or who, he couldn’t remember. At the field hospital an English-speaking German officer took away the haversack, armband and papers that identified him as a medic. As soon as it became clear Allan was walking wounded he was separated from the French prisoners. Still alone, he was placed on to a truck and driven to a reception area for British prisoners. In the weeks, months, then years, that followed he never met another survivor of the defence of Hazebrouck, a battle that the German Army described as having been carried out ‘in a manner truly worthy of the highest tradition of the British Army’.
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However, if some Germans rushed to praise the efforts of the British Army, there were plenty who did not hold the defeated men in such high esteem. Some believed their own propaganda that they were superior to all others. In their minds the prisoners were worthless specimens who deserved nothing more than to be beaten and humiliated. Initially, many prisoners found it was common for the German front-line infantrymen to treat the defeated British with respect, as Peter Wagstaff discovered:There is no doubt there is a vast difference between the treatment by the fighting soldier at the front and the administrative bastard at the back. I remember I found myself at a German gunnery colonel’s HQ. He looked at me and stood to attention and then gave me a bottle of beer. I also remember sitting on the pavement of a railway station, as we waited to be put into cattle trucks. A whole lot of German troops passed us, they were young lads – I don’t suppose they were more than eighteen or twenty. And somebody lobbed a cigarette into my lap. He did it quite secretly.

Similarly, Eric Reeves discovered the fighting men who took him into captivity treated him fairly. Some men from his regiment were even offered lifts by German motorcyclists who dropped them off at the enclosures for prisoners, rather than leaving them to walk. Indeed, Eric Reeves was initially shocked at being so well cared for by his sworn enemy. He soon discovered not all Germans were so concerned about prisoners: ‘The next day the B-Echelon troops turned up. They kicked us all the way up the road.’

For some, such mistreatment became a regular feature of the round up. At Hesdin five British officers were singled out and forced to stand in the gutter. Three were wounded and one was suffering from a fever. The French and Belgian medics who passed through the streets were refused permission to help the wounded officers; instead the German soldiers stood and jeered. After four hours of humiliation, two of the officers were finally taken away by ambulance. An hour later the remaining officers were eventually allowed to rest.

Elsewhere five British officers and forty other ranks were forced to spend a night in a cowshed that was deep in liquid manure. The policy of deliberate humiliation, particularly of British officers, was widespread. Soldiers found themselves laughed at by their captors, many of whom seemed so much taller, physically fitter and better equipped than the exhausted POWs. Senior officers found themselves forced to stand to attention when speaking to junior German officers. Captain G.S. Lowden, captured at Rouen in June, was told by his captors that all officers would have their rank badges removed and then be sent to salt mines. Once the British had been defeated, his captors informed him, the prisoners would be held as slave labourers for thirty years. The threats were compounded by the promise that if any officer attempted to escape, five other officers would be shot as a reprisal. Such claims hit the already battered morale of the prisoners, although the next threat was even more worrying for Captain Lowden: ‘our women folk at home would be equally treated and those found to be of suitably Nordic stock would be reserved for breeding purposes . . . my own wife, being partly of Scandinavian stock, was practically certain to be amongst the favoured ones!’
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If it was not enough for the defeated British to see the modern tanks, guns, half-track carriers and automatic weapons of the enemy, they also had to endure Germans armed with cameras. Like tourists taking holiday snaps, their captors seemed obsessed with taking photographs of the battleground and the men who had lost the battle. One group of prisoners found camera-wielding Germans lining up to photograph their bare backsides as they used the open latrines. It was just the beginning of the degradation they would suffer in the months and years that followed.

To some of the survivors such behaviour seemed little more than gesturing compared to what they had already witnessed. After all, what were kicks, punches or humiliation compared to the fury of mass murders? In May 1940 there were two incidents that have, in the post-war years, come to sum up the brutality shown by the SS towards defeated British soldiers. The massacres at Le Paradis on the 27th, and at Wormhoudt the following day cost the lives of scores of soldiers who had given their all in battle and then surrendered.

When the survivors of the 2nd Battalion Royal Norfolk Regiment surrendered they were filled with the same sense of trepidation shared by all prisoners. They were marched away, their helmets and equipment taken from them, then sent to a nearby farm, Le Paradis. Their treatment at the hands of the 1st Battalion, 2nd Infantry Regiment, of the SS Totenkopf Division was rough, but initially no rougher than that experienced by many prisoners. Wounded men were kicked to their feet, others were hit with rifle-butts and threatened with bayonets. But it was what followed that was so different to the majority of POW experiences. Around ninety of the Norfolks were marched to a brick farm building with a pit running along the outside. When they saw the two machine-guns pointing towards them it was clear they were to be executed. There was nowhere to run or hide as the machine-guns poured fire at the helpless men. Eventually the bullets stopped and the survivors could hear bayonets being clipped to rifles. The survivors then heard the ringing of pistol shots and the sound of bayonets being thrust into screaming men. Others had their skulls smashed in with rifle-butts, a sight that appalled some of the Germans who discovered the massacre site. Some of the badly wounded men pleaded to be finished off desperate to be released from their agony. Slowly the cries of the wounded and the noise of gunfire died down as the SS finished their deadly labours. When the attack was finally over just two men were alive. Privates Bert Pooley and Bill O’Callaghan had somehow survived, despite both being shot and having been checked over by the SS men. When night fell the two men were finally able to escape the scene.

In the aftermath of the defence of Wormhoudt a group of survivors from the 2nd Battalion Royal Warwickshire Regiment were herded towards a barn. Those unable to walk were simply shot where they lay. In common with so many of the defeated troops, the fifty or more who were hustled inside the barn were exhausted and apprehensive. All knew the terrible reputation of their SS captors. At the entrance to the barn stood a German soldier who spoke with an American accent. The actions of this man, taking out a hand grenade and preparing it to be thrown, convinced the prisoners of their intentions. Believing they were to be executed, Captain Lyn-Allen asked for permission for the men to have a last cigarette. The request was granted, then the Germans began firing machine-pistols and throwing grenades into the barn. Two of the grenades had little effect on the assembled men since Sergeant Moore and CSM Jennings threw themselves on to the grenades, absorbing the blast but sacrificing their lives.

The SS then called for the survivors to leave the barn in groups of five. As they left they walked six or seven paces, then were shot in the back by the Germans. Realizing their fate, the following groups refused to move, causing the Germans to continue throwing grenades into the barn. When they believed their work was done the Germans departed. Yet they had not been thorough enough. Some of the men had survived despite their injuries. Some had feigned death, others had suffered sufficient injury to lose consciousness and appear dead. One, Private Albert Evans, had escaped from the barn when the Germans threw the first grenades. Along with Captain Lyn-Allen, Evans – his arm shattered by the first grenade – made for the safety of a copse, where they sheltered in a pond. Soon a German appeared and fired at the two men. The captain received a fatal wound and slumped into the water. Two bullets then struck Evans in the neck and he too collapsed into the dirty pond. Believing his quarry dead, the German departed. Some minutes later, Evans regained consciousness. Amazed he had survived, he crawled away, being hit again by a stray bullet fired during the execution of others at the barn.

Albert Evans was incredibly fortunate, he was found by a German ambulance unit who treated his wounds and saved his life. Others who survived included one from the groups taken outside; he had been hit then feigned death. Some of the survivors within the barn were eventually saved by a German anti-aircraft unit who turned up and treated their wounds. Another man was actually blown from the barn by a grenade and shot in the face, but he too somehow escaped death.

The first reports of the Wormhoudt massacre reached London via letters from an officer who met survivors of the incident while in hospital in Ghent. At first Lieutenant Kenneth Keens did not believe the man’s story, the shocked survivor of the massacre being unable to remember any of the names of his comrades. However, as the days passed, three survivors, Edward Daly, Albert Evans and Private Johnson, recounted the same version of events.

Although the incidents at Wormhoudt and Le Paradis became widely publicized in the post-war years, they were not isolated incidents. There were plenty of other murders and acts of violence towards prisoners right across France and Belgium. When Lieutenant Keens reported the Wormhoudt massacre he also pointed out stories he had heard of similar incidents on a smaller scale. One wounded officer from the Worcestershire Regiment told Keens he had watched as his men were lined up against a wall and executed by SS troops. He was then also shot but somehow survived. French sources later also revealed that twenty-one Scottish soldiers had been discovered in a mass grave. Each corpse displayed neck wounds suggesting they had not fallen in battle but been executed by their captors.

Some of the many murders and massacres were later reported to London by prisoners via the Red Cross, others remained only in the memories of the men who had been fortunate to survive. Fred Gilbert, serving in the 8th Battalion of the Warwickshire Regiment – whose 2nd Battalion became victims of the Wormhoudt massacre – watched as his captain, whose last minutes of battle had been spent trying to clear his jammed revolver, attempted to surrender: ‘He’d got his hands up and the German officer just shot him. His hand was up and the bullet went straight through the palm and blew his hand off. It was bewildering, I didn’t know what was going to happen next.’

The officer was fortunate; the German officer then waved his pistol and signalled to him to walk away to join the other prisoners. Others were not so lucky. In the aftermath of the defeat of the 4th Battalion of the Royal West Kent Regiment in the Fôret de Nieppe, a number of soldiers were murdered by their captors. Corporal Bertie Bell, a reservist who had spent five years in India during the 1930s, Corporal Theroux and Privates Shilling, Mills, Daniels, Carter and Lancaster, were rounded up by soldiers from the SS Totenkopf Division after they were found sleeping in a farmhouse. Paraded from the farm in single file, the men were taken into the forest. Uncertain what might happen next, Bertie Bell kept a careful eye on their captors, who all seemed to have their rifles at the ready. Suddenly one of the SS men jumped up and hit Daniels and Shilling with the butt of his rifle then spat at them. Bell tried to intervene, hitting out at the German, but the intervention of a German officer prevented any further action. At that moment Bell heard the officer bark out an order. Though unable to understand the words, he was certain of their meaning and threw himself to the ground as shots rang out around him: ‘I lay perfectly still and held my breath. A few seconds later there were three revolver shots. I then heard the Germans walk away. Remaining in my position for some five minutes more, I got up and looked at my comrades.’ What he saw shocked him: ‘I saw that one revolver shot had hit Private Shilling and blown half his head off. The other two shots appeared to have been aimed at Private Daniels who was shot in both eyes.’
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For the whole of the day he remained hidden in the forest, only returning to look for the bodies the next day. He discovered all evidence of the execution had been removed. For five more days he hid in the forest, attempting to find food and water. Eventually he was hidden by French farmers and joined up with two other survivors of the battle. Six months later Corporal Bell and Second-Lieutenant Parkinson of the Royal Sussex Regiment reached Marseilles and were interned by the Vichy authorities. They escaped and reached Gibraltar in April 1941.

Another who survived the vicious attentions of victorious Nazis was Private John Cain of the 2nd Battalion, the Manchester Regiment. He was part of a Vickers heavy machine-gun crew fighting in the rearguard. At 5 a.m. on 26 May their position was overrun by advancing tanks and infantry. Cain and his fellow machine-gunners Johnson, Phillips and Hodgkins, along with the platoon runner Private Maish, soon found themselves prisoners. Although wounded in the left shoulder, Cain helped Johnson, who had been wounded in the foot, to the supposed safety of a house, while Privates Maish and Hodgkins carried Phillips, who had been wounded in the hip and groin. Confronted by Unteroffizier Karl Mohr, Cain refused to reveal his regiment, defying the German by revealing just his name, rank and number. Ominously Mohr told him: ‘We have means in the German army.
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When Private Johnson heard the German’s words he turned towards him, only to be shot in the stomach by Mohr, who fired his rifle from the hip. The unwounded Hodgkins jumped at Mohr in a futile attempt to stop his murderous intentions but was cut down by a burst of fire from another German armed with a machine-pistol. His right breast was shot away and he had a bullet hole in the centre of his forehead. Accepting his fate, Cain looked towards one of the Germans and then flinched as he heard the bang of the rifle. The bullet tore into his cheek, throwing him unconscious to the floor. When he regained consciousness he was surrounded by the corpses of his friends and was being assisted by a German medic who revealed to Cain the identity of the man who had murdered his friends and then left him for dead. Unteroffizier Mohr was captured by the Americans at Landau in the last weeks of the war. Efforts were then made to bring him to the UK to face trial for the murder of Privates Johnson and Maish.