The Channel Islands At War (22 page)

William Symes, cousin of James Symes the agent captured in October 1940, owned the Dive in Fountain Street, St Peter Port, a waterfront pub frequented by fishermen and Frenchmen forced to work on the Island. Symes smuggled out information which reached the Maquis and MI9 operatives in France and Spain. But he was caught, and taken to Cherche Midi prison in Paris for interrogation. He was sentenced to im
prisonment going first to Compiegne, and then to Romainville
from which, after travelling four days naked with about a hundred other prisoners in cattle trucks, he arrived at Buchenwald where he found Stanley Green.

The consequences of being involved in military matters were sharply revealed in the case
of a young boy, James Houillebe
cq of Jersey, who went around picking up weapons and soon had quite a store of them. Others boys were involved, but his parents managed to destroy a list of their names when their house was raided. Houillebecq died later in Neuengamme concentration camp a few weeks before his eighteenth birthday.

In the autumn of 1944 it became vital to get information to London about food shortages. Even though the Germans had said they would notify Switzerland, the protecting power, nothing had happened, and permission had not been granted yet for the bailiffs to approach the Red Cross directly. For once the names of Island officials appear in the ranks of resisters when it was decided to get vital information from Guernsey to London in November. Frederick Noyon, a widower and retired sea-captain, agreed to make the attempt from St Sampson's. His nephew Steven wanted to go with him, but Fred would only take Bill Enticott because he feared reprisals against St
eve's parents. Sir Abraham Laine
agreed to provide the information through an intermediary, Deputy C.H. Cross, and on the night of 2 November Noyon collected the material from Cross' house.

Friday 3 November dawned. German artillery practice meant that fishing was not permitted that day, so Noyon went to the harbour police to get a permit saying he was going to drop a net in the next bay, and then sail on to St Peter Port for engine repairs. At one o'clock they set off from St Sampson's, jettisoned an old net in the next bay in case they were being watched from shore
, and carried on towards L'Ancre
sse. At 4.30, mizzle came up. In the mist and gathering dark, the boat altered course for the Channel, and hoisted sail. The aim was to make for Poole in Dorset, but 30 miles north of Guernsey they were intercepted by an American ship which took them back to Cherbourg where their papers were examined. Nine days later they arrived in Britain, and delivered their papers at the war office. For once the government all
owed a coded message to be sent
SOE fashion to Guernsey. It said 'Personal message to George. The answer is Yes'. As far as is known it was the only such message sent in connection with espionage.

Part of any successful occupation policy was to deny information to the occupied likely to encourage resistance by censorship of various kinds. The libraries were purged. The newspapers were censored. The
Guernsey Evening Press
proprietor was a co-operative supporter of the Germans, and made no effort to circumvent the operations of successive censors, Kurt Goettmann and Horst Schmidt-Walkoff, although on Jersey, Arthur Harrison of the
Jersey Evening Post
proved more difficult to control. As early as July 1940 in Jersey the
Deutsche Inselzeitung
was produced for the troops, and the editor told Leslie Sinel that it was the first German paper issued in Britain 'for the time being'. In July 1942, it was joined by the
Deutsche Guernsey Zeitung
copies of which reached Sark next month. 'An awful German pictorial on a par with our
Picture Post
is on sale at all the shops showing the British defeats,' said Julia
Tremayne
and quoted some headlines like 'Britain facing Hunger', and 'Second Front would be Churchill's wildest gamble'. The German news, she wrote in February 1944, was always appalling, and it seemed the local newspaper might stop altogether through lack of paper leaving them with only the German version of events. Any genuine news from the mainland was heartening to Islanders, as Mrs Tremayne wrote in July 1943: 'We all feel a bit more hopeful this week, scraps of news come through saying we are doing well, although this German rag is full of boasts and brag.'

Mrs Tremayne referred to the paper as 'Haw-Haw' headlines. She recognized it for what it was, but it must have been hard to resist the official story deprived as Islanders were of any accurate information from Britain. Those who resisted by breaking the German news monopoly were doing valuable morale-boosting, and for that reason the Germans were particularly severe on those involved in clandestine information circulation from the BBC broadcasts in printed bulletins.

The first temporary ban on wirelesses as a result of the Nicolle-Symes Missi
on was described by Mrs Tremayne
as 'a day of mourning'. The order was issued in October, and confirmed in November 1940, although they were allowed their wirelesses again in time for Christmas. In December she recorded, 'Great joy, we have the wireless back', and at her last normal Christmas for five years, she heard the King's speech and drank his health in port wine.

This temporary ban was followed by the complete confiscation of all wirelesses in June 1942. In fact, confiscation did not prove quite so sweeping. The Irish were permitted to keep their sets. German officials kept theirs, and Frederick Cook was able to listen to Knackfuss' in his kitchen at Linden Court. On Alderney, Clifford Bichard, the foreman, was able to listen to one kept by his German room-mates. Members of the Island governments were allowed to keep sets in secret - von Aufsess listened to Ralph Mollet's regularly, and he expressed alarm, it will be recalled, when the Labour representative, Le Quesne, was arrested for having a set. On Sark, Sibyl Hathaway described how: 'We hid our set in a trunk left behind by one of our friend
s ... and went to the length of pac
king it in an old moth-eaten carpet to which we adde
d moths from time to
time. We only dared to listen to the
9
p.m.
news, and there were four of
us, Bob, our farm bailiff, Bishop, his wife Jenny and myself.' Elsewhere it is claimed this secret set was kept in a chicken run. What Hathaway did not mention was that the German doctor left his own portable set for her to listen to during his visits.

The order was a violation of the Hague Convention because, although the Germans cited Article 53 as covering their action, this clause made it clear it was transmitters not receivers that were illegal. Julia
Tremayne
's set had broken down, but she had listened to neighbours, and when all wirelesses were taken away 'we hear no news, except German news, so just try to imagine our thoughts about you all'. She believed the sets would never be returned. 'There is not one in the Islands now and you may be sure the Germans will only give us 'Haw-Haw' stuff. The rumours are alarming, and if we believe them we should be in the depths of despair. Before long she said she felt 'more resigned than ever to our prison life', and this was the Germans' purpose.

Detector vans were in use, but in the main the Germans relied on Islanders handing in their sets. Many failed to do so, and at a stroke became liable to prosecution for the rest of the war, resorting to all manner of tricks to hide sets and spread information. Wirelesses were hidden beneath floorboards, in the bottom of armchairs, in unused water tanks, or in specially constructed cupboards like one made by the Cortvriends. Many were the tales of narrow escapes during the frequent searches. A small set was concealed by one woman under a tea-cosy which she carried round with her pretending it was a teapot while the Germans searched her house. The manager of a St Peter Port bank heard of a woman who had kept a set, but was now frightened and wanted to get rid of it. He took the set and concealed it in the basket of an errand-boy's bicycle he was using. As luck would have it, he had to cycle past Germans, but he got the set to Barclay's Bank, and hid it in the strongroom. To his horror, the bank was subjected to a detailed search, but fortunately for him the searchers were too lazy to go downstairs, and he was ordered to bring the boxes up being able of course to keep the one with the wireless back. Others faced with searches had to lose their sets. One woman plunged hers into the suds of the weekly wash just in time, and another tipped hers into a septic tank.

Possession of a set led to three months in prison and even death. So many were convicted they had to wait their turn to serve sentences in Island prisons. On Jersey, they would have been even more surprised to know the assistant matron of the women's wing in the prison listened to a set in her sitting-room. But all traces of comedy vanish when the fate of some Islanders is considered. It was seen that when Canon Clifford Cohu of St Saviour's in Jersey, visited the general and maternity hospitals he was able to impart information he could only have got from BBC broadcasts, and it is likely that one of the women fraternizers betrayed this fact. It is said that Cohu had a set concealed in the organ loft, and he received information from
a cemetery worker, Joseph Tierne
y, who in turn heard the details from John Nicolle listening to his own set. The

Germans surprised Tierney at the cemet
ery, and although Nicolle escaped
to his father's farm nearby, he was arrested. Others were soon roped in including Joseph's wife, Eileen, Mr Mourant, a local farmer, and officials at the hospital. Some received short sentences.

Three were sen
t to the Continent. John Nicolle
died in a camp near Dortmu
nd, Joseph Tierney died at Celle
, and Clifford Cohu at Spergau. They were not the only men to die for listening to a wireless. A former CID officer Percy Miller and Peter Painter and his young son Peter were among those who also lost their lives. Jack Soyer sentenced for the same offence managed to escape in France, and joined the Maquis. He was killed in action on 29 July 1944, and honoured by them. Others, like Stanley Green sent to Buchenwald for a wireless offence, managed to survive the war.

Ingenuity produced new wireless sets. At first these were handmade mains receivers, but when electricity was cut off crystal sets were introduced early in 1945 which could pick up Forces broadcasts from France. Telephone boxes were raided for earpieces. A large piece of crystal in the Jesuit College museum on Jersey was used to make over 60 such sets, while in Guernsey a jeweller cut up an old meteorite for the same purpose. Sets were available for £10 according to Mrs Cortvriend, and Mrs Tremayne had access to news from a crystal set somewhere on Sark. In 1945 L'Amy wanted a transmitter, because the number of esc
apers had fallen rapidly once Hüffmeier
had taken over. The set was made by a post office engineer, and installed in a convalescent home at Les Vaux where it was possible to enter the room secretly from below. But before the set could operate, the cipher and call sign had to be smuggled out. Gladden was persuaded to build another boat, and two boys were willing to escape with the material. Plans were laid for an escape in April 1945, but bad weather delayed them, and it never took place.

From clandestine radios producers of resistance news-sheets obtained their information. One appeared on each of the main Islands although both were closed down by the Germans. On Jersey, Herbert and George Gallichan produced the
Bulletin of British Patriots
which took as its theme the illegality of confiscating radios. 'For our part', they wrote, 'we refuse to comply with the confiscation order'. Herbert worked in the food office in the town hall where it was typed and duplicated, while George was responsible for distribution. When no one owned up to producing the paper, the Germans seized ten hostages - an indication of how effective they thought this kind of activity was. The Gallichans then surrendered. George was given a year in Dijon Priso
n, and Herbert remained in Wolfenbu
ttel concentration camp until the end of the war.

In Guernsey the underground news-sheet, entitled (perhaps unwisely)
GUNS (Guernsey Underground News Service)
circulated from May 1942 to February 1944. Conceived by Charles Machon of the
Guernsey Evening Star,
the others involved included Frank Falla, Ernest Legg, Joseph Gillingham, and Cecil Duquemin. A good many others were involved in distribution, but it was policy only to c
ommunicate directly with Machon, so
that even Falla,
for example, did not know Duquemin was involved. On S
ark, Wakley the carter and Lanyon the ba
ker were the distributors. The sheet, 13½”
x 8" with a heading bearing the illegal V-sign, came out daily and contained about 700 words from BBC broadcasts. It was dangerous to produce it in the office, and even more unwise on occasions to use linotype. This was sometimes done when Churchill gave an important speech, and an ex-editor, Bill Taylor, took it down in shorthand for them to set up in type.
GUNS
circulation of perhaps three hundred reached out to all the Islands successfully. Mrs
Tremayne
praised Lanyon when he was given six months 'for trying to cheer us all up by telling us a bit of news'. They had many narrow escapes, said Falla. 'Once a subscriber passed his
GUNS
to a friend with the written injunction 'burn after reading' followed by his initials. Unfortunately this friend left it in a book which he had read and returned to the library. Happily the next person to take out that book chanced to be a regular receiver of our news sheet.'