The Channel Islands At War (30 page)

For this neglect there were sound military reasons. Invasion did not take place because of the likely civilian casualties, according to Morrison, but this was not the prime factor. In the past Churchill had shown willingness to discuss and even urge operations involving substantial loss of life.

In the planning stages for D-Day it was made clear the Islands would not be included in any attack because heavy German fortifications would necessitate the use of the equivalent of four divisions and this was wasteful use of manpower crucial to success
in Normandy. The Islands were a
potential flanking threat as the help given to St Malo, and the raid on Granville showed, but no more than that. It was confirmed in October 1944 that no direct attack would take place. From then it was clear that intensive naval activity in the Western Channel would cut the Channel Islands off from supplies and thus damage the German garrison. On 27 September the cabinet discussed the possible supply of food to the Channel Islands. The chiefs of staff, the ministry of economic warfare, and the home office were not opposed to this. However, Churchill was clear that he opposed aid, and General Brooke recorded that evening that it was decided not to send in any food. When he approved the plan for eventual liberation Churchill scribbled in the margin, 'Let 'em starve. No fighting. They can rot at their leisure'. Referring though he was to the Germans, it was the civilian population who would rot as well.

So the last year was to prove a terrible one. Famine, fuel and medical shortages grew steadily worse helped only a little by five Red Cross visits. The troops grew more violent in their search for food. Restriction followed restriction. Gas, electricity, and telephone services ceased. Even the water supply was affected. German repression increased. By February 1945, firm Nazi supporters were in charge of the troops, and the Platzkommandantur. They discussed seizing all food, and letting the Islanders starve.

The Germans, too, were under siege that last year. The officers shielded themselves from the consequences for a time, but the German forces were steadily disintegrating during the last six months or so of occupation as the proud conquerors became beggars at cottage doors. Mrs Tremayne noticed troops going to house after house asking for food particularly after dark, it's pathetic to see them in threadbare coats, and no overcoats, their boots the best thing about them'. Molly Finigan noticed how roles had become reversed. An officer gave her father his binoculars in exchange for some Red Cross chocolate. Among those she saw ferreting in the dustbins was the soldier who had once kicked her for scrounging potatoes.

Desperate for food the Germans tried every expedient. Too late they appointed battalion agriculture officers. Instructions on growing wheat and vegetables were issued. They tried cultivation in the greenhouses, and fished in co-operation with local fishermen to maximize the catch. All available animals svere eaten: 'You may find it hard to believe but the troops
are
actually picking up cats and dogs they find in farmhouses and yards and eating them', wrote Mrs
Tremayne
. Crops and livestock were taken from gardens and fields, and cows were even milked before their owners could reach them. Eleven soldiers died after eating hemlock in January 1945. Others died trying to scale down cliffs for birds' eggs and plants. Von Aufsess mentioned the first deaths from malnutrition early in 1945, and some figures quoted by Cruickshank showed that of 99 soldiers inspected on Guernsey, 24 were suffering from it. German expedients failed, and even Mrs Tremayne was moved to say, it is distressing to see the poor fellows walking about. They only have nettle soup now, they go about in groups with sacks gathering nettles ... it is slow starvation.'

The Islanders began to notice rest
lessness among the troops, then
fighting amongst themselves, and finally open dissent. By February 1945, the soldiers 'speak freely of being taken prisoner and I am sure the majority of them would welcome that'. When troops arrived to cut down Doctor Symon's fruit trees, the officer in charge turned to him at the end and said, 'when the war is over, for God's sake kill every Nazi'.

Sadly the breakdown of discipline and the suffering of the enemy did not help the Islanders. The occupation army ceased to be well-disciplined. After a murderous attack on Mr Jehan and his son in August 1944, the Germans announced severe penalties for looting, and such orders continued to be issued with ever increasing frequency; but to little effect. Death sentences were passed on troops like two soldiers who stole six sacks of flour, and in the end orders were given to shoot on
sight at night. In May von Aufse
ss admitted all attempts to stop soldiers looting had failed.

The Cortvriends found their unripe fruit seized, and root crops dug out from their garden, and M. Lambert, worried one night that two soldiers had overheard his wireless, was relieved when they turned out to be stealing his pears. There were robberies with violence and murder. An elderly man and his wife were murdered for the sake of their Red Cross parcel. Mr Le Gresly was murdered and his sister badly beaten by marauding soldiers.

The Germans also tried to help their troops by requisitioning food. Von
Schmettow
made it plain that he blamed the British government for shortages because of its air attacks, and the Island governments for not taking precautions 'to make provision for the poorer sort of the population'. Now the Islands were cut off, i can no longer provide for the population'. He argued that in a war zone, particularly a fortress, 'all consideration for the besieged' disappeared, and even if the population were destroyed in action or by famine, 'this would not in any way alter the case'.

In the first place the officers had to be provided for. In August 1944, soldiers were sent to Sark to buy up eggs, butter and chickens to take back for the officers. At Christmas over 3,000 chickens were demanded for the forces. Von Schmettow rejected complaints about confiscations.

As soon as the decision was made to send the
Vega
with food the Germans used this as an excuse to increase their confiscations. As the first parcels were delivered an order went out to hand in any stocks of food by 15 January 1945. The same day an order restricted households to one dog with ominous implications f
or pets. Soldiers and Feldpolize
i began house-to-house searches, and according to Mrs Cortvriend these were far more thorough than in the past. The Royal Hotel in St Peter Port lost its liquor supplies, 360 tins of vegetables, and some of the last soap remaining in the Island. Milkless days were introduced, and the ration was virtually ended on 23 April when the Germans demanded, 'that all farmers and cow keepers must deliver, without reserve, the whole of the milk produced by their cows.' The potato ration was cut to 1 lb and then stopped. The meat ration ended in April. Most alarming of all, bread rations were reduced on 3 February and stopped on 14 February. The

The Underground Hospital at St Lawrence in Jersey. This was used for casualties from St Malo in July 1944. Doctor John Lewis has described operations without anaesthetics which took place at that time when the wounded were held down by four soldiers

The Dead 2. German military graves on
Alderney
removed in 1961. Only 113 German graves at Fort George on Guernsey were left out of a total of 568 on the Islands

Islanders were without bread until 12 March. The first orders to surrender cattle went out the day before liberation. By the time the Red Cross ship arrived, things were so bad that its five visits could do little more than provide temporary relief, and parcels designed to last three weeks were usually exhausted within a week.

Vital public utilities ceased to function. Gas ended in Jersey in September, and in Guernsey in December. Electricity ended in January 1945 together with the telephones. In March, water supply was cut to two hours in the morning and two in the early evening. To make sure this order was kept, 'the Germans sent out pairs of soldiers to cut off bath water supplies and lavatory flushes. They were equipped with heavy hammers and wrenches and their primitive methods of cutting off lead pipes caused floods in several houses.' The aim was to restrict water use to a basic supply for drinking and kitchen washing up, and the Germans told people to use their gardens as toilets. It froze almost continuously through December 1944 and January 1945. Yet it was at this very moment that the order banning the collection of fuel was issued. On
Sunday 12 January 1945 von Aufse
ss witnessed the following scene in St Helier: 'The townspeople's assault on any trees within reach in their frenzied search for fuel today escalated into what almost amounts to a popular uprising. Following yesterday's felling of some of the wonderful old evergreen oaks along Victoria Avenue ... this morning the people turned out in strength and armed with saws and axes descended on the avenue in hordes.' A nine year old boy searching for wood in the Parade Gardens in St Helier knocked over the side of a shelter and was buried alive in February 1945.

The bringing of relief to the Islands was bedevilled by administrative wrangling. By the end of August both Carey and Coutanche had drafted appeals to the Red Cross at Geneva and the Swiss minister in Berlin. At the beginning of Sept
ember, Coutanche
sent a document to the Commandant which von Aufsess said contained, 'a barely veiled threat to bring the guilty persons to justice after the war, if the civilian population should suffer.' Von Schmettow did not reply until late in the month when he said the responsibility for feeding the population was Britain's. Churchill then delayed matters for a month on military grounds.

October was therefore a month of desperate waiting on the Islands. The first escaper with information about conditions had reached London on 23 September. Yet, when the cabinet discussed the matter on 16 October they were still unwilling to accept Morrison's request that the Red Cross be approached. Churchill said the Germans should be warned they would be charged as war criminals if the population starved. All the Islanders knew was that nothing was happening, and on 21 October Carey at last plucked up courage and sent a sharp message to the Commandant accusing him of requisitioning a disproportionate amount of local produce for the troops and failing to maintain the civilian population. Von Schmettow replied two days later refusing the request, denying the accusations, and repeating that 'the besieger alone bears the responsibility for his compatriots'.

In Jersey, Coutanche asked Norman Rumball, a former member of the Granville Purchasing Mission, and an empl
oyee of the National Provincial
Bank, to take copies of his memorandum to the Red Cross with him when he escaped early in November. In Guernsey, a group of officials twice urged Carey to take action, and, when he would not. Sir Abraham Laind, C.H. Cross, and Doctor A.W. Rose decided to act on their own initiative, and Frederick Noyon and William Enticott escaped with details of Island shortages. By then the Germans had won, and the British government been forced to climb down. Complaints from MPs, and action by the Channel Islands Committee in Britain reached the cabinet, and strengthened Morrison's hand. Yet when the matter was raised on 6 November Churchill still dug his heels in, but in the discussion he was overruled and it was agreed to approach the Red Cross providing the German commander was warned of his responsibility, and told not to reduce existing rations. This decision was sent via the Swiss Minister on 7 November, and the Germans replied on 23 November agreeing not to reduce rations, and to give safe conduct to Red Cross vessels. The Islanders reacted with delight to the news. 'Hurrah. A ship is really coming with relief, wrote Mrs
Tremayne
at the end of November, but sadly there was to be yet another 'month of delay before the
Vega,
a Swedish vessel, sailed from Lisbon on 20 December carrying 100,000 food parcels from New Zealand and Canada, 4,200 invalid parcels, and consignments of medical supplies. On 27th of December hundreds of hungry, badly clothed, chilled to the bone people gathered on White Rock to watch the arrival of the
Vega
at St Peter Port. The food was given out in Guernsey on Sunday December 31st. Goods for Sark were loaded on the
White Heather,
and were distributed on 3 January 1945. The
Vega
then left Guernsey for Jersey on Saturday 30 December, and supplies for Jersey were handed out before it left St Helier on 4 January.