The Channel Islands At War (39 page)

Clearing up
Alderney
was one of the most difficult tasks facing the military government. After most of the Germans were removed in five LSTs on 20 May some 500 remained, and until some preliminary mine-clearance had been achieved worked without British troops. A German crew was also left in the Casquets lighthouse for a time. Judge French and Snow, made a preliminary visit after a week to assess the damage, and teams of WVS personnel were brought in to clean up the properties. Early in December some preliminary parties arrived, and on 15 December the first of the Islanders returned. Eventually 685 of the pre-war citizenry returned to the barren and broken-down Island.

Unfortunately Judge French, due as much to his former Indian service as to an ulcer, was unable to provide any leadership. Quarrels broke out when atlcmpts were made to restore property to its rightful owners. Communal farming was tried, and proved a failure, and once the military left, relations between French and the people deteriorated until the home office had to retire him.

Naturally a feeling of tremendous elation followed years of repression as people gave themselves over to public ceremonies, and making allied troops welcome. From the mainland came visitors, but not Churchill. On 15 May, the home office party arrived led by Herbert Morrison accompanied by Lord Munster, Sir Frank Newman, and Charles Markbreiter whose voice Sherwill had heard on the telephone the evening when St Peter Port was raided. Morrison was received by those responsible for affairs during the occupation who lost no time in letting him know their side of the story. Coutanchc described the scene in his house after the nine o'clock news when, 'we went on sitting round the table for several hours while they asked questions and I did my best to answer them. Eventually we got up and went to bed, I suppose at around two o'clock in the morning.'

Although they visited some damaged houses before Morrison went on to Guernsey, it is clear his impressions were superficial. The only result was that home office officials were seconded to the Islands to help reorganize administration. Morrison reported to the cabinet, and in August
his successor, Chuter Ede
, reported to the Commons using material that Morrison had gathered in less than 48 hours.

24 May was Empire Day, and another excuse for patriotic display. On 7 June came King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, an unusual royal visit in which the King was cheered by Russian prisoners and met French North Africans.

Behind the scenes of merrymaking, however, Island life was resuming its old ways. Black market operations were clearly illegal under existing law, but no prosecutions were brought, because of the ramifications concerning the recipients of black market goods that any trial would have revealed. Excess profits taxes were introduced in the Islands of 60 per cent in Jersey and 80 per cent in Guernsey on profits above standard profits. Businessmen were soon buying up property for building and the holiday trade when the Islands opened for business again in 1947.

The army did its best to dispose of German armaments. Ammunition was dumped offshore in the Hurd Deep while unstable material was exploded on the west coast of Jersey behind the escarpment. Some guns were left: others were thrown over the cliffs at Les Landcs where the occupation claimed its last victim in 1977 when a weapons enthusiast disappeared over the cliffs. Other material was sealed into the tunnels although it was impossible to remove it all. As for the military supplies and confiscated civilian goods, some attempt was made to restore the latter to the rightful owners, and public auctions disposed of a good deal.

Some fortifications were blown up or earthed over. Roads, public amenities - particularly beaches - and agricultural land were cleared of anti-landing devices. But the big guns contained much valuable metal and before long businessmen from England arrived. One of the most famous was George Dawson who paid £25,000 for the iron on Guernsey, and he was followed by others down to 1953. On Jersey, the attitude of the government was that such relics of war needed to be cleared, and there was no thought of preservation. On Guernsey, Lieutcnant-General Neame continued to urge the war office to preserve some items, but nothing was done. Jersey kept its collection of German weapons secret for 22 years, and it was not until the tunnels had claimed lives among their explorers that they were opened up, and their artefacts used to form museums. Molly Finigan and her sister Joyce ran guest-houses among the hundreds that sprouted up, many with their occupation stories, or features like Mrs Winifrid Green's piece of crochet work done in Caen prison. The first museum actually opened in 1946, but it was in the 1960s that the boom started with museums and guided tours of fortifications and underground works.

There
are
few places in Western Europe where it is easier to see what German occupation was like. Yet for all this physical evidence, the truth about what happened to ordinary people in the Channel Islands remains something of a mystery. Missing documents and the passage of time make it unlikely that the full extent of cither Island bravery or treachery will ever be revealed. I have tried to build round the details of German and Island administration, and the operations of the Wehrmacht and Organization Todt, a picture of what these prosaic regulations and orders entailed day by day for Islanders, troops, and prisoners.

German documents can be supplemented by evidence like von Aufsess' diary, and Island documents by personal recollections. Both official documents and personal recollections need to be treated with caution, but they form part of a common picture. Evidence, almost without exception, shows they were a terrible five years. Similarly, evidence of camp inmates, supplemented by records like List's 1943 trial, strongly supports the view that the camps, particularly Norderney and Sylt, were atrocious places of starvation, violence, disease and death. There was less violence and suffering than in some places, but this was brought about by a greater degree of co-operation than prevailed elsewhere. This led to a moderate occupation for the rulers, and the richer black marketeers, for the women who slept with Germans, and informers.

But for the majority of Islanders, German occupation from early in 1941 was purgatory, as anti-Jewish laws, and the proposal for mass deportation showed. The rattle of gunfire shooting Todt workers, cscapers, and Germans was heard on the Islands, death sentences were passed, and thousands fined or imprisoned. The German legal system condemned nearly a hundred to life in the camps of Fortress Europe. Claims about a 'moderate occupation' of the Islands were the product of the Island rulers' views who had received privileged treatment themselves, and of a joint determination by the rulers and the British government to hide collaboration in high places, shaming indeed in 1945 in the only British territory to fall under Nazi rule.

This tale of a moderate occupation denied the opponents of the Island governments the opportunity to protest, or change the form of government, and conferred on the Island rulers (and of course Whitehall) the mantle of having pursued the wisest and most subtle of policies which in Morrison's words obtained, 'the best possible treatment from the Germans commensurate with the avoidance of any semblance of collaboration.'

Honours were showered on the Island rulers including Carey, Sherwill, Coutan
che, and Leale, with CBEs for Leale and Edgar Dore
y, and OBEs for Touzel Bree, R.H. Johns
, and H.E. Marquand. Guillemette
got an MBE. Some of these were richly earned; others were ill deserved. Sherwill's broadcast on Radio Bremen, and his remarks about cscapcrs and resisters should have disqualified him, while Carey had set his hand to orders like the anti-Semitic regulations, and the offer of cash to informers. Such men would not have been decorated in neighbouring France. Apart from a few exceptions like McKinstry, and Bertram, none of the names in this book were mentioned in the honours list in December 1945. Nor did any receive compensation. Nor did any of them even have their names carved upon a memorial. Those who helped Allied servicemen, aided escapers, upheld morale by making wirelesses, or producing news-sheets, gave assistance to Todt workers, showed defiance and stood up to the bullying and greedy occupiers, languished in gaol, died shot on the beaches trying to escape or drowning off the coast, and died in faraway camps often alone for trivial offences, were one and all quickly part of an army of Unknown Warriors.

In May 1946 the Victory Parade took place in London in which representatives from all over the Empire marched in p
ouring rain to celebrate victory
. Molly's sister Joyce was overjoyed that she was to be one of the school children to go to London, and to receive a Liberation Day medal. Among those also invited was Frank Stroobant whose experiences of occupation had taken him to prison, and to a deportation camp. He realized as they marched through London, that the Channel Islanders were the only group unidentified by either flag or placard. They marched anonymously on Victory Parade Day as so many of them had suffered anonymously in the years of German occupation.

Appendix

An Estimate of the Totals of Dead in the Channel Islands War Theatre

This table of figures is incomplete in two ways. Some of the figures given are approximate. Some figures still cannot be given. However, an estimate helps to illustrate the numerous ways in which death came to the occupying forces, their prisoners, and the Islanders both in the Islands and elsewhere, and is further evidence that this was a tough occupation that took its toll in life.

Deaths in the German Occupation Forces

The overall total of German graves was 568.

455 were removed in 1961 and 113 rem
ain at Fort George.
Kriegsmarine
102

Wehrmacht 457

Luftwaffe 3

The number of Luftwaffe dead was higher than this: several crashed in

the sea.
CIOR
lists 24 dead.
Merchant seamen 4

Feldpolizei unknown

SS and camp guards unknown

Examples of causes of death Executions by courts martial

Alderney 2 April 1945

Jersey 5

It was said that the only convicted military rapist was executed, and death sentences were passed on looters and thieves.

Suicides

Alderney 7 1 in 1942, 5 in 1943, 1 in 1944

These included Doctor Kohler and Lieutenant Frank.

Jersey 8

It was said that some troops either killed themselves or died from self-inflicted wounds to avoid Russian service or at the surrender.

Killed in action Sark

Alderney
2

Granville raid
1

Accidents

Palace Hotel explosion
9

Hemlock Poisoning
11

Stepping on mines, Sark

Hinkel and two soldiers
3

By mines after liberation
7

Fights between troops
2

Drowned

Major-General Christiani and 7 others November 1942
Captain Parsenow mid 1943

Murder

Doctor August Goebel was said to have been murdered by his batman in April 1942 on Sark. The batman committed suicide, and it was later revealed a soldier had killed the doctor for refusing him a medical certificate.

Deaths in Allied forces or of Allied nationals

Islanders serving in United Kingdom forces
Guernsey 221

Alderney
18

Sark 1

Jersey unknown

Military casualties

Raid on Sark (Bellamy, Dignac) 2

Raid on Jersey (Ayton) 1

Naval casualties unknown

Included loss of
hms
Charybis,
and
hms
Limbourne
on the night of

23/24 October 1943
504

41 were buried on the Islands.

There were between five and seven naval engagements in the waters near the Islands.

Air casualties

unknown

Included: British air crew American air crew Canadian aircrew Belgian air crew

10 2

Some aircraft were lost at sea with no survivors.
Crew of Lancaster bomber who were not rescued off Alderney in June 1944
on German orders. 6