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You are here: Home / Article topics / Publications / Naval Historical Review / Letters: HMAS Sydney and Kormoran

Letters: HMAS Sydney and Kormoran

Letter Writer · Sep 11, 1991 · Print This Page

Author
Letter Writer
Subjects
WWII operations, History - WW2, Letter to the Editor
Tags
Prisoner of war, SS Mareeba, Kormoran
RAN Ships
None noted.
Publication
September 1991 edition of the Naval Historical Review (all rights reserved)

Well we could: not get into Bordeaux so we finished up the coast of France 100 miles from Bordeaux at a place called Lorient and was I glad to put my feet on the terra firma (soil) again. Well the snow had been falling and not having any boots didn’t help me to keep my feet very warm but still I survived and after being given a very good hot meal by the French people we were all put in two motor lorries and taken 20 miles away to a place called Vannes and put in big barracks which were occupied by French Moroccan troops and while there the Moroccan troops game me a pair of military boots, two pairs of woollen socks, a khaki shirt, a woollen singlet, battle dress coat and trousers and an overcoat and balaclava hat. So I was beginning now to feel a little bit at ease.

We only stayed there for two nights and then were taken by train to St Nazaire where we stayed for two (2) weeks and we were glad to leave there because the commander hated “Der British” and he only gave us one meal each day and that was the midday meal.

After leaving there we were put in cattle trucks with straw in to sleep on and taken from place to place and around the south of Paris and finally we crossed the border into Germany and then were taken to Bremen and then we were taken by motor lorry to a place eighteen (18) kilometres from Bremen called Westertimtke which had barracks specially built for prisoners of war and was surrounded by barbed wire fences 10 feet high and guards all around the wire and a machine gun tower on each corner of the camp.

The barracks had bunks 2 high and had 24 to 26 men in each room which was only 10 feet by 12 feet so you can guess just what it was like. After we were interrogated we were then mixed with the other 3,000 prisoners who were all seamen as this camp was for seamen only.

The food was not so good as we only got sauerkraut and potatoes to live on but then we started to get Red Cross parcels one (1) per man per week and this helped us out very much but as the summer came so I used to go and work on the farms and they used to treat me like one of their own.

In the winter time we used to run shows in the Merchant Navy Theatre which was a barrack turned into a place for shows and this used to keep up the morale and spirits of the rest of the lads. I took part in about 26 of these shows while a P.O.W. and have a diploma to show in appreciation of my efforts to the camp but it is still rolled up as I have never had it framed as yet.

Every day and night we saw the air raids on Bremen and Hamburg and they used to frighten us as we had no air raid shelter to get into but the airmen must have known that we were Prisoners of War. We saw some terrible things happen but then that is war and so that is that.

We were released on May the 8th by the 53rd Highland Division All Scotch Regiment and I was very ill at the time and was taken to hospital just outside of Bremen called “Celle” and had a temperature of 106° and was much run down so I was taken from there and put in an ambulance wagon and taken on to Brussels and put in an ambulance Dakota plane and flown across to England to Red Hill Downampney Air Field and taken by ambulance to E.M.S. Hospital in Stratton near Swindon and after three (3) weeks there was allowed to go out and sent to Australia House where they sent me to Gloucester House by Sloanes Square in London but I got ill again and had about 5 blackouts and was put in University Cottage Hospital in Tottenham Court Road, London and had that high temperature of 106° again and this time they built me up and when I left hospital had weighed 11 ½ stone which was 2 ½ stone heavier than when I went in there.

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Naval Historical Review, WWII operations, History - WW2, Letter to the Editor Prisoner of war, SS Mareeba, Kormoran

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