Thought i would share this everyone, Just discovered this little bit of history doing a random search, Dad was interviewed soon after being released from a POW camp after 4 years in captivity. The text was not good having been scanned from the original newspaper article dated Friday 20th April 1945 so I have corrected to make it better. ---- Jim Australians Tell Of German Cruelty From Our War The Correspondents, Harold Austin | DUDERSTADT, April 14 (delayed). - The inhuman treatment given Allied prisoner« of war by their German guards on a 600 mile forced march from Poland to Western Germany was described to-day by a number of Australians released from the prison camp here. Nearly 4,000 men marched continuously for 10 weeks on starvation rations, many died from exhaustion, and sick men were beaten with rifle butts to make them continue the journey, they said. Scarcely any medical attention was provided throughout the march, and men suffering from serious disease or of dysentery were compelled to keep moving with the column until they dropped. Many were left to die by the roadside. I heard the story of the march from six Australians who were taken prisoner on Crete and in the Western Desert. They are Corporal John Burk, Bonnie Doon, Tamworth; I Sergeant George Thompson. Brunswick. Victoria, Private Ronald Downe, Toorak. Victoria; Corporal Herbert Aldridge. Ivanhoe. Victoria: Private J. J. J. Walker, Stawell, Victoria; and Sergeant. Harold Daggar, whose married sister lives at South Street, Tempe. Sergeant Daggar has been serving with the New Zealand Army THOUGHT FOR RELATIVES ! The men were wildly excited at having been released, but their main concern was that word should reach their relatives. They asked particularly I that I should send a message that they were in process of being returned to Australia. The Germans are swine. exploded Corporal Aldridge, who was a member of the Sixth Division Engineers, when I asked him to talk of his experiences. The treatment which some of our chaps received was unbelievable as between humans. Sergeant Daggar, who served with a New Zealand Field Ambulance,! showed me his finger which bad been broken in three places by a German soldier who forcibly removed a ring from his finger soon after he had been taken prisoner in Crete. Every day we had to march between 15 and 20 miles. he said. We received two meals, which normally amounted to little more than a tiny piece of really black bread. Fortunately most of the Aussies were fit at the start of the march and managed to last out fairly well, but it was cruel to see some of the others. Chaps who were too weak with dysentery to move were knocked senseless with blows from rifle butts, and those who died were just thrown on to the side of the road. An English medical officer to whom I spoke paid a remarkable tribute to ¡ the Australians. They stood up to the march better than anyone else. he said. Mostly they were tough as steel and did everything possible to cheer the other troops. If any Australian reported sick he really was sick and not fit to go another yard. They are a wonderful crowd of chaps, and your country should be proud of them.
Posted on: Sun, 02 Feb 2014 03:32:43 +0000
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