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The following story appears courtesy of and with thanks to Gord and Leslie Davison.

A couple of days later the Germans started evacuating all of us to a Dutch barracks in Apeldoorn, about 20 kilometers to the north. They had decided we would run our own hospital from these premises until such time as they were able to take us all to POW camps in Germany. The barracks were vacant but there were enough beds to accommodate all of our patients. The Germans fed us, more or less, from a field kitchen. Watery potato soup twice a day accompanied by a slice of black bread and something called coffee, which I think was made of roasted grain of some kind. At least the German guards got the same food so we could hardly complain. Soon the walking wounded were put on trucks and taken to Apeldoorn station. Here they were packed into cattle cars or freight wagons, with a little water and some dry bread, and carried off to POW camps. With the doors padlocked they had little chance to escape though I heard, after the war, that three of them had worked away at some rotten floor boards and made a hole large enough for them to drop through. They then went through the hole and dropped to the tracks and let the train pass over them. After about two weeks the population of the barracks had diminished considerably. The ratio of medics to patients improved to the point that some medical personnel were offered the chance to escape.
Generally speaking R.MA.C. people did not escape if there were wounded to look after but, as the wounded were evacuated, the medics were left behind in Apeldoorn with the result that there were more than enough to look after the casualties that were still there. Finally we were told that the barracks were to be closed down and that we would be on the last train to the Fatherland.
Because the patients that were left were the most seriously wounded, the Germans had come up with a proper hospital train. This was a converted passenger train with all of the seats removed and bunks installed down on each wall of the coaches. If memory serves me right, there were eighteen bunks on each side of a coach and each coach had an observation platform at each end. Fortunately for me, the allies knew we were in Apeldoorn station and kept bombing the line in front of the train with the result that we were there for three days.
I had decided sometime earlier that, if the opportunity presented itself, I would attempt to escape and consequently I kept one of the two sandwiches we were fed daily as a means of survival should I be successful in getting away.
There was no chance to disappear while we were in the station as about twenty SS men guarded the whole train. However when the train was moving I hoped that I would have no trouble getting off. I had talked to my charges about my escaping when I could and they all agreed that they would be all right and not to worry about them.
Finally one evening about the 10th of October, the train started to move and I immediately started to put on my camouflage and jacket and my small kit. There was a German medical orderly in the coach who had been working with me and it must have been obvious to him what I was going to do, however he made no attempt to stop me or raise an alarm. He was a typical rather fat middle-aged German who probably hoped to get some leave when the train got to its destination. Whatever the reason for his silence I was very thankful because I had visions of trying to knock him out if he showed any opposition to my leaving.
As I moved down the coach to the exit I whispered my goodbye to the patients and they all wished me luck. Upon arriving at the observation platform I was surprised to see half a dozen of the medical officers on the adjoining platform, including my commanding officer, Colonel Townsend. He asked me what my intentions were and said I had been looking for him to ask for permission to escape. This was not really true as I had decided to jump anyway, but as it was expected that an escaper would get permission it suited my purpose to tell a white lie. He immediately decided that it was OK and that the officers had decided that one of them would escape.
They had drawn straws to decide who was the lucky one and a Captain Theo Redden had won the draw. I had never met this officer, who was a surgeon, but Col. Townsend suggested we go together and this suited me fine. It was decided that we jump together, one from each side of the train, and that there were guards on the roof of each coach with machine guns, the other officers started a mock argument in order to distract them.
I stood on the bottom step of the platform until I felt a tap on my shoulder and promptly jumped to the side of the track and rolled down into the ditch. I lay down until the train was out of sight and apparently the guards had not seen us as no gunfire erupted.
After a minute or so I called out across the track " where are you sir" and the captain whispered "over here", he was directly across from me. We were in a thickly wooded area so I crossed over the rails and we had some discussion as to what we would do. We had no idea where we were although I knew the train had been traveling north, so I suggested we travel due south, avoiding the roads and populated areas in the hopes that we would eventually reach the Rhine and swim across.
Captain Redman wanted to know how we would know whether we are going south. I said I had my escape compass. All Allied airmen and parachutists carried an escape kit with them in an oilskin pouch, this contained a silk skin of the area, in this case North-Western Europe, a small compass about the size of a thumbnail, a couple of trouser buttons which were magnetized, along with some thread. I had stored these in what I shall call a rear orifice when the Germans searched us. He said "good for you" at least we will have some idea of where we are going.
So we set off through the woods, not really knowing what to expect as we had no idea of where we were, until after about an hour we came up against a barbed wire fence about seven feet high. It was the type that angles out at the top and we could not decide whether we were on the inside or the outside. It did not take long to find out as we heard dogs barking in the distance, fortunately we were on the outside of the fence. Because the fence ran east to west we turned to the west to get around it and after about a quarter of a mile it turned to the south. Because the dogs were making such a racket we quickly got away from the area, which was just as well as I found out after the war that this was a military area.
We carried on with our march until about 11PM when we came across a house in the woods. There were lights on so we stopped about a hundred yards away to discuss the situation. Captain Redman suggested that he creep up to the window of the house and see if they were speaking Dutch. The Captain spoke German as he had trained in Germany before the war and for all we knew we might be in Germany. When the captain came back from the house he said they were not speaking German and he could only conclude that they were speaking Dutch.
We approached the house with some trepidation not knowing what our reception would be like. I knocked on the door, which was opened slightly by a middle-aged man of slight build who promptly slammed the door in our faces. After a minute or so I knocked again and a young girl opened the door, in very good English, asked what we wanted. She obviously recognized us for what we were and quickly invited us in.
In the house was the man who invited us in first, together with a jolly looking rather plump lady and two younger children. The older girl who had let us in was the only person who spoke English and asked us if we would like some coffee and a biscuit. We accepted this although we were both ready for a good cup of tea. We never saw any tea for the next three months. The coffee was rather "ersatz", I don't know what it was made from but it certainly was not coffee, however we were very grateful for it.
We told the girl how we came to be at her house and she spent some time telling the rest of the household our story. After a few minutes with her parents the girl said we could sleep in the haystack for the night and that she would try to contact someone from the underground. She said that her family were not active in the resistance but had a way to contact people who were and she would do that first thing in the morning.
The haystack in the yard was about twenty feet high with a roof over it but no walls. The girl showed us where a wooden extension ladder was kept and we scaled the ladder and got into the hay, after which we pulled the ladder up after us and laid it across the top. We were both asleep in no time and it only seemed a short while before I heard the girl cooing to us softly that it was time to come down and have some breakfast.
After a typical Dutch breakfast of cold ham and hard boiled egg with black bread we were asked to follow the girl into the woods and keep a distance of 100 meters behind her in case she was stopped by the soldiers or the "Green Police".

Continued...
'This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by 大象传媒 Radio Merseyside鈥檚 People鈥檚 War team on behalf of the author and has been added to the site with his / her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.'

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