大象传媒

Shortly, as I was about to climb on to the bottom of a bunk bed, my left leg suddenly swelled up like a tree trunk. Consequently, I could not possibly lift the leg without using both hands to do so. I cannot remember whether it lasted long, but the amazing thing was that there was absolutely no pain. The condition was established as DVT.

On the 12th May the first air raid upon those Herrman Goering Works at Brux was carried out. The day was clear and sunny, so no doubt the enemy wws taken by surprise, because they had not put up a smoke screen. The raiders did drop strips of foil to interfere with their radar system.

We always assumed that the Americans carried out bombing missions by day and the RAF. by night. On this occasion, there was a direct hit on the most important part of the works and quite a mushroom-shaped cloud ascended to a great height. I could not contain my joy and expressed it in no uncertain manner, when a guard on the other side of the fence asked me "Why you laff?" Whereupon, I countered with "If you were a POW in my country, would you not laugh if you saw your Luftwaffe attacking one of our works?" The German mentality appeared to have been that they could do whatever they liked to us, but we should not retaliate!

There were air raids on Monday mornings regularly and we wondered why this should be. The damage caused each time was quickly made good by using hordes of foreign labour. By now though they had drums placed around the neighbourhood which had a tap attached, which when released, would very quickly blot out the sky and it would suddenly become quite chilly.

On the day of the 60th Anniversery of WW2 on 10th July, 2005, each of us attending the Lunch in the grounds of Buckingham Palace was presented with an Official World War II Commemoration Brochure. I was indeed very sad to have noticed on a page entitled 'People at war' that one of our men - Gunner Stuart Campbell, had been killed during the air raid on Brux, on that 12th May, hitherto mentioned.

On arrival at the pit-top that evening there was some commotion, when the enemy tried to muster some of us for some very unpleasant duties. A shot was fired and one of our men was struck on the side of his neck, as we tried to place something under his head, as he was laying on the wet cobble-stone floor. I scaled a fairly high wall in next to no time, in order to avoid the crazed gunman, who must have chased men around tha pithead.

From that moment on, I decided not to go down the pit again and hid out for some time among coats hanging up in a surface cloakroom, until the end of the shift, fearing that they would carry out a search at any moment. Strangely enough they never missed me, so consequently did not seek me!

Whenever there was an air-raid when at the pithead, it meant that the enemy would refuse us the use of the pit air-raid shelter, saying that they thought Englishmen were supposed to be brave, so we had to run like hell towards the Erzgebirge Mountains, passing long jagged pieces of bomb casing in the fields en route. There it felt safer to cling to a tree for safety. From there we could see the bombs falling, like silver fish in the sunlight all around where we had just come from. Then we would return, until possibly having to do the same all over again, at any given moment

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