大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War web site by Ron Steer, of 大象传媒 South East Today, on behalf of Yvonne Denton,and has been added to the site with his/her permission. Mrs.Denton fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

My husband (who I was yet to meet) was with the Hampshire Regiment in Italy and Sicily and they returned to England to land on Gold Beach, Normandy in the early hours of 6th June 1944.

After the landing a few men had been cut off by a withdrawal. They peered out of their foxhole to discover German troops queuing up for their breakfast. After hurried discussion they decided that the best thing was to surrender. They buried anything they thought the Germans would have an interest in and they got up with their arms raised. They were lucky to be captured by crack German Regiment; they might not have fared so well with another one.

They were put into cattle trucks on the railway and were shunted about with a lot of other prisoners. They had lost shaving kit, toothbrushes and other vital things and were looking unkempt and dirty. They were all taken and made to walk through Paris; Hitler鈥檚 way of showing what the rabble prisoners looked like. It was an experience Stan would never forget, they were whistled and hooted at by the crowd, but all he could think was, we are supposed to be liberating you.

They finally arrived at their destination and were put in Stalag X11A camp, which I have found was in a place called Moosburg not far from the Czech border. The prisoners were taken to work at a wood factory; there were no horses to lug things about so they had to do it. Food was not plentiful. They managed to receive two Red Cross parcels; one was from Canada with lovely things like tinned butter, dried milk called Klim, dried egg, tinned meat and cigarettes.

The owner of the factory鈥檚 family lived in Dresden, which was razed to the ground in a terrible bombing raid by the RAF. The man was furious and brought a gun along and wanted to shoot them. They dodged behind logs and anything they could find, no one was shot but it was touch and go.

As the war progressed they heard rumours that the Americans were coming towards them one way and the Russians were coming from the other. They were told by their guards that they would not be liberated but they would be shot first.
In the event, they woke one morning to find the gates open and the camp deserted apart from just two guards, one of whom lived locally; they told him to go home to his wife and daughter as the Russians were coming. They walked the other way down the road for about a mile and were met by the Americans, who were a very welcome sight.
Stan died in 1986 we had 37 happy married years.

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