- Contributed by听
- jonwilkie
- People in story:听
- Jonathan Wilkinson, Alf Forrester, Jackie Hicks
- Location of story:听
- Upper Silesia (Poland) to south east Germany
- Background to story:听
- Army
- Article ID:听
- A6228218
- Contributed on:听
- 20 October 2005
The route of my 'Long March' from Upper Silesia to Bavaria from 24th January to 24th April 1945. Just one of the forced marches across Europe in retreat of the advancing Russian army. This map has been drawn up by Jonathan Wilkinson using the list of villages recorded in his personal diary.
The Russian winter offensive 1944/5 placed thousands of allied pows in danger of being caught up in the conflict between their captors and liberators. The International Red Cross suggested that the Germans should take steps to safeguard these prisoners by evacuating them to a 'safety zone'. The German High Command agreed, and from the middle of January 1945 this evacuation began. As each day passed the numbers of fleeing prisoners increased. In January there were some 5,000 Brits on the march, by February some 12,000 and the end of March over 20,000. In all it seems that over 120,000 allied pows were on the move westwards.
Those columns of men starting out from Upper Silesia crossed Sudetenland and Czechoslovakia into south east Germany before they were finally freed by the advancing allies. The distances marched in the freezing cold and snow were between 600 and 800 miles. During this forced march, I kept a diary and have recently located the small villages, where we camped overnight, on a map.
My account of the march can be found under:
POW IN UPPER SILESIA AND THE LONG MARCH BACK TO GERMANY AND FREEDOM
A6183182
A PAINTING OF THE LONG MARCH BY MY FRIEND AND FELLOW POW STAN JOHNSON
A6247956
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