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And eventually we were entrained to Czestochowa. Again, disorganisation, but eventually they did get us on this train, a Russian train, terrible train! They didn’t have seating, they had wooden planks across the coaches. It was a very primitive train and an old boy in charge of each carriage, who did the food, who brewed up and put soup on a sort of charcoal burner. And the trip began from Czestochowa, going east, and because we were going east, it was go up a mile, come back half a mile because the Russian trains were coming through. The big story was: ‘We must get to Berlin — don’t worry about trains going the other way!’, so you can imagine!

We got so used to it, we actually used to get out sometimes and walk alongside of the track, because we knew that it was up the road and we’d always catch it. And if you came to a village, the Russian or the Ukrainian people would stand outside their homes with bread, or anything, to barter. So if I had a pair of socks, I could forfeit, I didn’t really want them, I’m not going anywhere, I could get some bread or something. It was a bartering system. And, as I say, the train stopped and started.

When we came to a bigger town and the train stopped, it was near the river and we realised that there were German prisoners from Stalingrad. We’d heard about Stalingrad and how badly they were treated, the Russian prisoners; the Germans treated them like animals. What they’d made them do, for punishment, was repair the tracks they’d destroyed and the bridges they’d blown up, and they put them to work. They were still in the same uniforms that they were caught in. They were dirty, dishevelled, and we sympathised because we knew what it was like and offered them cigarettes. Don’t let anyone see us have a cigarette. The Russians treated them very badly. That was the Germans from Stalingrad, and we realised there were people worse off than us.

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Sue Craig on behalf of Ron Redman and has been added to the site with his permission. Ron fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

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