大象传媒

Told by Mr James Timothy Napier, typed by a UCN Community Volunteer.

I am James T Napier, number 2657306 of the Coldstream Guards Regiment. Prior to joining the army at 18 years March 10th 1936 I was in private service.
I was at Aldershot when the phoney war broke out. Sent with the British Expeditionary Force, landing at Cherbourg, then staying at the Ch芒teaux Jennet, until the following May. We then went up to the Albert Canal, but immediately turned back due to the German advance. The 鈥淏litz Krieg鈥� caught up with us, and we had to burn our weapons and all other armaments to prevent the Germans from using them against us.

We then travelled to Dunkirk, reaching the shore but were cut short on our journey back to Britain, due to the new German shell, which exploded in the air above us killing the majority our of column. I escaped with a piece of shrapnel in the upper chest, however the rest of my column was mowed down in front of me. Other soldiers tried to get me onto a boat but failed, laying me on the sand. Next thing I knew I was on a RAMC vehicle, with a medical officer leaning over me. We took shelter in a small wood in France, having been transferred to an ambulance, which received stray bullet fire. One man was slightly injured.

I was transferred to a hospital in Lille, which was a Roman Catholic Church (makeshift), under the care of volunteer British medical officers who had stayed behind. In the bed next to me was Jonny Steele (21 years), who was an airman and had been shot down over the channel, loosing a leg. An amusing memory of the time was of looking for cigarette ends, for him to re-roll cigarettes. I used to push him around in a wheelchair looking for 鈥榙og ends鈥�. He recovered and was later repatriated.

From the hospital we were taken in cattle trucks full of 40 men at a time. On the outside of the truck it said 鈥渇orty men or eight cows鈥�! On the journey we received one loaf of bread for the whole week, no toilets, we were let out once a day only, into the nearest field. This was on my journey towards Stalag VIII B in Poland, which took eight days, the most diabolical journey of my lifetime. On arrival I was numbered 47 962, which shows how many prisoners there were even at the beginning of the war. The prisoners built a whole village, the Germans used us for cheap labour, sunny days, we even build a church, and I was a hod-carrier and enjoyed the hard work in the sunshine.

Next we were sent to 鈥楾ulensk鈥�, I am not sure about the name but I remember the cobblestones, a place from Grimm鈥檚 fairy tales. It was a vile, black, filthy dirty place, where I feigned illness and got back to the main camp. From then on life became much easier. I was sent to work at the Siemans factory in Coselhaven, which was a large paper factory. The hours were reasonable at 7.00am to 4.00pm, we were given time to take a shower at the end of the day. I was there for three years until the end of the war. While I was there I received Red-cross parcels every week, these were a godsend and the only real food we had. They contained all the vitamins that we needed. The camp was a good camp, to prevent escape attempts. We made our own entertainment, put on shows and band performances.

The good times came to an abrupt end on January 21st 1945 when we were forced to go on the 800 miles march. Much of this was round and round in circles to avoid the Russian and US armies that we were in between. One tragic incident during that march, in the height of winter, took place one early morning, extremely cold and snow on the ground, we were told to stop and go to the side of the road. This was to allow a column of Jews to pass through, they were making terrible moaning noises and obviously praying. It was an awful sight to see them wearing their blue and white striped gowns, with no shoes and feet wrapped in old rags. This was quite traumatic to watch these sad people going by, but there was nothing we could do to help, we would not have been allowed to even if we could.

During the march we stayed at farms for the night, one being a poultry farm, with a 鈥榝unny鈥� twist to it. Some of the chaps went out to look for food and they stole dozens of chicken, not to be discovered until the next morning. The next day the Germans found a discarded chicken head in the yard, alerting them to what had happened. We turned out into the yard; all those with blood on their jackets were beaten up. In the inspection my friend and I swapped ranks to avoid his jacket being seen.

After 3 months of marching one beautiful sunny morning the American tanks came over the hill, April 21st, many tough hardened soldiers wept, after five years of being POWs. We were liberated and changed places with the Germans, who were put into a large farm building with the door locked. Which was quite a turnaround for us.

I afterwards became ill with dissentry I had to be sent home by air, to a camp in Wiltshire, from where after a few days we were all sent on leave. Unfortunately the train that I was travelling on finished its journey in Sherbourne, Dorset after which I had nine miles to walk. All the buses were gone. Fortunately the village grocer going home in his van picked me up. He took me to my home, arriving at about half past ten.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.