大象传媒

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For part one, 鈥楾he Day Before My Capture鈥�, see story number A7736213
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鈥� In the morning 鈥� half way between dead and alive 鈥� we were ordered to leave our trenches and start an attack. We had to cross the Deventer-Zutphen road. Passing a coffee-bar we entered a forest, darting between small houses like bungalows in very narrow streets. We were shot at by rifles and suddenly tanks armed with flame-throwers moved towards us. They, in turn, were attacked by our bazookas until they withdrew; but not for long. They pushed forward again using terrible long-range flame-throwers. I escaped with a comrade into the basement of one of the little houses. The inhabitants were there, trying to find shelter, some women, children and an elder senior [the householder 鈥� AB]. They were all very anxious, looking at us and not knowing what would happen. We tried to calm them down. The senior was very friendly to us and we so were we. We left the house again as soon as it became calm outside.

Well, many things happened and in the meantime it was growing dark. We moved forward again; entering a large building which turned out to be a mental home. As we entered some of the patients were lying in their sick beds and others staggered towards us. This was a very unexpected sight 鈥� I had never seen anything like this before and was terribly shocked. The other part of the building was occupied by the Canadians.

We withdrew and got to a house hiding behind a hedge when Canadian soldiers suddenly came along protected by flame-thrower equipped tanks. As soon as they passed I knocked on the front door of the house and the senior let me in, saying ; 鈥淐ome in and lay down. There is a long seat in the room鈥�. His voice was very friendly. I gave him my karabiner, my belt with my knife, steel helmet and, within a few seconds, I had dashed to the long seat and was asleep.

I do not know how long I slept for, it seemed like it would be until kingdom come, and I was awoken by three Canadians telling me to get up, ordering me to put my hands up. I did, of course; and I remember feeling as if I was drunk. They took me to a wall where there were more of my comrades from my company; maybe 10 or 20, I cannot remember. We were ordered; 鈥淗ands up!鈥� again and I saw a Canadian soldier standing in front of us holding a sub-machine gun and pointing it at us.

I had given up on my life when a couple of Dutch women who were standing around began shouting, 鈥淪top! Stop! Do not shoot!鈥� The Canadian did not shoot, maybe it was never his intention to shoot us, but it certainly looked like it. Anyway, at that point I just didn鈥檛 care.

After that we had to take position in front of a tank, running for our lives straight into some goat-barns, where they were we had to stay until they took us to our first 鈥楤lue-Sky鈥� camp [open-air with no shelter. AB]. I stayed in five or six of this type of camp until I arrived at Zedelgem in Belgium.

Our food ration consisted of three biscuits a day and a drop of water until we arrived at Camp 2226 Zedelgem.
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Herbert鈥檚 life as a POW in England can be seen on this site, starting with story number A5972033, and at www.hullwebs.co.uk
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Added by: Alan Brigham - www.hullwebs.co.uk

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