Occupation and Deportation by Dick Green

A Jersey internee at Bad Wurzach

I knew Dick when he was Treasurer of St Aubin on the Hill Church, and am pleased to have uncovered this account of his experience of the German Occupation

Occupation and Deportation by Dick Green

My war time memories cover the age seven to twelve years and are, as one would expect, very selective: it is difficult not to be influenced by what has been learned since and particularly by my RAF career which certainly affected how I think about that period of history'

When the war started we - father, mother, older brother and sister myself and one year-old sister were living in Victoria Road. Georgetown. The war meant little until the harbour was bombed when I recall seeing the black smoke rising in the distance Life did not seem different to me - perhaps everyone evaporated sea water to get salt, grew tobacco in their gardens (between lines of runner beans as camouflage), had a sack of sugar (black market I'm sure; hidden upstairs) and tried stewing limpets. School (De la Salle College) went on as normal except that occasionally we found shrapnel in the playground.

If one thing typifies the first year of Occupation for me it is the memory of green-clad German troops marching down Victoria Road singing 'I - E - I - O, I O", a very popular marching song for them'

Many people had trailers for their bicycles - including me - and it was a fag pulling it all the way up Don Road to town' But it did help bring home the vegetables etc.

We had a short holiday in a rented beach hut at St. Ouen's Bay and travelled there by horse and cart. It was a daily chore to fetch water from the pump on La Pulente Hill. One afternoon I was on my way down the beach and all by myself when I was "chased" up the beach by a low flying Junkers trimotor aircraft - whether the pilot was conscious of a wee lad running for all he was worth ahead of him, I'll never know'

I vaguely recall a disturbed night and finding things different and rather chaotic the next morning, with mother, helped by older sister and brother, packing cases and trunks, and father (then chief clerk of Barclays Bank), rushing out and back very evidently much worried and concerned. I later found out that he had been hurriedly arranging the custody of our household belongings and the transfer of his keys and responsibilities in the bank.

They had been visited at midnight by a German Officer accompanied by a Centenier and given a Deportation Order, requiring the whole family to report that afternoon to the Weighbridge - the old bus station behind what is now the Tourism Office building - where we duly assembled with our one case per person, with other families. That evening we were taken by ship to St. Malo, boarded a train at the dockside, and three days later got off it in the town of Biberach in southern Germany.

We were relatively lucky in that being six in the family we had a compartment to ourselves and did not have to share with people who, at the time, were complete and utter strangers.

It was a long walk up the hill from the station to the hutted and barbed-wired camp. On the way a German soldier gave me an apple from a roadside tree but it was hard, green and bitter' We were allocated to huts; father and older brother had to sleep in the men's quarters while the rest of us went to a large room wherein lived and slept about 40 people – women, girls and younger children.

I had a top bunk but was most embarrassed to find that in the rush my pyjama trousers had been left behind in Jersey Oh the shame of it!

Catering was a communal affair and meals consisted largely of cabbage "soup" and fishcakes (sawdust more likely from my memory and from the dislike of which delicacies which remained with me for many years!) Baths, too were communal and I recall a large (perhaps 40' x 40') room with overhead showers quite fun for the young lads to race round in, but the skylarking was stopped when I was pushed onto a very hot water pipe and suffered a quite severe burn in the small of my back!

After a few (6?) months all the Jersey internees were transferred to Wurzach, a small market town thirty miles or so south east of Biberach, where we moved into what had been a Jesuit College, a rather splendid three or four storey building with very ornate decorations and a very grand staircase.

It had housed French prisoners before us and was none too clean. The family size was again an advantage as we were allocated a room to ourselves, although father and older brother again had to sleep in the men's rooms. Schooling was organised once we were settled in Wurzach and I have a memory of being rather disgruntled that summer holidays were only a week or two long, but with hind sight and a family of my own, I know that we could not have been left to our own devices all that time!

Immediately outside the camp wire was a Hitler Youth camp, the inmates were aggressive and frequently taunted us internee children to which we replied with choruses of "Churchill. Churchill”

Stone throwing was immediately stopped by the camp guards and our parents were read the riot act and told to keep us under control.

Red Cross parcels were received regularly and undoubtedly saved us from severe hardship - at the end of the war we were better fed than those remaining in Jersey.

In the latter part of our incarceration we were guarded by the Wehrmacht equivalent of the Home Guard - elderly men and unfit for active service - who were, on the whole, good natured. As far as I know there was only one shot fired "in anger" and that was when we insisted on crowding the windows to watch a stream of bombers flying overhead during one of the many daylight raids on towns in southern Germany.

Other than that the only action we saw was by two aircraft (probably Typhoons) which strafed a road nearby; after we were released I walked out to the scene to see the wrecked and burnt bus which had been their target.

Near the end of the war a number of Jewish families and people arrived at our camp from other far more severe places. They obviously had not been well treated and were quite hard to get to know, because of the language barrier and their attitude to them our prison camp was probably luxury beyond dreams!

In May 1945 the sounds of war could be heard, barricades were built on all the roads into the town and there was considerable military activity. The next village did resist the advancing allied forces – and was flattened.

In the event the Germans surrendered Wurzach without a fight – just as well for us, as the Allied troops had no knowledge of the internment camp and had their sights set on the largest building in the town - ours! Then the tanks rolled in and the gates were unlocked I recall one of the camps inmates trying to direct a tank so that it would knock down the flag mast on which the German flag had flown - the driver would not oblige and the Nazi flag was replaced by the Union Jack.

The emotional release for my parents must have been enormous and one indication of this was the effect on my mother. She had suffered from migraine attacks all her adult life and these had become increasingly severe during our time in Germany: she never had another after our release!

In early June we were taken by lorry to Mengen airfield (memories of dusty roads and dust filled eyes for a couple of days!!) where we were to await our flight to England. There were many German aircraft around and one that sticks in my mind was a fighter with an engine and propeller at both ends, an experimental machine that, as far as I know, never went into action

We were flown to RAF Hendon in a Dakota aircraft crewed by Canadians and the flight lasted about three hours. There were no upholstered seats or safety belts (or air hostesses) and we were all sat on dished plywood seats with our backs to the side of the aircraft our luggage was in a long pile down the middle of the floor. It was my first ever flight and at some time I undid my belt: when I was invited to go up into the cockpit, my trousers fell down (even more embarrassing than not having pyjama trousers!).

Both my parents came from Hendon so for them it really was a home-coming, after a night in the Reception Centre, we were released into the care of my grandparents.

My father was returned to Jersey fairly soon so that he could help to sort out the bank's affairs and we followed in August or September 1945. We had to stay in an hotel (the Ommaroo at Havre des Pas) for a week while our house was made fit to live in. It had been used by the Germans and bottles of tar had been thrown through the bedroom windows - the tar had been dried with sand and I would not be at all surprised if the stains on the floor boards were still there! All but a few old mats and odds and ends of our household had disappeared from store - looted or stolen, I do not know and all that remained of the quite large model railway set shared by my brother and I, was a truck without wheels and a bent rail!