From Interrogation to Liberation: a Photographic Journey Stalag Luft Iii: The Road to Freedom

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© 2014 Marilyn Walton and Michael Eberhardt. All rights reserved.

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Photo Editor credits:

Philip Kramer

Philip Kramer Photography

930 20th Avenue

Seattle, WA 98122

Marek Lazarz —P.O.W. Camps Museum

Stalag VIIIC—Stalag Luft 3

Ul Lotnikow Alianckich 6, 68-100

Zagan, Poland

Unless otherwise stated, photos from the U.S. Air Force Academy are from the MS 329 Collection

Unless otherwise credited, pictures are from the authors’ private collections

Assistance with manuscript preparation John Walton

Published by AuthorHouse 5/8/2014

ISBN: 978-1-4918-4688-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4918-4706-0 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014900470

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Cover photo courtesy Imperial Museum/Donated by Air Commodore Charles Clarke and RAF Ex-POW Association

Bombardier’s Compartment—B-17

Courtesy Butch Lombardi—www.eastbayimages.com

Dedication

Two Bombardiers

During World War II, 300,000 United States Army Air Corps airmen were shot down. Of that number, 51,000 were prisoners of war or listed as missing in action. The chance of air crews going down in 1944 was one in three and as more and more crews went down, the demand for replacement crews grew. Bombardiers, positioned in the vulnerable bombardiers’ compartment at the front of the aircraft, were in high demand.

Two men who answered the call and beat the odds to survive the war were our fathers, 2nd Lt. Charles M. Eberhardt, POW #3641, and 2nd Lt. Thomas F. Jeffers, POW# 6128. Lt. Eberhardt was a bombardier on B-17, Little Audrey. Lt. Jeffers was a bombardier on a B-24 named, Rhapsody in Junk.

Pre-war, Jeffers was a machinist at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, and after the war retired as a lieutenant colonel in the United States Air Force. He married before the war, and his wife was expecting his first child. Eberhardt, who also married before his enlistment, later became an engineering executive with General Motors. Jeffers joined up September 1, 1942, and was shot down June 18, 1944, on a mission to Fassberg, Germany, with the plane finally crashing north of Kiel. One crew member was found dead on the ground. Eberhardt joined the service June 18, 1942, and his plane was hit by a bomb dropped by another B-17. The plane crashed in Munich, Germany, on March 18th, 1944, with three crew members killed.

The bombardiers’ kids, both on their own journeys to reconstruct their fathers’ World War II experiences as prisoners of war at Stalag Luft III, would meet sixty-seven years after their fathers came home from war. As far as we know, Jeffers and Eberhardt never knew one another, but they both lived in South Compound. They attended the same Catholic masses together, trudged through the cold and snow together on the Forced March of 1945, when their camp was evacuated, and were liberated at Stalag VIIA in Moosburg, Germany, April 29th, 1945, together. Like other members of our generation, whose fathers fought heroically in the blue battlefield, filled with streaks of white contrails and puffs of brown flak, we are staunchly loyal to and supportive of our fathers’ aircraft, weighing the pros and cons of the B-17 versus the B-24, as they used to do. Somehow that makes us feel even closer to them.

It is to these two brave men, both gone now, our airmen and fathers, whom we hold forever in our hearts, that this book is dedicated. And for all the other patriots, husbands, uncles, and fathers, who called themselves kriegies at Stalag Luft III, please know that our generation and the ones that follow will never forget.

Marilyn and Mike

Stalag Luft III Personalkartes

Prisoner of War Camps in Europe

Courtesy Parcels for Prisoners of War

Introduction

The Road to Freedom

The first step on the road to freedom for thousands of airmen made prisoners of war was taken the moment they were picked up by the enemy in widely-scattered locations in the Middle East, Mediterranean, and European Theatres of Operations. The road was a long one for most filled with pain and sorrow and just enough fortitude, shared humor, compassion, and brotherhood to see them through to the end. The isolation of a solitary confinement cell during initial interrogation for most, but not all, at Dulag Luft in Oberursel, Germany, while injured, hungry, and desolate, meant there were times that they walked that road alone. At other times, the road was crowded with immeasurable human suffering, immense danger, and fallen brothers who never finished the journey. With the Allied victory in 1945, the journey ended, and all the steps they had taken became memories, hidden away, lost to time and as faint as the words on faded pages of their Wartime Log Books. Our book retraces their steps in order to witness their youthful, formative years and to make vivid their astonishing feats during a time when circumstances beyond their control dictated in what direction they would walk. For many, the road to freedom first led to the barbed wire front at Stalag Luft III.

Stalag Luft III, the famed German Luftwaffe prisoner of war camp for Allied officers, was once called Kriegsgefangenenlager der Luftwaffe Nr 3—Carlwalde, reflecting the name of the small village south of Sagan, Germany. The adjacent camp, VIIIC, was established in 1939 by the Wehrmacht. Today, the remains of both camps are in Zagan, Poland, and the Obozów Jenieckich / P.O.W. Camps Muzeum there, preserving the history of Stalag VIIIC and Stalag Luft III, operates to archive the stories and memories of the prisoners and to educate the public about their histories. With this book, we hope to do the same. We wrote this book to financially benefit that small museum in Zagan that symbolizes the dedication of the Polish people, who still pay tribute to the courage, ingenuity, and endurance of the Allied airmen, who found barbed wire so confining to the human spirit.

The most historically memorable story that comes from the camp is that of the Great Escape, which took place March 24-25, 1944. The massive escape that disrupted the German war effort and resulted in the tragic deaths of fifty British airmen by direct order of Adolf Hitler still remains a story to be chronicled and analyzed by historians. On a smaller scale, but also historically significant, are lesser known stories, some humorous, some poignant, and many unusual that came out of the camp that are part of the rich mosaic that defines Stalag Luft III. Reflections on the facts vary slightly in the retelling by the so called kriegies, who lived the experiences, their accounts sometimes indicating discrepancies in times and conditions, for instance. We have intentionally kept varied accounts of the Forced March of January, 1945, (called the Long March by the British) when the camp was evacuated, and liberation at Stalag VIIA in Moosburg, Germany, to honor the kriegies’ individual recollections. Some pictures taken with clandestine cameras have not been altered in order to retain their original images.

Seldom heard are the German stories, and we present those as well. With over 10,000 Allied prisoners held at the camp, plus the German military and civilian personnel, the camp was a microcosm, where everyday living produced a plethora of daily human interactions. Much of the material in the book has been drawn from the historically-significant scrapbook that Lt. General A.P. Clark compiled over the years, which is held at the Air Force Academy, as well personal interviews with him. All of the clandestine photos and documents still in the form of undeveloped rolls of film were taken along by him on the Forced March preserving them for posterity.

In this book, we present the reader with a wide variety of stories of the people, whose wartime paths crossed, each on their own journey to freedom. Some of those people were Germans caught up in the madness of a tyrant. Some were young fresh-faced American pilots eager to get into the war and frustrated at suddenly being taken out of it. Others were well-seasoned and heroic British fliers gone down early, many veterans of the Battle of Britain, and old hands at prison life by the time the Americans arrived. Canadian prisoners had left their homes to participate in the Battle of Britain, and Polish pilots flying with the RAF found themselves in the unique position of being incarcerated very close to the Polish border and their homes. Other prisoners, representing many different countries, flew with the RAF, when their own air forces could no longer fly; yet they all continued to fight for freedom against German tyranny. Men from Australia, South Africa, and New Zealand heeded the call. Once out of the air war, many prisoners continued the fight from behind barbed wire by tunneling, escaping, harassing, code writing, and intelligence gathering. One common thread that connected all prisoners was the value they placed on their former freedom. Another was the continual counting of the days until they could return home, every day each man assessing just which day that would be.

Reichsmarshal Hermann Göring, in control of the German Luftwaffe, had an affinity with all pilots, and for that reason Stalag Luft III was not nearly as bad a place to be held as the ground troops’ or enlisted men’s camps. However, conditions still fell far behind what German prisoners of war experienced when held by the Allies. The major deprivations within Stalag Luft III were lack of adequate food and lack of heat in the winter, and the men had to get used to more crowded and more primitive facilities than they had ever known. Boredom was a big factor for so many highly-trained, pilots, bombardiers, and navigators. Recalling the large number of prisoners in the camp proper, the late Lt. Gen. Albert P. Clark, former prisoner and senior officer in the camp used to say, The group of POWs came from all walks of life and no matter how complex a task was that needed to be accomplished, there was a man there who would know how to do it.

We hope we have found stories that spark interest among historical researchers, former prisoners, their families and friends. Several recurring names guide the reader on the journey so that one might vicariously experience the prisoners’ plight on the way to liberation. Material in this book is only a sampling of the unique stories and often unseen pictures we found in a worldwide search that were so generously given by those who scoured old photo albums, letters, diaries, books, and journals. Archives and historical organizations opened their valuable collections to us in order to benefit the Polish museum. We remain forever grateful for the U.S. Air Force Academy McDermott Library Stalag Luft III Collection, in particular, and to Dr. Mary Ruwell and Ms. Trudy Pollok, who tirelessly combed the Academy’s archive, responding to our every request, allowing us to use hundreds of historic photographs that those unable to visit the academy would otherwise never see. We hope the readers of this book gain a genuine wartime perspective following the road our fathers and so many others followed seeking their denied freedom.

Foreword

As a World War II historian, it has been my quest to preserve the history of that war, with a particular interest in the remembrance of the prisoners of war of Stalag Luft III, men who saw combat and then sacrificed years of their own youth and freedom to preserve mine. In researching for my own books on the subject, I have been brought into contact with veterans, their families, and hundreds of prisoners of war from Stalag Luft III. These good people have been a driving force in my life. We must never forget the veterans who allowed the citizens of this great nation to walk on soil that’s free. They deserve all the accolades we can bestow on them.

This book by Marilyn Walton and Mike Eberhardt is one such honor. It is full of stories of the prisoners’ valiant experiences during a cataclysmic war, and as I read it I was reminded of so many of my friends mentioned here that have now passed on. But their legacy is continued through the words in this book, and their faces in the hundreds of pictures cause me to reacquaint myself with them once more and marvel at their accomplishments and sacrifices. Meticulous research allows the authors to present a depiction of camp life that is both realistic and memorable.

Arnold A. Wright

Recipient of the Air Force Scroll of Appreciation

Transcriber of Behind the Wire

Author of Out of the Blue and My Country Called

Acknowledgments

Air Commodore Charles

Clarke

Alan Bowgen

Alan Hopewell

Alan Righetti

Alexander Jefferson

Alastair McHardy

Andrea Hatfield

Arnold A. Wright

Barb Edy

Barry Davidson

Barry Schoen

Bernd Schmitt

Bill Grafton

Bill Homan

Bob Haltom

Bonnie Bedford-White

Bryan Makos

Carol Godwin

Carolyn Clark Miller

Chasten Bowen

Chris Anderson

Chris Scharff

Claudius Scharff

David Champion

Debbie Lamason

Dennis Daniel

Diana Darke

Diane Stamp

Don Edy

Don Shearer

Don Stine

Duane Reed

Ed Carter-Edwards

Ed Dement

Ed Zander

Edouard Renière

Ernie Hasenclever

Ethel M. J. Alle

Gene Daniel

George Sweanor

Gil Hoel

Graham McHardy

Guy Walters

Hal Gunn

Herb Weber

Ian Sayer

Irv Baum

James Douglas

James Stewart

Jarrod Burks

Jason Warr

Jeff Silverman

Jennifer Schwartz

Joe Consolmagno

Joe Gosselin

Joe Moser

John Gray

John Griffin

John Lanza

John T. Walton

Jon Cousens

Joyce Lorenz

Jonathan Vance

Julie Walton

Kathy McDowell

Katie Walton

Ken Rees

Kingsley Brown

Lisa Walton

Liz Golden

Louise Woehrle

Lucy Nesbitt

Lynn Hughes

Marek Lazarz

Mariusz Żarnowski

Mark Taylor

Martyn Rees

Mary Hargrove

Mary Ruwell

Mike Dorsey

Mike Netherway

Mike Walton

Mirek Walczak

Miriam Larson

Pamela Sconiers Whitelock

Patrick Sandman

Paul Tobolski

Peter Hynes

Peter Mayo

Philip Kramer

Pippa Langlois

Rafael Sandoval

RAF Ex-POW Association

Richard Bedford

Richard Kimball

Rob Davis

Robert Sandman

Ross Greene

Scott Walton

Shannon Klatt

Stephen Marks

Susan Holmstrom Kohnowich

Szymon Serwatka

Tamara Haygood

Ted Barris

Tom Mickelson

Tom Wilson

Trudy Pollak

Tyler Butterworth

Virginia Eades

Virginia Stump

Wendy McCleave

Werner Schwarz

Special Acknowledgement

While I may be able to take some credit for the idea to publish this book, the inspiration behind that idea was a direct result of the spirited dedication of Marilyn Walton to the preservation of the history of Stalag Luft III. With tireless devotion, she has virtually put this entire book together on her own—spending countless hours gathering photos from around the world, corresponding with surviving POWs and family members, researching little known aspects of Stalag Luft III, and writing unique narratives that put in context the photos in this book. Many of these narratives and accompanying photos have never been published before, so it is our hope that they add to the endearing memories of those POWs, who were captured, imprisoned at Stalag Luft III, and finally liberated. Without Marilyn, this book would simply not have been possible. On behalf of all, who are linked to the history of Stalag Luft III, we are forever grateful.

Michael C. Eberhardt

Special Photo Editor Acknowledgement

The scope of this book was to collect and reproduce as many relevant photographs relating to the lives of POWs imprisoned at Stalag Luft III as possible. In so doing, 900 photos of varying quality were collected from archives and personal collections from around the world. The challenge of bringing many of these photos to a resolution level, which allowed their use in this book, fell to Philip Kramer, the grandson of POW Lt. Charles Eberhardt. Philip, an accomplished professional photographer, spent tedious hours in efforts to enhance the resolution of many of the photographs used in this book and in doing so learned much about the World War II experiences of his grandfather and the many other POWs honored by this publication. Thank you, Philip.

With Gratitude

We would be remiss not to acknowledge the supreme effort on the part of the POW Camps Museum Director, Marek Lazarz, who has led a tireless effort in the search for photos and in providing historical perspective on the former camp. His knowledge of the camp history and Polish wartime history has been essential in providing context and accuracy. We have worked with him almost daily in the preparation of this book, and no matter what we asked, whether it was perfecting the resolution of old pictures, answering our endless questions, and at one point climbing to the top of the old granary for that special shot that he wanted to take, he was eager and willing to assist us—always done with a smile. Marek’s passion for keeping the history of our Allied POWs alive and his love of his countrymen, who suffered so much in the war, and never lived to see freedom, is palpable. To you, Marek, we say dziękujemy bardzo!

Contents

Dedication

Introduction

Foreword

Acknowledgments

1   Two Theatres of Operation

2   Stalag VIIIC

3   Duty, Honor, Country

4   Two Spitfire Pilots

5   Come In—I Am Your Interrogator

6   The Sun Never Sets on the British Empire

7   The Test of Time

8   Per Ardua Astra

9   The Big Brass

10   The Luftwaffe in Charge

11   Who Were the POWs at Stalag Luft III?

12   Fighting for the Homeland

13   Court Martial Offenses for Prisoners of War at Stalag Luft III

14   Taking the Count

15   Sitting It Out in Silesia

16   When Shots Rang Out

17   Kriegie Kompanions

18   Secret Communications

19   Stories from the Scrapbook

20   Hell over Holland

21   Unleashing the Horde

22   The Red Cross

23   Keeping Faith

24   Echoes from the Past

25   Maintaining Peace and Harmony

26   Clandestine Photos

27   Of Cabbage and Kohlrabi

28   Playing for Time

29   Portrait of an Artist

30   Tin, Wool, Pencils and Paints

31   Archived in the Shadows

32   Living on McHardy Time

33   Captive Audience

34   The Show Must Go On

35   Curtain Going Up

36   Red Tails over Europe

37   Celebrating Freedom behind Barbed Wire

38   Sailing on Troubled Waters

39   Gepruft

40   Winds of War

41   Krankenhaus

42   Fire and Ice

43   Buried Abroad

44   Guardian Angel

45   Breaking the Bonds

46   Solemnity and Sorrow

47   Soliloquy for the Ages

48   Good-Natured Madmen

49   Encounter with Evil

50   Everything Has Been Good Really

51   Pour Rechercher un Ami

52   Frozen in Time

53   Incident on a Boxcar

54   Two Days in Gross Selten

55   Rolling Degradation

56   Ode to a Wimpy

57   Cries in the Night

58   A Desperate Plea

59   The Beginning of the End

60   Deutschland Kaput

61   Stars & Stripes

62   Brothers in Arms

63   A Legacy of Ledgers

64   Unexpected Benevolence

65   Freedom Denied

66   Beyond the Wire

67   Hail the Conquering Heroes

68   The Man Left Behind

69   Unbroken Bonds

70   Lost and Found

71   The Old Granary

72   From the Director

Sources

Maj. Thomas C. Griffin left of Brigadier General Jimmy Doolittle

Courtesy John Griffin

Two Theatres of Operation

Maj. Thomas C. Griffin

There’s nothing stronger than the heart of a volunteer.

General James H. Doolittle

Dad went to war, crashed two planes, and went to jail. The humorous words that Tom Griffin always enjoyed so much, spoken by his son, John Griffin, belie the experience of a modest American hero. Griffin was one of four Doolittle Raiders, flying with Brigadier General Jimmy Doolittle, who had the misfortune of being shot down in the European Theater of Operations after flying the surprise raid on Tokyo, April 18, 1942, in retaliation for the attack on Pearl Harbor.

University of Alabama—ROTC coastal artillery training

Courtesy John Griffin

Griffin was one of eighty volunteers for the extremely dangerous mission. Sixteen land-based modified B-25s flew off the deck of the aircraft carrier, USS Hornet, headed for mainland Japan.

Courtesy John Griffin

The raid, immortalized in the movie, Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo, gave the United States the morale boost it needed as the country found itself immersed in a world at war. Tom Griffin was a member of that unique brotherhood of Doolittle’s fliers never to be forgotten.

Planes’ engines roared that historic day as the B-25s lined up on the flight deck of the USS Hornet. After all the practices in Florida, taking off on the ground in a much shorter distance than could ever be thought possible, the dress rehearsal was over. This was the real thing. Missing a cue on the deck of the ship, while trying to become airborne, would cause devastating consequences. As the ocean’s waves rose and fell, the pilots synchronized their actions accordingly. Griffin, as navigator on Plane #9, Whirling Dervish, braced for take-off. Taking off earlier than expected, after Japanese ships were spotted in the vicinity, meant there could be no delays. Had any plane shown any sign of mechanical problems, Doolittle, piloting the lead ship, ordered that the problematic plane be immediately dumped overboard. But all sixteen planes took off successfully and flew straight to the target on what turned out to be a sunny day over Japan. As shells exploded around Whirling Dervish, the crew dropped its bombs. Crew #9 felt sure they struck the primary target, the Kawasaki Truck and Tank plant. Later, they found they had hit and destroyed the Tokyo Gas and Electric Engineering Company instead but still struck a blow to cripple the enemy. 

After bomb release, Griffin’s pilot turned towards China with a pursuit plane close behind. The gunner fired a rapid burst and hit the Japanese fighter, and a second fighter bearing the dreaded red, round, sphere on its wings took its place. No damage was done, and the B-25 got away. On the way to refuge in China, rain pelted the plane’s thin skin as it was buffeted in a thunderstorm. Visibility remained poor as the plane droned on through the raging storm as the advancing dark of night filled the skies. After fifteen-and-a-half hours in the air, thankfully with a tail wind nudging the plane towards China, the fuel supply was exhausted. Then the motors coughed and sputtered to a stop.

The bottom hatch of the plane opened to a vast blackness below. None of the crew had used a parachute before, and the terror of leaping from the plane into the darkness during a thunderstorm was only surpassed by the possibility of landing in water. Regardless, one-by-one, each man lowered himself through the dark hole and fell into the abyss. When Griffin jumped, he felt as though he had missed the earth as he descended 10,000 feet suspended in a black silent void experiencing no feeling of movement in any direction. But the wind currents were violent, and his parachute continually collapsed and refilled with air before it spilled again, making it hard for him to comprehend that he was swinging in a pendulum motion. In the dark, it was difficult for him to find his orientation until he finally landed in a tree uninjured.

Finally on the ground, Griffin ran into his co-pilot in the Chinese hills. Finding a third crewmate, they made their way to a Chinese farm house, where they were allowed to take off their wet clothes and dry them by a fire, leaving their guns on a table as they undressed. Suddenly, a Chinese officer appeared in the doorway holding a gun, and the men noticed that their own guns were no longer on the table. The two men slowly peered around the room. At every window and door, local Chinese covered them with rifles. That night, the farmhouse became their prison.

In the morning, two Catholic missionaries arrived and talked to the fliers. The missionaries explained to the villagers that the men were part of a group of Americans who had just bombed what the locals called the land of the dwarfs, the Japanese enemies of the Chinese. Suddenly, Griffin and his two crewmates were no longer unknown curiosities, but were instantly transformed from captives to celebrities, and they were taken to the next town, where they were given a hero’s welcome. With the help of the Chinese, the crew made it safely out of China, continually eluding Japanese patrols. After their harrowing mission, Tom’s crew, unlike some of their fellow Raiders, returned home.

After flying in the Pacific, Griffin soon found himself in the skies over Europe. After the Doolittle Raid, five of the Raiders were sent to a B-26 Group at Harding Field, Louisiana, in July 1942. One year later, two of the five had been killed, and the other three placed in German prison camps. Griffin became one of the three, when he was shot down July 4th, 1943, on a mission over Sicily. When his plane was hit, and the crew bailed out, Griffin floated downward in his parachute. On the way down, he was buzzed two or three times by a German fighter pilot but never hit. His only thought was that the pilot’s guns had jammed. When he landed and was immediately captured, he was taken before the German kommandant and demanded answers as to why the kommandant was allowing or ordering his pilots to shoot at a parachutist. The colonel listened politely for a moment and then answered, Herr Hauptmann, my pilot was not trying to shoot you but rather was filming your descent for tonight’s newsreel.

Griffin was sent to Stalag Luft III and while there hid escape materials in a false wall of his barrack. When he was caught, the Germans charged him and Capt. John Beard with destructive behavior in the barrack. Griffin disagreed, stressing that they were making an attempt at property improvement. The Germans strongly disagreed and issued each of them a card confining them to barracks [Stuben arrest]. The card was a Punishment Order [Strafbefehl] issued to the two captains stating they had earned five days of extremely limited privileges—no talking to others, no exercising, and no attending theater or meetings. The reason given was damaging Reich property. The card was signed by Kommandant Braune, who had succeeded the previous kommandant, Friedrich von Lindeiner, and Griffin carried it out of the camp on the eventual evacuation march bringing it home as a souvenir after he was liberated.

South Compound staff—Griffin

Courtesy John Griffin

German-issued punishment card

Courtesy John Griffin

Another souvenir Griffin brought home with him from the camp was a civilian I.D. which was no doubt used as a sample document to forge for use by escaping kriegies. The card clearly pictured a foreign civilian and attached was a blank certificate of employment at the Danzig Shipbuilding Works. Kriegies made special note that such a card required two fingerprints, one each of the forefingers, rather than thumbprints. Forgers’ notes and measurements can be seen on the card.

Civilian I.D. card

Courtesy John Griffin

After service in two theaters of operation, Tom Griffin was liberated at Stalag VIIA in Moosburg, Germany, and returned home.

Courtesy John Griffin

He became an accountant after the war and spent time corresponding with those who wanted to learn about the Doolittle Raid or those who wanted his autograph. He sat at his table with a stack of photographs of the famous B-25s lined up for take-off on the deck of the Hornet, and he carefully signed each picture.

At home with picture of Griffin’s B-25

Courtesy John Griffin

Griffin attended the Doolittle Raider reunions for years and spoke to schools and civic groups. When he died in 2013, at the age of ninety-six, only four Raiders remained out of the original eighty. Thousands, most unknown to him, recognizing the bravery, courage, and patriotism of a gentle man, attended his memorial in Cincinnati, Ohio. A lone B-25 flew over the service, a tangible yet spiritual reminder of the man who struck back without hesitation at the enemy to defend the country he loved.

Watchtower at VIIIC

Courtesy Marek Lazarz

Stalag VIIIC

We hold our heads high, despite the price we have paid, because freedom is priceless.

Lech Walesa, Former President of Poland

Nobel Peace Prize recipient

Although most people think of Stalag Luft III, when thinking of the town of Zagan, Poland, another camp was built there earlier and co-existed with Stalag Luft III during the course of the war. Stalag VIIIC, one of the largest POW camps within what was then Germany, was set up by the Wehrmacht [German Army] southwest of what was then the town of Sagan. Before the war, the facility was a military training camp for a German Artillery Regiment from Sagan. In 1939, more barracks were added, and the military camp was turned into a POW camp. The camp had brick barracks, toilets, washrooms, kitchen, and a theater. During World War II, the camp sat just behind the West Compound wire. Today, the P.O.W. Camps Museum sits on that site.

One of the first groups of POWs to arrive at Stalag VIIIC consisted of Polish soldiers who had taken part in the defense of Poland against the German invasion in September 1939. The camp also held other ranks and NCOs from the army. In 1941, a group of French soldiers/prisoners arrived, and it became VIIIC French Camp.

Goon box

Courtesy Marek Lazarz

Courtesy Marek Lazarz

Courtesy Marek Lazarz

Stalag VIIIC—View of Main Gate

In total, Stalag VIIIC held 49,000 POWs of many different nationalities: Belgian, British, Yugoslav, Italian, American, Czechoslovakian, Greek, Dutch, and Canadian. Russians were soon to follow. Of the 49,000 prisoners, about 40,000 were French soldiers. Within the French Army, there were numerous soldiers from the French colonies of Algeria, Morocco, and Senegal. Of that number, 30,000 POWs were used by the Wehrmacht as slave laborers to work in the military industries. These prisoners were sent to labor camps [military factories, farms, and train stations] located all around eastern Germany, which today is western Poland. For the 30,000 POWs, who left to go to the work camps [arbeit commandos], they generally lived in barracks next to each factory. Many repaired the railroad tracks near train stations. Those, who lived on the farms, had relatively proper food and accommodations compared to those who did not. Those, who stayed behind in the camp, printed the camp’s newspaper and participated in the camp’s orchestra and theater group, and many of them survived the war.

VIIIC Orchestra

Courtesy Marek Lazarz

Stalag VIIIC was evacuated on a so called, Death March on February 8th, 1945, and the prisoners were marched 180 miles to Stalag IX-A, in Ziegenheim, Germany. The march from Sagan to Ziegenhein took one month. Approximately 4,700 U.S. infantrymen were held in Ziegenheim, and they were also liberated in April 1945.

After the war, large mass graves were found in the woods south of Stalag Luft III, graves dug no doubt by the Arbeitdienst [Labor Service], comprised of young, well-disciplined German civilian males. They wore white work uniforms and sang as they marched with shiny shovels resting on their shoulders. It was a cemetery for Stalag VIIIC POWs [1939-1945] that held the remains of many different nationalities, mostly French soldiers, but also Italians, British, Russians, Yugoslavians, and Polish prisoners.

During the war, there was also a special camp for Russians called Stalag VIIIE, a branch of VIIIC, and it was located in Neuhammer, Germany, ten miles southeast of Sagan. Stalag VIIIE could be described as a concentration camp. Stalag Luft III’s Kommandant von Lindeiner removed some of those Russian prisoners and moved them to Stalag Luft III, where they occupied two blocks in the Vorlager [the German administrative buildings at the front of the camp] of East Compound. The Russians, who stayed in Stalag VIIIE, who were too sick to march, were shot as traitors by the Red Army. Today the small town, where such brutality took place, is called Swietoszow, Poland, and mass graves dug there during the war hold untold numbers of Russian prisoners.

VIIIC Sports Field

Courtesy Marek Lazarz

Lt. Col. Albert P. Clark

Courtesy of Carolyn Miller

Duty, Honor, Country

Lt. Col. Albert P. Clark

A Soldier’s Pledge—"America must win this war. Therefore, I will work, I will save, I will sacrifice; I will endure. I will fight cheerfully and do my utmost as if the issue of the whole struggle depended on me alone."

Diary of Martin Treptow, KIA, carried

into battle, 1917—World War I

On July 26th, 1942, flying with the 31st Pursuit Group, 8th U.S. Army Air Forces, the first complete American combat unit to arrive in Britain, Lt. Col. Albert Patton Clark, nick-named, Bub, raced along low above the cold choppy water of the English Channel chased by four German fighters. Earlier in the pursuit and under fire, he sustained a large hole in his left wing. He had planned to execute a 360-degree hard turn and try to resume his race to the sea, but he hadn’t completed ninety-degrees, when he exchanged fire with a single aircraft in a head-on pass. As he continued to turn, he exchanged fire in another head-on pass with a single aircraft. Wing tip to wing tip as they passed, he saw the muzzle flashes from the nose of the enemy aircraft and then dived down and sped out to sea as the four German aircraft pursued him.

The fighters briefly held back giving the coastal flak battery a chance to fire at Clark, and as he crossed the shoreline he could see the plunk of splashes from their fire in the water on both sides of him. As the fighters were closing in to finish him off, he could see their tracers going by so he pulled up into a hard loop, only to find when he came out of it in a dive to sea level that he had the four aircraft trapped right in front of him. Closing on them fast, they spotted him before he was in firing range. Everything was happening with lightning speed. Two broke right. Two broke left. Clark bore down. He closed on the two turning right and fired on the closest. After a short burst, the guns of his Spitfire jammed or ran out of ammunition. He broke off again and continued out to sea just above the water. Seeing no enemy aircraft, he concentrated on getting back to England.

Minutes later, the Spit’s engine started running rough, and with the engine coolant temperature gauge approaching the highest possible reading, Clark knew he would have to bail out. Spitfires didn’t float well and ditching in the Channel would mean sure death. He zoomed the crippled plane up to 10,000 feet and initiated a Mayday call, switching on his pipsqueak tracking transmitter as he doffed his helmet, goggles, and oxygen mask.

Desperately trying to eject, he pulled the emergency lanyard to pop the canopy, but the lanyard broke off in his hand. The canopy came loose, but didn’t fall free so he then tried frantically to open it in the normal way by sliding it back on its track. It didn’t budge. Clark was as close to panic as he’d ever been. To avoid stalling, he was forced to descend and soon he was back at sea level expecting to hit the water any moment. With his engine sputtering, he instinctively looked for land as a wheels-up crash landing seemed to be his only hope of survival. Just five feet above the rough sea and flying very slowly, he approached the distant shore.

Clark had become disoriented in the air battle and was not sure if he was approaching the southeast coast of England or the west coast of France, as they were in close proximity between Dover and Cape Gris-Nez. The compass was on the floor of the cockpit, and as he braced his feet up against the instrument panel to ease the shock of impact in case he hit the water, he could no longer see it. He pulled up to clear a shallow bank just past the beach and prepared to land straight ahead in an open field. As he did so, the canopy broke free and disappeared. He had just enough air speed to avoid hitting a rock wall directly in his path. After clearing it, his plane hit hard and swung abruptly to the right, dragging on the radiator below the right wing. The edge of the windscreen gave him a hard crack on his helmetless head, but he was still strapped in so was not seriously hurt otherwise.

When a yellow-nosed FW-190 buzzed him, Clark’s heart sank realizing that the Spitfire had crashed in France at the command post for a German flak unit. Clark was immediately captured by the Germans on his first mission, becoming the first USAAF fighter pilot taken prisoner of war in Germany. Disheartened, he knew he would sit out the war.

Germans swarm over Clark’s Spitfire.

All courtesy USAFA McDermott Library, Stalag Luft III Collections

As he descended the steps of the old stone building, where he had been taken after capture, Clark noticed the French occupants of the houses across the square staring out, waiting to see the first American arriving in their village. At dinnertime, he was escorted to the dining room of a house. In the German officers’ mess, fifteen officers in green uniforms were assembled around a large table, and like them, he was served a cold plate of bread, sausage, and cheeses. Afterward, a well-decorated senior German officer arrived, and all seemed to know him as he made his way around the table saluting and shaking hands with each man. Maj. Gerhard Schöpfel was the commander of JG 26, the elite Luftwaffe fighter wing that flew against Britain in the Pas de Calais area. His pilots had engaged Clark that day, and three of those fighter pilots wanted to meet the American pilot. One, a redhead like Clark, claimed to have shot him down and had seen Clark’s red hair as the downed pilot climbed out of his plane. Through an interpreter, they each tried to determine who would get credit for the aerial victory. Due to his own disorientation during the battle, Clark was unable to help them. Decades later, when Schöpfel was 84, Clark contacted him and learned that Schöpfel had been a prisoner of the Russians for many years until eventually released. He still vividly remembered the meeting with Clark, no doubt partially due to his dealings with the two red-headed pilots.

The desire to serve his country had brought Clark to that fateful moment over the Channel. Born in 1913, the son of Colonel A. P. Clark, a doctor with the United States Army Medical Corps, he entered West Point in 1932, and later the newly-commissioned pilot was eager to get into the battle. He transferred to the Army Air Corps and was assigned to the 31st Pursuit Group at Selfridge Field, Michigan, and deployed to England as a lieutenant colonel and the Group’s Executive Officer in June 1942. Before deploying to Europe, leaving his three children and family, he dined with his wife, Carolyn, in New York.

Commander, 31st Pursuit Squadron, Michigan—1941

Courtesy of Carolyn Miller

Clark, left background, with Carolyn in New York

Courtesy USAFA McDermott Library, Stalag Luft III Collections

After capture, Clark was taken by train from Boulogne, France, to Brussels, Belgium. Another crowded passenger train full of soldiers, women, and children took him into the heart of Germany. There were no lights on the train, and during the night he found that he often had a baby on his lap. The next day, the train lumbered slowly through Cologne, and the shades were pulled down so he couldn’t see the damage done by the first British 1,000 plane bomber raid which had struck on May 30th. The next stop was Frankfurt and on to nearby Dulag Luft, where Clark was interrogated. Before departing for his permanent camp, Stalag Luft III, he was given a civilian striped Russian or Polish shirt and a pair of ill-fitting British army battle-dress trousers with suspenders, which was all the clothing he would have for the next few months as a new POW in East Compound, one of many compounds he would live in at the camp.

Back home, his family waited to hear his fate after his father had received a telegram listing him as missing in action. The Canadian officer, who had been Clark’s flight leader, reported that Clark had gone down in the Channel in flames, and that report got back to Clark’s wife, while he was still listed as MIA [missing in action]. She refused to believe it.

Telegram to Clark’s father

All courtesy USAFA McDermott Library, Stalag Luft III Collections

While in East Compound, after arrival at Stalag Luft III,