Great War to Great Escape: The Two Wars of Flight Lieutenant Bernard 'Pop' Green MC by Green Laurence

Author:Green, Laurence
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: HISTORY / Military / Aviation
ISBN: 9780957116382
Publisher: Fighting High Publishing
Published: 2012-07-05T04:00:00+00:00

7. The Black March

Christmas was celebrated with a weary familiarity by nearly all the officers in the camp. While many felt that it would be their last winter in captivity, others were resigned to wait for something to happen. Green had worked out that the Russians could not be very far off. He felt that they had exactly the same designs on Poland as the Nazis. Remembering the former treaty between Germany and Russia at the beginning of the war, which would have divided the country in half, he knew that the Russians would now take the whole of Poland under their iron rule.

The prisoners would be a useful bargaining tool for the Nazis. At worst they could be used for a shield against Allied bombing. At best they could be traded for a certain amount of leniency at the end of the war. One other possibility existed: they could be shot down like rats by a desperate and crazed Nazi hierarchy in mad revenge for the loss of the ‘Thousand Year Reich’. Speculation was a waste of time. Chance would be a leading factor in the fates of thousands of Allied prisoners.

January dragged its frigid feet. At the end of the month Green knew that something was up. In his letters and postcards he maintained the status quo. Yes, he was fit and well. He was enjoying his theatrical experiences and hoped that the war would soon be over. His world had contracted to a weary, cold existence, with miles walked every day round the wire and kit kept clean and serviceable. He continued to keep his best shoes and socks in reserve for whatever was going to happen.

Senior officers were briefed at the end of January and extra rations issued. Kit was to be packed and all officers were to parade in a state of readiness to move out at dawn on 27 January 1945.

Rank upon rank of emaciated men stood on the frozen ground with their breath pluming into a grey sky. There was no excitement, merely resignation that life could get a lot worse very soon. Most held bundles of clothes and food. All wore a strange variety of hats, caps and even scraps of cloth knotted at the corners. All kinds of tattered greatcoats and tunics were on parade. A few men had almost immaculate uniforms with the wings or brevets visible. Some men wore full beards and some were clean shaven; most wore a filthy stubble above the ragged scarves and mufflers with which they were trying hard to keep warm. All around them the cold seeped in. Yet not one man stamped his feet on the frozen earth. They all waited to go, thankful for a change of any sort. Few dreaded leaving the camp.

At last the German guards marched reluctantly up to the assembled officers. Their uncertainty was palpable. Many of the old soldiers were reminded of the Eastern Front and the Russian winter. Here they were about to embark on a

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