Within days the POWs were repatriated to their home countries. Some notifications of deaths of POWs during the Second World War are included in RG 32. Non-Commercial educational use for the purpose of teaching and instruction, including internal training. This road (the SS448/Due Mari) is now reached via the E45 Autostrada 1st exit after Perugia. Logistical problems meant that this part of the camp was administered by the Luftwaffe, the rest of the camp being under the Wehrmacht. After the Soviet takeover (in 1945) it was until 1949 a special camp, NKVD-camp Nr. It could have ended much worse. The first prisoners detained at the camp had been Poles, taken captive during the German invasion of Poland in 1939. I found this account so interesting; The daily lives of these officers (who were treated fairly well, and according to the Geneva Convention and it's international humanitarian law) and particularly their numerous and imaginative escape attempts.many ultimately unsuccessful but a number that were "home runs". Building the Colditz Glider. However, after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, the Wehrmacht began using the huts as a prisoner of war camp. But, between 1939 and 1945, it was famously used as a prisoner of war camp to house British and Allied Officers who had previously escaped from other camps, or were deemed to be a high security risk. (short for 'Geheime Staats Polizei': secret state police). They also organized the dates of escapes so that one group did not interfere with another. Finally, in late December 1944, Americans captured in the Battle of the Bulge arrived. (10 days confined arrest completed on 8 May 1941). These included many Americans and British airmen from Stalag Luft III. Anyone who was injured in work, or became ill, was returned to the Lazarett (Hospital) at the main camp or a nearby Military/civilian hospital. Although designated as a POW camp, this appears like many mainly Soviet POW camps to actually be a slave labour camp. (this is just an example of the out-sourcing of POW labour which was used particularly by the larger camps- as you can see there are dozens of smaller sattellite camps listed spread over a very wide area). In 1941 and 1942 Soviet prisoners arrived. Bobby Moore, Votes: The SHAEF/Red Cross reports from February 1945 show 1438 British, 1 US, 14111 Soviets, 20 Belgian, 401 Poles, 1703 Yugoslavs, 4177 Italians and 12814 French pows here. Rogue Heroes: The History of the SAS, Britain's Secret Special Forces Unit That Sabotaged the Nazis and Changed the Nature of War. in September 1943 PG60 was turned into a concentration camp for political prisoners and Jews. Director: Conditions in this camp were deplorable, as the rules of the Third Geneva Convention were not observed for Soviet prisoners. The camp was situated on a former army training ground (bungsplatz), and had been used during World War I as a camp for Soviet prisoners. Shelter was either a barn or under the stars, in the rain, snow, or whatever happened to be. The work performed was largely agricultural or industrial, ranging from coal or potash mining, stone quarrying, or work in sawmills, breweries, factories, railroad yards, and forests. The Colditz Glider. Drama, Sport, War. Beds were for officers, elderly and the sick. An area of about five acres gave adequate space for exercise, though the continued wet winter weather converted it into a quagmire. Stalag VIII-B and Stalag Luft VIII-B Lamsdorf, Poland (now Lambinowice), Stalag VIII-B Teschen Poland Location N/E 49-18. Mark Robson Opened August 1940, closed September 1942. Up to 5,000 POWs were housed here at any one time (Greeks, Maltese, Cypriots, British, Americans, French, Slavs). 13 August: Within days after their arrival, the Dutch escape officer, Captain Machiel van den Heuvel (known as 'Vandy'), planned and executed his first of many escape plans. Director: These were followed by Soviet prisoners from Operation Barbarossa in the summer of 1941. There were also camps designated Oflag 65 at Strasbourg in France, Wurzach in Germany, Schaulen in Lithuania and Osnabruck in Germany. 172 min Each subcamp was named after one of the Frisian Islands: Lager Norderney located at Saye, Lager Helgoland at Platte Saline, Lager Sylt near the old telegraph tower at La Foulre and Lager Borkum, situated near the Impot. They were moved to a different location closer to Cuxhaven, Westertimke, in 1942. They lived in 30 barracks, which were mostly built of wood. Several escape attempts, one successful on March 29th 1943 - Six British and New Zealand officers escaped through a tunnel from Castello di Vincigliata (Campo 12) near Florence, Italy. In the middle of April most of the prisoners in the camp and in the outlying Arbeitskommandos were marched westward ahead of the advancing Red Army. Broadcast Sun 26 Feb 2023 at 9:30pm. 351 officers held here as of 26/2/43originally opened April1941. Some great stories, but it can also be a bit slow. There was a military hospital also at this location, it held 2 British, 3703 US, 9053 Soviet, 840 Yugoslav, 2200 Italian and 15514 French Pows as of February 1945 (Shaef reports). The case for the defence at War Crimes Tribunals after 1945 was often based on this, however, this was overruled as Germany had signed, and hence was argued to be in breach of the rules they had pledged to uphold, regardless of which countries' POWs they were dealing with. Roy Ward Baker A contagious disease ward type hospital named Leipzig Wahren Lazarett belonging to this camp was situated close to the local gas works and railway station & consisted of 2 long stone buildings. The camp was originally built as barracks for German Army infantry early in 1939 and consisted of concrete single storey buildings on a plateau north-west of the town. The Geneva convention comprised a few other agreements made concerning Prisoners of war, notably the Hague regulations of 1899 and 1907 and the pre-war version which was initially signed on July 27th 1929. (Prison). The first HQ was in Fort 17, but during the first half of 1940, the camp authorities were moved to a two-storey house, now in Okolna Street, opposite Fort 13. Director: Records concerning war crimes committed against Allied POWs have mostly been preserved in WO 235, WO 309, WO 310, WO 311 and WO 325 with other material in FO 371, WO 32 (code 94), TS 26 and among the Foreign Office records of the Control Commission for Germany (CCG). Inmates were cleaned and transferred to an improvised hospital outside the camp and thence to convalescence camps. The Czech people in the villages and towns, through which they passed, passed food and clothing to them. When the Soviet front approached, orders were given to move the prisoners to other camps further west. Fort 15 (XV) named after Jaroslwaw Dabrowskiego. In addition, another tunnel was dug to store contraband. Some larger camps will have dozens of websites that you can investigate, always look at the links pages from these sites also a spiders web of information can often be discovered. They were transferred to other camps, and the camp was closed on 29 October 1941. camp housed in a Medieval castle known as "Colditz". The camp was built in late 1939 by Polish prisoners of war. Stalag XVII B held soldiers of ten different nationalities throughout the war. In 1942 the French officers were transferred to other camps and replaced with Polish officers. The camp was liberated by the U.S. 3rd Army on 5 May 1945. There was also a sub-camp, designated Oflag XXI-C/Z established at Grune bei Lissa (now Gronwko, near to Leszno), between September 1943 and January 1945. In September 1942 the camp became Lager Lindele ("Lindele Camp"), and was used as an Ilag ("Internment Camp") for about 1,200 civilian internees from the Channel Islands. The camp, a former spa hotel, was opened in July 1940 and housed approximately 70 Allied generals and their aides. Became a branch camp of Stalag IIIb in June 1942. Ian Dalrymple Milag or Marine-Internierten-Lager (marine internment camp) These were merchant seamen internment camps, both these and Marlags were administered by the Kriegsmarine (German Navy). In Germany, only those POWs from Britain, France, the Low Countries, the US, the Commonwealth and a few selected other countries were treated with any reference to the Geneva Convention's rules. (These are the sources for the German/Italian camps information contained on this site -they are hand transcribed and are fully searchable). German camps were arranged by district and then often had many sub-camps, these could be a small barracks attached to a factory or even just a barn on a farm, these could be up to 100 miles from the main camp, this combined with the fact that camps were sometimes moved or renamed means that researchers should take great care in identifying camps by both designation number and location to ensure they locate the correct camp. As usual with Oflags the other ranks were there mainly for use as orderlies to the officers. On December 1, 1941 the prisoner count was: 1664 Poles, 18,210 French, 2,871 Belgian, 2,459 British, 5,361 Serbians, 9,271 Soviets. Those prisoners are extremely interesting. Most of the men were moved by train to Stalag XX-A in West Prussia, but some 900 were taken to the port of Memel, where they were put aboard the merchant ship Insterburg for a 60-hour journey to Swinemnde. In April 1942 the last group of Polish officers arrived from Oflag X-C near Lbeck. Men of all nationalities were brought to Colditz from 1941 on. Finally the Senior British Naval Officer offered the Germans the POWs parole, in return for being allowed to rest during the day and march at night. Consequently the Germans were able to capture them all. In 1944 the Norwegian officers were located as follows: 630 in the Seminary; 290 in the high-school; 100 in the primary school; 80 in the Richter house; 30 in hospital. In March 1941, the Wehrmacht began constructing the camp in the northwest of Austria, between Innsbruck and Salzburg, the nearest railway station was Bishopshofen. The book 'Fascism's European empire' (Italian Occupation during the second world war) by Robert Rodogna which originally used the USSME (Italian Army archives) for camp listings. | Opened 02/41 Closed 10/44 - mostly French officers. Camp 34 - Construction of a large housing project for German colonists. Lists of Royal Navy personnel interned in enemy camps may be found in many of the files in ADM 1 (code 79) and ADM 116 (code 79), although the exact files are not identifiable from our catalogue. Colditz. 4975984 Private Claude Warner Sherwood Foresters died 9/8/1942 It was not a single camp, being split into several compounds each autonomous to some degree. When the POW camp in Bergen ceased operation in early 1945, as the Wehrmacht handed it over to the SS, the cemetery contained over 19,500 dead Soviet prisoners. After another train journey the men were force marched from Kiefheide, with many men being bayoneted or shot before they reached Stalag Luft IV in Gross Tychow. The end of the book explains what happened to a lot of the people featured in the book. Generally speaking, Im more of a fan of his espionage tales than the broader war histories hes done, but this takes all of those elements and boils it down to one incredible pressure-cooker of a story. All went well as the six escapers entered the office during the previous evening and opened up the tunnel. Director: The lucky ones got far enough to the west to be liberated by the American army. Polish prisoners from the German September 1939 offensive were placed in Stalag II-A. Placed on swampy ground, with a damp, cold climate, it is one of the most notorious prisoner-of-war camps. Housed 42202 POWs with 27 officers, 271 British. Colditz Castle 1943. The escape and evasion reports in AIR 40/1545-1552 include internal indexes, although these documents appear to be duplicates of the reports found in some of the WO 208 files described at the start of this section. In 1943 the Germans suggested an exchange of equal numbers of Merchant Navy prisoners, but this offer was refused by the First Lord of the Admiralty A. V. Alexander on the grounds it would be more to Germany's benefit, as it would provide them with a large number of men suitable to be used as U-boat crews, of which they were desperately short. Marlag und Milag Nord, the camps for captured Navy personnel and civilian sailors respectively, were originally in two separate enclosures at the Sandbostel camp. It housed 2455 officers with 297 other ranks. Their repeated, elaborate, and sometimes bizarre attempts at escape are a nice change from the stories of Grunts on the front lines. 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