Interview with Dixie Deans. Three

Interview with Dixie Deans. Three

Part 1 – interview with Dixie Deans detailing his attempts to get to the British front line to inform them POWs were in the area where the RAF were bombing and to desist from the action.
Part 2 – a radio interview with John Bristow about how he was able to construct a camp radio with basic materials found around the camp or from guards.
Part 3 – a self-recorded report by Henry Soderberg, a Swedish representative of the YMCA who visited German prisoner of war camps and provided the prisoners with items to make their imprisonment easier.

01:02:45 audio recording

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ADeansJAG[Date]-040002

DD: And he allowed this and I again had this bike which he, or he provided me with a better bike I think because the one I had there was getting a great big, oh what do they call a big balloon? It’s almost like a half puncture.
Interviewer: In the tyre.
DD: In the tyre that had a blow out and it was, felt as though it was going to blow up any moment.
Interviewer: This was a push bike was it?
DD: Yeah. A push bike and of course this would have to go through this. Through the front [pause] Oh God, I’ve forgotten now what they call these things at the axel. It had to go through the normal —
Interviewer: The hub.
DD: No. Not the hub. The [pause] comes down —
Interviewer: The prongs.
DD: The prongs. Yes. And it was rubbing all the time and I expected this tyre to blow up so it was amazing that it kept going as long as it did and anyway I felt sure it would blow up any moment.
Interviewer: And did you actually make contact with the British Forces?
DD: Yes. Yes. I did. I got to the British Forces and eventually, so I went right through the chain of command from the bottom up and I must more or less must have convinced somebody that I wanted somebody in authority to stop this bloody bombing of the British troops and eventually somebody passed me on up to the next rung of command. Then the next, and the next, the next. Nobody would touch it until eventually I was taken right back to the [pause] it was a major I saw I think and then a colonel and he said, ‘Well, look the general is coming up at 10 o’clock in the morning.’ This was so early in the morning and I had no idea what the time meant. I couldn’t care less anyway. All I wanted to do was to impress on the most senior officer I could that they had to, you know accept the fact that we were there and they shouldn’t be bombed. There should be no bombing attempts when there was any danger of getting prisoners in the middle of it. So as I say nobody wanted to touch it until I got to this general who then he said, ‘Well. Thank God. I’ll get on the blower.’ He knew which unit was doing this attacking and he knew there was another raid just about to be carried out. He said, ‘Let me get on the blower.’ And he managed to stop this other attack just in time.
Interviewer: Were you with a German escort when you made this contact with the British Forces?
DD: Well, I had this German with me. A German bloke. He was just a dolmetscher and another German who was, I think he was nothing very much but I think there were about three Germans with me.
Interviewer: Were you, so you were under parole to go back were you?
DD: Well, yes. Under parole and I insisted on a German accompanying us to get us out of difficulty if we were, if we ran into any difficulty because there was still fighting going on. Still some Germans firing guns around and I didn’t want to be shot by accident and I wanted somebody there who had some authority to stop any damn fool German who was going to shoot me just for the sake of it. Just for fun.
Interviewer: So what happened after the British officer had got the next air attack stopped?
DD: Well, then I felt, well that something achieved and that at least saved that particular trouble and I told them what was happening. That I was mainly trying to stop this bombing of the, where there was any danger that the POWs, to the POWs and as far as I was concerned that was the main, the main thing to avoid and I then decided well there was nothing more I could do there having made them aware of our presence and of the dangers to the POWs that I then insisted [pause] Oh, the British officer wanted to fly me home there and then and I said, ‘No. I can’t.’ I’d gone there with this purpose in mind. To contact the British and warn them about the POW presence there and having done that well I felt I had to go back to the POWs that I was still leading. I felt I had to go back and catch up with them and also the German commandant was still there and he, I felt well had allowed me to do this trip which wasn’t a normal thing at all. It was very much out of the ordinary. So I felt I ought to for courtesy if nothing else and tell them I was still there and I had come back. I’d come back after him allowing me to. I could have been off back home which wasn’t in the run of things at all. It wasn’t the idea. But it would have suited me quite well if I’d allowed the British CO there to fly me home but I didn’t really want to do that and I didn’t really feel that was the point of the trip at all.
Interviewer: So did you get back to the column?
DD: Yes. I got back to the column. To the village of Gresse where we had started from and saw the commandant there, the German commandant and they were absolutely amazed that I had been through to the British front-line troops and come back again and they were tickled pink at the very idea that I as a POW had been through, through the fighting lines of the British troops and come back again. Of course, all the way there had been this firing going on not of heavy guns but there was always meeting up with some group of either Germans or British with Tommy guns or something akin to that firing away at nothing in particular or so it seemed.
Interviewer: So what happened to you after you rejoined the column?
DD: Well, of course there was all sorts of things like the Germans were enjoying the story and of course the British troops were all, all the POWs all wanted to get my version of the story.
Interviewer: Can you tell me now how you came to be liberated?
DD: The main thing is that I was able to then contact the British advancing troops and leave it to them to organise the return to [unclear] for the whole mass of the POWs who were in the area. And I then find a Lieutenant Colonel Padre who was flitting around in the area and he told me, I’ve forgotten now what his name was but he told me that his job was he was circling around the whole area and was trying to contact all the POWs there in that area and to direct them to contact the British troops and to get [pause] God, I’ve forgotten the name now. [pause] And to get them to concentrate on this particular area so that he could organise their collection and return to England. He obviously had made certain arrangements to this effect but it was a question of meeting up with them to some extent as far as we could.
Interviewer: Could I ask you finally whether your period of imprisonment changed your attitude towards the Germans?
DD: Not particularly. No. I was never a hater. There are some people who can’t avoid hating. It so happened the Germans were the enemy and they were all bitter and full of hatred towards the Germans. Well, I wasn’t. I had, before the war, on two occasions gone to Germany on holiday and had a very good time there. I learned the German language and I was very happy with them and I really had no hatred. It was against my nature to hate just for the sake of hating.
Interviewer: Do you think that your period of imprisonment left any long-term effects with you?
DD: I don’t think so. I certainly hope not.
Interviewer: Do you think it changed your attitude in any way?
DD: Well, again I don’t think so. Other people may think otherwise but I certainly don’t think so. I’m not aware of anything.
[interview stops]
[recording paused]
[new interview begins]
Interviewer: Well, now onto our next item. If like me you had the impression that all the great escape stories of the last war have been told — not so. Meet John Curly Bristow, one of the real-life characters in a new book called, “The Sergeant Escapers.” It’s the story of escape which some people consider to be quite incomparable. In fact, John it’s not so much an escape but really a sign of how ingenious you were when you were a prisoner of war when you invented a radio set. Can you tell us how you, how you actually made it with absolutely nothing to start with?
JB: Well, we all were really. It’s just a question of basically we had some very very highly skilled and highly technical engineers in the camp and I was a very practical man. I just love making things.
Interviewer: Tell us, tell us about the sort of things you used to make it.
JB: Well, billy Cans, silver paper, old bibles which had a very very fine paper for making condensers. The wire we stripped from the, the wire we stripped down from the back so they had two-way wiring we altered to one way wiring and used the wiring for making transformers. The earphones were a terrible problem but unfortunately the security officer one day invited me to his room for about five minutes and he was called out and of course he lost his telephone inside of his telephone and we had a marvellous earpiece.
Interviewer: I know you hid the earphones, your final production underneath a rugby hat.
JB: That’s right. Yes. Yes.
Interviewer 2: Yes. Where exactly was this? What camp was this?
JB: Sagan. That was at Sagan actually.
Interviewer 2: How far away is that from England?
JB: Oh, a thousand.
Interviewer 2: So you had to produce a radio which could cover that distance.
JB: Oh, we did. Yes. Yes. But the beauty of it was that they soon found out in course that we had this radio and they had a transmitter operating for us with our own call sign. Every hour on the hour they would send out messages to us.
Interviewer 2: What about —
JB: We were in very good communication the whole time.
Interviewer 2: But while —
Interviewer: So, John [pause] sorry.
Interviewer 2: I was going to ask what sort of communication? What messages were you sending?
JB: Well, we had, we had a, we had a secret [unclear] We obviously kept from [unclear] it wasn’t used that often because it would have been caught very very quickly but it was used for an emergency when there was a camp down the road and men had needed medical care.
Interviewer: You weren’t, you weren’t caught in fact.
JB: Oh not through the transmitter of course. With the radio set several times.
Interviewer: And intercepted.
JB: Oh yes.
Interviewer: Yes.
Interviewer 2: What did they do? The Nazi boot came down with a crash.
JB: Oh, we used. well we used to get [unclear] arrested. Fourteen days hard arrest where you had bread and water. Really it was quite a rest. I used to quite enjoy it actually. Quite enjoy it.
Interviewer: John, tell me when things go wrong here and we can’t for example make a decent telephone interview which we tried to do this afternoon would you come and help us out please.
JB: I will, yes. With great pleasure.
Interviewer: [unclear] all about it.
JB: Yes.
Interviewer: Thank you very much John.
JB: You’re welcome.
Interviewer: Now, a brief look at what is happening tonight in London.
[end of interview]
[new interview segment]
HS: My name is Henry Soderberg. I’m seventy four years old and I am taping this in my home in Stockholm, Sweden. During the war I served as a field delegate with the International War Prisoners Aid of the World’s Alliance of the YMCAs with head office in Geneva. My special field of activity was in eastern parts of Germany. After the war I made a career in civil aviation. First in the Swedish Civil Aviation Administration representing the Swedish government in the International Civil Aviation Organisation in Montreal for five years. Later on I became a vice president of Scandinavian Airlines System, SAS where I was in charge of the foreign affairs activities travelling around the world repeatedly for negotiations and international conferences. I retired in 1981. I have been asked to give my comments and opinions about Dixie Dean. My friend, Jimmy whom I used to meet from time to time when I was visiting prisoner of war camps in Germany. I cannot go into all the details and I do not think I have a record of every time I met him but I think I will try to concentrate on some of the more important camp visits when I visited the camps where he was and also I’ll give my personal views on him. And perhaps I should start with the latter. Already when I met Jimmy the first time and I think that must according to my notes have been already at the end of May 1943 in Stalag Luft 3 I got the impression that I was here standing face to face with a young man of unusual qualities. He at that time was an NCO still remaining in Stalag Luft 3 with a group of other NCOs. They were just about to move to a new camp which was very much up north. Very close to the border of Lithuania in East Prussia and that camp at this time was not yet ready. Stalag Luft 3 at the end of May 1943 had just opened for American and British officers and that became one of the biggest camps in Germany, later on very famous for the, “Great Escape.” But when those things took place Jimmy and his friends and his prisoner of war comrades were already located up in, at Heydekrug in East Prussia in Stalag Luft 6. When I met Jimmy I always had the feeling that he was remarkable because of the strength of his personality and his charisma. The quiet way in which he talked, still with poise. He was never demanding but when he said something and if he gave an order I think that everybody understood that you had to obey. I think if he had continued in the career he would probably have had reached the level of a general or an air vice marshal. I’m pretty sure about that. Now, unfortunately circumstances prevented him from climbing up the stairs in that way. Something we all know about and which we deeply regret. I think that I shall now look in my diary and repeat what I said after my camp visit to Stalag Luft 6 when I met Jimmy and please remember that whenever I’m talking now about what I experienced during these visits it was experience together with Jimmy during the visits I was, he was always accompanying me. Of course, we had a German security officer going along with us all the way all the time but those officers didn’t bother us very much and sometimes I even had a feeling that hearts of the security officers were more on the side of the, of Jimmy and his prisoner of war friends than they were on the other side. In any case I had the impression that Jimmy was very popular also among the Germans. The commandants both in Stalag Luft 3 and in Heydekrug told me frankly that they had as a camp leader a very young and unusually clever man who was a real leader and with whom they could do business very well. Not in the sense that he gave in to the demands from the Germans. On the contrary but he stood up to them and that was something these men respected. I think I visited Heydekrug and Stalag Luft 6 on the 22nd and 23rd of July 1943.
[recording paused]
I think, I think simply the best thing is that I read from my diary. “22nd and 23rd July 1943. Heydekrug. I visited for two days the newly opened Stalag Luft 6. It is only five weeks old. It is situated on a very big plain in East Prussia not very far from Memel. There are several thousand English non-commissioned officers and they have had to move here from Stalag Luft 3 at Sagan. The barracks are by and large new. They are lying there in long rows out in the fields. Very heavy barbed wire rose all around. Watch towers, masses with German soldiers and dogs. Everything is uncompleted here. They lack a sports place for instance. They do not have a building for theatre. The crowd and the narrow space is very painful. One notices especially in the locality which have been arranged as library and school. The lack of activity is resting over the camp. These non-commissioned officers cannot be sent out to work according to the Geneva Convention. The men are walking up and down between the barracks or lying between the barracks and are doing nothing. I have had several very serious discussions during these days with the commandant and the German officers from the Luftwaffe. The German, the German Air Force. They are fully aware about the situation and they are asking us to help as much as we can. They have their own sorrows they say. I have been in conference the whole time with the chief man of confidence, Sergeant James Deans. First with him and his adjutant Sergeant Mogg. Deans which I, by the way had met last May in Stalag Luft 3 he is only twenty-five years old but he has a very great personality with a very strong radiation. Everyone is admiring him a lot and they have accepted his leadership which he is carrying our very firmly in the sharp and distinct way. He has been elected by the men to be their camp leader. He is standing up against the Germans with the power of his personality in such a way that everyone is impressed. Even the German officers are speaking about him with greatest respect. He is speaking German language fairly well. He had been to Germany before the war and that is very useful right now. His assistant, Sergeant Ronald Mogg is a very nice humoristic type who is a poet, at the same time a journalist in civil life from Fleet Street. The street of adventure which has always had such an enormous attraction on me.” I’m getting a book directly from him which he has written, as a present. “We are having a cup of tea during the conference with the various department heads of the camp. I’m hearing long reports about how life is and what they are doing and what they now want to have. It’s a very very fat bunch of request lists to be sent to Geneva and Stockholm. They have a good store of sports material which they could bring with them from their time in Stalag Luft 3. But what they need above everything is a sound film projector and movies. They want equipment for winter sports since they are very far north. Close to the Lithuanian border where they can expect ice and snow. The winter is expected to be very long. They have a dam. Water dam pool. The purpose of which is to have water available in case of fire. Now, that dam they would like to use as a skating rink when the ice is coming and they want to play ice hockey. There are many Canadians also in these camps and they of course love ice hockey more than anything else. Now, this was the first day of my visit this time. The second day in Luft 6 we are present at the daily morning prayer in the little chapel in the camp. It was a very moving hour for an outsider to look at the men. The prayers and the Psalms, the hymn singing made a very deep impression on me. We are then proceeding to the sick quarters where I meet several prisoners. Then I have a reception. There is a long long queue of prisoners of war who were standing outside my door in order to be received by me where they can come forward with their complaints and with their desires and with their worries. All the time Jimmy Deans is with me. Some of them have not had letters from home for a long time or no letters at all. There are some requests about the most necessary things in life. There are complaints against some of the Germans and at this point the German safety man who is sitting close to us is looking at me in a very unpleasant way and the man who is complaining. He knows of course what is true or not true. In this case I think what the prisoner is complaining about is true. Then I am having a long talk with an English priest, a Captain Simmonds who is being assisted by a German priest and the cooperation between these two seems to be good. Most of the prisoners are members in Church of England. About twenty five percent are members of various Protestant sects. About twenty percent are Catholics. For the spiritual welfare of the Catholics they have a German priest who comes and provides them with what they need. Captain Simmond’s workload is enormous. There are fights or tensions between various religious sects within the camp about the way in which the religious work should be carried out. There are personal talks from morning to night with prisoners who have been caught by the psychosis of the barbed wire. There is a movement in the camp which is called the Toc H. It’s a kind of Association with an idealist direction the members of whom have decided to serve their friends and comrades while they are in prisoner of war camps. Toc H has quite an impact on the camp. Now, we are looking a little bit at the sports life. Football. That means here soccer football and handball is played very often. Cricket matches are going on even during my visit. The library has now six thousand books, eighty percent of which is specialised literature. The theatre and the music is very extensive. If these men only are getting a theatre barrack they will see to it that the art will flourish here. The commandant has promised to put up a barrack within two months. In the meantime the theatre group is preparing itself for entertainment. There are masses with material which is needed for costumes, paper lamps, electric wires, wings etcetera etcetera. Most of what they ask for will arrive here sooner or later. That is something I can promise them. There are several orchestras in the camp. [unclear] one symphony orchestra with twenty five instruments and one dance orchestra with thirteen musicians. They are crying for more instruments. Here is a camp where very much can be done and has to be done and I hope that our assistance shall not drag out but that it will arrive fairly soon. I’m leaving Stalag Luft 6 thoroughly tired but very inspired. My visit is the first visit that any delegate from any organisation has paid to the camp from the outside world. ‘Will you come back as soon as possible?’ They are shouting and there are hundreds of those airmen who are shouting that behind the barbed wire when the heavy gates are banging together behind me. I’m waving to them and say that it will not take a very long time before I am back in Heydekrug again.” Well, this was my visit in the summer of 1943 and I now proceed maybe I’m skipping some visits I’ve paid because I cannot find them all in my very fat wartime diary but I am looking at the 16th of October 1943. “Today I visited Stalag Luft 3 with my friends here James Deans and Ronald Mogg. It’s raining the whole day and it soon —"
[recording interrupted]
“Well, this was my visit in the summer of 1943 and I now proceed. Maybe I’m skipping some visits I’ve paid because I cannot find them all in my very fat wartime diary but I am looking at the 16th of October 1943. “Today I visited Stalag Luft 3 with my friends here James Deans and Ronald Mogg. It’s raining the whole day and it is so much clay that we can hardly move our feet but the spirit is upwards. Lots of good material has recently arrived. The expansion of the camp is going very slow and in spite of this new equipment the problems are many. The barrack for the leisure time activities which the commandant had promised to take care of last time when I was here has never been put up. Not in any camp have I seen such a crying need of a place where the men could relax and forget all about prisoner life for a little while. The commandant was very sorry when he had to tell me that he had done all he could in order to arrange with this barrack for the men but he had not the wood for it and he couldn’t get permission from above to requisition wood for barrack for prisoners of war. I then took up the question if he would have something against having a barrack sent from Sweden to these English airmen. It could take a couple of weeks but here was something which could increase the hope. The commandant liked this proposal and so did the prisoners of war and now we will see what can be done in this case.”
[tape paused - phone ringing]
From my diary I have a note dealing with things that happened in January 1944. Here I write, “My friends in Stalag Luft 6 in Heydekrug in East Prussia had two little incidents that would go to history and they have been reported to me by the chief man of confidence, Sergeant James Deans, Dixie Deans and I think they are both tragic and amusing. It was quite a regular day in January 1944 in Stalag Luft 6. In the morning. Mike [Custons] was giving a lecture about Jeremy Bentham. Outside the school barrack there was the ice-skating rink which this day was absolutely packed with skating people. Suddenly there is a bang and a bullet from a gun is piercing itself into the room where [Custons] is lecturing. There is a machine gun that is sending off quite a lot of shots outside. Everybody is rushing away to the window. What do they see? Well, there is a prisoner of war who has been out on a walk and he came too close to the barbed wire and the postern, the watch man, the ferret in the towers started to shoot after him. Then the prisoner is running as fast as he can out on the ice and he throws himself out among all the skating people. He is sitting there on his trousers on his back and he is gliding out of the skating rink in very high speed. But the very energetic watchman is still shooting after him against the ice. Everybody is then throwing themselves down and the bullets are ricocheting all around. Just like a miracle everybody is avoiding getting hurt and even if some bullets have found their way through corners of the coats and their shirts. Well, this has been told to me as one incident of many in Air Force camps. Suddenly everything is very quiet. The skating people are standing up and they are very soon all skating again and in the school barrack Mike [Custons] is continuing his lecture about Jeremy Bentham, ‘benevolent paternalism,’ he says sarcastically when he then continues his lecture and as if nothing at all had happened.” Now, here is another incident which occurred on the 25th of January 1944 in Stalag Luft 6 as told by Jimmy Deans to me. Major Peschel is a security officer whom I got to know fairly well during my many visits to the camp. Suddenly he is letting all his watchmen, his postern running out in the barracks and in the camp in order to investigate everything. They are throwing everything up and down. They are hunting openings of tunnels and forbidden tools. They are banging and crashing and they are throwing over everything that is standing in their way. Dixie Deans is this day in a very good mood and he goes up to Major Peschel. ‘Well,’ Dixie says, in a way which only he could speak to Major Peschel, ‘I’m very much surprised Major Peschel that you have chosen this day of all days for a search in our camp. I thought that you were a gentleman and that you were respecting a holy day.’ Major Peschel looks like a question mark. ‘Holy day? Why?’ ‘Well,’ says Jimmy, ‘This is Robert Burns Day.’ He said this with great reverence. ‘A day when all Scottish people in this camp are celebrating their great national poet. This is also my birthday and you should know about that.’ ‘Well,’ says Major Peschel, a little bit ashamed, ‘If I had known this then we had not arranged with a search today.’ he says, ‘But now we cannot stop it once it is going on. But perhaps we can give you some compensation.’ ‘Well, I have a suggestion,’ says Jimmy. ‘What is that?’ ‘Well, take me out of the camp,’ says Jimmy Deans. ‘Well, I shall see what we can do,’ says Peschel. Deans very quickly forgets this little discussion but one hour later a German officer is coming into his room. Well, there are greetings from Major Peschel, ‘I am here to accompany you in order to take you out for a walk.’ ‘Well,’ says Deans, ‘Then I would like to have one of my friends and associates coming with me.’ And so it happened that on this day the 25th of January 1944 Jimmy Deans and Ronald Mogg to the big surprise and the jubilating screams of all the inhabitants of the camp walked through the big barbed wire gates and had a walk out in the nearby forest. My comment is that I think this story has also been told in one of the books which have been written about Stalag Luft 6 but I can remember very well when Jimmy told me and we, we had great fun at listening to stories of this kind. Well, I am looking in my diary again from the 1st and 2nd of March 1944. It was such a big camp so far away I had to drive for two full days in order to go up to that camp in East Prussia. Therefore I always stayed two days in the camp. So this is from the 1st and 2nd of March 1944. “For two long days I have been with my friends in Stalag Luft 6 in Heydekrug. Many changes have taken place in the camp since my last visit. I’m meeting many many men who are suffering heavily from neurosis after the very heavy pressure on them when they were shot down. The parachute jumping, the capturing of them and the very quick environment change. They seem to be scared. They are scared for the Germans. They are scared for the comrades. They are scared for me. They are very shy. Some of the shy and nervous ones were brought to me. They had difficulties to believe that it was true that there was a civil man, a civilian man here in Germany with a friendly attitude towards them and their problem. I think however that that became clear to them not the least through the interventions of Jimmy Deans who was sitting with me. He was always very charming and very effective as chief man of confidence. The relationship to the Germans seems to be very tense right now. I’m hearing complaints about sharpened attitudes from both sides. Every compound is living its own life. One in the first camp I’m meeting is a very good artist. A certain James Lambert who has collected all the poems that have been written in the camp during captivity and he has compiled them together in a very beautiful hand designed book with very artistically carved out covers. This book has recently been sent to the King of England with greetings from Stalag Luft 6. Now everybody is waiting with great attention and interest to see what happens to this gift and if it will be received by the King. During the second day of visit I’m looking into Camp Number 2 which is so new that they have not come into good order yet. About half of the prisoners here are Americans. I spoke with several of the American airmen who had come in this very day direct after they had been captured. They were scared about me but they said that they had tried to visualise that the prisoner of war camp was a little bit different than the one in which they had come now. Several of them had already dived into the established library to find a good book even so early or so quickly that they had not been able to open their own little kits and look into their own little drawers. During the last day I had dinner with Jimmy Deans, with all the men of confidence from all the three compounds, There was an exception made by the camp commandant because of my visit. The spirit was very happy and good and the cooks were very good and they understood very well how to make the best possible food from the Red Cross parcels. And among those present at this occasion I found two very interesting English prisoners of war. They were the first British prisoners to be taken prisoner in the Second World War. It was Sergeant George Booth and Sergeant Larry Slattery. They are quite proud about their status and they are in very good spirits and full of humour but they want to go home. After the camp visit I am having a cup of coffee with some German officers. One of them a Major [Taubert] who is an Austrian actually takes me back to my hotel where we are offered a glass of wine by the hostess. ‘Herr Soderberg,’ he asks me, ‘When will this war be over?’ ‘Well,’ I answered, ‘This may take a year. Perhaps two. There is much suffering ahead.’ ‘Well then,’ he said, never forget that I am not a German. I am an Austrian. The Austrians hate Hitler and I certainly hate this uniform.’ This was one of the most outspoken confessions I ever heard from a German officer.” Well, I think I will look at still at one or two camp visits from 1944. I was there [pause] “I was there on the 22nd and 23rd of May 1944. Then I came to the camp together with one of my colleagues. Sometimes when we were visiting prisoner of war camps in Germany we, we went together. Two delegates together. We could accomplish much more then. This time I came to the 23rd and 24th May 1944. I came with my friend, Swedish friend Eric Berg. B E R G. He worked in Bavaria mainly. He came with his movie camera and we were shooting a lot of pictures that day. The first evening the prisoners, they were all non-commissioned officers but very nice people that I knew now since a long time back. They had arranged a very wonderful YMCA festival. A show as a kind of sign of appreciation for the assistance that we had been giving them and also as a kind of jubilee because it was just one hundred years ago that the YMCA was founded. And we shall never forget this evening which was absolutely marvellous under the direction of Jimmy Deans and there were thousands of spectators. The programme aimed at showing what the YMCA meant for this big camp and how the various kinds of material was used that we sent into the camp. Everything was made or put on stage by professional people and everything was so beautifully done with colours and lights that I hardly can describe it. When it started there was very light music through the loudspeakers and then a very short suggestive speech about the foundation and the expansion of the YMCA. Then the male chorus was singing from the scores that we had sent to them and they were also giving us a kind of example of the kind of gramophone concerts that they are giving over the loudspeakers in the camp. Then came singing, dances, ballets, sketches. Everything with material and with costumes from the YMCA. The symphony orchestra which counted no less than seventeen violins was playing classical music. At least showed with the YMCA the YMCA had supported bodily exercise in the camp. The dance orchestra had a big band. Everything with comments over the loudspeakers. After my friend Eric Berg had been introduced to the big crowd then I could give a little speech to all these men with greetings from the outside world and I could also tell them a little bit how the YMCA delegates were living and working in Germany and how our colleagues were working in other parts of the world. Since not everybody of course in this big camp could get a seat in the theatre barrack then the whole thing was transmitted by loudspeakers out over the whole camp and there were hundreds of people standing outside the barracks listening. And I think this was one of those memorable memorable days. For this occasion they had also designed and painted and drawn a little booklet which they presented to me. It was a beautiful thing called, “For One Night Only,” with a dedication to myself and to the YMCA. Within brackets let me say that that little beautiful painted booklet together with many many of my memorabilia from the Second World War, things I collected in prisoner of war camps etcetera have been deposited with the United States Air Force Academy at Colorado Springs. They are having a big collection from many ex-prisoners of war and I was invited a couple of years ago to donate what I had there. There are lots of things dealing with Stalag Luft 6 also in that collection in the Kimble Library of the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. While this was for one night only I am still gone and look at another camp visit which took place in, this must have been in [pause – pages turning] on the 19th of October 1944. Well, let me see. This visit was not in Stalag Luft 6 because at that time the British prisoners of war who I earlier had met in Stalag Luft 6 up in Heydekrug had now been moved from Heydekrug to [Grostikov] which was not far from Bromberg in Northern, Northern Poland. That was because of the approaching Russian Front. They were now accommodated there in Stalag Luft 4 and it was overcrowded. Their old camp Heydekrug at this time I’m writing was under very heavy artillery fire from the Russians. I do not have any special notes there from [pause – pages turning] from the camp visit. Well, I think what I have quoted so far from my diaries shows a little bit what the position of Jimmy Deans was in the camp. He was so to say the central figure. Everything was hinging on Jimmy and when people had problems they were always brought to him and he had a word of comfort, he had a word of advice and you always felt comfortable in his presence. Then unfortunately because his camp had moved from my area, was taken over by one of my colleagues and in my area in the eastern part of Germany and western part of Poland there were so many new prisoners that I had to reduce somewhat my area of visitation. Therefore I had no more contact with Jimmy until the war was over. But I had, I have read about him and heard the stories about him leading his prisoners out to liberty at the end of the war by riding on a bicycle etcetera. This is true. If I remember correctly this has been described by [Calton Younger] in a book. I’m sure that the last weeks before liberation, very dramatic wherever you were in Germany had been told in details to those who are receiving this tape so I do not need to dwell on this. Then but I kept track of Jimmy and his men and I heard of them even during the last days of the war in Germany when I was down in Bavaria. There were rumours going around and then when the war was over then I worked in, I worked in Belgium for one year. I paid a visit to England. I paid several visits to England in 1945 and ’46 and then of course Jimmy was back home and I could visit with him and Molly in their modest little house in one of the London suburbs. He was just recuperating from his prisoner of war time. At that time as far as I could notice we, we couldn’t see any signs of the approaching illness which later on would successively break him down. I had a very nice time with him, with them in their house and I remember very well I received a little tablet for a table which we still have in our home and which we treasure very much. I also met him with the Swedish legation priest. Jimmy came up with a friend of his and we were having a meal or a coffee sitting there talking. Now talking about things which, which belonged to the past. After that the years passed by and of course we have been in constant contact with each other. There have been letters and cards every year and I followed with, with great sorrow the deteriorating state of health of Jimmy. Still every time I came to London on business, I was with aviation I made a point as far as I could do it of going out to see them in their home even when he finally was sitting in his, his wheelchair. On some occasions they came into London and we had a meal together. I also attended several of the Royal Air Force Ex-Prisoners of War reunions at the time when he was still was able to act as the chairman. I think he was sincerely loved by everybody and I think his, his faith, his moving, moving story should not be forgotten because he meant so much to the men in in prisoner of war camp. It’s very difficult for outsiders to understand the situation inside a crowded prisoner of war camp. What it, what meant to comfort and confidence to have a man like Jimmy in the head of, of the camp. As the head of the camp. Well, I think it was in the spring of 1969 Jimmy and Molly came to Sweden. Probably it was in connection with a flight they made on Scandinavian Airlines. I don’t remember where they went. If they went to North Africa or Bangkok but never mind. They came here and they spent I think a week or ten days in Sweden and in Stockholm they also visited the island of Gotland I remember. It was always very happy occasions. A very pleasant thing to meet with Molly and Jimmy. Well, I think with this I have not of course exhausted the subject of Jimmy Deans but I think that what I have told you and what I have recalled from my diaries, some of them also from my letters home to my people may give you a little bit of an idea how I as an outside visitor saw and looked at, at Jimmy. And I’m sure that my opinion and my observations on and about him will be probably identical from other sides and confirm as to correctness. He, he truly was a remarkable man. He was a good friend. He was, he was a person of that quality that you always felt a kind of pride to be together with him.
[recording paused]
I wish you good luck with your undertaking. The making of a movie of Jimmy Deans life. Well, this has been reported to you in a very casual and not formal way. I don’t know if you can use it but if you would like to have some parts of it spoken in a more formal way as a commentary to something you are going to show in your picture you you are always very welcome to come back again and we will see what we can do. Good luck to you.
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